Nintendo Patents: In Game Chat, Sound Sampling, Low Power Mode, and More

[binary solo]

spemanig said:

binary solo said:

The only possibly unique thing is how Nintendo will implement them.

Which was 100% obvious to me, and which invalidates 50% of the stupidly sarcastic replies in this thread.

Some of the replies in this thread make my head itch. Like obviously Nintendo aren't patenting party chat. They're patenting their implentation of party chat. As in with the Gamepad and whatever weird gimmicks they throw in to make it unique. They aren't patenting copies of existing ideas, they are patenting their unique twists on existing ideas.

I am very skeptical that you can patent such things. You might be taking a unique approach to something that already exists but that doesn't make it patentable. In order for a new twist on an existing technology or function to be patentable you've got to be able to show that what you're doing is not a reasonably obvious extension of what's already out there. What I read in the OP does not appear to meet that criteria. But there might be more detail which does show how this is a really left field approach that no one would come up with except for the brilliant creative minds at Nintendo. I'm a very hard sell when it comes to new patents on things that already exist. I pretty much dismiss the validity of all Apple's touchscreen functionality patents because as soon as touch screen tech was invented (and patented, which was not by Apple) eveything they ended up patenting (like swipe to unlock and pinch to zoom) is a reasonably obvious extension of the tech.

The patent system is out of control, IMO, with patents of highly dubious merit being submitted and, it seems, getting through because patent offices don't have the resourcing to properly assess each patent application. I can understand if Nintendo is submitting patents defensively, which is to say if they have a patent registered then patent trolls will have a harder time trying to extort money out of Nintendo. That's probably a fair defensive tactic, but it is merely a symptom of a patent system that needs serious reform.