Interesting new patents

[rwolf]

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-...cs'&OS="3d+graphics"&RS="3d+graphics"

Any Idea what HP is doing here?

Omnidirectional shadow texture mapping

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-...1=6,876,362&OS=6,876,362&RS=6,876,362

 

[rwolf]

Perhaps we can find details about new upcoming hardware in some of the more recent patents.....

ATI Patents

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-...;l=50&d=PTXT&Query="ATI+Technologies"

Nvidia Patents

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-..."&Refine=Refine+Search&Query="Nvidia"

Nintendo Patents

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-...amp;Refine=Refine+Search&Query="Nintendo"

Micron Technology, Inc

Micron bought rendition and never did anything with it yet they are still pumping out 3D graphics patents....

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-...1=6,876,361&OS=6,876,361&RS=6,876,361

 

[Simon F]

HP Patent

Any Idea what HP is doing here?

Omnidirectional shadow texture mapping

What are they doing? IMHO the bleeding obvious - The opening paragraph says it is using a cube map for shadow mapping. :?

 

[AndrewM]

That shadow patent is sad. I think some people are gonna have problems with that.. developed by Mark tho.

Grah!

 

[trinibwoy]

That shadow patent is sad. I think some people are gonna have problems with that..

Why?

 

[DOGMA1138]

why does ati patented an "Automated survey kiosk" ?

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=2&u=/netahtml/search-adv.htm&r=93&f=G&l=50&d=PTXT&S1='ATI+Technologies'&OS="ATI+Technologies"&RS="ATI+Technologies"

 

[Reverend]

This is so very odd... just some minutes ago (before I participated in the NVNews forum about some Doom3 hack), I had thought of asking (in the GD forum here) about what needs to be done before I even consider filing (no, thinking about filing) a patent about the result of my R&D on some algorithm. And then I realized I live in Malysia and it's useless to ask here!

That said, and after reading the patent, this is the first time I have to treat the word "omnidirectional" as an abused word.

 

[Simon F]

That shadow patent is sad. I think some people are gonna have problems with that..

Why?

Shadow maps are well known in the art (Williams, 1978) as is the use of cube maps for environment mapping where you need to be able to sample in "all directions". (sorry, don't have a date for these).

One might consider that putting the two together would be obvious to one skilled in the art.

 

[trinibwoy]

Shadow maps are well known in the art (Williams, 1978) as is the use of cube maps for environment mapping where you need to be able to sample in "all directions". (sorry, don't have a date for these).

One might consider that putting the two together would be obvious to one skilled in the art.

Oh ok. Thanks.

 

[MfA]

One might consider that putting the two together would be obvious to one skilled in the art.

Carefull there Simon, one might consider a lot of things obvious

 

[Simon F]

But Marco, IIRC wording is "obvious to an average person skilled in the art" - doesn't apply to geniuses such as yourself.

 

[MfA]

I dont think it actually says average ... not that it matters, obviousness is untestable and as such irrelevant. If it hasnt been described or is in current use it should be patentable, pure and simple. That is the only way it can work.

Unless you want to tell me you think there should be fixed procedures to test obviousness using a jury system of your industry peers.

 

[hoom]

An originality test soulds like a bloody good idea to me.

A patent is supposed to only temporarily protect brand new non obvious ideas from the free market so as to encourage people to continue to come up with non obvious ideas.
Patents were not intended to allow the indefinite ability to shut down branches of research/product development with an obvious 'next step' patent that it has become :?

Only if its a real, provably original idea should anything be patentable.

 

[Jawed]

Get rid of patents all together. Patents are a socialistic idea that runs counter to the free-market ideal.

Jawed

 

[Geo]

Get rid of patents all together. Patents are a socialistic idea that runs counter to the free-market ideal.

Jawed

Part of my maturing process has been to recognize when to ask someone "What did you mean by that?" rather than just assuming they are stark-raving mad when their statements can't be mapped into my paradigm even with a sledge-hammer.

So, "what did you mean by that?" Particularly the "socialistic idea" part. In my world its a lot more socialistic to allow all and sundry to steal, reverse engineer, whatever, everyone elses work with no let, hindrance, or recompense. In other words, the only "socialistic" element to patents is that their protection *ends* after a certain time, not that they exist.

 

[Xmas]

Well, depth cube maps are mentioned in the ARB_depth_texture extension spec, which was written half a year before this patent was submitted. However, one could argue that it does not describe calculating the depth compare value from the 3d texture coordinates. With 2d depth maps you use the third coordinate as depth compare value directly.

 

[Jawed]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#Economic_view

"The United States and the United Kingdom are the only two nations who consistently receive net balance of payments benefits from "IP". These nations are the chief promulgators of "intellectual property" systems.

Jawed

 

[Geo]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intellectual_property#Economic_view

"The United States and the United Kingdom are the only two nations who consistently receive net balance of payments benefits from "IP". These nations are the chief promulgators of "intellectual property" systems.

Jawed

Well, let's go to PM rather than bore everyone else.

 

[akira888]

They're "socialistic" in the sense that the government apparatus is restricting private, consensual economic activity. While this is not the original meaning of "socialism" a la Proudhon (or perhaps not even the proper current definition) this has been the dominant meaning for quite some time in most of the world.

Similiarly, "liberal" in the Anglophone world (US, UK, CA, AU, etc) signifies something almost diametrically opposite to its referrent during Locke's or even Mill's time.

 

[MavXP]

except that its an important part of american capitalism - The drive for higher profits. The US taxpayer through the US govt invests in military research and development, US companies get paid squilions to develop tech, and then use that R&D to create spin offs for the consumers -like computers. The parts can then be made wherever is cheapest (good the free market is finally being involved), so long as the IP is owned by a US company. This way companies pay less in R&D (its subsidised by healthy tax payer grants), and reap the benefits even when they themselves cant make it cheaper (ie compete in the free market).
its not "fair" but hey, so long as profits are up no one cares whether it subscribes to the "free market ideal" they teach in economics school