At the Ocean Tomo live auction last week, US Patent 6618593 sold for $2.6 million to an anonymous buyer making it a record for the purchase of a patent in a live auction.
Billed as a patent to bridge the online into the real world, the patent’s main claim covers the use of mobile location information in conjunction with online information. This is a broad application which provide a location-based boost to gaming as well as networking sites like MySpace or upstart mobile IM players like Twitter.
As an example, one of the patent’s independent claims:
4. A system for matching users of mobile communications devices comprising:
a first mobile communications device for transmitting information defining a location of the first mobile communications device and a user receiving status;
a second mobile communications device for transmitting information defining a location of the second mobile communications device; and
a central unit having a processor coupled to a memory, the central unit capable of communicating with the first mobile communications device over a first wireless communications link and with the second mobile communications device over a second wireless communications link, the memory storing a first user profile including information associated with a user of the first mobile communications device and a second user profile including information associated with a user of the second mobile communications device, wherein the central unit receives the user receiving status from the first mobile communications device and the information defining the locations of the first and the second mobile communications devices and wherein the processor receives the first and the second user profiles to match information of the users and, if there is a match and depending upon the user receiving status, effects the transmission to the first mobile communications device of locating information based upon the information defining the locations of the first and the second mobile communications devices.
In scanning related technologies, this looks to be an early invention adopting the incorporation of multiple mobile users connected to an online network using location based information.
With so much money being paid, the planned adoption of such a user is likely very soon to come by a major player in networking or gaming.
Update: Here’s the link to the Ocean Tomo announcement of results and what GPSBusinessNews reported. Apologies for the technical glitch.