Apple patent hints at videoconferencing for iPhone

By Stephen Withers
Wednesday, 04 June 2008 12:43

Mobility

A new patent application from Apple could be interpreted as meaning the new expected 3G iPhone will have integrated videoconferencing features. Is this realistic?

Some people put a lot of effort into watching for Apple's patent applications in the hope they'll yield some clues about future product directions. But it's drawing a long bow to suggest that the recently published patent application 20080122796 has much to say about the iPhone Mk 2 expected to debut next week.

Filed last September, the application describes "Touch Screen Device, Method, and Graphical User Interface for Determining Commands by Applying Heuristics" - more simply, the gesture-based user interface found on the iPhone and iPod touch.

Just because a patent application outlines possible features, that doesn't mean the applicant has immediate plans for a product that embodies them. Part of the art of writing patents is to make them as broad as possible in order to increase their value.

That said, the idea of mounting an "optical sensor" (ie, a camera) on the front of a phone to allow videoconferencing is hardly new. What Apple is asserting is that the UI described could work with such an arrangement. The same goes for the inclusion of a GPS subsystem, MMS capability, or even blogging.

There are some interesting ideas incorporated in the patent. When I tried out an iPod touch, I was surprised by how accurately I could use the on-screen keyboard. Apple's patent includes a method for adjusting the "activation susceptibility" of different interface elements according to the context. So if the user has typed "Go", the susceptibility of "A", "D" and "O" is increased as they are the next letters in various common English words, while it is reduced for "K" as no common English word begins with "Gok". That certainly helps explain why I made fewer errors than I expected.

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