[ic] divine, Inc. patent infringements

Ron Phipps interchange-users@icdevgroup.org
Fri Sep 20 02:05:01 2002


> From: Mike Heins
> 
> Quoting Charles Chang (cchang2000@yahoo.com):
> > Hi All,
> >
> > I've been contacted by a lawyer who represents a
> > company called divine, Inc.  They claim that my
> > website has infringed U.S. Patent Nos. 5,715,314 and
> > 5,909,492. I have been using Interchange for about a
> > year for my online store. The lawyer asked me my
> > yearly sale and proposed one-time license fee of
> > $5,000 based on my yearly gross volume sale of
> > $20,000.
> >
> > He also said that any site that uses ability to
> > accululate items and then checkout those (i.e.
> > shopping cart capability) is infringing divine's
> > Patents.
> >
> > I have no intention of infinging anybody's Patents,
> > and I always had impression that using Interchange was
> > free under GNU license.
> >
> > Should I pay the $5,000 fee and get over with the
> > license?  Or is he bullshitting?  What will happen to
> > me if I ignore this?
> >
> 
> I certainly wouldn't. This sounds like a scam -- I have never
> heard of such a patent and I bet we would have....
> 
> --
> Mike Heins
> Perusion -- Expert Interchange Consulting    http://www.perusion.com/
> phone +1.513.523.7621      <mike@perusion.com>
> 
> Experience is what allows you to recognize a mistake the second
> time you make it. -- unknown

It appears the patents are valid, but whether or not they would be
upheld in court for such a broad idea / description is yet to be seen.
Here are the links to the actual patents:

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=
/netahtml/search-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&co1=OR&d=ft00&s1=''5,715,314''.W
KU.&s2=''5,909,492''.WKU.&OS=PN/"5,715,314"+OR+PN/"5,909,492"&RS=PN/"5,7
15,314"+OR+PN/"5,909,492"

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=
/netahtml/search-bool.html&r=2&f=G&l=50&co1=OR&d=ft00&s1=''5,715,314''.W
KU.&s2=''5,909,492''.WKU.&OS=PN/"5,715,314"+OR+PN/"5,909,492"&RS=PN/"5,7
15,314"+OR+PN/"5,909,492"

-Ron