[ZZII 527]

Interesting fact:

The photomosaic is actualy patented by a company called Runaway Technology. I originally thought this patent applied only to their specific method/code. However, it seems that the patent covers photomosaics in general. From their website:

Photomosaic "look and feel" are protected by the patent, copyright, and other intellectual property laws of the United States and other major countries. We protect these rights vigilantly.

I suppose that's why AndreaMosiac is freeware - any attempt to commercialize it would probably be illegal.

Even more interestingly (at least to me) is that the CEO of Runaway Technology, a man named Robert Silvers, invented the photomosaic in 1996 - while a student at the MIT Media Lab! Seeing as my photomosaic of the apple picture (taken by Doc Edgerton, also an MIT alumni and professor) will be displayed in the Edgerton Center, about a half a mile from the Media Lab, I think I'll be safe from any patent problems... If not, I'm sure the Edgerton Center would be glad to take it down and have Runaway Technology make us one...maybe for free.

I've seen a lot of third-party photomosaic software on the web and I have written my own code for producing halfway-decent photomosaics without researching anyone elses method. I'm sure the Runaway Technology method is much better, and I still think that Robert Silvers does deserve the credit for coming up with the idea first, but I think the reason it was never done before '96 was not because nobody else could have programmed it, but because computers just didn't have the power to process images that quickly. So when computers are powerful enough to process videomosaics, I am going to patent that.