Google Sued For Adding Options To Links

Google has been sued, just another company facing a lawsuit for doing something that is sorta common, obvious, and a perfectly normal function of everyday software. In this case, it’s adding options to a hyperlink by detecting the mouse hovering near the link and offering extra options. Besides that fact that this is similar to many other features in other projects, I can’t even remember any Google product that uses it!
The patent abstract:
An enhanced hyperlink and method for providing an enhanced hyperlinked are provided. This invention permits the user to interact with a hyperlink in a variety of ways without necessarily having to open and/or follow the hyperlink. This is accomplished by detecting the presence of a cursor near a hyperlink. When the cursor has remained near the hyperlink for a predetermined time period, a toolbar is displayed containing one or more link enhancements that the user […]

Original post by Nathan Weinberg