Google were recently granted a patent (US7912915) covering the iconic Google doodles which are created on special occasions and used in lieu of the Google logo on the Google home page.
The granted patent has only one independent claim, which reads as
A non-transitory computer-readable medium that stores instructions executable by one or more processors to perform a method for attracting users to a web page, comprising: instructions for creating a special event logo by modifying a standard company logo for a special event, where the instructions for creating the special event logo includes instructions for modifying the standard company logo with one or more animated images; instructions for associating a link or search results with the special event logo, the link identifying a document relating to the special event, the search results relating to the special event; instructions for uploading the special event logo to the web page; instructions for receiving a user selection of the special event logo; and instructions for providing the document relating to the special event or the search results relating to the special event based on the user selection.
The granted claims covers the process whereby a single memory storage device (which may be construed to be a hard disk, flash driver, DVD, CD-ROM and so on) contains instructions to create an animated commemorative logo based on specified rules, associating pages (which may contain search results) to the logo, uploading the logo and providing the document to a user, on the user clicking on the logo. The memory storage device may perform the above mentioned actions in conjunction with one or more computing devices.
The points to be noted above is that the claims as such is restricted to an animated logo and not a static logo. While Google has been using both static and animated logos on their home page, the use of animated logos have shot up in recent months (examples include the logos for Thomas Alva Edison’s birthday, Jules Verne’s birthday, PacMan’s anniversary). Further, the logo seems to be restricted to act as a link to search results related to the commemorative event, for which the logo has been created.
The inventor of the above mentioned patent is Sergey Brin, one of the founders of Google.
The various doodles created by Google can be viewed here.
The doodle displayed above was created for the 30th Anniversary of Pac-Man and is a playable version. Due to popular demand, a permanent link was created for the doodle, which can be played here.
Note: Brain League nor the author accept any responsibility for man hours spent on playing Pac-man as a result of reading this post.
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