The Prior Art

Paul Allen v. The Internet

Former Microsoft executive and billionaire Paul Allen sued several major Internet companies and three large retailers for patent infringement today, asserting that four patents originating at Interval Research, Allen's dot-com era think tank, cover basic web browsing and e-commerce technologies.

The lawsuit [PDF] was filed by Interval Licensing LLC, a patent-holding company owned by Allen, and names eleven companies as defendants: AOL, Apple, eBay, Facebook, Google, Netflix, Office Depot, OfficeMax, Staples, Yahoo, and YouTube.

Interval Research was founded in 1992. It closed its doors in 2000, but the lawsuit is necessary to monetize the investment that Allen made in the organization, said David Postman, a spokesman for Allen.

The patents cover "a variety of key processes in e-commerce," said Postman. "Interval Research was early—and right—on key pieces of the Internet," said Postman. "It's important now to protect that investment. We believe these companies are using that technology, in both e-commerce and search."

Allen is one of the world's richest people, with a fortune that Forbes magazine estimates as over $13 billion.

A Wired magazine profile of Interval Research suggests that by 1999, the institute was struggling, with Allen having spent upwards of $100 million on research and not much to show for it. "Interval always had a special buzz and a collection of talent that, even in the annals of technological genius, stands out."

The four patents-in-suit were filed between 1996 and 2000.

They are:

• No. 6,263,507, "Browser for Use in Navigating a Body of Information, With Particular Application to Browsing Information Represented By Audiovisual Data."
• No. 6,034,652, "Attention Manager for Occupying the Peripheral Attention of a Person in the Vicinity of a Display Device."
• No. 6,788,314, "Attention Manager for Occupying the Peripheral Attention of a Person in the Vicinity of a Display Device."
• No. 6,757,682, "Alerting Users to Items of Current Interest."

The suit was filed in the Western District of Washington. Interval Licensing is represented by Susman Godfrey, a Texas-based law firm that focuses on contingency-fee patent lawsuits, and Heim, Payne & Chorush is a smaller patent firm based in Houston.

More documents:

• Interval Licensing press release on the lawsuit
• Interval Licensing v. AOL et al. complaint [PDF]
• Coverage from Wall Street Journal

Cross-posted at Corporate Counsel.

 

 

Do Trademark Owners Really Need to Fear a Facebook "Land Rush?"

I've received a slew of e-mails from law firms and sources over the last few days regarding Facebook's announcement that, beginning at midnight EST on Saturday, it will allow "usernames" to be tacked on to the end of the Facebook URL to create personal URLs. In other words, John Smith could have his Facebook profile set up at www.facebook.com/johnsmith.

This development is causing a minor freak-out among trademark lawyers, eager to reassure clients that they're on top of every occurrence in Internet-land. Morrison Foerster is one of several law firms that has quickly penned an advisory on "Protecting your Trademark From Facebook Username Abuse." One veteran IP lawyer from another firm wrote to me: "I think Facebook has a lot of chutzpah to do this on such short notice!"

Facebook has set up a registration form for trademark owners, and a help center about the usernames feature that specifically addresses IP rights. Domain-name tycoons who look forward to a burgeoning new market in cyber-real estate are going to be disappointed—the usernames can't be sold or transferred once claimed. Seems that Facebook is trying to make this "land rush" as non-commercial as possible.

So, for anyone concerned about controlling their trademarks on Facebook, let it not be said that you weren't warned here. The username feature goes live in just about eight hours as of this writing, at 9:01pm PST. But since Facebook "reserves the right to remove and/or reclaim any username at any time for any reason," and is publicizing trademark claim forms, it seems likely that even trademark owners who have their mark scooped up by a ne'er-do-well will be able to get them back, hopefully in short order. Sibling publication the National Law Journal reports that Facebook will have a grievance process to take down cyber-squatters.

Meanwhile, I'm staying focused on my continued Internet domination of the other Joe Mullins of the world, all of whom will have the chance to sign on and try to win control of facebook.com/joemullin at exactly 9:01pm...

No, I mean, ah, 10:01pm. Yeah, I had the time wrong earlier. Log on at exactly 10:01pm Pacific time and you might beat me to the punch.