*****  To join INSNA, visit http://www.insna.org  *****

so friendster was just awarded patent no 2: number 7,117,254  (on the 
us pto site you can do a quick search with the number) entitled, 
"Method of inducing content uploads in a social network"...and they 
wrote to gigaom to tell him more (link to post is 
http://gigaom.com/2006/10/18/friendster-gets-patent-2/)

salient excerpt, "Friendster1 just wrote in to tell us it has been 
granted a second social networking patent2. The patent basically 
covers uploading a photo and associating it with someone you are 
connected to on an online social network. Friendster also claims it 
should extend to "videos, audio, comments, and any other content 
type, supported in public or private forums, within a social network."

does this seem like a practical approach to a patent - or does the us 
pto simply not understand the dynamics of networks and relationships 
might develop or be manipulated within a site like friendster, myspace, etc..?

per the patent, note the use of degrees as key element of definition, 
"A method of inducing content uploads in an online network includes 
the steps of storing content relating to a first member of the 
network that is submitted by a second member of the network, 
receiving approval of the content from the first member, and 
associating the content with the first member. The uploaded content 
may comprise an image file containing a photo of the first member and 
a caption associated with the photo image. The second user uploads 
the content relating to the first member using a GUI. This GUI is 
made available to the second user through a hyperlink that appears 
when a profile page of the first member is accessed if the degree of 
separation between the first member and the second member is less 
than or equal to a maximum degree of separation set by the first 
user. On the other hand, the hyperlink to this GUI will not appear 
when the profile page of the first member is accessed by the second 
member if the degree of separation between the first member and the 
second member is greater than the maximum degree of separation set by 
the first user. The default setting for this maximum degree of 
separation is one."

thoughts? reactions?
-dave

David Carpe
Principal and Founder, Clew, LLC (http://www.clew.us)
E: [log in to unmask]
W: 781.674.2539
M: 781.883.5487
Skype: dcarpe


***Internet Email Confidentiality Footer***
Privileged/Confidential Information may be contained in this message. 
If you are not the addressee indicated in this message (or 
responsible for delivery of the message to such person), you may not 
copy or deliver this message to anyone. In such case, you should 
destroy this message and kindly notify the sender by reply email. 
Please advise immediately if you or your employer do not consent to 
Internet email for messages of this kind. Opinions, conclusions and 
other information in this message that do not relate to the official 
business of my firm shall be understood as neither given nor endorsed by it.  

_____________________________________________________________________
SOCNET is a service of INSNA, the professional association for social
network researchers (http://www.insna.org). To unsubscribe, send
an email message to [log in to unmask] containing the line
UNSUBSCRIBE SOCNET in the body of the message.