- Sep 25, 2000
- 22,151
- 5
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Nevada-based Ideaflood has been sending letters to various organizations, warning them that they own the patent on sub-domains, and hinting that to use such a concept, said organization should pay them a licensing fee. The company owns patent number 6,687,746: System apparatus and method for hosting and assigning domain names on a wide area network. According to the letter, posted from the Host Hideout Forums, the company is contacting hosts and businesses to let them know Ideaflood "is making the Patent available for license on attractive terms." Web Host Industry Review (WHIR) has an interesting story on the company and their efforts to make you pay for subdomains such as "Candy.Candyshack.com."
Original Thread - Ideaflood wants to license domain names?!?
Letter
Patent # 6,687,746
Web Host Industry Review article.
Quote from TheWHIR.com article:
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Ideaflood secures many Internet-based patents ... [and] describes itself as an intellectual property holding company. On Feb. 10, 2003, it announced that it was looking for a buyer for its "Patent No. U.S. 6,389,458, covering exit traffic on the Internet," which is "one of the most widely infringed patents ever issued by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office." Ideaflood also has claimed patents on addressee-defined mail addressing systems; managing ownership of virtual property; aggregating information over a wide-area network; and a host of other Internet-based methods, systems and practices.
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The loser thing about this is they are a business entity designed, it seems, to do nothing but
> identify unlicensed technology & practices,
> claim development of them, then sit back & wait for the practices to become widespread,
> go after the category of users more likely to pay a nominal fee than fight it in court
> which establishes a precedence,
> go after everyone else.
Original Thread - Ideaflood wants to license domain names?!?
Letter
Patent # 6,687,746
Web Host Industry Review article.
Quote from TheWHIR.com article:
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Ideaflood secures many Internet-based patents ... [and] describes itself as an intellectual property holding company. On Feb. 10, 2003, it announced that it was looking for a buyer for its "Patent No. U.S. 6,389,458, covering exit traffic on the Internet," which is "one of the most widely infringed patents ever issued by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office." Ideaflood also has claimed patents on addressee-defined mail addressing systems; managing ownership of virtual property; aggregating information over a wide-area network; and a host of other Internet-based methods, systems and practices.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
The loser thing about this is they are a business entity designed, it seems, to do nothing but
> identify unlicensed technology & practices,
> claim development of them, then sit back & wait for the practices to become widespread,
> go after the category of users more likely to pay a nominal fee than fight it in court
> which establishes a precedence,
> go after everyone else.
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