Techdirt: Philips Patents Pissing Off TV Viewers: Techdirt is out with a story about Philips latest patent a “system for inserting flags into television broadcasts that would prevent you from changing the channels during commercials or prevent you from fast forwarding if watched on a DVR.”
Wait a minute. Wasn’t the television industry just using their fuzzy math to tell us that they liked DVRs? Oh, wait, that was just for their *advertisers* to hear, ok. I get it now.
Well it would be an interesting feature, just imagine how the sales will skyrocket when Philips markets this exciting new feature on their new TVs. Plus it’s a pretty cool feature for a company whose tag line is “At Philips, everything we make is designed to improve your life.” This would be one hell of an improvement. Thanks guys for thinking of it.
Hey and while we’re at it, I’ve got another idea. Philips could patent one of those chairs that has the clamps that forces your eyelids open. You know the one, like from the movie A Clockwork Orange. They could then put a little LazyBoy swivel on the chair and when the commercials come on the thing could grab your eyelids and force them open.
It could be a huge hit!
in these sorts of situations, companies can sometimes choose to patents something as a form of defense. ie: they could choose to patent it and not license it – ensuring that that idea doesnt make it into the wild.
yeah, its a long shot, but we can all hope, right?