The patent, issued in September, grants AOL's instant messaging subsidiary ICQ broad ownership rights to the technology, which enables users to chat quickly and cheaply across the Internet.
The broad wording of the patent means AOL could get an important legal leg up on rivals Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo, the other players in the potentially lucrative instant messaging (IM) arena that have their own proprietary technologies.
I always wondered why AOL bought ICQ after they'd all ready had AOL Messenger out for a while. This explains it. Did you know that AOL also owns the patents for cookies and SSL (used in most secure online transactions such as shopping)? Currently AOL doesn't enforce these patents. It doesn't mean they can't though. The WWW could become a very different place if they decide to.
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