In a development with potential legal implications for Netscape and AltaVista, a Virginia company has won a patent for technology that uses simple words, rather than URLs, to access Web sites.
Netword LLC said Tuesday it had been awarded a patent for its Netword System. Netword did not indicate it would claim patent infringement by Netscape or AltaVista, although both companies have recently introduced browser and search-engine services that closely resemble the Netword System.
The technology lets companies and site owners register simple keywords that browsers can use to access Web sites. "Chevy," for example, could be used as an alias to replace the lengthier Web address http://www.chevrolet.com. The system works using a browser plug-in.
Netword's primary competitor, Centraal Corp., licensed its technology to AltaVista in May. Like the Netword System, Centraal's Real Name System is designed to let companies register brand names, company names, and trademarks as keywords in the company's "Real Name" registry.
AltaVista is the first search engine to license the Real Name technology from Centraal. The company has said it expects to conclude other deals soon.
Internet Keyword, a component of Netscape's recently announced Smart Browser technology, also bears close resemblance to Netword's technology. Its first incarnation will appear in the new Netscape Communicator 4.5.
"Netword has written to us indicating that they have [the patent]," reported Centraal CEO Keith Teare. But, he said, "their patent is unlikely to affect our business," emphasizing that his was a personal, rather than legal, opinion.
The Netscape technology lets a user type a word or phrase, such as "Ford Ranger," into the browser's location bar, again instead of a conventional URL. The browser queries a database at the company's Netcenter site. The search reveals that Ford Ranger has a company URL associated with it, a specific page containing information about the truck.
A Netscape representative said the company had no comment on Netword's patent.
Teare said there had been discussions about incorporating Centraal technology into Netscape's architecture, which would enhance the databases Navigator can access in processing keywords. Without being specific, Netword has also claimed to be in talks with major Internet companies.
Following recent meetings with Netword, Teare said his company was discussing the issue with its patent attorneys to determine whether action was necessary.
No legal riposte is currently being considered, since Netword has shown no inclination to enforce its patent.
"It's not the company's goal to use the patent as a license to sue, but to use it as a tool in securing partnerships," saiid Shep Bostin, Netword's vice president of marketing, who stopped well short of saying that legal action was out of the question.
"We certainly will look at [Centraal's] activities on an ongoing basis -- as we would any competitor -- to see how their activities might influence the market, to see if their companies -- or any other company's activities -- might infringe upon our patent," Bostin said.
Specifically, the Netword patent covers what the US Patent Office has termed a "universal electronic resource denotation, request, and delivery system." The system works by users guessing a short "mnemonic alias," the patent says. It works without the user being required to know a Web page's "physical or other location denotation" -- or the URL. The patented system incorporates a client computer, local server, a central registry server, a value-added server, and a root server.
Teare believes the patent may be so broad that it is unenforceable. Its wording could be interpreted, he said, to include many Web technologies, including hypertext, the coding that causes a link to appear in the text of a Web page. "It's general not only to what we do but what many others are doing, too," Teare said.
Nor are Centraal and Netscape the only companies affected, Teare said. If they're vulnerable, he said, so are America Online's keyword system, Prodigy's "Jump" words, and CompuServe's "Go" words, which all use keywords to access content. Bostin disagreed.
"First of all," he said, "the US Patent and Trademark Office considered all prior art when evaluating our patent and after so doing, granted it," Bostin said. "Keyword systems that exist were prior art and deemed not to be in conflict." Furthermore, one would expect a company in Centraal's position to claim the patent is too broad, Bostin said. "There's no appropriate response when a competitor has a patent on a technology."
Teare raised the possibility that Netword may have planned the patent strategy from the beginning, never intending a commercial roll-out as his company has already begun to do.
"Netword isn't a lot more than its patents," he said. "It doesn't have a business model." Not surprisingly, Bostin disagreed again.
"That is absolutely, positively without merit," he said. "We made a high-profile deal with Progressive Networks [now Real Networks] in July of last year. We have previously announced more than 50 Fortune 1000 clients."
These clients pay US$5 per month per word to keep their keywords registered in Netword's database, he said. "We've had lots of press coverage and an evolving strategy to have an even more end-user strategy." That strategy focuses on letting individuals register keywords for non-commercial use free of charge.
"It was our strategy to assume we would not get the patent from the very start," he said. It would have been stupid to do otherwise, he said. "Again, that's the sort of response I would give if I were in [Centraal's] shoes.
He says there are "nondisclosure discussions going on with really big-name Internet companies. I can't comment on them, but expect that the patent will contribute positively to their outcome."
Netword was founded in 1996 but filed its patent application before that, in November 1995. "We made publicly available an inital version of our technology as early as May of last year -- about 10 months before Centraal," Bostin said.
Centraal's Teare remains unconcerned for now.
"It's our belief that legal claims aren't going to decide this space," he said. "Much more important is the technology that gets to a larger number of users."
In that race, he believes his company's technology is well ahead.
