Facebook Wins Real-Time Update Patent
Facebook has won its fight for a U.S. patent on news feeds behind the kinds of real-time updates that make social-networking websites popular amongst users.
“The launch of News Feed in 2006 was a pivotal moment in Facebook’s history and changed the way millions of people consumed and discovered information on the site,” Facebook said Friday in an email response to an AFP inquiry.
“We’re humbled by the growth and adoption of News Feed over time and pleased with being awarded the patent.”
The patent summarizes the “invention” as a “method for displaying a news feed in a social network environment.”
The first method was described as including comments and links posted by users for sharing with members of the social network community.
This concept is a big blow to Twitter, which allows people to share thoughts through microblogging at any point during the day via text messaging.
Kevin Weil, which is apart of the Twitter analytics team, said that users of the service are creating 50 million of messages per day.
Twitter fans have been using the service to blog their thoughts on the patent that was awarded to Facebook co-founder Mark Zuckerberg.
“This is stupid!!!” Twitter user A_Kim83 commented in a growing mountain of tweets on the topic Friday. “Screw you Facebook if you start strong arming other sites.”
According to analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group in Silicon Valley, the patent gives Facebook a potential weapon to fend off competitors on an Internet battlefield where social networking is a hot topic.
“It is not just Facebook taking on Twitter,” Enderle said. “It is taking on MySpace or any other social networking service. You might even argue it is a defensive move against Google.”
Google added a Buzz social networking feature to its free email service Gmail earlier this month.
The Buzz service lets users get updates about what friends are doing online and offers ways to share video, photos and other digitized snippets in a way to combat sites like Facebook and Twitter.
Buzz has been under privacy concerns because the service automatically generates social networks for users based on their Gmail contacts.
“Buzz is a train wreck, but it was enough to scare a bunch of these guys half to death because it showed Google getting into their space,” Enderle said.
“Facebook is probably more concerned about Google than Twitter and MySpace combined and squared. Any time a 600 pound gorilla enters your room you are pulling out your heavy weapons.”
According to the analyst, Facebook is in a position to deny others permission to use its invention or license the technology.
“It is transformational for Facebook and indicates that they have a big desire to own their customers,” Enderle told AFP.
The patent might be challenged, causing Facebook to have to prove that it is valid and that the news sharing covered was not being done elsewhere on the Internet prior to the time it was filed in 2006.
“This isn’t about who won the Olympic gold yesterday; this is for sharing what happened to me as well,” said Michael Barclay, a California patent attorney and a fellow at the Electronic Frontier Foundation.
“That is pretty broad. I would not be surprised if someone had been doing just what is in this patent before 2006.”
“You have to study the claims of this very carefully,” Barclay said of the patent. “The first part is validity, is the patent any good. My reaction is maybe this patent isn’t any good.”
—
On the Net: