Patent Troll Takes Aim At iDating Industry

OPW - Jan 6 - Recruit Me, LLC is taking aim at a slew of Internet dating companies in a series of patent suits. The defendants are accused of infringing on U.S. Patent No. 5,623,660 issued April, 1997. A "System for Regulating Access to Data Base for Purposes of Data Base Management." Recruit Me is asking for an injunction and damages, interest and court costs. 

Happy New Year and thanks to Recruit Me, patent suits just landed on the desks of:

• Catholic Match
• Chameleon Internet Group (PinkWink)
• Couchsurfing
• Global Personals (Fling)
• Here Media (Gay.com & PlanetOut)
• Meetme
• Next C (Mingle2)
• Real Cafes (ChristianCafe)
• Successful Match
• World Singles (IranianPersonals.com)

While these companies were lucky enough to be singled out earlier in the year, in July, 2013.

• Avid Life Media
• DMS Network (DateMySchool)
• IAC / Match
• InfoStream Group (Carrot Dating app)
• PlentyofFish
• Zoosk

Recruit Me is represented by Ni, Wang & Associates in Dallas. A jury trial is requested. 

Comments

[TrollFighter]

Support the Innovation Act in the Senate to stop Patent Trolls here: https://action.eff.org/o/9042/p/dia/action3/common/public/?action_KEY=9416

[Jonathan Harrison]

It seems to me this patent is effectively for what we now describe as an "online marketplace". It appears to describe the invention as a database where potential buyers and sellers connect, to generate "leads". This could apply to any online marketplace: classifieds sites such as Seek, Amazon, eBay, HomeAway, Gum Tree; online dating, where the lead is a romantic interest; Community forums connecting likeminded people who may ; almost any web application you can think of.

This makes it so generic, that it's like patenting the invention of "Putting words on a medium, paper or otherwise, to communicate with other people"!

The only think I don't understand is how it stands up when it's so generic, and how "eHarmony and Match and Date were sued first. They were successful in getting the patent refined and limited. It still stands, they settled for negotiated annual licensing fees" as described by Mark Brookes.

It's describing what has become a foundational hygiene factor of the internet.