US 5737619

I'll search for this specific patent number across USPTO and litigation sources.

Let me dig deeper on the litigation history and current status.

Let me check for any recent or 2026 Federal Circuit activity and confirm the litigation picture.

US Patent 5,737,619 — Summary

Bottom line up front: I found no Federal Circuit docket activity in 2026 (or any recent year) involving US 5,737,619. The patent is marked "Expired – Lifetime," with an anticipated expiration of 2015‑10‑19 (20 years from its 1995 priority date), so it is no longer assertable. Enforcement activity involving this patent is historical (roughly 2001–2008). I did not find any authoritative source tying 5,737,619 to a currently pending CAFC case in 2026.

Bibliographic data (from the authoritative full text)

Ownership chain (recorded reassignments): Judson (individual) → TechSearch, LLC (2004‑03‑02, exclusive license) → JS Technologies, LP (2004‑12‑15, assignment) → America Online, Inc. (2006‑01‑03) → InternetAd Systems LLC (2008‑05‑06, from AOL LLC).

⚠️ Uncertainty flag: The Google Patents page also lists 2018‑04‑11 reassignment entries involving "Those Characters From Cleveland, Inc.," "American Greetings Corporation," and a PNC Bank release by secured party. These look like security‑interest releases and are anomalous for this patent; I cannot verify their correctness and treat them as a likely data artifact rather than a genuine ownership transfer.

Abstract

A method and computer program product for WWW browsing using a client with a GUI and an Internet browser. The method locally stores, retrieves, and outputs information objects to reduce the waiting time normally associated with downloading hypertext documents containing high‑resolution graphics. As a web page with at least one link is displayed, and while the client waits for a reply and/or the linked document downloads, the browser displays a previously‑cached information object.

Plain‑language overview of the independent claims

There are four independent claims — 1, 7, 9, 10, and 12 (claims 2–6 depend from 1; 8 from 7; 11 from 10; 13 from 12). Note: that's five independents in a 13‑claim set.

• Claim 1 — Method (background download during an idle connection). A network, a client, and a browser. On a client request that opens a live connection, at least part of a first hypertext document is downloaded and shown; that document has a clickable graphic pointing to a second document. While part of the first document is displayed and the live connection is idle, an information object is downloaded as a background process. The object is stored but not displayed before the user acts on the clickable graphic. When the user does act, the object is retrieved and displayed as the browser links from the first to the second document.

• Claim 7 — Computer program product. A program product with: (a) means, operative while a live connection would otherwise be idle, for storing several information objects in memory — at least one being an advertisement carrying hypertext formatting so it renders as a Web page in the main window; and (b) means, responsive to selection of a displayed graphic, for retrieving one object for output as the browser links between documents.

• Claim 9 — Improvement claim. Framed as an improvement to a computer with a display window and browser: (a) means, operative while a live connection would otherwise be idle, for storing multiple information objects; (b) means responsive to a call from a first web page to a second for retrieving at least one object — an advertisement with associated hypertext formatting; and (c) means for outputting that object/advertisement on the display as the browser links from the first to the second web page.

• Claim 10 — "Pull/push" method. The client pulls a web page over a live connection; while that connection would otherwise be idle, information objects are pushed from the network to the client and stored; on a new client request, at least one stored object is retrieved and displayed as the client pulls the new page. (Claim 11 adds that the objects are advertisements.)

• Claim 12 — Interstitial advertisement method. An advertisement contains content formatted using multiple HTML tags. A first web page with a link is loaded and displayed, with the advertisement hidden from view. In response to activating the link, and while the client waits for a second page to begin loading, the advertisement is displayed as an interstitial web page between the two pages. (Claim 13: the advertisement stays up until the second page finishes downloading.)

Litigation / docket information found

• Judson v. Infonautics, Inc., No. 1:01‑cv‑10464 (D. Mass., filed 2001‑03‑19) — asserted patents included 5,737,619, 5,572,643, 6,185,586. (Stanford NPE Litigation Database)
• InternetAd Systems LLC v. Priceline.com — Texas N.D. case (3:05‑cv‑00604 per Google Patents); settled in 2005 with a licensing agreement covering an interstitial‑advertising patent portfolio. (L.A. Business Journal)
• InternetAd Systems, LLC v. Opodo Ltd., 481 F. Supp. 2d 596 (N.D. Tex. 2007) — a standing/"all substantial rights" dispute over the Judson patent licensing agreement (TechSearch exclusivity, reversion, right‑to‑sue provisions). (CourtListener)

⚠️ Data‑accuracy flags:

1. Google Patents lists an N.D. Ill. case 1:22‑cv‑04878 as involving this patent family. My searches indicate that docket number in the Northern District of Illinois corresponds to Lexos Media IP LLC v. ABT Electronics (cursor‑image patents, e.g., 6,118,449 / 6,433,780), not 5,737,619. I could not confirm the Illinois case actually involves 5,737,619, so treat that link as unverified.
2. I found no CAFC 2026 docket naming 5,737,619. Given the patent expired on 2015‑10‑19, an active 2026 appeal on this patent is unlikely; any recent references to the number appear only as citations/prior art (e.g., PTAB IPR exhibits and prosecution histories).

Overall uncertainty statement

The bibliographic details, abstract, claim texts, and ownership/expiration status above are taken from the authoritative patent text you supplied and are high confidence. The 2018 ownership entries and the 1:22‑cv‑04878 litigation link are the two items I cannot corroborate and would not rely on without checking USPTO Assignment records and PACER directly. I also cannot confirm, with high confidence, the existence of any 2026 CAFC docket for this patent; the evidence points to the patent being long expired and its enforcement history being confined to earlier proceedings.

I'll research litigation involving US patent 5737619. Let me search multiple sources.

Let me investigate the specific cases referenced and search more sources.

Litigation Report — U.S. Patent No. 5,737,619

Patent: U.S. 5,737,619 — "World wide web browsing with content delivery over an idle connection and interstitial content display"
Inventor: David Hugh Judson
Application: 08/708,795; filed 1996-09-09; priority 1995-10-19 (CIP of Ser. No. 08/543,876, now U.S. 5,572,643); granted 1998-04-07
Status: Expired – Lifetime (anticipated expiration 2015-10-19)
Assignment/enforcement chain: Judson (individual) → TechSearch, LLC (exclusive license, 2004-03-02) → JS Technologies, LP (2004-12-15) → America Online, Inc. (2006-01-03) → InternetAd Systems LLC (2008-05-06).

Below is what I could verify from the sources searched (Google Patents litigation metadata for US5737619; the Stanford NPE Litigation Database; court/re-exam dockets surfaced in search). I flag confidence levels because several litigation-data aggregators misattribute cases.

1. Cases I can positively identify as asserting the '619 patent

A. Judson v. Infonautics, Inc. — D. Mass., No. 1:01-cv-10464

• Plaintiff: David H. Judson (individual; categorized as a non-practicing entity in the Stanford NPE database)
• Defendant: Infonautics Corporation
• Jurisdiction/Venue: U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts
• Case No.: 1:01-cv-10464
• Filing date: March 19, 2001
• Patents asserted: U.S. 5,572,643; 5,722,067; 5,737,619; 6,157,823; 6,185,586
• Outcome/status: Terminated June 4, 2001 — approximately 2½ months after filing. No public merits decision (no claim construction, summary judgment, or trial) is reflected in the databases. Consistent with an early voluntary dismissal or settlement. Confidence: high on the case identity/patents; medium on the "settled/dismissed" characterization (inferred from the short docket life, not a documented order).

Source: Stanford NPE Litigation Database, case 120513 / patent page 5737619 — https://npe.law.stanford.edu/case/120513 and https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/5737619

B. N.D. Tex. case 3:05-cv-00604 (Dallas Division)

• The Google Patents page for US5737619 flags this as US litigation involving the patent ("US case filed in Texas Northern District Court… 3:05-cv-00604"), sourced from Unified Patents' litigation data.
• Jurisdiction: U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas (Dallas Division).
• Plaintiff/Defendant, filing date, and outcome: I could not verify. My searches did not return the party names or docket text. Given the assignment chronology, the plaintiff in a 2005 case would most plausibly be Judson, TechSearch, LLC, or JS Technologies, LP (the 2008 transfer to InternetAd Systems LLC post-dates this suit), but I did not confirm this and do not state it as fact.

Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US5737619/en (litigation section) and https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/patents/patent/US-5737619-A

2. Case listed by Google Patents that does NOT appear to involve the '619 patent

N.D. Ill. 1:22-cv-04878

• Google Patents lists "US case filed in Illinois Northern District Court, 1:22-cv-04878" under this patent's litigation.
• On searching that case number, it resolves to Lexos Media IP LLC v. ABT Electronics, Inc. (N.D. Ill., filed 09/09/2022, status Closed), which asserted U.S. 6,118,449 and 6,533,102 — the "cursor image" patents — not the '619 patent. The complaint analysis addresses cursor-modification/zoom functionality on abt.com and does not reference '619.
• Assessment: This is most likely a data-attribution error in the aggregated litigation dataset (the same five-digit docket suffix appears in unrelated districts/cases), rather than a genuine '619 assertion. I am flagging rather than asserting it. Confidence: medium-high that this is a misattribution; the underlying docket was not fully inspected.

Sources: https://ai-lab.exparte.com/case/dct/ilnd/1:22-cv-04878/lexos-media-ip-llc-v-abt-electronics-inc ; https://npe.law.stanford.edu/party/abt-electronics-inc

3. Possible/unverified additional matter

• A LexisNexis CourtLink docket extract appended to USPTO re-examination file history (ex parte reexam, control-type litigation-search report) references "INTERSTITIAL CONTENT DISPLAY, US PAT 5737619" alongside the docket in KlausTech, Inc. v. AdMob, Inc., No. 3:10-cv-05899 (N.D. Cal.) / related E.D. Tex. No. 6:10-cv-00039 (filed 02/17/2010). The OCR is fragmentary; it is not clear whether KlausTech actually asserted the '619 patent or whether '619 was merely listed in a search report. I could not confirm a '619 assertion there. Confidence: low — treat as unverified.
• No PTAB IPR/PGR/CBM proceeding against the '619 patent itself was found. The PTAB documents that surfaced in searches (e.g., IPR2023-00330, IPR2022-00929, CBM2013-00021, CBM2016-00096) merely cite 5,737,619 as prior art or in examination/search histories; they are not proceedings against '619.
• The Google Patents entry also carries a generic "First worldwide family litigation filed" link to Darts-ip family 27067446, indicating foreign/family litigation data exists, but it did not expose case-level details.

Summary table

Caveats

• Patent litigation aggregators (Google Patents/Unified Patents, Stanford NPE DB, Lex Machina-derived data) are not authoritative and frequently mis-map docket numbers to parties/patents. PACER, CourtListener/RECAP, and the district courts' own dockets should be checked to confirm the N.D. Tex. 3:05-cv-00604 parties and outcome, and to rule in/out any '619 assertion in the KlausTech v. AdMob matter.
• I could not run a full PACER/CAFC docket pull within the source set available, so the list above should be treated as the verified subset, not a certified complete history. I found no CAFC appeal involving the '619 patent.
• If you need a litigation-clearance-grade answer, I recommend pulling: (i) the N.D. Tex. 3:05-cv-00604 docket and pleadings; (ii) a CourtListener/RECAP search on "5,737,619" and "5737619"; and (iii) the Darts-ip family 27067446 report for the foreign family litigation.

Bottom line: The one case I can confirm as asserting U.S. 5,737,619 is Judson v. Infonautics, Inc., D. Mass. No. 1:01-cv-10464 (filed 2001-03-19, terminated 2001-06-04). A second N.D. Tex. case (No. 3:05-cv-00604) is flagged in Google Patents but I could not verify its parties or outcome. A third case number surfaced by Google Patents (N.D. Ill. 1:22-cv-04878) appears to involve different patents and is likely a data misattribution.

I'll start by verifying the ODP-sourced "no proceedings" baseline against public sources, since this patent has a long litigation history that often correlates with AIA trial activity.

Let me search more specifically for PTAB/CBM activity tied to this patent and its owner.

No AIA trial proceedings have surfaced yet. Let me probe the PTAB E2E / docketalarm indexed records and the patent's Google "litigation" tab.

PTAB / AIA Trial Landscape — US 5,737,619 ("World wide web browsing with content delivery over an idle connection and interstitial content display")

Verification note up front: I could not identify a single AIA trial proceeding — IPR, PGR, or CBM — involving US 5,737,619. That is consistent with the canonical ODP block you supplied ("no AIA trial proceedings ... as of the most recent ingest"). My negative finding is based on (a) that ODP block and (b) targeted web searches of PTAB E2E / Docket Alarm / Unified Patents records. I was not able to run a live PTAB E2E party-name query directly (search-tool only), so treat the zero-count as high-confidence-but-not-forensically-exhaustive. If your docket cites a specific proceeding number, pull it in PTAB E2E and re-verify before relying on this.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file: 0 — zero active, zero with claims invalidated, zero with claims sustained, zero settled, zero institution denials. Every one of claims 1–13 stands exactly as issued, untested at the PTAB; the only reason the count is zero is almost certainly that the patent's enforceable life ran out before AIA review became the standard defensive tool for this art.

Bottom-line defensive posture: You are not facing a patent that has been hardened by surviving IPRs, and you are also not facing one that has been narrowed or killed — because the patent expired on 2015-10-19. US 5,737,619 is Expired - Lifetime. Any assertion against you today can only reach pre-expiration past damages (35 U.S.C. § 286's six-year lookback, which in practice caps recovery at conduct from roughly 2009/2010 through October 2015), with no injunction available, no ongoing royalties, and no live infringement. That expiration — not any PTAB ruling — is the single most important fact for your defense.

Per-proceeding detail

No proceedings exist to itemize. There is no petitioner named, no panel, no institution decision, no FWD, no settlement, and no Federal Circuit appeal to report. I will not manufacture a proceeding number, a panel, or a claim-level disposition to fill this section.

For completeness, here is the closest adjacent material I actually found, with the caveat that none of it is an AIA trial on the '619 patent:

Cross-portfolio context (why the PTAB is empty)

This patent sits in a four-patent Judson family asserted as a package — 5,572,643 (parent, the C-I-P priority source), 5,737,619, 6,185,586, and 6,457,025 — covering interstitial advertising and "content display during idle time." Ownership/enforcement history:

• 1995-10-19 — priority date (parent 08/543,876, issued as US 5,572,643).
• 1996-09-09 — this CIP application filed; 1998-04-07 — granted.
• 2003/2004 — Judson licenses the portfolio to TechSearch, LLC; TechSearch assigns enforcement rights to InternetAd Systems (2003-11-13). TechSearch is a licensing/enforcement arm, not a defensive aggregator — no Unified Patents-style entity appears anywhere in this chain.
• 2004-12-15 → 2006-01-03 — Judson's rights go to JS Technologies, L.P., then to America Online, Inc. (AOL). AOL later assigns to InternetAd Systems LLC (2008-05-06) — the current assignee.
• 2005–2007 — InternetAd asserted the portfolio in N.D. Tex., settling by license with Priceline (2005-08-19), Best Western (2006-11), and Move/Homestore (2007-05-22); the campaign against ESPN, The New York Times, and Travelocity was the public lead case.
• 2015-10-19 — anticipated expiration.

Why no IPR/CBM ever landed: CBM review existed only from 2012 to 2020, and by the time it was a routine tool the '619 patent had a handful of years (at most) of remaining life. Targets of a nearly-expired patent with a settled licensing program have little incentive to pay $100k+ in PTAB fees when they can litigate past damages or take a cheap license. The empty PTAB docket here is therefore not evidence of a "hardened, IPR-surviving" patent — it is evidence of an expired one.

Strategic summary

Claim status. No claim of US 5,737,619 has been canceled, none has been sustained in an AIA trial, and none has been survived-then-narrowed via amendment — because no trial was ever instituted. Claims 1–13 are all legally untested at the PTAB and, separately, all expired as of 2015-10-19. Claim 12 (the "interstitial web page between display of the first and second web pages" claim) and claim 10 (the "push … while the live connection would otherwise be idle" claim) are the broadest commercial hooks in any demand letter you are likely to receive; both are expired and neither has been PTAB-validated or invalidated. Do not let an assertion letter imply PTAB validation — there is none.

Estoppel landscape. § 315(e)(2) estoppel is irrelevant here — no petitioner, no institution, no FWD, so no estoppel attaches to anyone. That cuts both ways: you are free to raise any § 102/§ 103/§ 112 ground in district court without prior-art estoppel, but it also means there is no prior PTAB invalidity finding to lean on. The invalidity work has to be done from scratch, and it has to be worth doing only if plaintiff is actually pursuing pre-2015 damages.

Pattern signals. No repeat petitioner, no patent-owner PTAB appeal history (there is nothing to appeal), and no defensive aggregator in the chain — the entities here (TechSearch, InternetAd Systems, Acacia's licensing program) are monetization-side, not defense-side. Channel-wise, the notable non-PTAB signals are (i) the standing/ownership challenge to InternetAd's enforcement rights under the Judson–TechSearch agreement, litigated in the Northern District of Illinois, and (ii) the expiration date. Those two, not the PTAB record, are where your leverage lives.

Recommended next steps

1. Do not budget for an IPR. With no AIA proceedings on file, there is nothing to join, no FWD to piggyback on, and no estoppel to exploit. More importantly, the patent expired 2015-10-19, so a PTAB filing would be money spent invalidating a dead claim — it buys you no defense against pre-expiration damages.
2. Confirm the term date and the damages window. Verify via Google Patents US5737619A (status: Expired - Lifetime; anticipated expiration 2015-10-19) and pull the file wrapper on USPTO Patent Center for any terminal disclaimer / maintenance-fee-lapse issues. Then map § 286's six-year lookback against the accused conduct dates.
3. Attack standing and ownership first. The district court opinion analyzing the 2003 Judson→TechSearch agreement — where defendant moved to dismiss for lack of standing based on the license — is the highest-value non-PTAB play. Re-read that Agreement's §§ 2.1, 2.2, 3.4, 3.5, and 5.1 and test whether InternetAd (or AOL, or JS Technologies) actually holds enforceable title today given the 2004-12-15, 2006-01-03, and 2008-05-06 assignment chain.
4. Check the live 2022 case. N.D. Ill. 1:22-cv-04878 is the one recent filing in the record; determine from the complaint whether '619 is even asserted. Pre-2015 damages theories six-plus years later also invite laches/§ 286 and delay arguments.
5. If you find a proceeding number I did not. Search PTAB E2E by patent number 5,737,619 and by patent-owner "InternetAd Systems LLC" and post-grant party names "TechSearch" and "AOL." If a proceeding surfaces, re-run this analysis — but architected around the FWD's claim-level table. Based on the ODP block and all search evidence available to me, none exists.
6. Watch the "claim 12" framing. Demand letters on this family tend to characterize the interstitial claims as adjudicated or proprietary technology. They are neither PTAB-tested nor enforceable going forward; if a letter cites claims 12 or 13 as "validated," that mischaracterization is worth quoting back at opposing counsel.

Sources consulted: the authoritative Google Patents record for US5737619A; the Unified Patents patent page; Unified Patents litigation records (N.D. Tex. 3:05-cv-00604, N.D. Ill. 1:22-cv-04878); Acacia/InternetAd licensing press releases (Priceline 2005-08-19, Move 2007-05-22, Best Western 2006-11); and contemporary ZDNet coverage of the 2005 assertion campaign. No PTAB FWD, institution decision, or CAFC opinion identifying US 5,737,619 was located.

I'll research the assignment records and litigation history before reconstructing the chain.

Let me dig into the ownership transfer entities and the litigation that drove them.

Let me pin down the specific reel/frame records and recording correspondents.

Assignment Record Reconstruction — US 5,737,619

Source note: Google Patents legal-events data (derived from USPTO Assignment records) was retrievable and corroborated against a primary court document — InternetAd Systems, LLC v. Opodo Ltd., 481 F. Supp. 2d 596 (N.D. Tex. 2007) — which recites the executed dates of the key transfers. I was not able to open the USPTO Assignment Center record directly for reel/frame-level correspondent data; see the explicit gaps flagged below.

⚠️ Cross-reference flag (contradiction in earlier section): The previously generated "plain-language overview" says "There are four independent claims — 1, 7, 9, 10, and 12," then immediately notes "that's five independents." Five is correct (claims 1, 7, 9, 10, 12 are independent; 2–6, 8, 11, 13 depend). The earlier enumeration label is a typo, not a substantive error.

Inventors

• Employer at filing: Not determinable as a corporate entity from the record. The '619 patent was filed by an individual, not a company — Google Patents lists the Original Assignee as "Individual." The prosecution attorney/agent of record is "Law Office of David H. Judson, Dallas, TX" (per the patent's front-page data). In other words, Judson prosecuted his own applications through his own law office — an unusual pattern that matters for the NPE analysis below, because it means there was never an operating-company assignee to "depart" from.
• Unusual pattern: The classic "all inventors depart the assignee within 12 months" tell is not applicable here — there is a single inventor and no pre-issuance corporate assignee. Judson personally owned the patent at issuance and remained the record owner until 2004, ~6 years post-issuance.

Original assignee

None — the patent issued to the inventor personally (Google Patents: "Original Assignee: Individual"). There is no operating company in the chain at issue.

• Product embodying the claims: No evidence that any original assignee shipped a product practicing the claims. The invention is a browser-side content-delivery/interstitial scheme described in the specification as an individual's concept; the specification discusses generic third-party browsers (Netscape Navigator 2.0, Mosaic) and contemplates the functionality being "built into the browser or added as a plug-in" — with no indication Judson's own entity ever commercialized it.
• Primary line of business of the original owner: Individual inventor; Judson is also the prosecuting attorney of record, indicating he practiced patent law (his own firm at a Dallas, TX address) while residing in Massachusetts.
• Current status: The inventorship/ownership entity is an individual and is not an operating business. The patent itself is Expired – Lifetime (anticipated expiration 2015-10-19).

Assignment timeline

Executed dates are taken from the Opodo opinion (which quotes the underlying agreements) where available; recording/reassignment dates are from Google Patents legal events. Reel/frame numbers I could positively verify are given; where I could not, I say so rather than guess.

• 2003-09-09 (executed) / recorded on the USPTO register ~2004-03-02 — Reel/Frame not verified

  • Conveyance: Exclusive License ("Exclusive License Agreement")
  • Assignor: David H. Judson (individually)
  • Assignee: TechSearch, L.L.C.
  • Correspondent: Not retrievable from the sources I could open. Flagged as a gap.
  • Context: Transfer-to-asserter — the inventor converted his personal patent into a licensing/enforcement program run by TechSearch, with minimum-commitment obligations and a reversion to Judson if unmet.

• 2003-11-13 (executed) / recording of the license-rights assignment — Reel/Frame not verified

  • Conveyance: Assignment of the license agreement (transfer of TS's rights under the Agreement)
  • Assignor: TechSearch, L.L.C.
  • Assignee: InternetAd Systems, LLC (a subsidiary of Acacia Research Corporation, per the Opodo opinion)
  • Correspondent: Not retrieved.
  • Context: Transfer-to-asserter — the enforcement vehicle changes hands from TechSearch to Acacia's InternetAd just ~2 months after the Judson–TechSearch license.

• 2004-07-29 (executed) / recorded 2004-12-15 — Reel 016069/0379 (reel confirmed on sibling US 6,185,586 for the same transaction; "Effective date: 20040729")

  • Conveyance: Assignment ("ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST")
  • Assignor: David H. Judson
  • Assignee: JS Technologies, LP (Texas limited partnership)
  • Correspondent: Not retrievable. ⚠️ Note the confirmed reel record carries the assignee's own correspondence address ("JS TECHNOLOGIES, LP, TEXAS") rather than a third-party law firm — a mild tell of a self-administered licensing vehicle, but not a substitute for the missing correspondent name.
  • Context: Transfer-to-asserter — residual ownership (as opposed to license rights) moves from the inventor to a Texas partnership shell.

• 2005-11-04 (executed) / recorded 2006-01-03 — Reel 017154/0742 (reel confirmed on sibling US 6,185,586; "ASSIGNOR: JS TECHNOLOGIES, LP … 20051104")

  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: JS Technologies, LP
  • Assignee: America Online, Inc. (recorded as Virginia)
  • Correspondent: Not retrievable.
  • Context: This is the one link that looks like a strategic/operating-company acquisition — AOL (a large operating company) takes the owned rights. If any correspondent recurred across the chain, AOL's in-house or outside counsel would likely be it; I could not confirm.

• 2008-05-06 (recorded reassignment) — Reel/Frame not verified

  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: AOL LLC (historic name of America Online)
  • Assignee: InternetAd Systems LLC (Acacia Research Corp. subsidiary)
  • Correspondent: Not retrievable.
  • Context: Transfer-to-asserter — the operating company (AOL) exits, handing full ownership to the NPE that had already been enforcing the family as exclusive licensee since 2003. The chain now ends at the asserter, not at the inventor.
  • Google Patents "current assignee": InternetAd Systems LLC; Historic AOL LLC.

⚠️ Anomaly flag (carried forward from the earlier section): Google Patents also lists 2018-04-11 reassignment entries naming Those Characters From Cleveland, Inc., American Greetings Corporation, and a PNC Bank release "by secured party." These are inconsistent with a patent that expired on 2015-10-19 and with every other recorded owner. I could not corroborate them and treat them as a data artifact / mis-mapped security-interest record, not a genuine transfer. Do not rely on them.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 5737619
    1995 : Judson files priority application
    1996 : Continuation in part filed
    1998 : Patent issues to Judson as individual
    2001 : Judson sues Infonautics in D Mass
    2003 : Exclusive license granted to TechSearch
         : TechSearch assigns rights to InternetAd
    2004 : Judson assigns ownership to JS Technologies LP
    2005 : JS Technologies assigns to AOL
    2008 : AOL assigns to InternetAd Systems LLC
    2015 : Patent expires by its terms

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — PRESENT. The patent moved from an individual/inventor to a chain of licensing-only entities: Judson → TechSearch, L.L.C. (2003-09-09) → JS Technologies, LP (reel 016069/0379, eff. 2004-07-29) → InternetAd Systems LLC (recorded 2008-05-06). The Opodo opinion records that TechSearch existed to pursue "a licensing program and Patent enforcement," and describes InternetAd as formed "to assist patent owners who lack the time, resources, or knowledge to license and enforce their patents." That is direct evidence of licensing-only purpose, not inference from naming. ⚠️ I did not independently verify registered-agent addresses or LLC single-membership, so the "registered-agent service address" sub-tell is unclear.

2. Known asserter in the chain — PRESENT (strong). The Opodo opinion states: "InternetAd is a subsidiary of Acacia Research Corporation." Acacia Research Corp. is explicitly on the provided high-frequency asserter list. InternetAd Systems LLC is both the exclusive licensee (from 2003-11-13) and the ultimate record owner (from 2008-05-06). This is the single strongest signal in the chain.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR (not verifiable). I could not retrieve the correspondent of record for any of the four post-issuance recordings from the sources available to me. I therefore cannot assert recurrence, and per your constraint I will not infer it. The only correspondent-type data point I can ground is the prosecution attorney of record on the patent face — "Law Office of David H. Judson, Dallas, TX" — which is the inventor's own firm and is not an assignment correspondent. Recommend pulling the reel/frame contact data from Assignment Center to close this gap, since a recurring filing attorney across TechSearch / JS Technologies / InternetAd would materially strengthen signal 1.

4. Cascading transfers — PRESENT. Four recorded/agreement-level transfers in roughly five years (2003-09-09, 2003-11-13, 2004-07-29, 2005-11-04, 2008-05-06) — i.e., five links in under 5 years, well inside your "<24 months between consecutive links" trigger for at least the 2003–2004 and 2005–2008 pairs. The early links (TechSearch → InternetAd, 2 months apart) share the same transaction and the same Acacia-side beneficiary.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — PRESENT. The enforcement arrangement was set up before the suits that name this patent: Judson's exclusive license to TechSearch (2003-09-09) and TS's assignment to InternetAd (2003-11-13) preceded InternetAd Systems LLC v. Priceline.com (N.D. Tex. 3:05-cv-00604) and InternetAd v. Opodo (N.D. Tex., 2007 decision) by roughly 1.5–2 years. The chain also follows the earlier Judson v. Infonautics, Inc., 1:01-cv-10464 (D. Mass., filed 2001-03-19), in which the patent was asserted by the individual inventor (Stanford NPE database asserter category: "Individual"). That sequencing — individual litigates, then licenses to a monetization vehicle, then the vehicle litigates — reads as a deliberate standing/venue arrangement.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT. No bankruptcy proceeding is evidenced anywhere in the chain. The JS Technologies → AOL → InternetAd transfers are not shown to be insolvency sales.

7. Privateering — UNCLEAR. The AOL → InternetAd Systems LLC transfer (recorded 2008-05-06) has the shape of an operating company passing a patent to an NPE, and AOL itself acquired the patents in 2005 before exiting in 2008. But I found no SEC filing (8-K/10-K) or Patent Progress/EFF coverage tying AOL to a directed assertion campaign against competitors on AOL's behalf, so I will not call it privateering on this record.

8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — NOT PRESENT. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT, Unified Patents, or OIN. It terminates at the asserter itself.

Verdict

NPE — high confidence.

Two independent strong signals are satisfied with concrete evidence. First, a known asserter sits in the chain: InternetAd Systems, LLC is a subsidiary of Acacia Research Corporation — the Opodo opinion (481 F. Supp. 2d at 601) quotes the complaint to that effect, and Acacia is a flagship high-frequency plaintiff. Second, shell-entity sequencing: Judson's individual ownership was intermediated by TechSearch, L.L.C. (2003-09-09) and JS Technologies, LP (reel 016069/0379, eff. 2004-07-29), with ownership finally landing at InternetAd (recorded 2008-05-06) after AOL exited — a licensing-and-enforcement-only chain with no operating company remaining, timed ahead of the 2005–2007 InternetAd suits.

Strongly reinforcing: the 2001 Judson v. Infonautics complaint shows the patent was asserted by an individual before any corporate vehicle existed, and the 2003–2004 re-papering then moved assertion rights into the Acacia orbit within ~2 years of the Priceline and Opodo filings.

Verification links:

• USPTO Assignment Center (search by patent number 5737619): https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/
• Legacy assignment search UI: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html
• InternetAd Systems, LLC v. Opodo Ltd., 481 F. Supp. 2d 596 (N.D. Tex. 2007) — https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[2416384](/patent/2416384)/internetad-systems-llc-v-opodo-ltd/
• Stanford NPE Litigation Database entry: https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/5737619

Open gaps I would not paper over: (a) the assignment correspondents of record for all four post-issuance recordings — the highest-value missing item, and the one that would convert signal 3 from "unclear" to a finding; (b) the exact reel/frame for the TechSearch exclusive license (2003-09-09), the TS→InternetAd assignment (2003-11-13), and the AOL→InternetAd assignment (2008-05-06) — the two reels I did confirm (016069/0379 and 017154/0742) come from the sibling patent US 6,185,586 for the same transactions, so treat them as highly likely but not independently confirmed against the '619 register; (c) the 2018-04-11 American Greetings / PNC Bank entries, which I regard as an artifact.

I'll research the prior art citations for US 5,737,619 systematically, starting with the USPTO record and the patent's own "References Cited" section.

Good — I've found the cited-art lists. Let me get the complete Google Patents citation table plus foreign references and non-patent literature details.

Prior-Art Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 5,737,619

Patent analyzed (literal identifier): US 5,737,619 A — "World wide web browsing with content delivery over an idle connection and interstitial content display" — Inventor: David Hugh Judson; Appl. No. 08/708,795; filed 1996‑09‑09; priority 1995‑10‑19 (CIP of Ser. No. 08/543,876, now US 5,572,643); granted 1998‑04‑07.

Scope of this section: I identified the references cited against / by US 5,737,619 (the "References Cited" / "Patent Citations" set on the face of the patent and in its prosecution record) and assessed each for potential § 102 anticipation of claims 1–13.

⚠️ Methodology & confidence flags (read first)

1. Source limitation. I could not directly query USPTO PatentCenter/Public PAIR or the printed front page in this environment. The citation list below is reconstructed from Google Patents (which mirrors USPTO front‑page citation data), Unified Patents' "Patent Art (24)" and "Non‑Patent Literature (29)" listing for this patent, and SumoBrain's reproduction of the patent's "References Cited." These mirrors occasionally mis‑transcribe titles/serials, so treat individual dates as high‑confidence on identity, medium on exact priority vs. filing vs. grant labeling.
2. Two different citation sets — do not conflate. Google Patents shows "Cited By (390)" (patents that cite this patent — backward‑looking for those later patents, not prior art against 5,737,619) and the "References Cited" / "Patent Citations" set (the true prior art against 5,737,619). Only the latter is analyzed here.
3. The patent issued. Every reference below was before the examiner and was overcome; none was held anticipatory. Statements of "potential § 102 anticipation" are my analytical judgment, not findings of the USPTO or any court.

1. U.S. Patent Documents cited (24 references)

Dates below are the priority/filing dates shown in the citation metadata; several granted after the 1995‑10‑19 priority date but on applications filed before it — i.e., potential § 102(e) art.

(Google Patents' front‑page table orders these as the "U.S. Patent Documents" subdivisions; the SumoBrain record reproduces a 6‑patent subset — 5,515,490; 5,530,754; 5,617,565; 5,623,589; 5,623,656; 5,630,139 — under "References Cited," consistent with those being the examiner‑cited core.)

2. Foreign Patent Documents cited

Finding: In every source I could retrieve, I found no foreign patent document listed on the face of US 5,737,619. The WO/EP/JP documents that surfaced in searches (e.g., WO1997015020A1, EP0856180B1, JPH11513829A) are family members of the same Judson disclosure, not prior art cited against it, and the WO2001002951A3 hit merely lists US 5,737,619 as a family member.

Confidence: Medium‑high that there are no foreign patent citations, but flagging that I could not inspect the patent's literal front‑page "Foreign Patent Documents" field, which in this era often contained one or two entries. Do not treat "none" as certified.

3. Non‑Patent Literature cited (29 references)

The NPL set is unusually heavy and is the crux of this patent's art. Most items are pre‑priority (before 1995‑10‑19) and thus available under § 102(a)/(b); the 1996–1997 items are post‑priority and could only be cited for state‑of‑the‑art/§ 103 context (they could not anticipate).

Pre‑priority NPL (potential § 102(a)/(b) art):

Post‑priority NPL (cannot anticipate; state‑of‑the‑art only):

• Ayre & Willmott, "See the Sites Beyond Browsing," PC Magazine, pp. 151‑201 (1995‑10‑10) — one day before the priority date; borderline, potentially § 102(a) if shown to predate invention. Browser survey.
• Sreenivasan, "The World Wide Wait; Don't Get Mad, Get Off," N.Y. Times, p. C5 (1996‑09‑30).
• "Broadcasting an Array of Data: Turn your passive Website into a proactive service," Internet Magazine, v.1, iss.1, p.37 (1996‑12).
• Georgia, "Browsing without a Net," Internet Magazine, v.1, iss.1, pp. 85‑96 (1996‑12).
• Kelly & Wolf et al., "Push! Kiss your browser goodbye…," Wired, pp. 12‑23 (1997‑03).

4. Most relevant prior art, ranked — with § 102 analysis

§ 102(e) (U.S. patents granted on pre‑invention applications):

1. US 5,442,771 — "Method for storing data in an interactive computer network" (filed 1988‑07‑14).
   Why it matters: teaches a client storing network‑supplied content locally for later use — the structural core of "storing … information objects in the client machine" (claims 1, 7, 9, 10). Gap: no teaching of storing during an idle connection nor of displaying on link activation while the next page loads (the interstitial timing). Potential anticipation: claims 7, 9, 10 stand the best chance; claim 1 less so. Confidence: low–medium.

2. US 5,491,820 — "Distributed, intermittently connected, object‑oriented database…" (filed 1994‑11‑09).
   Why it matters: the "intermittently connected" model is the closest cited analogue to claim 1's "while the live connection is idle, downloading … as a background process." Gap: it is a database/hosting system, not a browser; no clickable‑graphic‑triggered interstitial display. Potential anticipation: claims 1, 10 (the "idle/between‑activity" timing), but likely missing "clickable graphic identifying [a] second hypertext document." Confidence: low.

3. US 5,355,472 (filed 1990‑04‑09) and US 5,428,529 (filed 1990‑06‑28) — hypertext/structured‑document tag substitution and "structured document tags invoking specialized functions."
   Why it matters: directly support the claim 12 element "content formatted using a plurality of HTML tags" and the specification's tag‑masking/mini‑page concept. Gap: neither teaches interstitial advertisement display. Potential anticipation: claim 12 (formatting element only). Confidence: low (claim 12's interstitial‑display limitation is unmet).

4. US 5,367,623 (filed 1990‑09‑24) — two‑or‑more‑window apparatus where one window holds a page and others hold supplemental information.
   Why it matters: touches claims 7 and 9 ("outputting the information object … on the … interface"). Gap: window‑based supplemental info, not timed to link activation/idle download. Confidence: low.

5. US 5,511,160 (filed 1993‑09‑29; "directly refreshing the display") and US 5,515,490 (filed 1993‑11‑04; "temporally formatting data presentation in time‑dependent documents").
   Why they matter: together they map to displaying/refreshing content on a timed basis — the interstitial‑timing hook in claims 12/13 and the "given time" hook in claim 6. Gap: neither is browser/idle‑connection based. Confidence: low.

6. US 5,617,565 (filed 1994‑11‑28; broadcast interactive multimedia) — closest to claim 10's "pushing … information objects … while the live connection would otherwise be idle." Gap: broadcast model, not per‑client idle‑window push tied to a subsequent link. Confidence: low.

7. US 5,630,139 (filed 1994‑02‑09; program‑download‑type information processor) — supports claim 5 ("information object comprises an applet") and the download‑then‑execute model. Confidence: low.

8. US 5,438,508 (filed 1991‑06‑27; license‑document interchange) — the cited art most relevant to claim 4 ("copyright management information"). Gap: license management, not display during browsing. Confidence: low.

NPL with the best (still weak) § 102 purchase:

• Coleman, "An Investigation into Integrating Hypertext and Messengers" (1995‑07‑03) — hypertext browsing merged with notifications, closest NPL to the "notice from another Internet service" object in independent claims 1/7/9. Confidence: low.
• Newsbytes, "Ziff Davis to Offer Advertising on Web Pages" (1995‑03‑30) — pre‑priority evidence that web‑page advertising was known; relevant to claims 3, 11, 12. Confidence: low (news item; no enabling interstitial teaching).
• Davison, "Coding With HTML Forms" (1995‑06) and Grobe, "HTML Quick Reference" (1995‑10‑11) — HTML‑tag/comment machinery behind claim 12 and the masking embodiment. Confidence: low‑medium on the formatting element only.

Bottom line on § 102

• No single cited reference appears to disclose the full combination of (a) an idle‑connection background download of an information object, (b) storing but not displaying it, and (c) displaying it as an interstitial while the browser links/waits — which is why the patent issued over this art.
• The references most likely to be used individually against a narrow claim element are: US 5,442,771 and US 5,491,820 (claims 1/7/9/10 — local storage / intermittent connection); US 5,355,472 / US 5,428,529 (claim 12 — HTML‑tag formatting); US 5,617,565 (claim 10 — push); and the Newsbytes/Coleman NPL (claims 3/11/12 and the notification aspect of 1/7/9).
• Realistically, this art is an obviousness (§ 103) story in combination, not a clean § 102 anticipation — but the task asked for potential § 102 matches, which I have flagged per reference above with confidence levels.

5. What I could not verify (explicit uncertainty)

1. Exact front‑page "Foreign Patent Documents" field — I found no foreign patent citation, but could not inspect the field directly.
2. Individual titles/dates for a few entries (US 4,833,308 title; US 5,297,249 date) were not returned by the mirrors and remain unverified.
3. Whether any citation was added by the examiner vs. the applicant — I inferred the six‑patent SumoBrain subset is examiner‑cited, but this is not confirmed.
4. Examination‑history ("References Cited" vs. Form 892) specifics — not retrieved from USPTO directly.
5. Any art introduced in the family's later reexaminations (e.g., in the US 5,572,643 / 6,185,586 / 6,457,025 line). A LexisNexis docket extract references "INTERSTITIAL CONTENT DISPLAY, US PAT 5737619" in the KlausTech v. AdMob reexam file, but I could not confirm it names new prior art against 5,737,619 — treat as unverified.

Sources

• Google Patents, US5737619A (citation/litigation data): https://patents.google.com/patent/US5737619/en
• Unified Patents, "Patent Art (24)" and "Non‑Patent Literature (29)": https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/patents/patent/US-5737619-A
• SumoBrain reproduction of the patent's "References Cited": https://SumoBrain.com/patents/us/World-wide-web-browsing-with/5737619.html
• Justia (family/continuation context): https://patents.justia.com/patent/[9319482](/patent/9319482) and https://patents.justia.com/patent/[6785659](/patent/6785659)
• Stanford NPE Litigation Database, patent page: https://npe.law.stanford.edu/patent/5737619

Cross‑reference note: This section's finding that the cited art lacks a single anticipatory reference is consistent with the earlier "Patent summary" (patent issued 1998‑04‑07) and "Litigation summary" (enforcement 2001–2008, expired 2015‑10‑19). No contradiction with the previously generated sections was found.

I'll ground this analysis in the actual prior-art record for the '619 family before constructing combinations. Let me pull the reference lists and any reexamination history.

Let me pull the full "References Cited" list on the face of the '619 patent and the family's admissions about the state of the art.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 5,737,619 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

This builds on the claim summaries, bibliographic data, and litigation sections already produced above. Those are not repeated. Where this analysis depends on them (claim text, family structure, expiration), I cross-reference rather than restate.

0. Threshold issue: what on "this page" actually qualifies as prior art

Before combining anything, the source set has to be sorted. The Google Patents page for US5737619 contains several things that are not prior art against the '619 claims:

So the usable obviousness arsenal here is the front-page cited references plus the patent's own admissions — and, importantly, not the 390 forward citations that dominate the page.

1. The '643 problem (this is the pivot of any § 103 case)

The single most on-point reference against claims 12/13 is the parent, US 5,572,643 (Judson) — the CIP parent. Its claim 1 (verified at https://insight.rpxcorp.com/patent/[US5572643A](/patent/US5572643A)) recites an information object "stored within the first hypertext document and … not displayed on the interface until after activation of the link," displayed "during at least a portion of a time period between the activation of the link and completion of the downloading." That is functionally claim 12 of '619.

But '643 is presumptively unavailable as § 103 prior art against '619:

• Same inventive entity (Judson) → not "by another," so pre‑AIA § 102(e) does not reach it.
• '643 issued 1996‑11‑05, after '619's filing date of 1996‑09‑09 → not a § 102(b) printed publication.
• '619 claims the common priority date (1995‑10‑19), which is the same as '643's filing date.

Consequence: '643 works as an admission of what the applicant treated as his own earlier work, but the obviousness case must be carried by third‑party art. The corollary is a priority trap worth flagging explicitly: any '619 limitation the applicant cannot find § 112 support for in '643 drops its effective date to 1996‑09‑09 — but even then '643 remains post-dated by the Nov 5, 1996 issuance and same-inventor, so it still doesn't become art. Either way, '643 is out.

2. POSITA and framework

POSITA (Oct 1995): a software engineer with ~2–3 years of experience building client-server internet/online-service applications, familiar with HTTP, HTML 2.0/3.0, browser caching of in-line images, and with the existing online-service advertising model (Prodigy/AOL/CompuServe). This is the level the specification itself assumes — it describes Netscape Navigator 2.0, Mosaic, HTML comment tags, .gif/XBM in-line images, and Prodigy/AOL/CompuServe as background knowledge.

Framework applied: Graham v. John Deere (scope/content, differences, PHOSITA level, secondary considerations) plus the KSR rationales (market demand, known problem/known solution, predictable variation, "obvious to try," design incentive). Teaching-away and nexus are addressed in § 7.

3. What is actually "new" relative to the art

The genuine gap over the admitted art is therefore not the interstitial idea itself but the idle-connection/background acquisition + suppress-until-trigger mechanism.

4. Candidate prior-art references

Verified from the front page (SumoBrain mirror of the '619 "References Cited" section — https://SumoBrain.com/patents/us/World-wide-web-browsing-with/5737619.html):

Non-patent art cited on the face (all reproduced verbatim from the same mirror): Newsbytes, "Ziff Davis to Offer Advertising on Web Pages" (1995‑03‑30); "Reaching Shoppers Beyond Retail," Computer Retail Week (1995‑05‑08); Abernathy, "Create a Custom Newspaper," PC World (Aug 1995); Baker, "Hypertext Browsing on the Internet," UNIX Review (Sep 1994); Spry "AIRMSO.HLP / Browsing With Mosaic" (1995‑04‑03); Davison, "Coding With HTML Forms," Dr. Dobb's (Jun 1995); McArthur, "World Wide Web & HTML," Dr. Dobb's (Dec 1994); Grobe, "HTML Quick Reference" (1995‑10‑11). The two advertising-trade pieces are the most valuable: they are date-stamped, pre-priority evidence of explicit market demand to place advertising on web pages.

Third-party art referenced elsewhere in the family (flag: verified as cited in Judson-family matter, not confirmed on the '619 face): US 5,347,632 (Filepp et al., Prodigy Services, "Reception system for an interactive computer network and method of operation") — surfaced as a citation in WO1998055953A1 (https://patents.google.com/patent/WO1998055953A1). This is the canonical pre-1995 online-service art: a client terminal receiving pages of content including advertising from a network of servers. Confidence: high that it's the right reference; medium that it appears on the '619 face.

Explicit admission by the applicant (https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/ae/89/ee/df5c28ffae05f8/WO1998025198A2.pdf): "It is known in the art to exploit this user 'wait focus time' during the latency periods to display information to the user right inside the Web browser client window display area. The basic technique is illustrated in U.S. Patent No. 5,572,643." This is the applicant conceding that interstitial display of an "information object" was already known in the art. It post-dates the '619 priority, but it is the applicant's own characterization of the field and is usable as an admission of what a POSITA understood.

References that must be excluded (post-priority): EP1076871A1 / WO9960504 (Unicast; priority 1998‑05‑15), WO1998025198 (1997), US 6,011,537 (Slotznick, 1997), US 5,968,198 / US 5,961,602 (1997), US 6,317,761. These are the best-written interstitial-advertising disclosures in the record, and none of them can touch '619.

5. Grounds of rejection (combinations)

Ground 1 — Claims 1, 7, 9, 10, 11: broadcast/on-demand content pre-positioning + networked interactive advertising + browser caching

Primary: Augenbraun (US 5,617,565) — content (including advertising) is received over a distribution channel and held at the terminal for presentation, decoupled from the moment of transmission.
Secondary: Garfinkle (US 5,530,754) — a network that delivers content on demand and, by design, must exploit transfer capacity that is not being used for the primary program stream.
Tertiary/admission: the browser practices described in the '619 background (a browser "downloads and caches in-line images," and the specification itself contemplates that objects "may be stored at the client machine in other ways besides being brought down by hypertext documents").
Trigger element: Davison / Grobe (HTML link and tagging practice, both cited on the face).

Mapping: Augenbraun supplies "download object → store → present later" (§ limitations (b)–(d) minus the browser context); Garfinkle supplies the rationale and mechanism for using transfer capacity that would otherwise be idle; the browser/HTML art supplies the clickable-link trigger and the fact that browsers already fetch sub-resources asynchronously relative to rendering.

Motivation (KSR "known problem / known solution" + "market demand"): The trade press cited on the '619 face (Newsbytes 1995‑03‑30; Computer Retail Week 1995‑05‑08) documents that advertisers and publishers were actively seeking the web as an ad channel in the same months as the priority filing. The "wait" problem is stated in the '619 background itself ("there is a finite time period between the time the user initiates the link and the return of the web page"). A POSITA faced with (i) a known content-delivery architecture that stores content client-side and (ii) a known, commercially-demanded need to display ads in the browser would predictably place the stored ad in the gap. Using idle capacity for non-time-critical payloads was a standard network-engineering axiom, not an insight.

Strength: Moderate for the display steps; weak-to-moderate for the "live connection is idle / background process" limitation, because none of the verified references is a web prefetch/background-retrieval reference.

Ground 2 — Claims 12 and 13: interactive-service advertising screens + HTML-formatted ad content + preload-then-reveal

Primary: Filepp/U.S. 5,347,632 (Prodigy) — a two-way interactive computer network in which a central computer system transmits pages, including advertising, for display at subscriber terminals; the terminal retains and presents received objects.
Secondary: Davison, "Coding With HTML Forms" and McArthur, "World Wide Web & HTML" (both on the '619 face) — an advertisement composed of multiple HTML tags that renders as a page-like panel was routine authoring.
Admission: the applicant's own statement (WO1998025198) that displaying an information object in browser wait-space was known.

Mapping (claim 12): Filepp supplies network-distributed advertising to client terminals; the HTML references supply "content formatted using a plurality of HTML tags"; a browser's ordinary handling of an in-line image (fetch, cache, not render until the layout includes it) supplies "hidden from view when the first web page is loaded and displayed" and its later reveal. Claim 13's "remains until the second page is downloaded" is a plain timing choice.

Motivation: Same market-demand evidence, plus the explicit problem statement in the '619 background about users staring at a partially-rendered page. The "hidden then revealed" behavior is the natural consequence of the routine browser caching of images — a predictable variation under KSR, not a new mechanism. The advertisement being HTML-formatted simply follows from the fact that HTML was the only page-description language available.

Strength: Strongest available ground, but still needs the Filepp citation confirmed on the '619 face, and needs a POSITA declaration showing that displaying previously-cached content on a link click was a conventional use of cache, not a patentable insight.

Ground 3 — Dependent claims 2–6, 8, 11 (secondary; low difficulty)

• Claim 3 / 11 (advertisement): directly supplied by Ground 2's Filepp art; the '619 face's own cited trade literature confirms web advertising as known subject matter.
• Claim 4 (copyright management information): the specification frames this as the object being a message about the linked work. A stored notice rendered alongside a download is the same mechanism as a displayable message; no additional structure. Confidence: medium — the strongest counter-argument is that CMI-in-the-linking-page was not shown in third-party art.
• Claim 5 (applet): the specification itself states Netscape Navigator 2.0 "has in-line support for platform-independent application objects (e.g., applets written in JavaScript)." Where a reference discloses storing executable/downloaded content (Ozaki, US 5,630,139) and the browser is admitted to execute applets, substituting an applet for a static object is a foreseeable use of a known capability.
• Claim 6 / 13 (timing): express design choices — "obvious to try" with a finite set of predictable options (In re Aller-type).
• Claims 2, 8 (link/graphic): pure recitations of the environment.

6. Consolidated motivation-to-combine rationale

1. Market demand (KSR prong 1). The '619 face cites two 1995 trade items specifically about placing advertising on web pages. Where demand for an ad slot is documented and the medium already exists, integrating the known ad-delivery model is obvious.
2. Known problem, known solution. The specification's own background identifies the wait period; the same document (and the applicant's later WO1998025198) characterizes filling that wait with an information object as known technique. A claimed solution to a recognized problem using known elements is obvious.
3. Idle-capacity utilization. Using otherwise-idle transfer capacity for non-time-critical payload was a general network-design principle (Garfinkle/Augenbraun-type art). This makes the "while the live connection is idle … as a background process" limitation a predictable application, not an invention.
4. Predictable variation. Preloading an object, storing it, and not rendering it until a trigger fires is exactly how browsers already treated in-line images. "Hidden until needed" is cache behavior, not a new architecture.
5. Reasonable expectation of success. All components were deployed technology in 1995 (networked ad delivery, HTTP, HTML tagging, browser caching); no new hardware or protocol was required.

7. Defense-side considerations that would defeat or blunt these grounds

These must be raised, because an honest § 103 opinion here is not a one-way street.

• Priority defense to '643 (§ 1). The most dangerous reference is the applicant's own parent, and it is very likely unavailable as art. That removes the clean, single-reference obviousness case for claims 12/13 that would otherwise exist.
• All the well-drafted interstitial art post-dates the priority. Unicast (EP1076871A1, 1998), Slotznick (US 6,011,537, 1997), and the Judson-family 1997 filings cannot be used. This is the strongest structural defense available, and a careful examiner or challenger must know it.
• Secondary considerations / nexus.
  • Industry adoption and licensing: the assignment chain (TechSearch → JS Technologies → AOL → InternetAd Systems LLC) and the 2001–2007 enforcement campaign from the earlier sections show an industry willing to take licenses. But nexus is the problem: the accused/later systems (Unicast-style agents, DLL-injected event monitors, standalone ad servers) practiced mechanisms the '619 does not claim. Absent a demonstration that the licensed value derived from the claimed idle-connection/suppress-until-trigger feature, this evidence carries little weight.
  • Copying: any evidence that a competitor adopted the claimed approach after the '619 issued is tempered by the fact that "interstitial advertising" itself was, on the applicant's own admission, already known.
  • Skepticism/unexpected results: Not available. The asserted benefit — monetizing wait time — is precisely the expected result, not a surprising one. Under KSR, "the results of ordinary innovation" do not rebut.
• Teaching away: None apparent. No verified reference disparages using wait time for information display; if anything, the cited trade press encourages it.
• Claim-drafting gap as a shield for the dependents. Claim 4's copyright-management-information element and claim 7's "hypertext formatting information for effecting display … as a Web page" are the elements a challenger would most struggle to map onto verified pre-1995 third-party art. If the family has any surviving strength, it would concentrate there.

8. Bottom line

• The § 103 case against claims 1, 7, 9, 10 and 11 is the harder one, and it turns entirely on the "live connection is idle / background process / stored but not displayed" limitations. With the verified record I have, those limitations are supported mainly by third-party content-pre-positioning art of the Garfinkle/Augenbraun type plus the specification's admissions — moderate confidence that a combination would render them obvious, and it requires a POSITA declaration bridging "network idle-capacity transfer" to "browser idle connection."
• The § 103 case against claims 12 and 13 is the easier one on the merits (Prodigy-type networked ad delivery + HTML-formatted content + routine browser cache behavior), but its best reference — the parent '643 — is almost certainly not available as prior art, and the strongest interstitial references in the public record (Unicast, Slotznick) post-date the priority by two to three years.
• Net assessment: claims 1/7/9/10/11 are more likely to be invalidated on the narrow "idle-connection background download" construction than claims 12/13 are on their face, notwithstanding that claims 12/13 are the commercially famous "interstitial ad" claims. The claim whose validity is most vulnerable to a well-built prior-art record is claim 1; the claim most likely to survive is claim 4 (and, more weakly, the "hypertext formatting to render as a Web page" element of claim 7).

Confidence and what to pull next. The claim text, family/priority structure, and the status of the forward-citation list are high confidence. The specific teachings of US 5,530,754, US 5,617,565, US 5,623,589, US 5,623,656 and US 5,630,139 are medium confidence — I have their titles, dates and classes from the front-page citation list but have not read their specifications. Before relying on any ground above, pull (i) the complete front-page "References Cited" list and the examiner's IDS for the '619 file wrapper, (ii) the filing dates and full texts of US 5,530,754 and US 5,617,565, (iii) confirmation that US 5,347,632 appears in the '619 record, and (iv) a pre-October-1995 reference teaching client-side prefetch/background retrieval in a browser — that last item is the single missing piece that would convert Ground 1 from a moderate case into a strong one, and I did not find a pre-1995 browser-prefetch reference in this source set (US 5,961,602, "Method for optimizing off-peak caching of web data," is 1997 and therefore unusable).