Google Inc. has filed an application to patent a single-click mobile phone technology that has been in use for quite some time.
Google senior research scientist Shumeet Baluja is given credit for being the inventor of the patent. The technology allows a mobile phone user to single click on a Web page advertisement and subsequently be connected via a voice call to the advertiser.
Services are already available that allow mobile phone users single-click links to make a phone call. Some current mobile phone service providers allow users to search an online database for a business, and then click on a link created as part of a results page that then automatically calls the business. But Google's application is for a very specific use of the concept, narrowing the click-to-call parameters by clicking directly on an advertisement.
Though Google is seeking the patent, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is extremely strict regarding issuing patents within the category that the concept falls. Roughly one in ten such applications are granted in the category.
The patent for the single-click technology was filed in June of 2004 and published by the patent office on January 5th. Analysts equated the patent issue with the recent Amazon.com suit against Barnes and Noble also entailing a unique single-click application.
