I don't know what's so surprising or hard to imagine about any of this. First of all, as the article says, there are already plenty of examples of sites available only for a fee. And secondly, we have had for about a century a global network that required payment for use. It's called the telephone network. If businesses which use the web or FTP sites think it's to their advantage to go to such a model, it will merely make Internet users behave more like telephone users. It's hard to believe that would make a lot of sense to these businesses, but it's up to them. The fact seems to be, though, that it's the telephone companies trending to more of a fixed fee service. That can either mean that pay-per-use Internet will not happen in a big way, or it could mean that telephony and Internet are converging to a middle ground business model. I tend to believe the former. Bert > PATENTS > > Internet Patent Claims Stir Concern > > By TERESA RIORDAN > August 16, 2004 > > IMAGINE being able to set up a tollbooth on the Internet. Now imagine > collecting a small fee every time anyone in the United States clicked > on the Web to watch a video of a car advertisement, to listen to an > audio clip of a garage band or to review an updated credit card > statement. > > Sound far-fetched? Acacia Research Corporation, an obscure but > well-financed company in Newport Beach, Calif., has a portfolio of > patents that, it claims, allows it to do exactly that. > > Acacia holds five patents covering streaming video and audio. The > earliest one, numbered 5,132,992, was issued in 1992. > > In 2002, the company began sending out letters demanding licensing > fees, largely from the lucrative online pornography industry. But of > late, it has stepped up pressure on financial and educational > institutions and news organizations, including The New York Times > Company, which has received a letter from Acacia relating to its > corporate Web site. In June, Acacia sued nine cable and satellite > companies, including Comcast, DirecTV and EchoStar Communications. In > late July, it sent out more letters demanding licensing fees from > educational organizations that offer Web-based classes. > > ... > > http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/16/technology/16patent.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways: - Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at FreeLists.org - By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word unsubscribe in the subject line.