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:
Dec. 09, 2003
Filed:
Mar. 28, 2001
Henry Kaufman, Cambridge, MA (US);
Tinsley A. Galyean, III, Cambridge, MA (US);
Bruce D. Wyman, Jr., Belmont, MA (US);
Nearlife, Cambridge, MA (US);
Abstract
A message generated by an originator participant is entered into a “bottle” that passes the message from participant to participant. The bottle may be a hand-held device that is capable of directly communicating with another such device. When the originator is located close enough to another participant who also has such a hand-held device, the devices communicate and the message is passed from the originator to the other participant. The bottle may be a hand-held device that is capable of communicating with a central base station, such as a pager or cell phone or a computer that communicates with the base station via the Internet. When the originator enters a message into the device, a program at the base station selects a participant from the list to receive the message and the message is sent to the other participant. The selection of a participant to receive a message can be random, based on geographical areas, virtual geographic areas or other criteria such as whether the hand-held device is activated when an attempt is made to transfer a message.