A physical characteristic is accessed that has been nonvolitionally obtained from a user, avoiding the inconvenience or unaccountability of voluntarily supplied information.
This is so ... wrong .. that it is hard to know where to start criticizing it. At first I thought it was an April Fool's joke a little too early, but then I clicked through to the patent itself. As a work of brilliant satire poking fun at the whole patenting process, it succeeds -- too bad it's for real! Anyway, here I go:
1) M$ will obtain your data nonvolitionally -- to wit, without your consent! Leaving aside the obvious Constitutional implications of this (5th Amendment violation, for those keeping score), it raises the interesting question: where is this data going to come from? (And: can the source be spoofed?)
2) More ominously, note the following claims:
[0024]It should be appreciated with the benefit of the present disclosure that the physical characteristics that can be conveyed include can include health information pertinent to performance such as blood pressure, heart rate, pulmonary flow rate, weight, body fat index, strength, blood glucose level. These physical characteristics can be chronic conditions such as allergies, disabilities, diseases, etc., that facilitate locating people of similar sensitivities, lifestyle and background.
[0025]In addition, the physical characteristics can include psychological and demographic information such as education level, geographic location, age, sex, intelligence quotient, socioeconomic class, occupation, marital/relationship status, religious belief, political affiliation, etc. Such information can be useful in enhancing social interaction as well as adjusting how an avatar performs in a competitive virtual environment.
Needless to say, such 'physical characteristics' provide a fertile ground for discrimination. For example, imagine the following:
You have been denied access to Fourth Reich because you are a Jewish scum. Your internet address has been logged; your home address has been located; a squad of Storm Troopers will be by shortly to teach you a lesson in respect.
3) No more anonymity. Under this system, Publius -- the collective identity of the Founding Fathers when they were attempting to convince their fellow citizens of the necessity of a new form of government -- would have been ferreted out and they would all have been tossed into British gaols to await their trials for treason.
And let's not forget M$s ultimate goal:
NON-WINDOWS SYSTEM DETECTED.
