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GEN-ERIC Patent News Tuesday, December 30,
2003
================================================== Use Quick Links
to Access any Area of Interest Headlines News Patents of the Day Access Official Gazette and
Notices Patents Available for Licensing Patent Related
Opportunities
Printer Friendly Version ================================================== HEADLINES (patents issued a few hours
ago..) The Bill Gates Patent of the Day goes to
Inventors who probably work at Microsoft but have assigned the Patent to
Bill Gates instead for a Method and system for distributing
art
The Touch and Feel Patent of the Day goes to West
Virginia University for an Instrumented breast model
Index ================================================== NEWS eBay, Tumbleweed settle
patent suit http://news.com.com/2100-1038_3-5133886.html Tumbleweed, an
enterprise e-mail, file-transfer and firewall services provider based in Redwood
City, Calif., sued eBay subsidiary PayPal last year, alleging infringement of
two patents related to electronic notification processes and document storage
and retrieval. PayPal, an online-payment service, responded with counterclaims,
also dismissed in the settlement. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.
eBay, which acquired PayPal after the suit had been filed, declined to comment
on the settlement, which was disclosed in a court filing. Tumbleweed did not
return calls or e-mail queries. Index Microsoft to pay SPX $60M
in patent suit http://www.computerworld.com/governmenttopics/government/legalissues/story/0,10801,88582,00.html Microsoft
Corp. will pay $60 million for violating a patent held by a division of SPX
Corp., a Charlotte, N.C.-based manufacturing and technology company, SPX said in
a statement released on Wednesday. On Nov. 14, a jury awarded SPX's Imagexpo LLC
subsidiary $62.3 million in damages after finding that Microsoft had willfully
infringed a technology patent held by Imagexpo. Microsoft infringed on the
patent with the Whiteboard feature of its NetMeeting conferencing software, SPX
said. After the November ruling, it was unclear whether Microsoft, which denied
any patent infringement had occurred, would appeal the jury's decision, but
Wednesday's settlement resolves the matter, said Stacy Drake, a Microsoft
spokeswoman.
Index WebTV Co-Founder Phil Goldman Dies at 39
http://www.bayarea.com/mld/mercurynews/business/7595359.htm Phil
Goldman, a Silicon Valley engineer who co-founded WebTV before launching a
Web-based e-mail service that promised to block unwanted spam, has died. He was
39. Goldman died at home in Los Altos Hills on Friday. Goldman held 19 U.S.
patents for inventions. Over the course of his career, Goldman worked on the
cusp of technology and consumer electronics at firms such as Apple Computer,
General Magic and Microsoft Corp. In 1995, along with former Apple colleagues
Steve Perlman and Bruce Leak, Goldman co-founded WebTV Networks, which allowed
users to surf the Internet from their televisions. Microsoft bought WebTV in
1997 for $425 million and today is called MSN TV.
Index ================================================== PATENTS OF THE DAY
6,670,934
Method and system for distributing
art
Abstract: An art
distribution system for distributing art to multiple display devices within an
environment. The art distribution system provides a technique for specifying
images to be displayed in an environment. The art distribution system provides a
hierarchical representation of spaces within the environment. Each space may be
further subdivided into subspaces. The art distribution system allows a user to
select a space within the hierarchy and then to select an image that is to be
displayed at the display devices within the selected space. The art distribution
system then displays the selected image within the space including within all
subspaces of the selected space. The art distribution system may allow a
subsequent assignment of the image to a subspace to override within that
subspace the previous selection of an image for the space.
Index
6,669,483
Instrumented breast model
Abstract: An
interactive breast model is disclosed for training lay persons and health care
providers to perform effective breast examinations and to locate and identify
masses in a breast. The model of the invention comprises a silicone breast model
equipped with a data acquisition unit having a plurality of sensors for
detecting displacement in the surface of the breast model during an examination
and data acquisition modules for receiving the sensor output data. The data
acquisition unit sends the sensor output to a personal computer for analysis and
display to the user. Software executing on the personal computer performs fuzzy
logic algorithms to correlate the sensor output data to usable information
regarding the time duration of the examination, finger placement of the user,
and the level of displacement throughout the examination. This performance data
is displayed to the user.
Index ================================================== ACCESS OFFICIAL GAZETTE AND
NOTICES Access this week's Official
Gazette http://www.uspto.gov/web/patents/patog/week52/OG/index2.htm
Excerpt
from OG Notices
EPO Competence to Act as a PCT Authority
Revisions Relating to Decisions by BPAI
Index ================================================== PATENTS AVAILABLE FOR
LICENSING
to Learn More or to List a Patent
Plug-and-play smart data
cable The invention includes a smart, plug-and-play cable capable of
transparently translating between two different communication protocols. The
cables are "plug-and-play" such that two devices can be coupled together for
communication without the requirement that the user perform any special set-up
steps in order for it to work. To implement this plug-and-play functionality,
the smart cable of the present invention determines which communication
protocols are required at each of its ports, and selects, activates, enables, or
downloads the appropriate communication protocol drivers to enable proper
operation.
Electric shaver having orbitally moving blades An
electric shaver includes blades which while rotating around their own centers
also orbit around another axis, thus providing that the blades sweep a large
area.
Implantable fuel cell This invention makes use of an
electrostrictive material to increase the efficiency of a fuel cell as used
for the production of power within a human.
Index ================================================== EMPLOYMENT
OPPORTUNITIES
to List a Job
Patent Related Jobs from Monster
Patent Related Jobs from www.IntelPropLaw.com
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