Information Week reports:
A patent has been granted to a relatively unknown California Web-design firm for an invention its creator says covers the design and creation of most rich-media applications used over the Internet. The patent holder, Balthaser Online Inc., says it could license nearly any rich-media Internet application across a broad range of devices and networks.
In simple words, this page, and this page and this one and this one and this one – you get the drift – are in violation of the United States Patent Law(PDF).
Oh and by the way, no use yelling now. The patent’s already been issued – on Valentine’s day. Lovely, eh?
The Patent applicant (now owner) claims everything from creating users for media-rich applications to maintaining them on hosting services. Which essentially means that if you are using Flash, Flex, Java, AJAX and XAML on your site, you gotta pay these guys.
And they don’t even have their names on the first page of Google Search results, sheesh!!
If you are wondering why nobody ever knew about this coup d’état, I recommend you run a quick eye through the Patent. The references are so subtle it would take a keen-eye to spot them. But, the references are there. All references to rich media and the explanations thereof, point clearly to the various rich-media enablers described early on in this post.
The A-list bloggers might recall the name of Neil Balthaser. He was declared a DEMOgod in the 2001 DEMO conference for the Flash-based website builder Pro:Fx.
Flash-based? Erm, back in my days, this was called hypocrisy. But then, the world has changed now, After all this is the Web 2.0, right?
I, for one, am looking forward to this conversation in particular…
With my ear-drums well-protected, of course. 
Technorati Tags: Patent, violation, screw-up, peeves, hypocrisy, USPTO 7000180,
Posted by Shrikant Joshi 