After the abismal flub that was Sony's SmartWatch, the threshold for smartwatch success is preeeeety low. I mean, a construction-paper-and-crayon watch would be an improvement on that "gadget cold sore."
A patent filed by James Brooks Miller and Richard Carl Gossweiler III, on behalf of Google, back in October 2011 was approved today, a patent for—you guessed it!—a smartwatch.
A smart-watch can include a wristband, a base, and a flip up portion. The base can be coupled to the wristband and include a housing, a processor, a wireless transceiver, and a tactile user interface. The wireless transceiver can be configured to connect to a wireless network. The tactile user interface can be configured to provide interaction between a user and the smart-watch. The flip up portion can be displaceable between an open position exposing the base and a closed position concealing the base. Further, the flip up portion can include: a top display exposed when the flip up portion is in the closed position, and an inside display opposite the top display. The inside display can be concealed when the flip up portion is in the closed position and be exposed when the flip up portion is in the open position.
For the curious, the full-text of the patent can be found here.
Right now, the watch's conceivable powers extend only so far as: coffee. Just kidding. Certainly Google has all sorts of ideas for its possible application. The patent describes a sort of point-and-display feature that would pull up information about a given product. You know, kinda like all those shopping apps that do the basically same thing already. Only question is: do we want this? [USPTO via GizMag via MobileMag]