an answer What the AOL IM patent really covers

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "Faisal N. Jawdat" <faisal () faisal com>
Date: Fri, 20 Dec 2002 01:27:27 -0800
To: dave () farber net, johnl () iecc com
Subject: Re: [IP] What the AOL IM patent really covers

> The application was filed on Jan 27, 1997, so the priority date would
> be Jan 27, 1996.  Was anyone using an IM system with permanent user
> names and a buddy list server before that?  The systems I used either
> used terminal names (TOPS-10 and Unix "talk") or per-session handles
> (IRC).

    Zephyr, written at MIT.  I was using a locally modified
    version on Carnegie Mellon's network in 1991.  We had
    central servers, permanent user names (your userid,
    which was system wide and authenticated via kerberos),
    and the equivalent of buddy lists (with notification)
    via the service.  The service was available on multiple
    platforms (unix tty, x windows, and on the mac).  The X
    client supported text formatting, and through the use of
    some spare fields in the protocol we were able to hack in
    something like file transfer (actually pointers to files
    on the local network, since we had AFS to use as a global
    file store) and a number of other capabilities (e.g. semi
    private discussion groups which automatically changed
    location on a regular basis, etc.)

    Zephyr had some capabilities that AIM still lacks, such
    as "instances", which are to to chat rooms as mailing
    lists are to bulletin boards:  you'd send a message to
    an instance and everyone subscribed would get a copy
    of the message (without having ot have a dedicated
    chat room window open).

    Feel free to forward the above to IP.

    Dr, Farber - you should have access at CMU.  If you'd
    like to test it out, let me know and I'll see if I can
    find time during the day tomorrow to demo it for you
    (I still have an account with access).

    -faisal


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