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Information Week writer Alexander Wolfe has taken the time to scour through some iPhone patents recently in preparation for the Palm Pre and iPhone patent battle that may very well happen soon. However, while searching for potential infringements, he stumbled upon some interesting wording in patent number 7,479,949 that may very well show how serious Apple is about adding recording functionality to the iPhone. More impressive than the usual 30 second or so video clip that most phones allow on the market today, Wolfe believes that Apple will really blow this one away.

Even more boldly, I believe Apple intends to go well beyond the simple video clip recording that every still camera today has anyway. It intends to turn the iPhone into a handheld video conferencing device! That’d make the iPhone even more powerful than it is today. So rather than shooting its whole wad at one time—like with the intro of the 3G iPhone—I’m guessing Apple is waiting until there’s both a sag in demand and a more robust build-out of nationwide 3G network capabilities. (Currently, many major metro areas have 3G, but one can’t really say 3G is fully deployed throughout the country.)

So what are the chances of this? Well he does have a point about the 3G networks not being up to speed yet, but despite that, I still think this must be taken with a grain of salt (at least the video conferencing aspect). As with most Apple patents, much of the stuff in there is just to use against potential competitors. Any Apple follower knows that they have patented some pretty awesome concepts that we most likely won’t see for a long time. That said, I would love to see this come to the iPhone as it would make it that much more superior as a multimedia device.

Via [Information Week]