[ic] divine, Inc. patent infringements

Robert Fournerat interchange-users@icdevgroup.org
Fri Sep 20 12:12:00 2002


Dan Browning wrote:
> 
> At 01:55 AM 9/20/2002 -0400, you wrote:
> >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....
> 
> Here's two links to the patents in question.
> 
> 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=AND&d=ft00&s1=''5,715,314''.WKU.&OS=PN/
> 
> 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=AND&d=ft00&s1=''5,909,492''.WKU.&OS=PN/
> 

I too am not a lawyer.  However, I understand that 
whomever holds the patent *has to* protect that 
patent from misuse.  And if the patent holder does
not protect the patent, the patented material becomes
public domain.  While it sounds like the patent 
holder is trying to protect his patent from the
original poster, I think they would have to go
after Amazon, IBM, Best Buy, (I'm trying to pick
very well known examples) and everyone else who
has an ecommerce site.  But maybe they have.

I think there is also an argument about patents
being overly broad.  I think the first patent is.
I have not read the 2nd patent.

Again, I could be totally wrong, and recommend
talking to a lawyer.  If you need a recommendation,
I would contact Greg Howison 
( http://www.dalpat.com ).

Please keep the list informed and good luck,

Robert