Networked personal contact manager

{
  "publication_number": "US6269369B1",
  "country": "US",
  "kind": "B1",
  "title": "Networked personal contact manager",
  "abstract": "A network-computer-based personal contact manager system is disclosed wherein users of networked clients maintain and update a set of user information which is stored in a relational database on a networked server. The personal contact manager system allows each user to specify on an individual basis which of their contacts are permitted to access respective datums of their user information. In some cases, and assuming permission is granted, the system will issue notifications (e.g., by e-mail) to a user's contacts when the user changes his information or when a preset event, such as a birthday, as defined by the user, is to occur. The system also allows users to find contacts based on common group affiliations and notifies users when there are coincidences in their data (e.g., travel plans, astrological compatibility). The personal contact manager system supports the retrieval of information on the contacts of contacts, assuming such as permission has been granted by the contacts and their contacts, and can also be used to synchronize the server database with a PIM database of the user and any contacts of the user whoe have the appropriate permissions.",
  "claims": [
    "1. A networked contact management system, comprising: a database which contains personal records of multiple users, each record including multiple fields, including fields for storing personal contact information; and contact manager software which provides restricted access to the database through an interface in which (1) users select other users from the database to include in their own, respective virtual personal address books without the need to enter information for such users, (2) if a first user selects a second user to include in the first user's virtual personal address book, the second user is provided an option to specify the types of information of the second user's personal record to be viewable by the first user, (3) users directly update their own respective personal records within the database, and (4) the personal records stored within the database are at least partially viewable as virtual address book entries, so that updates made by users to their own respective personal records are reflected automatically within the virtual personal address books of other users without the need to propagate or separately apply the updates to individual address books.",
    "2. The networked contact management system as in claim 1, wherein the interface further provides the second user an option to grant permission to the first user to be notified of at least one type of occasion.",
    "3. The networked contact management system as in claim 2, wherein the at least one type of occasion includes at least one of the following: (a) a birthday of the second user, (b) an anniversary of the second user, and (c) a correspondence in schedules of the first and second users.",
    "4. The networked contact management system as in claim 1, wherein the database contains information about a plurality of affinity groups, and the contact manager software implements functions for (a) allowing the multiple users to select and join individual affinity groups, (b) notifying a new member of an affinity group of existing members of the affinity group, and (c) presenting the new member an option to select individual members of the affinity group to add to the new member's personal address book.",
    "5. The networked contact management system as in claim 4, wherein the contact manager software automatically notifies existing members of the affinity group of new members.",
    "6. The networked contact management system as in claim 1, wherein the contact manager software receives and stores information about travel plans of individual users, and uses the information about travel plans to detect that a user and a contact of the user will be in the same location at the same time.",
    "7. The networked contact management system as in claim 1, wherein the contact manager software automatically notifies the first user when the second user modifies a datum of the second user's personal record that the first user is permitted to view.",
    "8. The networked contact management system as in claim 1, further comprising synchronization software which synchronizes a personal digital assistant (PDA) device with a user's virtual personal address book over a computer network.",
    "9. A networked personal contact management system, comprising: a database which contains personal data records of a plurality of users, at least some of the data records including contact information of respective users; and a server system which provides restricted access to the database through an interface that provides functions for each user to at least (a) directly modify the user's own repective personal data record within the database, (b) select other users from the database to add to a virtual personal address book of the user, and (c) specify, on a user-by-user basis, permissions for other users to view the personal data record of the user through virtual virtual personal address books of such other users; wherein users directly view the data records of other users through the virtual address books according to said permissions, so that updates by users to their own respective personal records are reflected automatically within the virtual personal address books of other users.",
    "10. The networked personal contact management system as in claim 9, wherein the interface allows each user to grant said permissions separately for each of a plurality of data types.",
    "11. The networked personal contact management system as in claim 9, wherein the server system notifies the user of at least one of the following types of occasions associated with a contact of the user: (a) a birthday of the contact, (b) an anniversary of the contact, and (c) a correspondence in schedules of the user and the contact.",
    "12. The networked personal contact management system as in claim 9, wherein the database contains information about a plurality of affinity groups, and the server system implements functions for (a) allowing the plurality of users to select and join individual affinity groups, (b) notifying a new member of an affinity group of existing members of the affinity group, and (c) presenting the new member an option to select individual members of the affinity group to add to the new member's virtual personal address book.",
    "13. The networked personal contact management system as in claim 12, wherein the server system automatically notifies existing members of the affinity group of new members.",
    "14. The networked personal contact management system as in claim 9, wherein the server system receives and stores information about travel plans of individual users, and uses the travel plans to detect that the user and a contact of the user will cross paths.",
    "15. The networked personal contact management system as in claim 9, wherein the server system automatically notifies the user when contacts recorded within the user's virtual personal address book modify their respective contact information displayed within the virtual personal address book.",
    "16. The networked personal contact management system as in claim 9, further comprising synchronization software which sychronizes a personal digital assistant (PDA) device with a user's virtual personal address book over a computer network."
  ],
  "description_excerpt": "The present invention relates generally to computer software used to manage contact information - such as mailing addresses, e-mail addresses, phone numbers, and birthdays - and more specifically to a method of creating links between members over a network and providing information to each member based on levels of permission maintained by the other members to which they are linked.\n\nSeveral types of prior art for managing contact information exist, including Personal Information Management software applications, Groupware Applications, and Internet-based “White Pages” and e-mail services.\n\nPersonal Information Management Software\n\nAs represented generally in FIG. 1, in a typical prior art Personal Information Management (PIM) software application (e.g., Lotus Organizer, Microsoft Outlook, or U.S. Robotics Palm Pilot), a PIM software application 120, 124 that stores contact information in a database resides on a workstation or handheld computer 100 having a central processing unit 102, a display 108, a keyboard and/or mouse 110, a primary memory 104 (e.g., random access memory) for program execution, a secondary memory 106 (e.g., a hard disc) for program storage, and peripheral devices 112. As is well known, programs, such as the PIM software 120, are executed in the RAM 104 by the CPU 102 under control of the operating system software 122, 126.\n\nIn the prior art, users themselves enter the contact information that they want to store in the PIM software. A variety of methods exist for entering this contact information.",
  "cpc": [
    "H04L 63/0227",
    "G06Q 10/02",
    "G06Q 10/025",
    "G06Q 10/063",
    "G06Q 10/0631",
    "G06Q 10/10",
    "G06Q 10/1093",
    "G06Q 10/40",
    "G06Q 10/42",
    "G06Q 10/48",
    "G08B 2001/085",
    "H04L 61/00",
    "H04L 63/0263",
    "H04L 63/102",
    "H04L 67/306",
    "H04L 67/54",
    "H04L 69/16",
    "H04L 69/329",
    "H04M 3/42008",
    "Y10S 707/99931",
    "Y10S 707/99945",
    "Y10S 707/99952"
  ],
  "ipc": [
    "G06Q 10/02",
    "G06Q 10/06",
    "G06Q 10/10",
    "G06Q 50/00",
    "H04L 29/06",
    "H04L 29/08",
    "H04L 29/12",
    "H04L 9/32",
    "H04M 3/42"
  ],
  "assignees": [
    "Amazon.com Holdings LLC"
  ],
  "inventors": [
    "Brian D. Robertson"
  ],
  "filing_date": "1997-11-02",
  "publication_date": "2001-07-31",
  "grant_date": "2001-07-31",
  "priority_date": "1997-11-02",
  "application_number": "US-96299797-A",
  "family_id": "25506606",
  "cited_by_count": 1605,
  "citations": [
    "US5133075A",
    "US5539813A",
    "US5835087A",
    "US5831611A",
    "US5794210A",
    "US5737726A",
    "US5796395A",
    "US5918227A"
  ]
}