Oh patents. While they can be a good thing, they can also be a bad thing. We’ve seen this time and time again particularly with Apple and their very generic patents that have been featured in other products well before their “inventing” them.
A company by the name of Accredited Transcription Corp acquired 100% ownership of United States Patent 6,298,326 which is for an off-site transcription system. After acquiring this patent, ATC for short says that they’ll be going after Apple, Google, Samsung, and many others who are utilizing what the patent entails. Google has had voice recognition in Android for a couple years now, but ATC is particularly going after the technology in Android 4.1 Jelly Bean.
Basically, the patent involves someone speaking into a device, the voice being transmitted to a data processing facility, and being translated into text and sent back to the device, something that many voice recognition technologies, not just Google, use.
This whole situation is an example of how patents can hurt both companies and consumers. Millions of people enjoy the benefit of voice recognition and this could cause some issues. Either way, ATC is planning on moving forward and getting some money from various tech companies. Patent troll is an understatement here. Maybe money hungry douchebags?