The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jan. 18, 2000
Filed:
Aug. 28, 1996
John K Arnold, Kent, WA (US);
John R Bennett, Seattle, WA (US);
Peter O Claar, Seattle, WA (US);
Kurt D Dahl, Seattle, WA (US);
Jennifer L Dobson, Seattle, WA (US);
Charles A Fontaine, Seattle, WA (US);
Philip H Johanson, Seattle, WA (US);
Donald G McGuire, Mount Vernon, WA (US);
Mary Swanson, Edmonds, WA (US);
David G Wagner, Issaquah, WA (US);
Steve Wainright, Seattle, WA (US);
InfoSpace.com, Inc., Redmond, WA (US);
Abstract
A method for establishing and maintaining a virtual outlet ('VO') relationship on the Internet between an entity that controls and manages a Web site constituting a VO and a merchant that controls and manages a different Web site. The VO presents a series of VO Web pages to customers that contain descriptive information about products from one or more merchants. Customers can link through the VO Web pages directly to a merchant Web page provided to the customer computer by the merchant computer for the purpose of obtaining more detailed information about the product and for ordering the product. When the customer has finished ordering a product, the customer computer returns to a VO Web page. To the customer, it appears that the entire ordering process is conducted entirely within the VO Web pages. The merchant then credits the VO for the sale of the product to the customer, charges the purchase to the customer, and sends the ordered product to the customer.