Did You Know...
...that after Parker Brothers executives turned down the game of Monopoly because it had "52 fundamental errors" (including taking too long to play), a copy of the game wound up in the home of the company president who stayed up until 1 a.m. to finish playing it? He was so impressed by the game that the next day he wrote to inventor Charles Darrow and offered to buy it!
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 8082311 | Authentication of electronic data Systems and techniques for transmitting electronic data by receiving, at a communications system host, electronic data transmitted from a sender and addressed to an intended recipient; authenticating the electronic data based on attributes of the electronic data and... | 12/20/2011 |
| 7929976 | Communicating forwarding information for a communications device based on detected physical location Detecting a physical location change of a mobile communications device may initiate a process to initiate, or cancel, forwarding of future incoming communications to the mobile communications device. Forwarding information for a mobile communications device may be a... | 04/19/2011 |
| 7822703 | Automatic verification of a user A system and method are described for verifying a user. More specifically, a user contacts a goods or service provider and gives that provider information about himself or herself in order to register for receipt of goods or services. The provider then uses this inf... | 10/26/2010 |
| 7769811 | Instant messaging sound control Controlling the volume of an audible alert associated with an instant messaging communications session includes rendering, on a first instant messaging user system, an instant messaging application user interface for an instant messaging communications session invol... | 08/03/2010 |
| 7725587 | Deep packet scan hacker identification Securing an accessible computer system typically includes receiving a data packet that includes a payload portion and an attribute portion, where the data packet is communicated between at least one access requestor and at least one access provider. At least the pay... | 05/25/2010 |
| 7715655 | Image registration system Images may be registered using temporal (time-based) and spatial information. In a film implementation, because film is a sequence of frames, using information from neighboring frames may enable a temporally smoother visual experience. In addition, it may be benefic... | 05/11/2010 |
| 7707262 | Negotiating content controls Access to an electronic conference may be administered by receiving an electronic instruction configured to establish the electronic conference, enabling more than one user to generate content restrictions that limit content rendered during the electronic conference... | 04/27/2010 |
| 7689540 | Collaborative user query refinement A first query and a second query, both of which were submitted by a first user to identify information that satisfies a single information need of the first user, are received. The first query and the second query are stored in association with one another and based... | 03/30/2010 |
| 7689349 | Automatic determination of a surrogate origin for personalized routing A surrogate origin is substituted for a user-entered or system-determined origin, and maneuvers for a route from the surrogate origin to a destination are determined and presented to the user as driving directions. A surrogate origin may be pre-selected or pre-confi... | 03/30/2010 |
| 7689036 | Correction of blotches in component images Blotches may be identified and processed to reduce or eliminate the blotch. The blotch may be in just one of several separations and multiple separations may be used, for example, to identify the blotch. An implementation (i) compares a first component image of an i... | 03/30/2010 |
| 7672541 | Registration of separations Separations or images relating to film or other fields may be registered using a variety of features, such as, for example: (1) correcting one or more film distortions; (2) automatically determining a transformation to reduce a film distortion; (3) applying multiple... | 03/02/2010 |
| 7669213 | Dynamic identification of other viewers of a television program to an online viewer Informing a viewer of a television program of the identity of other online identities that represent users concurrently viewing that same television program includes determining dynamically a first television program to which a television viewing device associated w... | 02/23/2010 |
| 7668775 | Calendar overlays Implementing an electronic calendar can include accessing a first electronic calendar owned by a first party, accessing a second electronic calendar owned by a second party, and presenting a view that combines at least one existing entry from within each of the firs... | 02/23/2010 |
| 7664767 | System and method for geographically organizing and classifying businesses on the world-wide web A method and search engine for classifying a source publishing a document on a portion of a network, includes steps of electronically receiving a document, based on the document, determining a source which published the document, and assigning a code to the document... | 02/16/2010 |
| 7664673 | Smart transfer A first sales pitch appropriate for a particular telephone caller of a telephone call center may be selected by receiving a call from a caller to the telephone call center, accessing information about the caller including an indication of past misbehavior or a sales... | 02/16/2010 |
| 7660784 | Geographically resolving a keyword query Generating a keyword resolution includes receiving one or more keywords from a requestor and determining a geographic location to be associated with a resolution of at least one of the keywords against electronic information within at least one electronic informatio... | 02/09/2010 |
| 7653693 | Method and system for capturing instant messages Managing instant messages may include receiving instant messages created by or on behalf of one or more message sources for delivery to an intended recipient. From among the received instant messages, qualifying instant messages may be identified that satisfy a capt... | 01/26/2010 |
| 7653379 | Configuring wireless devices Techniques are provided for the configuration of a home-networking system. Home-networking configuration information may be stored on a host system in a manner accessible to the home-networking system and migrated to a home-networking gateway or router that has not ... | 01/26/2010 |
| 7650383 | Electronic message system with federation of trusted senders Systems and methods for allowing challenge messages to be sent directly to a recipient's inbox where normally the challenge message would be sent to a pending folder or deleted. Challenge messages sent between federated messaging services contain a federated token w... | 01/19/2010 |
| 7647381 | Federated challenge credit system Systems and methods for reducing the number of challenge messages that are sent in response to an incoming message in situations where the incoming message is likely not unsolicited. The systems and methods include evaluating the behavior of a sender with regard to ... | 01/12/2010 |
| 7647375 | Enabling mapping identification of online identities between different messaging services A method and system for populating identities in a message service involves registering a user of a first messaging service with a second messaging service. User identities for users other than the registered user may be identified. These user identities may be asso... | 01/12/2010 |
| 7644166 | Source audio identifiers for digital communications Audibly informing a recipient of an arrival of a digital communication from a sender includes receiving a digital communication from a sender directed to a recipient and determining whether the digital communication is associated with an audio identifier that identi... | 01/05/2010 |
| 7640336 | Supervising user interaction with online services A report card provides a supervisor or master account holder (e.g., a parent) with information about the activities of an individual or sub-account user (e.g., a child). For example, the report card may include a list of sites (e.g., content identifiers and/or unifo... | 12/29/2009 |
| 7640306 | Reconfiguring an electronic message to effect an enhanced notification An electronic message may be reconfigured to effect an enhanced notification using an input interface to receive at least one electronic message created by or on behalf of a message source for delivery to an intended recipient. A matching engine determines whether t... | 12/29/2009 |
| 7640232 | Search enhancement system with information from a selected source The system and method comprises enhancement of results for a search engine, wherein the results from the search engine are refined or reorganized, based upon information from an identified secondary source. The results obtained using a conventional search are compar... | 12/29/2009 |
| 7639740 | Film resource manager Post-production processing may be performed by receiving a film-processing order, determining a process useful in fulfilling film-processing order, identifying one or more resources available to perform the process useful in fulfilling the film-processing order, and... | 12/29/2009 |
| 7636777 | Restricting access to requested resources Access to network information may be restricted based on a classification of the network information. When a request for network information is received, a classification of the network information is determined. The network information may be classified as static o... | 12/22/2009 |
| 7636755 | Multiple avatar personalities Perception of multiple online personas is enabled in an instant messaging communications session. At least two identities within a communications environment to whom messages may be directed are identified. A first persona of a user is enabled to be projected to a f... | 12/22/2009 |
| 7636751 | Multiple personalities A computer implemented method enables perception of multiple online personas in an instant messaging communications session by identifying at least two identities within a communications environment to whom messages may be directed, and by enabling a first persona o... | 12/22/2009 |
| 7627635 | Managing self-addressed electronic messages A system may include an electronic messaging system that may access user identifier information, which may be used to identify self-addressed electronic messages. The electronic messaging system may determine how to process an incoming electronic message using at le... | 12/01/2009 |
| 7624416 | Identifying events of interest within video content Instant messages sent by a viewer of a video while the video is perceivable to the viewer may be monitored. An event of interest occurring in the video may be identified based on the monitored instant messages. Metadata that describes the event of interest may be ge... | 11/24/2009 |
| 7624172 | State change alerts mechanism A communications system including one or more alert gates and an alert controller. Each alert gate is configured to detect a different type of alert feed corresponding to a particular kind of alert. The alert controller is connected to the alert gates and operable t... | 11/24/2009 |
| 7624103 | Culturally relevant search results Search results may be provided to a user. A search query may be received from the user. A query feature vector may be formed for the search query. The query feature vector may be compared with news feature vectors associated with documents related to current events.... | 11/24/2009 |
| 7620691 | Filtering electronic messages while permitting delivery of solicited electronics messages Systems and methods for delivering solicited electronic messages to a client. Senders of electronic messages become authorized senders and electronic messages from the authorized senders are delivered to the intended recipients. Electronic messages from unauthorized... | 11/17/2009 |
| 7620363 | Proximity synchronization of audio content among multiple playback and storage devices A wireless communication system and in particular to a wireless communication system for digital audio players that provides for increased functionality, such as communication, interaction and synchronization between a computing platform and various mobile, portable... | 11/17/2009 |
| 7617458 | Managing navigation and history information History and navigation information in a computer application are managed by establishing a global context that can communicate with multiple resources, each of which resides in an associated local context. State information from one or more of the local contexts is ... | 11/10/2009 |
| 7617286 | Sorting electronic messages using attributes of the sender address Systems and methods for sorting electronic messages using attributes of senders or of sender addresses. An electronic messaging server sorts electronic messages using attributes associated with the senders or sender addresses of the electronic messages. The sender a... | 11/10/2009 |
| 7613779 | Self-policing, rate limiting online forums A method and means for self-policing and automatically rate-limiting multiple-user online forums. The preferred embodiment of the invention includes a set of rules that permit users to censure other users. A censured user has one or more “privileges” (which may ... | 11/03/2009 |
| 7613776 | Identifying and using identities deemed to be known to a user The people a user is presumed to know or be associated with may be determined using a number of techniques. This information about people that the user knows is used in relation to the user's communications. For example, a display of e-mail may only show the user e-... | 11/03/2009 |
| 7613690 | Real time query trends with multi-document summarization A list of “hot topics” may be provided to a user to indicate information that is currently popular. A topic may be deemed popular when a large number of search queries related to the topic are entered by users. A search system may receive and analyze an electron... | 11/03/2009 |
