Filed under: Internet, Web services
Local.com gets a patent for local search
Ever wonder who owns the patent for local search? Of course not, because being able to search for local restaurants, transportation, or classified listings online is kind of too obvious to be patented, right?Apparently not. Local.com has picked up a patent for local search. Patent 7,231,405 refers to a process for "indexing and retrieving web-related information by geographical location."
Does this mean that Google, Yahoo!, Craigslist, and pretty much any other service that provides the ability to filter search results geographically will have to license technology from Local.com? Nope. The patent refers to one method of conducting location-based search.
Still, it sounds about as patentable as saying Download Squad would like exclusive rights to a certain method for using email tips, RSS feeds, and common knowledge to write blog entires about news and information about software and web services.
[via Search Engine Land]
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So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do.
Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game.
The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...
