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Apple Patents Reveal Plans for Mobile Social Networking App
In: web resources
19 Mar 2010
The smart folks at Patently Apple have uncovered some documents published to the USPTO today detailing a social application Apple is building for the iPhone.
The application, known as iGroups, is designed to let people meet up and exchange information in a way that is focused on ensuring privacy.
The USPTO documents are pretty detailed in terms of how the application — and the related patents — work. The big takeaway seems to be that group controls are granular and that location uses something called “virtual GPS” — which appears to be using either Bluetooth or Wi-Fi as proximity tools.
A side note — there is an existing iPhone app called iGroups, which means that if this app does come to the marketplace, Apple might have to work with the developer to resolve the name issue.
What do you think of Apple’s push into social networking? Let us know!
[img credit: Patently Apple]
Reviews: Bluetooth
Tags: apple, geolocation, igroups, patents, social media
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3 Responses to Apple Patents Reveal Plans for Mobile Social Networking App
Tony
May 19th, 2010 at 3:42 am
usually, if a website has high hits, it can attract more companies to display their ads on that site in exchange of some amount of money. but i doubt that you'll get a lot if you'll only depend on advertisements for revenue since your social networking site is dedicated to a specific group of people only. but it's sad to see a good cause go to waste. you can ask for donations from your site too, that might also help you raise funds to keep your site up.
cato___
May 23rd, 2010 at 6:33 am
The patent process takes a long time and can cost as much as a new car or more.
You can file an application yourself. But if your are asking this question, you probably don't know enough about the process to do it yourself successfully. You need the assistance of a patent attorney or agent.
If you are contemplating a U.S. Patent, then you can find a roster of attorneys and agents at http://www.uspto.gov (use the cite index to find it). You can search the roster by the first 3 digits of your zip code to find someone near you.
gosain
May 28th, 2010 at 3:10 am
you have to get a new license.