Sony Ericsson is patenting a system that would tie songs to specific locations, says a new filing within the US. Proposed technology for a "location dependent music search" would use GPS or a similar mapping method to determine the phone's location and promptly find music associated with the area, whether on the device or on an Internet server. The feature would let users cue songs they associate with favorite areas or download songs from local artists.

The patent, published late last week, was originally submitted in November 2006 and isn't necessarily expected to translate into a shipping product. However, the technology already exists in shipping Sony Ericsson phones to use real or assisted GPS for a position lock as well as to download RSS subscription feeds, making the addition of the feature relatively simple. [via Dial-a-Phone]