Sony Patent Application #20100299595

   Akihabara News has been sleuthing around recent patents filed at the United States Patent and Trademark Office website and they’ve found seven patents filed by Sony Computer Entertainment of America. The diagrams included with the patents appear to indicate a touch-sensitive screen of some sort, a thin clamshell design, text entry capabilities, a mini keyboard, and a mass storage port or built-in device.

   Akihabara News and other sources that have picked up on the news appear to speculate that this might be a future PSP model but the device looks more like a PDA of some sort that might be capable of playing multimedia applications such as games, music, and video. The patent application #20100299595 may be viewed at http://appft.uspto.gov.

The abstract for the patent reads as follows:

    A hand-held electronic device, method of operation and computer readable medium are disclosed. The device may include a case having one or more major surfaces. A visual display and a touch interface are disposed on at least one of the major surfaces. A processor is operably coupled to the visual display and touch screen. Instructions executable by the processor may be configured to a) present an image on the visual display containing one or more active elements; b) correlate one or more active portions of the touch interface to one or more corresponding active elements in the image on the visual display; c) operate the one or more active elements according to a first mode of operation in response to a first mode of touch on one or more of the active portions; and d) operate the one or more active elements according to a second mode of operation in response to a second mode of touch on one or more of the active portions, wherein in the second mode of operation, the second mode of touch activates an enhancement of one or more of the active elements.