this patent stuff has gone rather too far

[David Farber <farber@central.cis.upenn.edu>]

>>LAS VEGAS, NEVADA, U.S.A., 1993 NOV 17 (NB) -- Does anyone own
>>multimedia? Compton's New Media, a wholly owned subsidiary of Tribune
>>Publishing, claims it does and it has the patent to prove it.
>>
>>According to the company, anyone selling information in a  multimedia
>>format will need to pay license fees to Compton's no  matter what the
>>device used to distribute multimedia. Company  officials say interactive
>>television services like those announced  by Time Warner and GTE,
>>graphical on-line services such as  America Online and Prodigy, and
>>compact disc read-only memory  (CD-ROM) title developers will all be
>>obligated to pay or face  legal action.
>>
>>The US Patent Number is 5,241,671 titled: "Multimedia Search System
>>Using A Plurality Of Entry Path Means Which Indicate Inter-relatedness
>>Of Information." The patent was issued on August 31, 1993, and describes
>>the technology as: "A database search system that retrieves multimedia
>>information  in a flexible, user friendly system. The search system uses
>>a multimedia database consisting of text, picture, audio, and animated
>>data. That database is searched through multiple graphical and textual
>>entry paths."
>>
>
>***
>>
>
>>Four ways were enumerated for the licensing: one percent of the  net
>>profits, rising to three percent for those who do not comply  by June
>>30, 1994; a strategic licensing agreement; distribution  of multimedia
>>information which it will buy for resale at a 65 percent discount; or
>>purchase of a Compton's tool set for title development with accompanying
>>run-time fees for distribution.