walkah: Flickr patents "interestingness"
Flickr patents "interestingness"
I read this morning over on bopuc's blog that Flickr is patenting "interestingness". I realize this was probably yahoo's lawyers' idea... but I have to say it sucks. -1 Yahoo.
Why does it suck? Well, in general I don't believe in patents - I don't think they serve the intended purpose of "protecting" the idea and have several negative side effects. However, this particular patent hits a bit closer to home for me. I have been closely involved in the Terminus 1525 project since its inception. In it's latest revision, Terminus 1525 introduced "terminosity" as a method for better finding good artwork on the site that we felt was otherwise getting lost in the noise. It was one of the main features of the new explore tool.
Now, it's perhaps premature... it's not like Yahoo! has served terminus1525 with cease and desist orders or anything and, realistically, they're not likely to. But in a web2.0 world where we need to get better at filtering through all the "stuff" (call it media) that we've gotten good at getting out there, I don't see a whole lot of good coming from this one.
James Walker
other obvious pattent nuttiness
Hi James;
I've been blogging recently about another such wacky patent thang here:
http://www.ashleyit.com/blogs/brentashley/2006/11/02/patently-obvious/
http://www.ashleyit.com/blogs/brentashley/2006/11/05/a-patent-should-pas...
Thanks for the links, Brent
I know this isn't necessarily the dumbest patent ever filed - but it's definitely on the list, and for some reason was just really disappointing for me to read. I mean, Flickr is one of the good guys, no?
yeah but
no one ever said Yahoo was gonna act with all the earnest loveliness of the Flickr folks.
no they sure didn't
and i hope this isn't the first step in a long line of nasty fallouts we see from all the web two oh acquisitions. i'd be interested to hear who's idea it really was to file the patent... but at the end of the day it's stewart, caterina and cal's names on the patent. the naive little idealist in me would like to think one of them would stand up and say "no".
Thank you!
I stumbled across this article today, and I just had to take a second to say muchos muchos gracias to you for your involvement with Terminus1525. It's one of the most fantastic tools out there for emerging artists, and I feel really grateful that it's out there. Thanks!
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