14 DAY TRIAL // Not a week seems to go by without some mention of Google's Glass project, so here is this week's episode, one that may or may not be followed by another one before Friday rolls around.
The subject matter is controversial, but the way it is conveyed is surprisingly gentle. Definitely not what we'd associate with the potential for a patent war.
That is because Masayoshi Son, the billionaire (and philanthropic) CEO of SoftBank, didn't give the impression that he was out for blood when he gave that two-hour speech to his shareholders about his technological predictions for the next 30 years.
It was more of an attempt at one-upmanship than anything else really, if we were to guess: Google is making the Glass augmented reality headset, so the man scored points by saying he owns the patent for such things.
Sure enough, a Japanese patent filing (Ekouhou patent filing) describes “translation glasses with captions.”
They can understand what a person is saying and provide translations, subtitles really, as a visual overlay.
It's not quite the same thing as the Glass, not as sophisticated and multi-purpose in any event, but the idea is close enough that trouble could spark if either side wanted some action.
After all, in one of the recent Google Glass promo videos, a man uses the spectacles (or rather monocle with double frames) to translate his own words.
Hopefully, there won't be though. We already have enough patents wars, what with Samsung and Apple going after each other over the rights to make tablets, and the entire Samsung-LG situation that caused a police investigation at one of the former's headquarters.
If nothing else, the existence of this patent will make it easier for companies to directly oppose Google without fear that they have to use its patent. Not like Google would be keen to license it.