MS Seeks Patent For Repossessing School Computers

theodp writes "Microsoft has applied for a patent for 'securely providing advertising subsidized computer usage.' The application describes how face-recognition webcams and CAPTCHAs can be used in schools to ensure that computer users are paying attention to ads, and the recourse of 'disabling or even repossessing the computer' if they are not."

Left hand vs right hand?

[pluther]

Somebody at Microsoft didn't understand what somebody else was doing...

The whole reason for Microsoft giving free computers to schools in the first place was to get them used to the Windows OS, and hopefully prevent them from wanting to switch to Linux. It wasn't supposed to be just a short-term revenue stream.

If they actually use this, schools will start saying no thanks to their "free" computers - which will, in the long term, be a serious blow to Microsoft.

Excellent patent!

[swordgeek]

Fascinating stuff. This is pretty clearly evil and dangerous behaviour, at least from a cursory glance at the application. However, it

• is

actually fairly innovative and unique. Now to the best of my knowledge, patents aren't supposed to be concerned with the morality of the application, but the originality and non-obviousness of it.

Microsoft should be hung out to dry for this, but from a patent aspect, it's valid.

I thought of this

[David_Shultz]

I thought of this very system over three years ago, although it wasn't for the nefarious purpose of forcing school children to watch targetted ads. The idea actually was to set up a system whereby internet users could sit down, and watch ads for a few minutes to earn some money (sell your time). Obviously I take let's say 2% of what they get. I needed a way to check if the user was actually watching the ads, and the system sounds remarkably what MS guys were able to come up with. I didn't have the time to set up the site.

This situation to me highlights some of the annoying aspects of patents. First, if I had billions of dollars of cash lying around, I would have this patent (would've applied without a second thought). How then, is this system helping individual innovators rather than big corporations? Second, isn't it clear that the patent system isn't promoting R and D in this particular case?

On the plus side, I do believe a site has recently popped up that does what I wanted to do, and they probably have implemented a comparable system. Therefore, MS might lose this patent on the grounds of prior art, which is a plus.

Also, I wonder whether MS intends to charge for the webcams being provided, since they are required for the face tracking, but the schools might not (and probably don't) want them.

Re:Why advertise to someone

[Glowing Fish]

I also have gotten tired of "inner city" being used as a codeword for "poverty" and "black/minority".

At least in Portland, poverty seems to be associated with some of the suburbs. Some of the most expensive homes are in the center of the city.

Re:Think of the children?

[HiThere]

Check the linked patent then. It specifically mentions schools as a target (though, admittedly, it doesn't highlight them).

FWIW, *DON'T* read the patent if you're a programmer. Reading patents on software can lay you open to increased fines. I just did a find on schools, and it specifically mentions schools as a target for the patent. I can't claim to know what the patent covers, since I intentionally didn't read it.

The users will react...

[Anonymous Coward]

From the article:

When the allowable number of incorrect answers has been exceeded, several response [sic] are possible, from noting a user's record but taking no action, to a follow up communication with the user, to disabling or even repossessing the computer 110.

The action done by the algorithm may include disabling or repossessing the computer, but I sure hope no advertiser will specify that this action be taken should the user not answer the verification correctly. In a school context, a whole group of students could deliberately look away from an ad destined to them and render the computers unusable for the next class. As if teachers didn't have enough to worry about already.

Let's say some Foolish Advertiser specifies this action for all of their ads, though, and compare that with some real-life situations.

• You wake up. You drink some coffee, watching the morning news, and ads pop up every 10 minutes. In this situation, you may not be awake enough to view the full ads consciously, and you don't even need to listen to them -- there's a Mute button on your remote. Some of the ad's images and sound may attract your attention and stick in your head.
  
• You go to work. You drive on the highway, with some billboards around you. In this situation, your eyes may stay on the road, or jump to the billboards as their colors attract your attention.
  
• At work, you sometimes get bored. (Yes, it does happen :) You browse some websites, containing small Flash games. The ads are on the top of the website, so you quickly scroll down to hide them. Though, if an ad attracted your attention, you might click on it.

Note how every one of these has "attract your attention" somewhere in it. That is the goal of advertising: presenting you with an image of a product, unintrusively, hoping that your attention will be drawn to it and that you will buy the product.

If your computer disables other output to present you an ad from the Foolish Advertiser when you were working on something else, you will not want to look at it. It has stopped your current flow of work; it is intrusive. You might have been typing in a word processor and your keyboard input was redirected to the ad's verification field; you might have been playing Quake and your character got fragged while the video output was grabbed by the ad; and so on. In these cases, you'll be annoyed and just want to get the verification over with as quickly as possible, while leaving your computer usable.

I even foresee this algorithm included in a future version of a certain browser (hint: look at the Assignee Name filed in the patent), used by web pages and exploitable by spyware/adware for even better targeted advertisements.

Net result: for the users, a needless compulsory intrusion into their work, which is not possible with a TV (does it tell you to press a specific button on your remote to confirm you saw the ad?) or with billboards (does it grab your head and force your eyes open to view the ad?); and for the marketers, more and more annoyed customers spreading the word about this advertising strategy, thus less sales. Oh, and did I mention more and more annoyed customers?

Re:As long as it's crackable...

[dreez]

Actually you really have a real and good point here. As long as the specs are open, anyone with some knowledge is able to generate a driver/decoder/whatever of the same quality that a certain big company is. .
However, if the specs are not open, the driver/decoder/whatever will never be as good because you just don't know all the details, it will allways lag behind the big company's driver, every little change in the big company's driver will need to be reverse engineered again to see what it all was about. . .

And as DRM and driver signing and secured data streams between devices are becoming more and more complex, the reverse engineering will take longer and longer and at a certain moment it is just no longer paying off anymore. . . that will be a black day !!



!! I fight to keep the hobby-port on the PC motherboard, safe the parallel port !!

Bad

[Monoliath]

I think this is a very bad idea.

1. You're dealing with forcing individuals in their formative years, to look at advertisements which have been pyshologically designed to influence spending / desire.

2. I'm sure the least amount of effort will be put into controlling the content and reviewing the moral implications of such a system if the patent is granted.

3. Microsoft is displaying it's bottom line here, which obviously is not about helping out schools who need the help and promoting education, but the fact that money is far more important than education will ever be. The meaning behind charity is to give with out the intention of return...remember that concept?

The fact that they would consider taking the computers back if students don't look at the ads is downright grotesque to me.

The institution of the corporation is getting away with far too much at this point. I hope this idea is squashed before it even begins, and if it is granted...that no schools are even lacking enough in moral fiber to accept such a ridiculous deal from such a greedy company as Microsoft. I wish them nothing but the worst of luck and bankruptcy in this endevour.

Re:Illegal?

[darkob]

Rubbish. Once pricetag is placed on a donation it's not donation any more. In fact, this can easily be seen as a way to steal taxes from the IRS since donations are tax deductable, while items sold for money are generating taxable income. And the fact that Microsoft makes it compulsory for a recepient of the donation to "watch adds" makes it perfectly clear how much this whole deal is worts. "No watching = no computers", so adds = computers. Again, this is patently wrong for many reasons, and in my first writing I pointed out just the first reason. The deal would be legal if Microsoft would reveal in advance "how many adds?", "for how long?", "total time that a person would commit by watching adds", etc. For Microsoft "watching adds" is clearly a business. They should simply reveal what EXACTLY do they expect from the person or persons, and not something that's more like "voluntary slavery". Regards!

Re:Schools with no money.

[fourchannel]

Not directed at you, but I fucking care.

If we treat education like some service, optional, profitable, exploitable, then we will eventually get degredation over time, and the quality of education will drop. With that, the investment in the school will drop, and what do you know, education fucking drops some more.

Education is the only thing (technology is derived from the knowledge education provides), that separates our society from those of the primative past. If we treat education as anything but the highest concern, then we have failed our ancestors to learn from the past and prevent the problems of the past from manifesting now.

So, yes I fucking care.

BTW, I was ranting, but I'm not mad at the parent or anyone in particular.

Illegal in europe

[DrYak]

This exact practice - i.e.: forcing ads on students - is illegal inpublic education in several european countries.
In France, public schools aren't allowed to give material "sponsorized by [whatever]" to students.
It hasn't been enforced very well up until now, but MS-Computers that force kids to watch adds is sure to stir up enough noise in the media to attract attention.

One more of those Microsoft's stupid moves that encourage people to pursue the migration to OSS that is already very active in EU.

(insert revelent StarWars quote here...)

Re:um, no?

[Digital Vomit]

Microsoft is supposed to be making money any way possible, like any good organization.

Assuming you meant "corporation" and not "organization", I have to disagree with your assertion. The primary responsibility of any corporation is serving the society which granted it its existence via its corporate charter. Making money is secondary to that. The problem in our society today is that most people forget the first part because the enforcers of the law are either spineless or bribed into never revoking corporate charters when a corporation's actions demand it.

A good corporation would be giving its products to educational and non-profit organizations for free, as thanks to the public for allowing the corporation to exist. What Microsoft is doing -- trying to trap schools and students into reliance on their products and forcing them to watch ads -- is exactly the kinds of thing that should lead to the termination of its corporate charter in a just society. Would that we actually lived in a society that resembled one...