Microsoft Mood Ring? Seeks Patent on Mood Activated Device

The computing world has been dominated by a handful of corporations over the past few decades, one of the most recognizable being the Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, WA. This company is a major developer of personal computers, computer electronics and computer software used all over the world. In the past few weeks, Microsoft made a major move into computing software for iOS devices by releasing a Microsoft Office app for the iPad. In another move towards creating software for device manufacturers, Microsoft also recently launched its Enterprise Mobility Suite, allowing an organization to administrate network resources among employee devices, whether they’re running on Android, Windows or iOS software. Interestingly, Microsoft may be making a move into the world of wearable technology with its purchase of $150 million worth of related intellectual property from the Osterhout Design Group, a designer of wearable computing technologies for military and governmental organizations.

Here at IPWatchdog’s Companies We Follow series, we’re stopping back into the offices of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to uncover the most recent inventions coming out of the facilities of the Microsoft Corporation. Our readers will be interested to find out about the various software technologies being created for both business and personal activities, as well as a few novel pieces of computer hardware.

We start today with a long look at the featured patent application, which describes a hardware device capable of determining a person’s mood from various sensors and inputs. In what you might consider a modern day evolution of the mood-ring, this device is capable of representing a person’s mood and stress levels. The system works by using biometric data signals indicative of mood from a variety of sources, including a heart rate monitor, galvanic skin monitor, camera or microphone.

Better systems for displaying application icon text and application window inputs, as well as a method for accessing advanced keyboard functions on a simple keyboard, are also described in other patent applications we profile to assignee Microsoft. Additionally, Microsoft’s recently issued patents from the USPTO increase the corporation’s intellectual property holdings for document collaboration systems, as we feature with a pair of issued patents in this field. Another patent protects a method for creating a bidding system that creates a more accurate pricing system for advertising keywords. Finally, Microsoft also patented a system capable of identifying the location of individuals and suggesting real-world activities and social situations nearby.

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Mood-Actuated Device
U.S. Patent Application No. 20140085181

Analysis of biometric data has been a major area of new research among appliance and electronics manufacturers in recent years. We’ve covered inventions involving body and facial analysis for building personal profiles, such as the microwave system invented by Whirlpool that can identify a person interacting with the appliance for personalized settings. Readers of our Companies We Follow series will have seen plenty of technologies providing unique interfaces between humans and machines for determining personal data.

Stress is something that everyone experiences throughout their daily life, and biometric systems for determining mood and stress levels have been created in the past. However, there are few applications that exist for using this information for reducing stress and the associated negative impacts, like chronic health conditions and poor work performance. Some applications allow users to input stress information manually, but this may overlook shortcomings in a person’s ability to accurately identify stress levels.

Microsoft filed this patent application with the USPTO in December 2012 to protect a device that uses a microcontroller capable of processing biometric data about a person’s stress levels. The patent application claims priority to a provisional patent application filed in September 2012, which is incorporated by reference.

The device described in this patent application includes a flexible material that morphs its shape to create a representation of the received biometric information. Stress information can also be output to a display that lets a person view stress and mood information and add their own personal input. This system could receive biometric data signals indicative of mood from a variety of sources, including a heart rate monitor, galvanic skin monitor, camera or microphone. For instance, a camera and image processing system could determine a change in mood based on an eyebrow shift or another facial expression. Along with changing shapes, the device can indicate a person’s mood through sounds or light display.

Claim 1 of this Microsoft patent application would give the company the right to protect:

“A mood-actuated device, comprising: a microcontroller configured to receive signals corresponding to an emotional state of a user; and a flexible material configured to be controlled by the microcontroller to change to a shape based on the emotional state of the user.”

 

Other Patent Applications 

From U.S. Patent Application No. 20140078063, titled “Gesture-Initiated Keyboard Functions.”

Like many other electronics manufacturers, Microsoft is busy trying to establish itself as a major innovator in the field of handheld mobile devices. A couple of patent applications filed by this company with the USPTO detail interesting improvements to smartphone shortcomings. For example, U.S. Patent Application No. 20140089853, entitled Dynamic Display of Icons on a Small Screen, describes a technology that enables more intuitive icon display on mobile device screens. This patent is designed so that user created icons can display labeling text that can be easily read by using only a substantial portion of the title and not the entire title, which could require the text be shrunk to the point where it’s difficult to read. U.S. Patent Application No. 20140078063, which is titled Gesture-Initiated Keyboard Functions, discusses a method for enabling advanced keyboard functions on a small keyboard. This technology allows users to enter inputs on a touchscreen to access functions that aren’t represented by a key on the keyboard; often, keys must be removed to fit a QWERTY keyboard, or another style, to a display.

Video games and virtual environments are also on the radar for Microsoft’s research and development goals, as evidenced by another couple of patent applications that piqued our interest. U.S. Patent Application No. 20140087875, filed under the title Responsive Cut Scenes in Video Games, discusses an innovation that may be great news for owners of Microsoft Xbox video game consoles. This patent application would protect a method for creating cinematic cut scenes for video games during which a player could still operate their avatar to interact with other characters and aspects of the game environment. U.S. Patent Application No. 20140089856, titled Customization of an Immersive Environment, describes a novel system for fitting multiple applications into a single window. When multiple applications are open in windows on a computing device, the windows are automatically resized in this system so that all important user inputs for each app are still displayed.

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Issued Patents of Note

As we’ve featured in our coverage of the upcoming U.S. Supreme Court case Alice Corporation v. CLS Bank International, we may be fast approaching some turbulent times in the world of software innovation. The potential that all software patents could be deemed invalid under the minimal threshold established by Section 101 of U.S. Code Title 35 could be devastating to companies like Microsoft, Google, Apple and others that have spent so much time patenting software technologies. This company is still assigned a healthy stream of patents being issued every week from the USPTO, to judge by our most recent patent search here at IPWatchdog.

A number of software patents recently issued to Microsoft Corporation protect some intriguing systems for project collaboration and advertising campaigns, technologies that could likely be scaled appropriately for small groups and large enterprises alike. U.S. Patent No. 8682989, entitled Making Document Changes by Replying to Electronic Messages, protects a method of collaborative document editing that enables all parties to easily see who has contributed to which document edit. Users receive an electronic message containing edits and have the opportunity to accept or reject them directly from the message.

From U.S. Patent No. 8,682,302, titled “Place-Specific Buddy List Services.”

U.S. Patent No. 8682973, issued under the title Multi-User and Multi-Device Collaboration, enables easier collaboration of documents, images, presentations and more among users of various electronic devices, including computers, smartphones and tablet devices. Online advertising campaigns may find a lot of use out of the software technology protected by U.S. Patent No. 8682839, titled Predicting Keyword Monetization. This system creates a bidding landscape for advertising keywords based on global keyword data, including the relationship between the keyword and the advertiser.

A couple of other issued patents that we noticed today protect some interesting technologies that can help users of Microsoft software programs find digital services or social activities which may be pertinent. For example, U.S. Patent No. 8682302, which is titled Place-Specific Buddy List Services, protects an information system capable of tracking the location of many individuals. This service could suggest activities to people based on their proximity and enable methods for notifying contacts with established relationships about the possibility for social interactions. U.S. Patent No. 8683374, entitled Displaying a User’s Default Activities in a New Tab Page, protects a method of using a new tab in a web browser window to suggest digital services. In this system, users can open a new tab, select an activity topic like blogging and be presented with links to online services for that topic.

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