You know we are well on our way to innovative technologies when the patent office issues a patent to Cisco for integrating voice, video and data as a single service. Does that sound familiar? Of course it does, but as I am sure Cisco would be quick to point out, that was not such a widespread notion when they originally filed for the patent back in 2000.
What are they going to do with this patent now? Somehow I don’t see them going after AT&T ot Time Warner for offering the same type of service. But if that is not their goal, what do they gain from it?
It is obvious that at some point the notion of using a common protocol to deliver all services may have been a novel idea. But it just seems that this would fall under the category of being too obvious to patent at this point. Blame it on Ciso or blame it on the Patent Office moving at a snail’s pace, but it seems pretty silly to offer a patent to a technology that has been used for a few years by numerous companies. If the government were not so inept at every change it attempts these days, I would suggest some patent reform.
