Worlds.com Hires IP Firm for Licensing: To Begin Contacting Virtual World Companies "Shortly"

Worlds.com and General Patent Corporation announced today that they had selected intellectual property law firm Lerner David Littenberg Krumholz & Mentlik LLP (LDLKM) to enforce Worlds' patents.  Together the two patents currently owned by Worlds  describe what sounds like the underpinnings for a wide range of client/server-based 3D virtual worlds, according to the company, if not pretty much all of them. While GPC Chairman and CEO Alexander Poltorak told me that the companies don't have any specific targets in mind, products from Second Life to World of Warcraft could be affected.

"It's a system of managing avatars in virtual worlds," explained Poltorak. "For whoever is working and developing virtual worlds, it's very relevant."

Worlds owns U.S. Patent Nos. 6,219,045 titled "Scalable Virtual World Chat Client-Server System"  and 7,181,690 titled "System and Method for Enabling Users to Interact in a Virtual Space."

Together the claims describe systems for tracking the spatial relationships of avatars and objects in client/server systems and managing their interactions as well as how many can be displayed at any given time.

The patents prompted Sean F. Kane of Drakeford & Kane LLC to blog this morning asking, "Does Worlds.com Hold the Patent for the Virtual World?"

When asked for his thoughts on the announcement, Kane explained, with the caveat that he is not a patent attorney, that "given how broad the patents are, they can make claims against a lot of virtual worlds and MMO people. Given the tenor of the announcement, it would seem to me that their intent is either to make claims or to file actions against those they consider infringing."

Poltorak said that the company would "very shortly be contacting various players in the virtual worlds community" to offer licensing opportunities.

"We are looking at various products and evaluating various technologies," he explained. "Our immediate objective is to make these patents available, and we hope that the industry will recognize that Worlds.com has been a pioneer in developing this technology since 1994 and 1995."

GPC is currently prosecuting other patents through the application process that it says are continuations of the original patents for the same technology.

Several IP lawyers declined to comment on the validity of the patents or on whom they might be applied to, though it seems safe to say that we'll be hearing about more activity soon.

"They are aggressive and they attempt to protect their clients rights based on a licensing agreement or litigation," Kane said of GPC. "To the extent that they've hired a firm with extensive and successful litigation history, it would point to litigation.  It's difficult to say where this is going to go out at the moment, but it'll be very interesting to watch. It could very well be a watershed moment.

Comments

[chris]

Pioneers, yes.
I suggest before the "blogger pundits" begin the blog rants and suggest their Second Life/VR evangelist expertise on what this means and request us all to pay for this "knowledge" at another conference...

Google- "Comptons- "Multimedia patents"

http://vr.albury.net.au/~kathyw/EyePics/compton.html

There's a pretty good chance that this will be the same game,with the same results.

We should welcome Worlds.com back into the fray, but this way seems.. well.. you decide.

[nw]

After having read both of the patents involved, I would be surprised if they hold much merit. I would imagine that under greater scrutiny, prior art would tend to negate their validity. For example, muds have used this method for some time prior to Worlds Chat ever coming about. Although the patents tend to suggest a separation between client and server processes, it can be argued that in a multi-threaded mud, such an architecture already had existed, though perhaps not formalized.

Now, when applied towards existing virtual worlds such as Second Life, the architectural definition within the patents seem to be too limited in scope such that SL does not appear to violate the patents. The defined separation between client and server could be shown such that the actions or functions processed by the client are, in Second Life, actually processed by the server.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the real world, but I think that the patents are firstly, improper, and secondly, too limited in scope to be applicable. We'll see.

[Randy Farmer]

[[Cross Posted from Terra Nova]]

Heh. Turns out this kind of thing is now going on in Europe and Asia with other attempts to enforce virtual world patents filed since the mid to late 1990s.

For the record and posterity, as a pioneer of many of the technologies in the late 80's and early 90s and concepts underlying such claims, I am available as a professional expert witness. In the last year, I have worked on several cases surrounding bogus virtual world patent claims. Most you haven't heard of, because we overwhelm them with prior-art and they die long before trial.

Ask Will Harvey (IMVU) how Forterra tried to shake him down by asserting that they had a patent on the 3D-word balloon in virtual worlds. I had fun providing the prior art for that one! If he'd lost, I'm 100% sure that Blizzard was next in line. [I should really write a blog post up about this one - Will, if you're reading this, drop me a line with the latest status.] As it is, your word balloons are safe. :-)

I've also referred other lame claims off to other pioneers/Terra Nova regulars, such as Brian Green.

Just today I faxed/couriered a witness statement in an international case that's so dumb it makes my head hurt.

Here's the deal - much of the stuff people patented starting in the late 1990s was previously created and not patented because we didn't think you *could* patent software. Lucky thing for virtual worlds this is true.

Patent trolls aren't going to get away with claiming *my* virtual world prior art! I'm a pack rat. I have stuff you didn't even know existed, and I know where I put it. :-)

Randy

[Geof Lambert]

Good info Randy, thanks for your wisdom, insights and diligent archiving. I would like to catch up with you sometime.

I just sent you a Linkedin message. You can look me up there.

Geof Lambert

[Dave]

I founded Worlds Inc. While I like the folks who bought the Worlds Chat piece of Worlds Inc, as has been mentioned there is a ton of prior art, and I too have many unpublished docs as you'd expect. Folks like Mr. Farmer and myself worked hard to ensure that Vworlds would not need to fight a thicket of impediments.

[Pac]

The funny thing about this patent is it does not define Virtual World or Massively Multiplayer.

(Doom 1993) is a virtual multiplayer world where "neighbors" can see other avatars, attempt to kill them and taunt them via text chat. Because this patent is so broad I'm sure that counts as prior art.

[Ramenth]

The patent they're using for the law suits, issued in 2007, does have valid complaints. Unfortunately, it extends the 1994 patent, which does not.

Read the '94 patent; it relates pretty much only to the ability for a server to determine the maximum number of avatars visible to a player.

That's not a core ability in MMO's. Or DOOM.

Hells, that's not even a tangential ability. If it was, people with bad video cards would lag far less.