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Online Greeting Cards Patented

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the what-is-the-wheel-next dept.

Trailer Trash writes "According to this story at bizreport.com, Hallmark has given in and licensed Tumbleweed Communication Corp's patent for delivery of online documents with e-mail notification. Will the idiots at the patent office never stop? Jeff Smith of Tumbleweed claims to have been granted three patents last year."

3 of 237 comments (clear)

  1. So what you mean to say by Safety+Cap · · Score: 4, Interesting
    ...is that someone can patent the process by which email can be generated which directs the recipient to click some link, which delivers a message on some dad-burn web page?

    Yup, the whole world has gone insane. I'm going to go cry now.

    --
    Yeah, right.
  2. Good! by dangermouse · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I hope this patent stifles the shit out of the email-a-link industry.

  3. Ask and ye shall receive by JohnA · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The company I helped found in 1995 started doing this in December 1995, with a launch in February 1996. It was an internet greeting card site, and included such AMAZING features as e-mail notification of a new card to a recipient, and an e-mail to the sender when the card was viewed. The Internet Archive has an archive of the page as it was in December 1996 at:

    http://web.archive.org/web/19961226182315/http://w ww.cardclub.com/

    Anyway, if anyone is challenged by this in court, let me know. I'm sure I can dig out all sorts of documentation that predates the filing dates of the patents in question.