The kind of reviews mentioned in this patent aren’t associated with particular sites, but appear that they would be made directly to Google. Would that make a difference in how you feel about them?

The reason is that Google only takes into account reviews from specific sites, all of which are pay sites. These sites determine a product ranking on Google product search. The biggest one taken into account, why Google Checkout of course. So this will be just another kind of hook (or more likely attempt) to have Google integrate into social networking, but will never affect your rankings for products. It sounds lame.

Yes, I think there are. I remember one of the first novels that I read growing up was about a dystopia. We really do need to take books like 1984 seriously as warnings of where we could be headed if we aren’t careful.

Good to see you. This patent filing does allow for people uploading audio, images, and video with reviews, but doesn’t go so far as to say that they might capture peoples’ reactions to information. At least not in the way that a Microsoft patent I wrote about a couple of years ago does. From my post Bill Gates and Company Want to Watch You Watch TV, Buy Groceries, and Use Your Credit Cards and Cell Phone (and Take Notes):

Reactions of a user to information — Collected by cameras, microphones, and/or systems that sense biometric information. The look on your face, the sound of your voice, the emotions that you express when buying something or presented with information could be “recorded, processed, and fed back for analysis to affect the type of advertising presented to the user when s/he goes online.”

I hope that we don’t see something like that come about, but I would guess that it’s a possibility some time in the future.

In the not so distant future; could people’s facial expressions automatically be aggregated in the context of this patent – such as when walking out of a comedy movie or upon receiving a meal at a restaurant?

I really do like the idea of including media in reviews, too. Someone can tell you how great the seared scallops with oyster risotto was at the seafood restaurant they just visited, but showing you a photo or two of the dish might make you hop in your car and go get some.