BT has begun its battle to recover licence fees from internet service providers, six months after first claiming to own a patent on the technology behind hyperlinks.
James Middleton, uk.internet.com,
VNU Business Publications 18 Dec 2000BT has begun its battle to recover licence fees from internet service providers (ISPs), six months after first claiming to own a patent on the technology behind hyperlinks.
The company sent notices to a number of ISPs during the summer, but has chosen to start its campaign in the US with legal action against Prodigy and America Online (AOL).
The telco rediscovered the patent (number 4,873,662 which expires in 2006) about three years ago during a routine check and decided that it might be able to charge ISPs for their customers' use of hyperlinks.
BT hired intellectual property specialist Scipher to pursue its claim but ISPs have refused to play ball, resulting in the legal action against Prodigy and AOL.
The technology in question forms a key part of the construction of hyperlinks and, whether applied in HTML, WML or Java, forms the basis of the whole internet.
BT claims that the patent dates back to the days of its Viewdata online services, including Prestel. With around 1.5 billion pages on the web, each with an average of 52 links, BT could stand to make many millions if it is successful with the claims.
One potential fly in the ointment, however, is the existence of film footage from 1968, which pre-dates BT's claim by eight years. The footage shows a presentation by Douglas Englebart, of the Stanford Research Institute, demonstrating the use of hyperlinks.
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22 Jan 2001BT's attempt to enforce a patent on internet hyperlinks has been thrown into fresh doubt by video footage of a 1968 research project.
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10 Jul 2000BT has said it wants US Internet service providers to pay for their customers' rights to use hyperlinks in Web sites, because the British telco claims that it invented them.
29 Jun 2000BT's claim that it holds patents to internet-based hyperlink and hypertext technology - and more worryingly, that it intends to charge US ISPs to use it - has highlighted once again the absurdity of the hi-tech patent industry.
27 Jun 2000An industry user group has congratulated BT on its decision to pursue licence fees for the patent behind hyperlinks, the mainstay of web navigation, saying the telco's actions illustrate the absurdity of US software patent laws.
22 Jun 2000BT said today it wants US internet service providers to pay for their customers' rights to use hyperlinks in websites, because the British telco claims it invented them.
20 Jun 2000
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