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United Keys looks real enough.

But I could not find an "Intelligentia International AB", just a FL organization called Intelligentsia International, which does not mention him.

Here is his patent for "A system for controlling an apparatus, which system comprises a control unit adapted to transfer control signals to the apparatus dependent on the control data..."

1. A method of playing a game by first and second players, the method comprising:
providing at least first and second toy bases for use by respective first and second players, wherein each toy base comprises multiple components, wherein the multiple components of each toy base are formed as generally-planar pieces, wherein the generally-planar pieces are manually punched out or removed from at least one rectangular panel by at least one of the first and second players, and wherein each of the first and second toy bases represent at least a portion of a vehicle or robot; manually assembling the first toy base by the first player;
manually assembling the second toy base by the second player;
removably securing at least one accessory to a location on the first toy base by the first player, wherein the accessory has use under predetermined rules of play;
removably securing at least one accessory to a location on the second toy base by the second player;
moving the first manually assembled toy base under the predetermined rules of play by the first player;
moving the second manually assembled toy base under the predetermined rules of play by the second player;
generating a first random number and playing the game according to the predetermined rules of play by the first player; upon occurrence of an negative event under the predetermined rules of play and based at least in part on the first generated random number, then either (i) removing the accessory or one of the multiple components of the second toy base, or (ii) replacing the accessory or one of the multiple components of the second toy base with a substitute accessory or substitute component, respectively, wherein the substitute accessory or substitute component represents damage to the accessory or one of the multiple components; and
generating a second random number and playing the game according to the predetermined rules of play by the second player;
upon occurrence of an negative event under the predetermined rules of play and based at least in part on the second generated random number, then either (i) removing the accessory or one of the multiple components of the first toy base, or (ii) replacing the accessory or one of the multiple components of the first toy base with a substitute accessory or substitute component, respectively; and
repeating the generating of random numbers and the removing or replacing of accessories or components, under the predetermined rules of play, until one of the first or second players wins the game at least in part because of the removing of accessories or components from the toy base, or because of the replacing of the accessories or components on the toy base with substitute accessories or substitute components.

Key DoubleClick assets from a recent post we did:

US Patent 7039599 - Automatic Placement of Advertising
Highlight: Claim 1. "A method for advertisement selection, comprising: (a) receiving from an advertiser Web site feedback representing user transactions at the advertiser Web site, the user transactions resulting from user response to at least one of a plurality of direct advertisements; (b) receiving a request to display a direct advertisement to a user; and (c) selecting, in response to the request, one of the plurality of direct advertisements for display based at least in part upon the advertiser feedback."

Analysis: This patent has a priority back to 1997 and allows for advertiser feedback from users on a website. Given Google's move into CPA, this patent would clearly provide added leverage to allow more data to flow between the advertiser and Google's system to optimize which ads should be displayed at a publisher.

US Patent 7085682 - Analyzing Website Activity
Highlight: A large number of independent claims covering the tracking and reporting of user activities to provide analysis of event level detail, which includes the addition of the retaining details of users' adding products to shopping carts, and repeat usage of a client site.

Analysis: In addition to the above, Google's analysis and reporting features for a tool like Analytics for a CPA advertiser become even more robust allowing for unique visitor tracking and loyalty. A robust addition to Google Analytics to be sure.

US Patent 5948061 - Delivering, Targeting and Measuring Online Ads
Highlight: What all consumer privacy folks have feared for the last 12 years. The tracking of user specific information and the performance and ongoing management of ad delivery based on user information.

Analysis: Whether we like it or not, Google retains a lot of information about our searches connected to our profiles. This technology does what the original vision of DoubleClick was built on: user-level targeted ads.

This announcement was easy to see coming.

Key DoubleClick assets from a recent post we did:

US Patent 7039599 - Automatic Placement of Advertising
Highlight: Claim 1. "A method for advertisement selection, comprising: (a) receiving from an advertiser Web site feedback representing user transactions at the advertiser Web site, the user transactions resulting from user response to at least one of a plurality of direct advertisements; (b) receiving a request to display a direct advertisement to a user; and (c) selecting, in response to the request, one of the plurality of direct advertisements for display based at least in part upon the advertiser feedback."

Analysis: This patent has a priority back to 1997 and allows for advertiser feedback from users on a website. Given Google's move into CPA, this patent would clearly provide added leverage to allow more data to flow between the advertiser and Google's system to optimize which ads should be displayed at a publisher.

US Patent 7085682 - Analyzing Website Activity
Highlight: A large number of independent claims covering the tracking and reporting of user activities to provide analysis of event level detail, which includes the addition of the retaining details of users' adding products to shopping carts, and repeat usage of a client site.

Analysis: In addition to the above, Google's analysis and reporting features for a tool like Analytics for a CPA advertiser become even more robust allowing for unique visitor tracking and loyalty. A robust addition to Google Analytics to be sure.

US Patent 5948061 - Delivering, Targeting and Measuring Online Ads
Highlight: What all consumer privacy folks have feared for the last 12 years. The tracking of user specific information and the performance and ongoing management of ad delivery based on user information.

Analysis: Whether we like it or not, Google retains a lot of information about our searches connected to our profiles. This technology does what the original vision of DoubleClick was built on: user-level targeted ads.

This announcement was easy to see coming.

Key DoubleClick assets from a recent post we did:

US Patent 7039599 - Automatic Placement of Advertising
Highlight: Claim 1. "A method for advertisement selection, comprising: (a) receiving from an advertiser Web site feedback representing user transactions at the advertiser Web site, the user transactions resulting from user response to at least one of a plurality of direct advertisements; (b) receiving a request to display a direct advertisement to a user; and (c) selecting, in response to the request, one of the plurality of direct advertisements for display based at least in part upon the advertiser feedback."

Analysis: This patent has a priority back to 1997 and allows for advertiser feedback from users on a website. Given Google's move into CPA, this patent would clearly provide added leverage to allow more data to flow between the advertiser and Google's system to optimize which ads should be displayed at a publisher.

US Patent 7085682 - Analyzing Website Activity
Highlight: A large number of independent claims covering the tracking and reporting of user activities to provide analysis of event level detail, which includes the addition of the retaining details of users' adding products to shopping carts, and repeat usage of a client site.

Analysis: In addition to the above, Google's analysis and reporting features for a tool like Analytics for a CPA advertiser become even more robust allowing for unique visitor tracking and loyalty. A robust addition to Google Analytics to be sure.

US Patent 5948061 - Delivering, Targeting and Measuring Online Ads
Highlight: What all consumer privacy folks have feared for the last 12 years. The tracking of user specific information and the performance and ongoing management of ad delivery based on user information.

Analysis: Whether we like it or not, Google retains a lot of information about our searches connected to our profiles. This technology does what the original vision of DoubleClick was built on: user-level targeted ads.

This announcement was easy to see coming.

Dyson developed and patented a number of concepts on autonomous vacs back to the late 1990's and launched a version in trial about three years ago as mentioned above. Like many players that looked at Roomba-like vacs, the price points they targeted were just too high. As this market develops (and continued in-store placement of Roomba shows that its got staying power), I'd expect Dyson to become a player with a positioning like it has in vacs at the high end.

Roomba has succeeded by being at a much more reasonable priced vac and have done the right things to stay innovative.

If companies don't pay maintenance fees on a patent it will become abandoned, and thus (after a grace period) public domain.
Patents that are expired, (17-20 years) are of course already thus.

Try searching on http://www.patentmonkey.com/ and the results will show you status. Roumour has it that just 10 minutes ago they fixed it so you can even be able to SEARCH on status .. like .. show me all the patents with 'cel phone' in the title that are abandoned.

While you are there, you can browse patents by front page - as if you were in the patent office in VA too.

All food for the entrepreneur.

Just in case anyone was interested, here is a full list of Microsoft's Issued Patents [Current as of a week or two ago].
Its hosted at a free patent searching tool, so don't blame me if their servers melt. :)

Microsoft's Patents

1. A method of placing an order for an item comprising: under control of a client system, displaying information identifying the item; and
in response to only a single action being performed, sending a request to order the item along with an identifier of a purchaser of the item to a server system;
under control of a single-action ordering component of the server system, receiving the request;
retrieving additional information previously stored for the purchaser identified by the identifier in the received request; and
generating an order to purchase the requested item for the purchaser identified by the identifier in the received request using the retrieved additional information; and
fulfilling the generated order to complete purchase of the item whereby the item is ordered without using a shopping cart ordering model.

1. A method of on-line shopping by a customer using a browser running on a client computer, said method comprising the steps of:
sending a first request by said browser to a merchant server for a first HTML document describing a product;
displaying said HTML document on said client computer, said displayed HTML document describing said product;
selecting, by said customer, said product;
sending a second request by said browser to said merchant server in response to said selection made by said customer;
sending a state object from said merchant server to said browser, said state object identifying said product; and
storing said state object on said client computer by said browser.

"Thereafter, this information is included in the state information which is exchanged between the client and the server in the process of the invention. Accordingly, when the user, during the browsing process, desires to view another publication (e.g., from the same or different publisher) this state information will be transmitted back to the Web server to provide the necessary subscription information (thereby entitling the user to view the publication) without requiring the user to re-enter the necessary subscription information. In this manner, a user may browse from publication to publication on the Web server or a different Web server in the domain without having to re-enter, when seeking a new publication, the necessary subscription information."

1. A method of placing an order for an item comprising: under control of a client system, displaying information identifying the item; and
in response to only a single action being performed, sending a request to order the item along with an identifier of a purchaser of the item to a server system;
under control of a single-action ordering component of the server system, receiving the request;
retrieving additional information previously stored for the purchaser identified by the identifier in the received request; and
generating an order to purchase the requested item for the purchaser identified by the identifier in the received request using the retrieved additional information; and
fulfilling the generated order to complete purchase of the item whereby the item is ordered without using a shopping cart ordering model.

1. A method of on-line shopping by a customer using a browser running on a client computer, said method comprising the steps of:
sending a first request by said browser to a merchant server for a first HTML document describing a product;
displaying said HTML document on said client computer, said displayed HTML document describing said product;
selecting, by said customer, said product;
sending a second request by said browser to said merchant server in response to said selection made by said customer;
sending a state object from said merchant server to said browser, said state object identifying said product; and
storing said state object on said client computer by said browser.

"Thereafter, this information is included in the state information which is exchanged between the client and the server in the process of the invention. Accordingly, when the user, during the browsing process, desires to view another publication (e.g., from the same or different publisher) this state information will be transmitted back to the Web server to provide the necessary subscription information (thereby entitling the user to view the publication) without requiring the user to re-enter the necessary subscription information. In this manner, a user may browse from publication to publication on the Web server or a different Web server in the domain without having to re-enter, when seeking a new publication, the necessary subscription information."

1. A method of placing an order for an item comprising: under control of a client system, displaying information identifying the item; and
in response to only a single action being performed, sending a request to order the item along with an identifier of a purchaser of the item to a server system;
under control of a single-action ordering component of the server system, receiving the request;
retrieving additional information previously stored for the purchaser identified by the identifier in the received request; and
generating an order to purchase the requested item for the purchaser identified by the identifier in the received request using the retrieved additional information; and
fulfilling the generated order to complete purchase of the item whereby the item is ordered without using a shopping cart ordering model.

1. A method of on-line shopping by a customer using a browser running on a client computer, said method comprising the steps of:
sending a first request by said browser to a merchant server for a first HTML document describing a product;
displaying said HTML document on said client computer, said displayed HTML document describing said product;
selecting, by said customer, said product;
sending a second request by said browser to said merchant server in response to said selection made by said customer;
sending a state object from said merchant server to said browser, said state object identifying said product; and
storing said state object on said client computer by said browser.

"Thereafter, this information is included in the state information which is exchanged between the client and the server in the process of the invention. Accordingly, when the user, during the browsing process, desires to view another publication (e.g., from the same or different publisher) this state information will be transmitted back to the Web server to provide the necessary subscription information (thereby entitling the user to view the publication) without requiring the user to re-enter the necessary subscription information. In this manner, a user may browse from publication to publication on the Web server or a different Web server in the domain without having to re-enter, when seeking a new publication, the necessary subscription information."

It'll take a bit of work to assemble everything relevant to cell phones, but we've got a tool that shows which patents are expired or abandoned. Here is a list of expired or abandoned cell phone patents we've got as a starter and will add to it as we go. Some aren't that great, think of it as a 'bargain bin'. :P I agree that cell phones have many possibilities and we should use the patent system as an advantage for this.

Apple Inc. is a Software Company(?)
Based on a detailed analysis of Apple's patent portfolio, we discovered at a high level that Apple is primarily a software company with roughly 65% of its issued patents being related to software elements like its: operating system; means for displaying information; networking; and image processing. If Apple is evil, then they aren't patenting it like Microsoft.

Evil Unseen - Apple's Growing Patent Application Base
Apple does have a slew of smart applications pending. One of the most interesting patent applications on our watch list, with a priority date reaching back to 2002, reads like this: "A method for synchronizing media contents between a portable media player and a media host... and synchronizing media content between the media player and the media host via the wireless connection..."

Apple may be able to make an iPhone call to Redmond if this one issues as written.

Apple Inc. is a Software Company(?)
Based on a detailed analysis of Apple's patent portfolio, we discovered at a high level that Apple is primarily a software company with roughly 65% of its issued patents being related to software elements like its: operating system; means for displaying information; networking; and image processing. If Apple is evil, then they aren't patenting it like Microsoft.

Evil Unseen - Apple's Growing Patent Application Base
Apple does have a slew of smart applications pending. One of the most interesting patent applications on our watch list, with a priority date reaching back to 2002, reads like this: "A method for synchronizing media contents between a portable media player and a media host... and synchronizing media content between the media player and the media host via the wireless connection..."

Apple may be able to make an iPhone call to Redmond if this one issues as written.

Clearly, they have only received one issued patent and the rest of the application cannot be asserted until the claims are set in stone. They have US Patent 6,988,138 which is currently under review as well. It is a great point that they've got more applications coming and this needs to also be considered.

Patents do NOT take something away from the public. What people seem to forget, is that the patent system ENCOURAGES people to publish their findings, sure .. short term they get an 'exclusive deal' on their idea, but after 20 years [from the application date mind you] its free game for anyone. People are also allowed to write improvement patents, where they improve on an existing patent, although the owener of the original patent might require licensing fees, of course - if your improvement totally makes his original patent a 'killer invention' the deal is normally settled pretty quick.

Example:

Anyone here who hates the patent system know the secret formula for Coca-Cola ? Anyone ? Anyone ?

No one knows it, because rather than let people figure out how to make coke, the company decided to lock that knowledge away in some vault somewhere and not let anyone but the most privileged in the company have access. If the Patent office didn't exist in the USA, that would be how EVERY company would act. With no method of preserving their business secrets, they would have to resort to hording their knowledge.

Anyone here know how to make a Spring-loaded dog assembly which enables a bezel of a speaker system and structure holding electric device to be mounted in ceilings and walls without having to use external retaining means ? If not, just follow the link - all the info on how to do it is right there.

Hey look, info has been given to the public, sure - you cant manufacture a product with it right now, unless its expired, or believe it or not .. the inventor actually PLACES it into the public domain when its issued. [It is an option !] Yes, the USPTO allows people to profit from inventing somthing, but it also allows people like you (and me) to have cheap hard drives, and REALLY fast processors. Compare computers now vs computers 20 years ago .. and ask yourself where we would be if there was no patent system in place, and all the emerging home PC patents that were filed, were instead kept in a vault somewhere.

I mean, I thought the Vic-20 was cool too, but those damn tape drives only held so much pr0n.

From the patent:
9. A processor based system, comprising:
a processor;
a joystick device having a first source voltage; and
an interface interfacing said joystick device with said processor, said interface including,
a Resistor-Capacitor (RC) network, connected to the joystick device, said RC network having a capacitor that generates an analog joystick position measurement signal; and
an interface circuit having a second source voltage that is lower than the first source voltage, including
a buffer circuit, in a first operation mode of said interface, receiving said analog joystick position measurement signal, outputting a first logic state as a digital signal before said analog joystick measurement signal exceeds said predetermined threshold, and outputting a second logic state as said digital signal after said analog joystick measurement signal exceeds said predetermined threshold, and
a pulse generator generating a pulse based on said digital signal in said first operation mode of said interface, a width of said pulse representing a coordinate position of said joystick device, and outputting said pulse to said processor, wherein the capacitance value of said capacitor is a function of said predetermined threshold that prevents deviation of the width of said pulse from expected values.

As has been mentioned on a few posts above, this relates to performing a low voltage analog response and this claim doesn't require a manual input joystick.

WRF highlights four patents (seen here: 1, 2, 3, 4) on their technology website dating back to 1996 covering a range of rf technology advances. They all cover building inventions on "...a useful device and method for receiving and tuning RF signals, with quadrature mixing to a near baseband passband performed in continuous-time and image rejection and translation to baseband performed in discrete-time. The device may also be adapted to transmit RF signals if desired."

WRF highlights four patents (seen here: 1, 2, 3, 4) on their technology website dating back to 1996 covering a range of rf technology advances. They all cover building inventions on "...a useful device and method for receiving and tuning RF signals, with quadrature mixing to a near baseband passband performed in continuous-time and image rejection and translation to baseband performed in discrete-time. The device may also be adapted to transmit RF signals if desired."

WRF highlights four patents (seen here: 1, 2, 3, 4) on their technology website dating back to 1996 covering a range of rf technology advances. They all cover building inventions on "...a useful device and method for receiving and tuning RF signals, with quadrature mixing to a near baseband passband performed in continuous-time and image rejection and translation to baseband performed in discrete-time. The device may also be adapted to transmit RF signals if desired."

WRF highlights four patents (seen here: 1, 2, 3, 4) on their technology website dating back to 1996 covering a range of rf technology advances. They all cover building inventions on "...a useful device and method for receiving and tuning RF signals, with quadrature mixing to a near baseband passband performed in continuous-time and image rejection and translation to baseband performed in discrete-time. The device may also be adapted to transmit RF signals if desired."

Scherling Corp appears to hold the key patent impacted by this one. Work arounds aren't about destroying the value of the patent system, many companies employ work-around techniques to mitigate the value of a potential license and drug companies, or any company, need to account for their pricing with the potential ramifications of activities like this.

www.patentmonkey.com

There are actually patents for online classified ads, the most recent I found was issued June 06, 2006.

Patent 7062466.

Everyone love's the Internet :)

Interesting patent. I note that the patent claims priority "This is a continuation of Ser. No. 08/523,716, filed on Sep. 5, 1995, issued Sep. 23, 1997 as U.S. Pat. No. 5,670,988."

The first patent was filed in 1995 and Claim 1 (the only independent claim) also contains the housing language.
US 5670988

A very important consideration is that the patent's independent claims all discuss "a housing for location at least partly between a first finger and a thumb of a user's hand...a contoured step having a first face for generally providing a rest location for the first finger of the user's hand...". US Patent 6,850,221

Motorola was one of the first to start using Li-On Polymer batteries on portable electronic devices. It was about 9 years ago.

US Patent 5,620,811

I see in US Patent 6,970,070 that RSA has an issued patent on a "a blocker device may comprise a mobile telephone, a portable computer, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a hardware-based authentication token such as an RSA SecurID.TM. token commercially available from RSA Security Inc..."

Don't see it referenced on A HREF="http://www.rsasecurity.com/node.asp?id=1155" >their site.

Interestingly, Google does a lot of reindexing using existing searches and then builds upon a search listing and a page indexing review. For example in US Patent 6,526,440, "The search engine obtains an initial set of relevant documents by matching a user's search terms to an index of a corpus. A re-ranking component in the search engine then refines the initially returned document rankings so that documents that are frequently cited in the initial set of relevant documents are preferred over documents that are less frequently cited within the initial set."

I agree that they are doing a lot of things to avoid computational load.