RicRicho

Just a little update on the progress of my latest invention zkimmer. It is a concept built on map tiling but using publication graphics rather than map graphics… its working great.

Since I did the patent 4 months ago we know have some real support from an industry veteran and talking to big names in the newspaper and magazine publishing businesses.

As things develop we’ll keep you informed.

Update: 4/4/08 - Visitors please note… a new zkimmer site is up please have a look at http://db.zkimmer.com

Status: Dropped after much testing and brainstorming
Basic concept: Hotsync to online web server direct to act as an intelligent online conduit to favorite web apps.

One of the big frustrations of dealing with the Treo is being anchored to a desktop for syncing. I cant remotely sync unless its some kind of web based app service which ties me down to Cingulars ridiculously slow G2 service and everything being online… What I want is the responsiveness of Palm apps on my Treo and the accessibility, copy and paste and desktop convenience of online web apps…. If I could somehow link my Palm apps via bluetooth, wifi, USB, 3G to a network device (as if it was my laptop on a private or public network) but in fact have a server that emulates the hotsync request and then acts as a virtual conduit to may favorite services such as:

• Palm Calendar to Google Calendars.
• Palm To do to Google Base
• Palm Memo to Google Base
• Or to the similar Yahoo alternates…..

Denied :-(… if the idea was viable then I’d have a web based emulation of the Palm Desktop application written get it working properly… but. The roadblock seems to be Palm’s neck hold on using the desktop sync app as the sole means of allowing the Palm device to talk to third party data apps… what a pity… if someone out there has worked out how to emulate the Hotsync API.. especially the network hotsync API I think a lot of people would find new life in their palms… another nail in the coffin.

I don’t know about you but one of the big frustrations about technology is that nothing equals the organic feel of a pen and paper. Even then US letter size paper is sooooooo restrictive and investing the time to somehow get it into a digital form for archiving, retrieval, reference and sharing just perpetuates the great divide between the organic and creative inspiring analog and the powerful, shareable, flexible and retrievable nature of digital idea capturing.

Enter the idea of a Muse Station™.

Simply it’s the use of:

I use the station for capturing and refining ideas and concepts and fleshing them out. The large white space is inspiring and allows continual refinement and development of ideas.

Here is a picture of a concept outline I started on:

And another pic with a link to the sketch clipboard at Pearl art and craft.

The next stage of the project is getting this analog concept capturing into digital form which is the next phase of the project… Ill link the next episode to this article for those interested.

Partial List:

• 2007
Polaroid based heads up display for consumer use.
Wireless telephone answering system for centralized message management.
Blind-spot mirror design for safe driving.
Audit Server – a new approach to software license management.
Software Throttling – a user friendly way of managing software copy counting.
System for adjustable flex in surfboard design (patent writer and invention advisor)
• 2006
Universal Database - Ever wanted to capture responses from visitors to your site without setting up a database or a mailto form? R2Labs Universal Database is a simple multi-use database that captures data from forms on your web page and forwards the results to you privately using email… a simple but much needed facility for the web.
• 2005
Password Packing - With key loggers and Trojans waiting to snatch your banking password something is needed to make their life a bit harder. Password Packing is a technique that adds nonsense characters to your password making it harder for a hacker to know what your password is yet no harder for you to remember.
Site Triage - A simplified password system for people who want privacy but do not want their visitors to sign up for anything
Cyclical Unlock codes - Unlocking codes for software that evades brute force number crunching attacks.
• 2004
Terremail - Send from email to post box.
• 2003
Personal Server - Automates collection of important information on your home computer and gets it to you over the web or on your cell or pda.

Digital Furnace - One computer for the whole household, a new multi-user approach to household computing.
Wireless Repeater - Uses light sockets to power wireless internet connections around the home and around the world.
Push payment system - Provides web buyers with a way to pay people over the web without using sellers shopping cart. Privacy
MicroPMT - Want to pay 2 cents to see an important page on the web…
Pop Central - An experiment using push technology to flash information to the user without interrupting their workflow.
Cell Redirector - Centralize your phone calls at home or on the move with automatic call cost optimization between your cell and home phone line accounts.
Cell2Cell2World - Use two cell phones to make all your calls from a landline while on the move.
• 2000
Logarex - A new way of compressing data using Logarithms.
Installer image wrapper patent.
• 1992
The Uniloc patent – locking a license to a specific device using hardware fingerprinting

Partial List:
US 5,490,216 A System for Software Registration
A registration system allows digital data of software to run in a use mode on a platform if and only if an appropriate licensing procedure has been followed.

US 60/713,926 Method for detection of tampering attack attempts against systems that use computing environments for identification purposes
The invention will provide a method of detecting when attempts have been made to circumvent or interfere with security or copy control systems that use the non-user-configurable information from a computing device for the purposes of identification and authentication.

US 60/713,928 Method for using imperfections and irregularities in optical media and optical fiber for identification purposes
The invention will allow the use of imperfections and irregularities present in optical media and optical fiber as a means of uniquely identifying the media or optical fiber, thereby allowing the component itself to become an integral part of an authentication security system that can protect the data being stored or communicated by the component. The invention will reduce the costs of adding security capabilities to optical media and optical fiber. The invention will simplify and increase the speed of the manufacturing process when secure optical media or optical fiber is desired.

US 60/716,400 System of dependent keys across multiple pieces of related scrambled information
The invention is designed to complicate and therefore make more secure a series of cryptographic keys across a number of separate but related pieces of information that are to be scrambled. The invention adds to the computational power required to attack and break the scrambling algorithm therefore making the protected information more secure. The invention is relatively easy to implement and therefore adds to the speed and effectiveness of the scrambling process while simplifying the steps involved to protect the information to be protected. The invention gives the publisher or originator of the information a high level of control over the protected information and therefore is ideal for information distribution applications.

US 60/716,421Method for using performance and stress tests on computing and digital storage devices for the purposes of device authentication
The invention is designed to use the results from performance and stress tests of computing and digital storage devices to develop a unique profile for the device that can be used for authentication in security, copy control and access control applications. The invention allows the device itself to be used as part of the authentication process and thereby reduces or eliminates the cost and time involved with adding and securing a separate identity token to the device to be secured or authenticated. The invention further capitalizes on the natural occurrence of many and varied irregularities that appear in the manufacturing process and during the product’s subsequent usage and to use these irregularities in identifying specific computing and digital storage devices. This in turn represents an ideal opportunity for developing unique identities that are hard to reproduce by attackers of authentication and security systems.

US 60/716,420Method for using imperfections and irregularities in computing and digital storage devices for the purposes of device authentication
The invention is designed to use the results from damage detection tests that may be currently used by computing and storage device manufacturers to develop a unique profile for the device that can be used for authentication in security, copy control and access control applications. The invention allows the device itself to be used as part of the authentication process and thereby reduces or eliminates the cost and time involved with adding and securing a separate identity token to the device to be secured or authenticated.
The invention further capitalizes on the natural occurrence of many and varied imperfections and irregularities in the manufacturing process and subsequent day to day use of computing and digital storage devices. This in turn represents an ideal opportunity for developing unique identities that are hard to reproduce by attackers of authentication and security systems.

Back in 1995 an opportunity came up to do a world first… combine a popular computer game AND digital music onto one CD. The game was an unlockable Uniloc-enabled copy of shoot-em-up DOOM and the music of the popular pop group Kulcha.

The idea was that the CD was purchased for the music and every buyer would get the opportunity to install and try the game DOOM as an added bonus. The game would only work for the first few levels of the game but would have to be purchased by getting an unlock code over the phone to play the game fully. It really worked well because the same kids that got into Kulcha aslo were only starting to get into computer games.

The album was set to be released by Warner Music but there was one big problem. When a CD player started playing it would try to play the game data which sounded like million gnats flying out your speakers and did real speaker damage.

A simple invention that I unfortunately never patented was the idea of hiding the game data from the CD players index, thereby tricking the player to see the fist track as the fisrt music track rather than the data. It worked. And the Kulcha CD was a success.

The CD was used as a lead component in a presentation to visiting Time Warner Chairman Gerald Levin, and resulted in an invitation to Ric to come visit the fortune 100 company later that year.

From the Uniloc website:
Device locking was invented by Uniloc’s founder, Ric Richardson, in 1992. Uniloc was subsequently granted the seminal device locking patent in 1996: US 5,490,216; System for Software Registration.

Today, Uniloc has over 10 related patents pending which leverage the power of device locking into several new markets and applications.

This is my first and most well known patent written back in 1992 in Australia and granted in the US in 1996. The patent covers the concept of locking a specific software licesne to a specific machine. This approach has been used by most of the world’s top software publishers and is even beginning to be used to secure financial and banking web transactions.

Ric has been working on businesses that exploit the patent ever since he invented the concept in 1992.

One of the best (if not the best) minds I have ever met is Peter Rentzepis. A kind, thoughtful yet brilliant man who I have been priviledged to work with over the last year. We have been working together on the writing of the patent for an invention of his that can be used to protect DVDs and other optical media from being stolen while on the shop shelf in stores.

Simply, the process is that the DVDs are coated with a dye that will make the DVD unreadable until it is “baked” by a special light at the cash register of the retailer checkout. We are working on this for a super large, as yet un-named retailer and it is looking like it will be ready for market very soon.

Teaming with “Dr Ren” (as I call him), we have been able to take what is a very technical concept, boil it down to concise yet global terms and then hand it off to a patent attorney in less than a week. He has commented a number of times that it is so much more rewarding to go thru the patent process when it is fast, succinct and well thought out.

I very much enjoy working with this obvious world leader in the field.

The opening sequence of the movie Mission Impossible II captured the imagination of futurists everywhere. The central character, Ethan Hunt, recieves his instructions by putting on a cool looking pair of sunglasses. The text and graphics are transaparently overlayed over the top of the lenses. That scene has inspired me ever since.

A breakthrough came when working with professor Peter Rentzepis of UCI (University of California in Irvine). Our discussions on light and lasers encouraged me to investigate how polaroid lenses work. Using the polaroid priciple as a base our experiments are encouraging and may soon result in a demonstrable prototype that uses the unique filtering/ trapping of light seen in the polaroid lense as a means of capturing a small LCD projector and displaying it transaparently over the usual image seen while using glasses.

Updates will be added ot this post as we progress.

One day I was trawling the web looking desperately to find a way to get email to my parents street mail box and realized that all the systems out there were fiddly, problematic and expensive. What is needed is a simple method that takes a standard email and gets itself printed and mailed in the reciepients country at the lowest possible mail rate.

The trick is making the addressing easy. And then a simple system of checking the mailing address via return email before finally sending it to the physical mail address.

Well we got it working AND patented it.

All you do is place the physical address in the top 5 lines of the email and leave a blank line. The server simply collects the address, sends an email to you to verify the address and then sends it off. With Terremail you can buy $5 of postage at a time using paypal and there are plans to have it print color and deliver registered and on card stock…. cool!

If you would like to be part of the beta email me at ric.r at r2labs.com.