[LINK] recent patent

[Ivan Trundle]

On 16/11/2009, at 12:00 PM, Tom Koltai wrote:

>> Jobs; Steven ;   et al.  October 22, 2009  
>> Assignee Name and Adress: APPLE INC. Cupertino CA
>> 
>> Advertisement in Operating System 
>> 
>> Abstract: Among other disclosures, an operating system 
>> presents one or 
>> more advertisements to a user and disables one or more 
>> functions while 
>> the advertisement is being presented. At the end of the 
>> advertisement, 
>> the operating system again enables the function(s). The 
>> advertisement can 
>> be visual or audible ..
>> 
> <http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?
> Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%
> 2Fsrchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=%2220090265214%
> 22.PGNR.&OS=DN/20090265214&RS=DN/20090265214>
> —
> 
> Obviously a free version of the operating system will be released -
> advertising sponsored.

It's not *that* obvious. 

Apple (like many other companies) lodge patent applications which might not have any bearing on existing or planned business models. The general view from most observers since the patent information was released a fortnight ago is that Apple don't have any intentions to do this, but they might licence the patent to others who might wish to do so.

iT