A Microsoft patent filed in the US on October 14 looks set to curb the torrent of swearing every Xbox Live online player has to put up with (mainly from homophobic eight year old Americans).
Patent 7437290: “An input audio data stream comprising speech is processed by an automatic censoring filter in real-time, producing censored speech that has been altered so that undesired words or phrases are either unintelligible or inaudible.”
The patent continues: “In massive multiplayer games, it would be impractical to employ a human censor to monitor the multitude of voice chat sessions that might be occurring at one time.” And adds: “Other participants in the online game who are listening to the participants’ should not be exposed to such undesired language.”
No word on when the frugging thing will be available. But given the high level of abuse on Xbox Live, often with players unable to accurately identify – and therefore leave bad feedback for – the culprits, this shiznit can’t come soon enough. Monkey bladders to swearing – here’s to a whole new batch of inventive get-arounds.
(T-shirt from Zazzle.com)
