Software Patent Court Decision

This ruling could put an end to a lot of software and process patents.

Techdirt: Court Greatly Limits Software And Business Method Patents

The summary is that the court has said that there’s a two-pronged test to determine whether a software of business method process patent is valid: (1) it is tied to a particular machine or apparatus, or (2) it transforms a particular article into a different state or thing. In other words, pure software or business method patents that are neither tied to a specific machine nor change something into a different state are not patentable. That means a significant number of software and business method patents are about to disappear, freeing up many industries to be much more innovative — at a time when that’s desperately needed.

New Google Chat to SMS interface could be useful.

Next thing you know, they will offer something in labs that will automatically shorten whatever you type to
less than 160 characters.

One nice feature that may evolve pretty quickly is the ability to set your GMail filters to forward your filtered messages as an SMS to a contact.  Currently, you must forward your mail to an email-style address managed by the cell provider.

SMS in Gmail Chat

Gmail is about to introduce a new feature that will let you send SMS messages to your contacts from the US, announces InformationWeek. Google explains how it works: