Microsoft Trademark Application Points To Kinect-Based Interactive Ad Platform

Microsoft has filed a trademark for the term NUADS, which the application hints might refer to a new, interactive advertising platform that uses Microsoft's Xbox 360 Kinect camera controller. The trademark application, filed last week and dug up by Techie Buzz, describes the mark as referring to "advertising services... through online interactive video games [that enable] consumers to interact with third-party advertising content through voice or body gestures via computer game console and sensor devices." Such voice and body gestures form the core features of Microsoft's Kinect, which sold over 10 million units through March since its release last November. At last week's E3 show, Microsoft announced that Kinect would eventually be used in all of the company's first-party games. The company also announced a number of new Kinect-based features for the Xbox 360 at the show, including a new interface for the system that uses voice commands to control everything from videos and music to Xbox Live searches. Microsoft shut down in-game ad unit Massive late last year after spending hundreds of millions of dollars to acquire it in 2006.