socialmedian: Friendster Patents On Social Networks May Make It Unfriendly To Other Social Networks

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Friendster Patents On Social Networks May Make It Unfriendly To Other Social Networks

Submitted by Diordna from blog

Oct 05, 2009

Summary

I do not like patents but they do excist and we all got to live with them! Techcrunch published the following data on some of the Friendster Patents, (since our report they got two more) and I hope some one, one of those big boys, validate these;

No. 7,478,078, titled “Method for sharing relationship information stored in a social network database with third party databases.” It was first filed on June 14, 2004.

The patent describes the sharing of information between users and applications based on relationships between users, as well as other uses. Most social networks today do exactly this, and may violate the patent:

By having a way of obtaining relationship information from an online social network, operators of online services can manage services based on the relationships between their customers. For example, a site offering a directory of members may allow each member to limit who may access his or her member information, or who may communicate with him or her, based on the closeness of the relationship between the requesting member and him or her. In add ...Read the full article

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