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AltaVista is planning to sue most of the web's major search engines for patent infringement, according to David Wetherell, the chairman and CEO of AltaVista’s parent company, CMGI. In an interview with Internet World, Wetherell says that AltaVista plans to enforce the 38 patents it holds on search engine technology. "We believe that virtually everyone out there who indexes the web is in violation of at least several of those key patents," Wetherell says. CMGI/AltaVista will sue the companies that are using technology it has patented, including now-mundane search engine tasks such as indexing and searching web sites and storing an index of database records. The lawsuits will be filed sometime this quarter. Patents on seemingly ubiquitous internet technology are nothing new: British Telecom claims it holds the patent on hyperlinks, and last month sued Prodigy Communications regarding the links. If AltaVista wins, many other search engines will have to pay it royalties – income that AltaVista needs, given that it hasn’t turned a profit and just fired a quarter of its staff to cut expenses.
Melissa virus is on the rebound
The Melissa virus, which caused $80 million worth of damage to computer systems around the globe in 1999, has resurfaced. The virus shows up as an email with "Important message" as the subject line. This message comes with an attachment called ANNIV.doc. If a user tries to open the attachment, the virus sends itself to everyone in that user’s address book. Melissa resends itself more than once, which helps clog up email servers. That's the main way Melissa does its damage, and it requires users with Microsoft's Outlook email software. But even on computers without Outlook, Melissa may copy itself and infect other programs on the system, according to virus experts. Computer security company Symantec says the new variant appeared on computers in Europe on Tuesday. The new Melissa is called Melissa-W or Melissa-X to distinguish it from the old one, Melissa-A. This latest strain arose when a Macintosh user saved an infected PC file. This means that both Mac and PC users are vulnerable this time around.
Atom Films and Ford team
for film promotion
Online entertainment site Atom Films has created three short movies that
prominently feature Ford Motor’s budget-conscious Focus model. The short
films, which were created by Atom-affiliated filmmakers, debut this week
during the Sundance Film Festival. The plot of one of the mini-movies,
"Little Man on Campus," centers on the awkward protagonist’s
efforts to join an athletic team, which will please his jock father, win a
cheerleader’s favors and earn him a Ford Focus. J. Walter Thompson and
Ford co-produced the short films. Atom has dedicated an area of its web
site, "Ford in Focus," to the promotion, and Ford will publicize
the films in its promotions of the Focus. Atom merged with Shockwave.com
last month. While the merger was complete Jan. 15, a new name for the
company has not been announced.
IBM: We've got Napster-proof
technology for you
In the latest salvo in the battle over online music distribution, IBM is
introducing technology that blocks the unauthorized circulation of
music files over the internet. IBM will market the service, which will be a
modification of IBM’s Electronic Media Management system, to record labels and other
such entities this quarter. How it works: Consumers can listen to a free
track online, but after playing the song a set number of times, the file
freezes and can’t be played until the record company gets paid. This
technique is called superdistribution; InterTrust Technologies of
Sunnyvale, Calif., pioneered it. IBM has not announced if it will deal
with leading music file-sharing site Napster in implementing the new
technology. Napster is working with Bertelsmann Music Group to create a
fee-based music distribution service.
Yahoo debuts money
transfer service
Yahoo has introduced an online service that lets users transfer money
between their bank accounts and their investment accounts. The
fund-transfer service is overseen by CashEdge and uses the Automated
Clearing House Network, of which 23,000 banks, brokerages and credit
unions are members. Users of the service can transfer money from, for
example, their Wells Fargo checking account to their ETrade portfolio.
Yahoo’s finance page, as it has for some time, still features message
boards, community feedback, market news and other money-handling tools. In
November, Jupiter Media Metrix ranked Yahoo Finance the top financial
portal. The new service is free right now, but analysts such as Merrill
Lynch’s Henry Blodget think Yahoo would be better off financially if
Yahoo charged for it.
In Japan men like their
girlfriends virtual
Virtual women don’t kiss back, but more than 30,000 Japanese men are
dating them anyway. Bandai, the company behind the once-ubiquitous
Tamagotchi virtual pet, has launched "Love By Email"--a line of
seven different computer-generated lovers, including a barmaid, a teacher
and a nightlife-loving student. The men pay about $2.50 a month to trade
up to three emails a day with their digital paramours in an attempt to get
them interested. The "women" respond, but their mood depends on
the season, the time of day and the content of the men’s messages. The
cybergirls don’t take kindly to hasty declarations of love. A Love By
Email user’s goal is to woo his virtual lover into revealing intimacies:
her 52 secrets, which can be tracked on a chart. Users can also go online
to see what percentage of the woman’s heart has been won. The
"courtship" lasts one to three months, and the goal is to get
the woman to declare her love.
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