"We wouldn't be surprised if somewhere in Mountain View, tucked into Bond-villain-esque underground liar, there's an epic sea-water tank, a wall of wave machines, and a prototype."

And sharks. With frickin' lasers on their heads.

Mustn't forget the sharks.

Computers on ships.. Prior air

water cooling.. prior art

power derived from water.. prior air

Just because it is a data center should have no bearing on the fact that it is a platform that pulls power and cooling from water.. it is a building that is cooled and powered by water simply that and nothing more.

Also notice how vague the idea is.. a patent should be very specific.. not something like be able to obtain its cooling and power by some means. In what method is the temperature transfer taking place? How exactly are you pulling power from the water? How is the computer room of your data center different from any other modern large ship at sea? Are these modifications to existing patented items or using entirely new technology?

The patent clerk that accepted this should have been fired!

I look forward to the first headlines of dot-coms going out of business because their datacenters are held hostage by pirates, beached on a remote island after a storm, or have insufficient positive elevation.

This is simply a fantastic background for some geek-oriented mil-SF... think huge slow "brains of the operation" datacenter ships (either in the sea or in the space), controlling everything in the combat arena... either indirectly or directly, with war drones.

Surely the prior art of the likes of Sealand (remember that glorified oil rig in the North sea that declared independence years ago- and subsequently became an errrrr data centre) might nullify this patent?

My hairy arse.

...that posters complaining about patents can be vetted for having the slightest clue what a patent is? Yerrghh... "OMG THEY PATENT THIS SO I IS GONNA PATENT BREATHING LULZ YOU OWE ME A MILLION DOLLARS"

Spare me. There are serious issues with the patent system, and real problems with patent trolls, but the flood of "the internal combustion engine is prior art so you can't patent a specific method for applying hybrid technology" type flames completely drown out the sanity.

"We file patent applications on a variety of ideas that our employees come up with," reads a canned statement from the company. "Some of those ideas later mature into real products, services or infrastructure, some don't."

The patent office has clearly gone crazy! They should go back to requiring an actual physical invention that works. The possibility of patenting an "idea" without a full disclosure of a practical actual implementation is crazy. I recently looked at a patent from the 80's that didn't work and was also vague on the implementation. When someone comes along and actually provides an actual working system it only allows the trolls to take it away.

Not that this Google invention wouldn't work. It just sounds like they like to file patents for the fun of it.

...only apply within national waters, don't they?

Isn't the whole point of these datacentres that they are located outside of national jurisdiction?

And yes. Floating ship with computers on it. Next you'll tell me that some company tried to apply a patent to sudo.

Oh, wait..

Er... I think Ronan O'Rahilly and the Radio Caroline crew got there in about 1965

The USPTO might as well be shut down and replaced with a website where you upload a picture of your invention ( preferably vague and scribbled ), send them $10 and they email you your patent details.

"And as Data Center Knowledge points out, such computing centers would be free of real estate and property taxes."

Probably also free of peskier things, such as copyright and patent laws.

no problem with your backups being at the bottom of the sea then?

Capt James Rand must be in league with the seagoing-chocolate-fish-factory farmers.

Think what 'advances' a completely law-free undersea cloud could provide for corporate/government, normally 'bound' by their own laws/borders.

SubmarineExtraOrdinaryDataRendition-As-A-Service.

Mines the one with amanfrommars's RFID tag in the pocket.

Or maybe Paris, starring in Octopussy 2010 ???

NY under water, ooooogle going strong!

:-P

Instead of indirectly heating up the oceans, why dont we just haat them up directly.

Anyone who has ever owned a boat will be able to tell you just how much of a money pit they really are.

This might be a good relocatable resource, but it won't come cheap.

Paris, because she knows all about coming cheaply

Given that most modern ships have servers on them, use water for cooling stuff and often have deployable generators to use the ships motion to generate electricity (as well as nuke stuff and big old engines) this new "idea" appears to have been in existence for years.

I shall look forward to Google getting licence fee's from the US navy!

Paris, her kind of dumb idea

"No, I said sync the servers!"

Mutant sharks (with or without lasers), visits from the Somalian navy, tsunamis, hurricanes, the occasional "hey who opened the stopcock"; and that perennial problem explaining to your CIO that your 100million dollar sitting duck just got blown out of the water by your competition (RPG optional).

Being on a ship, WiMAX can only go 31 miles, which leaves satellite the only option if its outside territorial waters (any music with 'delay' in it is appropriate here).

Thumbs up for Google: if everyone else can play the insipid patent guessing game why not them...

Thumbs down also for Google: its an expensive mistake waiting to happen if anyone is stupid enough .. its like buying a water bed when you have a 3-year old; they can't wait to stick a pin it it.

So the only icon applicable is stop.

IN THE NAVVVVVVVVVVVVVY, YOU CAN JOIN YOUR FELLOW MAN!

Yeah, good luck getting that out of your heads today, suckers!

Does anybody here really think intellectual property rights are enforceable in international waters anyway?

I can see it now.....

Yahoo buys a scrapped (your choice of country) submarine. Puts some cash into arms dealer's hands. Pays a short visit to where ever the ship is anchored.

OOPS. Didn't mean to lean on that button.

One part of my competitor is silenced.

Could be fun. Think Google will spring for a DE?

I'll take me coat now. It's the one with the 3 rings on the sleeve and the dolphins

They simply tap into the undersea cables - lots of bandwidth there.

*** On Tuesday, the US Patent Office gave Google exclusive rights to what the search giant CUM world power calls a "water-based data center." ***

Trying to get round various porn laws (Especaly the new UK one). Very clever thing there, dear internet seach king.

Paris, because she knows everything to do with porn.

I had a quick scan of the patent and there appears to be no mention of how this data centre connects to anything.

So in essence, its a cargo ship as without bandwidth it a chocolate teapot of a data centre.

Paris, equally as effective as a data centre

It's not a terrible idea actually, cheap to setup, low operational cost... Compared to massive solar powered data centers in the middle of a desert, Water-based data centers actually make financial sense. Of course you know this is the start of the "gMIL" Google's own private military to protect these floating fortresses.

To everyone saying satellite communication is the only practical method of data transfer... How do you think satellites communicate in the first place... same way WiMAX works... its all MICROWAVES different ranges for different distances, I doubt Google would have any problem setting up a point to point microwave system to communicate directly with the mainland (you don't have to worry about mountains on the ocean). That would cut down on latency quite a bit...

We regret that Google cannot answer your query because we have been sunk by a Somalia Pirate Torpedo.

Outside the municipal reach is also outside the Patent Office's reach. And anchoring them anywhere makes reaching them by rubber skiff extremely easy. "Psst, buddy, wanna buy a slightly used server, data still intact?"

For the first time I've felt it necessary to attach an emoticon. Ever see Steve Martin's "Roxanne?"