Google may lose PageRank patent
 

Even if they lose it, I doubt it would hurt them at all. Anyone can replicate it and do a small tweak and not be liable for royalties.
WG

And furthermore, does Google even use the PR for much these days? It seems to be one of the minor factors in their ranking algorithm these days.
WG

Why does it matter? Doesn't everyone just search in google and then click the relevant wiki entry anyway?

Once Wikipedia was at the bottom of the first page, I almost had a stroke. Can you imagine? Wikipedia.org entry not in top 5? :)

exactly, their traffic must be off the planet

Not really. Utility patents have what are known as "claims." A patent can have one or dozens or hundreds. In the case of this particular patent, there are 29 claims. If a person infringes on any 1 of those claims, that person is liable for patent infringement. You have to get around the specific claims.

i sale mainstream pr8 links

:1orglaugh no doubt

pr8 links are so 90s

doesn't it? What does Google use these days the most than links on whose number, quality, trust PR is being calculated. Number as a number doesn't matter much at all, but how that number is generated is what matters.
I don't know what did you mean with Google not using page rank, in which context? I agree Toolbar PR and PR as a number is just a number, but again page rank patent is very important and has enormous significance to the whole search algorithm.

So I wouldn't say it's just a minor factor in their ranking algo.

PR doesn't mean shit anymore...
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q...=Google+Search
#1 - PR3
#2 - PR0
#3 - PR5
#4 - PR4
#5 - PR5
#6 - PR0
#7 - PR5

It is all about relevance and trust...

Look at #6... Trusted domain with many backlinks from trusted domains... writes and article with blog style linking and walla... too bad they don't sell mufflers...

you can't compare TBPR with their internal PR ever!
TBPR is just a small portion of real PR.

However I agree it's all about relevance and trust, but how do you get those if not organically, which means of course links and hence higher pr.

you are talking about toolbar PR. What if #2 and #6 is PR7 (internal/actual PR) already.

This is the reason they do not report PR in realtime, and also export PR which is 1 month old. That's how they keep "How important is PR in SERPs?" thing secret.

:2 cents: