Weather-based ads. That’s a potential source of revenue, if you’re Google.

The Googs filed a new patent that would use tiny weather sensors on phones to trigger ads. If it the temperature drops below a certain amount, you might receive an ad from a clothing store to buy a coat, the patent suggests as an example. Privacy advocates are concerned with this possible technology – it’s not enough for Google to know everything about you, now it wants to know everything about the space around you too.

The BBC reports that Google has no immediate plans to turn this idea into anything concrete; however, it notes that these types of “‘blue sky patents’ were becoming increasingly popular with firms.” It’s the next step in the Great Patent Wars: think of anything, ANY thing, file a patent, then sue the pants off whoever has the ingenuity to make the darn thing.
Glowing, radar bike helmets! See-through shoes! A phone that is actually your bed! Oh, this is easy. See you in court!