US 6735628

I'll run targeted searches for this specific patent number.

Let me dig further on litigation/docket history and the FRISKITT entity.

Let me check for any 2025–2026 docket activity and the patent's abstract.

US Patent 6,735,628 — Analyst Summary

Searches run: Google Patents full text (authoritative source provided); Justia Patents; CAFC slip opinion (07‑1583); N.D. Cal. Markman/summary‑judgment records (C 03‑5085); CourtListener; USPTO assignment/PCT‑ISR records referencing the document.

1. Bibliographic identification

Note on the numbering: the '628 patent is a separate grant from its siblings US 6,725,275 ("…Multiple Media Resources Located on a Network") and US 6,519,648 ("…Multiple Media Resources Located on a Network"). Do not conflate 6,735,628 with 6,735,678, 6,725,275, 6,519,648, or 6,484,199 — all five were asserted in the same litigation, which makes the digits easy to transpose. The CAFC opinion itself at one point writes "claim 12 of the '678 patent" — read literally that number does not exist in the asserted set, and the surrounding discussion (client module / search interface / media player) matches claim 12 of the '628 patent; treat that as an apparent typographical error in the slip opinion, not as a distinct patent.

2. Abstract

Uncertainty flag: the fetched Google Patents text I was given for US 6,735,628 contains the front matter, classifications, and the "Definitions" (Summary) section, but not the verbatim abstract field. I therefore will not quote an abstract as if it were authoritative.

The closest authoritative equivalent in the record is the patent's own summary statement: "This invention relates to the field of streaming media content search and playback over a network. In particular, the invention relates to a computer system that enables a continuous streaming media playback from a distribution of sites available over a network such as the Internet." A reasonable paraphrase of the disclosed subject matter is: a server‑side search of a database of network addresses (URLs) each locating a media resource, where a network server module selects addresses matching a user's search criteria and programmatically drives a client media‑player component to automatically access and continuously play back the media at those addresses, including addresses on different network sites. If you need the literal abstract wording, pull it directly from the USPTO PatentCenter/Patent Full‑Text record rather than from my paraphrase.

3. Plain‑language overview of the independent claims

Important caveat: the text I was supplied stops inside the detailed description (around FIG. 12) and does not include the actual claims. The following is derived from (a) the patent's Summary‑of‑the‑Invention paragraphs, which in this family track the claim families closely, and (b) the constructions and claim characterizations in the N.D. Cal. Markman order (May 20, 2005) and the CAFC opinion. Treat these as functional descriptions of the claim families, not verbatim claim text.

The '628 patent's independent claims fall into these families:

1. Server‑driven media search‑and‑playback method. Receive a search criterion from a network‑enabled device; access a database of network addresses, each address locating a media network resource and each associated with one or more classes of information; select at least one address matching the criterion; signal the selected address to the device; and control the device so it automatically accesses and plays back the resource — i.e., the user's search request yields playback, not a list of links to click.

2. Continuous multi‑resource playback method. Receive a media‑playback request; identify at least two addresses in the database; signal each to the device; and control the device to access and automatically play back each resource in turn. This is the "continuous playback across multiple sources" core.

3. Client‑module / networked playback system claim (this is the family of asserted claim 12). A system with a network‑enabled device having a media playback component, a database of addresses each locating a media resource, and a client module executable to (i) provide one or more interfaces to receive a search request and (ii) control a media player, with a network server module that receives the search request, selects matching addresses, signals them to the device, and programmatically controls the media playback component to load and play the resource. The Markman court construed "client module" as "a module that is installed and executed on a user‑terminal," "media resource" as "at least one media file including audio, video or combinations thereof, capable of being loaded into a user accessible playback component," and "network server module" as "a software module located on the server‑side in a client‑server network."

4. Multi‑site system claim. A first network site and a second network site, each locating one or more media resources with corresponding addresses; a network server module that identifies a first resource on site one and a second resource on site two, signals the corresponding addresses to the terminal with control signals, and automatically signals the next address so the playback component loads the second resource — the "different sites, back‑to‑back, without user intervention" claim.

5. Playlist‑module / designated‑order system claim. A terminal plus a playlist module storing a playlist of network addresses spanning multiple sites; a network server module that signals the playlist and controls the terminal to access and load each address's resource; and a user interface whose inputs direct the server to alter the designated order of links.

6. Rating‑system claims. A database of addresses each with a rating/class of information; a network server module signaling addresses to terminals; and a rating module that receives a rating input from each terminal and associates (and reconfigures) the rating for the selected address — usable as a selection criterion for building playlists.

7. Link‑harvesting/verification claims (backend families). Independent claims covering: discovering and storing external links from a network site and extracting internal links selectable to open a resource of a specified data type; programmatically verifying that each stored link opens a corresponding media resource and storing only verified links; programmatically extracting metadata about the resource behind each link; and a metacrawler + media‑search + metadata‑extraction backend system feeding the link database. These recite the backend crawl/verify/annotate pipeline rather than end‑user playback.

Shared inventive thrust of all of the above: server‑side search over a pre‑built, verified, metadata‑annotated link database, combined with programmatic server control of a client‑side media player to deliver continuous playback sourced from multiple independent network sites, with playlist, rating, and link‑verification machinery around it.

4. Litigation and docket status (including the 2026 check)

• District court: Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc. and Listen.com, Case No. C 03‑5085 (N.D. Cal., San Francisco), Senior Judge William W. Schwarzer. Friskit filed June 27, 2003, originally on three patents and later adding two more; the five patents in suit were 6,389,467; 6,484,199; 6,519,648; 6,725,275; and 6,735,628. The court limited the case to eight claims: '467 claims 35 and 52; '648 claims 49 and 52; '275 claims 6, 16, 38; and '628 claim 12.
  • Markman/claim construction order: May 20, 2005 (Fern M. Smith, J.) — constructions of "client module," "media resource," "network server module," "search module," etc.
  • July 26, 2007: summary judgment for Real that all asserted claims were invalid as obvious under 35 U.S.C. § 103, applying the then-recent KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc. decision. RealNetworks' press release of 2007‑07‑31 described it as a complete victory invalidating four asserted patents' claims.
• CAFC: Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc. and Listen.com, Appeal No. 2007‑1583, decided January 12, 2009, 306 F. App'x 610 (Fed. Cir. 2009) (nonprecedential; Bryson, Linn, Prost, JJ.). The court affirmed the obviousness judgment. It held that IUMA Radio's HTML/JavaScript implementation satisfied "programmatic control" even under Friskit's own proposed construction; that the "direct control" limitation was a genuinely disputed fact on which the district court erred (but the error was not outcome‑dispositive); and that Winamp's mini‑browser satisfied the '628 claim 12 "client module" limitations.
  • Litigation links on the Google Patents record: https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/Court%20of%20Appeals%20for%20the%20Federal%20Circuit/case/07-1583 and https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/California%20Eastern%20District%20Court/case/3%3A03-cv-05085.
  • Discrepancy to flag: the Google Patents litigation entry labels the district case as "California Eastern District Court" with docket 3:03‑cv‑05085. The primary court documents (Markman order, CAFC opinion, and the Westlaw summary judgment report) place it in the Northern District of California, No. C 03‑05085 WWS/FMS. I report both literally rather than correcting either.
• 2026 CAFC dockets: I found no CAFC case docketed in 2026 involving US 6,735,628. My searches surfaced no 2026 Federal Circuit activity for this number. What I did find is that the Friskit patent family was later litigated by successors — e.g., Bluebonnet Internet Media Services v. Pandora Media (W.D. Tex. Case 6:20‑cv‑00731), where the transfer record discusses "predecessor Friskit which took place in 2003 in NDCA" and notes that the Friskit patents are not the patents at issue there. That later litigation concerns other family members, not necessarily the '628 patent itself. Confirm with PACER/Unified Patents before asserting any 2026 activity — I could not substantiate one.

5. Bottom line

US 6,735,628 is Aviv Eyal's/Friskit's "media search + continuous playback across multiple network sites" patent, filed 2002‑09‑20 with a 2000‑01‑24 priority date, issuing 2004‑05‑11, now expired for failure to pay maintenance fees (adjusted expiration 2020‑07‑11). Its asserted independent claim (claim 12) was held invalid as obvious by the N.D. Cal. on July 26, 2007 and that judgment was affirmed by the Federal Circuit on January 12, 2009 (No. 2007‑1583, 306 F. App'x 610). It retains value mainly as prior art — it has been cited in later patent prosecutions (e.g., the PCT/US2008/10002 and PCT/US2009/048528 international search reports list US 6,735,628 B2 as a cited document) — and as lineage for the live continuation family running to US 10,318,647 B2.

Items I could not verify authoritatively and did not guess at: the verbatim abstract text; the verbatim language of the independent claims (the supplied text omits the claims); and any 2026 Federal Circuit docket for this number.

I'll research litigation involving US patent 6735628. Let me search multiple sources.

Let me get more specifics on the case details, filing dates, and check for any other lawsuits.

Let me check for any additional cases and confirm the docket details.

Litigation Involving U.S. Patent No. 6,735,628

Patent identified (literal): U.S. Patent No. 6,735,628 B2 — "Media search and continuous playback of multiple media resources distributed on a network." Inventor: Aviv Eyal. Original assignee: Friskit, Inc. Priority date: 2000‑01‑24; filed 2002‑09‑20; granted 2004‑05‑11. Current legal status: Expired – Fee Related (adjusted expiration 2020‑07‑11). In the litigation record this patent is referred to as "the '628 patent."

Based on the sources retrieved, only one litigation family asserted the '628 patent. The '628 patent was asserted as one of several patents in a single infringement action brought by Friskit against RealNetworks and Listen.com, which then proceeded to appeal at the Federal Circuit.

Case 1 — District Court

Key developments (with the '628 patent's role):

• The '628 patent was one of five patents‑in‑suit (along with U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,389,467; 6,484,199; 6,519,648; and 6,725,275). Accused products included the RealOne Player Plus/subscription service and Listen's Rhapsody service.
• Friskit limited the litigation to eight claims: '467 claims 35 and 52; '648 claims 49 and 52; '275 claims 6, 16, and 38; and '628 claim 12.
• Markman / claim construction order (May 20, 2005) — Judge Fern M. Smith construed the disputed terms, incl. "client module," "media resource," "network server module," and "search module." Source: https://ipmall.info/sites/default/files/hosted_resources/Markman/pdfFiles/2005.05.20_FRISKIT_INC_v._REALNETWORKS.pdf
• July 6, 2006 — Court denied Defendants' motion to dismiss for lack of ownership (inventor Eyal's Microsoft employment issue). (Doc. 470)
• July 26, 2007 — Judge William W. Schwarzer granted RealNetworks' renewed motion for summary judgment of invalidity for obviousness under 35 U.S.C. § 103, applying the Supreme Court's KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc. decision. The court held that "all of the individual features of Friskit's patents which allow a user to easily search for and listen to streaming media existed in the prior art." This invalidated the asserted claims including '628 claim 12.
• Reported decision: Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc., 499 F. Supp. 2d 1145 (N.D. Cal. 2007) — https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[1871910](/patent/1871910)/friskit-inc-v-realnetworks-inc/
• RealNetworks' press release (July 31, 2007) announcing the win: https://files.shareholder.com/downloads/RNWK/6212936780x0x123521/.../RNWK_News_2007_7_31_General.pdf

Case 2 — Federal Circuit Appeal

• Citation: Friskit, Inc. v. Real Networks, Inc., 306 F. App'x 610 (Fed. Cir. 2009) (opinion by Circuit Judge Bryson; panel Bryson, Linn, Prost). CourtListener: https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[209377](/patent/209377)/friskit-inc-v-real-networks-inc/
• CAFC opinion (PDF): http://cafc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/opinions-orders/07-1583.pdf
• The Federal Circuit affirmed that the asserted claims — expressly including claim 12 of the '628 patent ("a client module being executable to (i) provide one or more interfaces ... to receive a search request; and (ii) control a media player") — would have been obvious in view of the prior art (IUMA Radio, Winamp, mp3.com, M3U playlists, etc.). Because the claims were invalid, the court did not reach infringement or the "substantially automatic" indefiniteness arguments.

Summary / Caveats

• One patent‑assertion case (plus its appeal) is known for U.S. 6,735,628: Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc. and Listen.com (N.D. Cal. 3:03‑cv‑05085 → Fed. Cir. 2007‑1583). The '628 patent was held invalid for obviousness, affirmed on appeal; the case is closed.
• I found no other lawsuits asserting the '628 patent. (Note: the separate Apple Computer Inc. v. Burst.com matter referenced Friskit's patents in briefing but did not assert the '628 patent — it is not a case involving this patent.)
• Source‑metadata caution (per your standing rules): Google Patents labels the district‑court case as "California Eastern District Court" for 3:03‑cv‑05085. That is inaccurate — the case was in the Northern District of California. I flag this rather than silently correct it; the N.D. Cal. designation is confirmed by the court's own orders and CourtListener/PACER records.
• I could not reach the Unified Patents litigation portal or PACER directly before reaching my research limit; the findings above are grounded in the Federal Circuit opinion (07‑1583), the N.D. Cal. summary‑judgment and claim‑construction orders, CourtListener/RECAP dockets, and RealNetworks' own press release. If you need a formal PACER docket pull, I can outline the exact docket numbers to request.

I'll start by verifying the structured-data default ("no PTAB activity") against public sources, then check for any older or recently-filed proceedings the ODP may not have indexed.

No PTAB hits yet. Let me run targeted docket-level searches to rule out older AIA proceedings and confirm the litigation chain.

Let me confirm the PTAB-negative and check for any post-2016 assertion campaign (which often invites IPRs).

PTAB / AIA Trial Activity — US 6,735,628 ("Media search and continuous playback of multiple media resources distributed on a network")

Bottom line first: there are no AIA trial proceedings on this patent. The structured block provided in the prompt (USPTO ODP) returns zero proceedings, and my independent searches of PTAB/ptacts.uspto.gov materials, the Friskit litigation record, and secondary coverage surfaced no IPR, PGR, or CBM petition naming US 6,735,628 — by any petitioner, at any time. Before relying on that, note the caveat below.

Confidence / caveat: I could not run an exhaustive DocketAlarm/PTAB-E2E docket pull for every Friskit-family patent number; one of my searches terminated early. I searched for 6,735,628 + IPR/CBM/PTAB, for "Friskit" + PTAB, and for post-2016 assertion campaigns of the Friskit portfolio. All results were district-court and Federal Circuit materials. I found no PTAB trial number to report. I am reporting zero proceedings rather than inventing one. If a proceeding exists that isn't publicly indexed, it would most likely be a recently filed petition against the later Friskit continuations (see the Bluebonnet note below), not the '628.

Proceedings overview

Total count: 0 AIA trial proceedings on US 6,735,628. Breakdown by status: n/a — there is no active proceeding, no claim invalidated at the PTAB, no claim sustained at the PTAB, no settlement, and no institution denial, because no petition was ever filed. The defensive posture this gives a defendant is not "hardened by surviving IPRs" — it is the unusual combination of (a) a claim that was already adjudged invalid by a district court and affirmed by the Federal Circuit under § 103, and (b) a patent that has expired (Google Patents and the ODP structured block both list an adjusted expiration of 2020-07-11, legal status "Expired – Fee Related"). Practically: the patent is not a live IPR target, and the only asserted claim in its litigation history is dead on the merits.

Because the requested per-proceeding format has nothing to populate, I've substituted the two non-PTAB adjudications that actually define this patent's validity posture, clearly labeled as not AIA proceedings.

No proceeding — [closest analogue] Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc. and Listen.com (N.D. Cal. No. C 03-5085 FMS)

• Type: Not an AIA trial. District court patent litigation (contemporaneous with CAFC appeal No. 2007-1583).
• Filed: 2003-06-27 (complaint); FRISKIT's own suit against Real and Listen.com.
• Status: Concluded. Summary judgment of invalidity granted for defendants; affirmed on appeal.
• Judge panel: District — Senior Judge William W. Schwarzer (N.D. Cal.). Federal Circuit — Bryson, Linn, and Prost, with Judge Bryson writing (nonprecedential disposition, 306 F. App'x 610).
• Asserted claims (patent-level): Friskit limited the case to eight claims across five patents: '467 claims 35 and 52; '648 claims 49 and 52; '275 claims 6, 16, and 38; and '628 claim 12. For US 6,735,628, only claim 12 was asserted and adjudicated.
• Grounds: § 103 obviousness, decided on defendants' renewed motion for summary judgment after KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc. Art included Winamp (with its integrated "mini-browser" for mp3.com / IUMA.com search and playlist construction), IUMA Radio (server-side HTML/JavaScript controlling an embedded RealPlayer plug-in via the player's API), pre-existing media players (Winamp, RealJukebox), mp3.com-style playlist services, and server-side programmatic control via Java/JavaScript.
• Decision: SJ for defendants entered 2007-07-26 (judgment). Federal Circuit affirmed on 2009-01-12. On the '628-specific limitation, the panel wrote: "claim 12 requires only that the 'client module . . . control a media player'; it does not require 'direct control' … We therefore agree with the district court that the contested limitation was taught by Winamp." (Note: the opinion's Section C text refers to "the '678 patent" — evidently a typographical error, since the case lists only the '467, '275, and '628 patents and the caption recites "claim 12 of the '628 patent.")
• Claim-level outcome for the '628: Claim 12 — held invalid for obviousness (§ 103); affirmed. The other 107 claims of the '628 were never construed, never asserted, and never adjudicated. I will not claim the FWD (or the district court) addressed them, because it did not.
• Settlement / termination: No settlement as to RealNetworks/Listen.com — this went to judgment and appeal. Separately, reporting on the later Friskit v. Microsoft dispute indicates a confidential settlement agreement in 2011; terms are confidential and I could not verify them from a primary source.
• Appeal: CAFC 2007-1583, decided 2009-01-12, affirmed. One nuance worth knowing: the panel disagreed with the district court's reasoning on the '275 patent's "directly controllable" limitation (holding there was a genuine factual dispute over whether Winamp's control was sufficiently "direct"), but affirmed the ultimate § 103 judgment. For the '628, the panel agreed with the district court outright.
• Defensive value: If a demand letter today cites claim 12 of the '628, it is citing a claim that a federal court held invalid and the Federal Circuit affirmed invalid seven years before the patent expired — that is a powerful, quotable, non-IPR defense. But the judgment is in personam: it binds Friskit/RealNetworks/Listen.com and their privies, not the world, and the opinion is nonprecedential.

No proceeding — [context] Bluebonnet Internet Media Services v. Pandora (N.D. Cal., 2020)

• Type: Not an AIA trial. NPE enforcement campaign on the later Friskit continuations — not the '628.
• Filed: August 2020.
• Status: Patents held invalid under § 101 (Alice) on judgment on the pleadings — order dated 2022-09-07 (Judge Vince Chhabria), who wrote: "These claims may capture the core of a good business idea. But they are directed to an abstract idea and lack an inventive concept—and are therefore invalid." Plaintiff appealed; I could not confirm the appellate disposition from a primary source.
• Relevance to the '628: The asserted patents were US 9,405,753; 9,547,650; and 9,779,095 — Friskit-family continuations, not US 6,735,628. Bluebonnet acquired the Friskit portfolio after the company ceased operating. This matters because it shows the Friskit family passed to an NPE — but that campaign ran on different, later-issued claims, and drew no PTAB petition on the '628.
• Defensive value: Low direct value on the '628, but it is the evidence that this family has been monetized by an NPE and that § 101 has been a successful (and cheap) defense tool against the Friskit continuations.

Strategic summary

Claim status of US 6,735,628. The patent issued with 108 claims on 2004-05-11 and has no PTAB invalidation history whatsoever. The only claim ever adjudicated is claim 12, which was held obvious under § 103 by the N.D. Cal. and affirmed by the Federal Circuit in 2009. Claims 1–11 and 13–108 are UNTESTED — never asserted, never construed in a validity ruling, never the subject of an IPR. That cuts both ways: a defendant cannot lean on claim 12's invalidity to defeat a theory built on claims 1–11 or 13–108, but it also means the patent owner has no PTAB wins to point to and no claim that has "survived" anything. There is no surviving-claims list to give you, because nothing was cancelled at the PTAB; the invalidation here is a district-court judgment, not a certificate.

Estoppel landscape — § 315(e)(2) is a non-issue here. Statutory IPR estoppel attaches only to a petitioner who obtains an FWD. There is no petitioner and no FWD on the '628, so no § 315(e)(2) estoppel exists against anyone and every prior-art ground remains formally available to a defendant — including Winamp, IUMA Radio, mp3.com, RealJukebox, Java/JavaScript server control, and the M3U-file art litigated in 2005–2009. The constraints that do exist are different: (i) issue preclusion/claim preclusion binds RealNetworks, Listen.com, and their privies to the '628 claim 12 invalidity judgment; (ii) the 2007–2009 district court and CAFC reasoning is persuasive but nonprecedential as to third parties; and (iii) § 325(d) and General Plastic would be discretionary considerations for any newly filed petition — but those are academic now (see below).

Enforcement horizon — the decisive fact. The structured data and Google Patents both place adjusted expiration at 2020-07-11, with legal status "Expired – Fee Related." Even if a successor-in-interest tried to assert the '628 today, the § 286 six-year damages lookback from a 2026 filing would reach back only to 2020-09-28 — after the listed expiry — leaving essentially no recoverable damages and no possibility of an injunction. That is the real reason no IPR exists and why none is needed: well-asserted patents attract IPRs, and this one stopped being worth asserting. Note the pattern signal too: the family's later continuations did draw an NPE enforcement campaign (Bluebonnet v. Pandora, 2020), and even that campaign produced no PTAB petitions — the defendants won on § 101 at the pleadings stage instead.

Recommended next steps

1. If you are facing a demand letter or complaint citing US 6,735,628: first note that claim 12 is adjudged invalid — Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc., No. C 03-5085 (N.D. Cal. July 26, 2007), aff'd, No. 2007-1583 (Fed. Cir. Jan. 12, 2009) (CAFC opinion PDF; CourtListener). Quote the panel: "We therefore agree with the district court that the contested limitation was taught by Winamp." Second, note the adjusted expiration of 2020-07-11 and that the patent is expired, which eliminates prospective relief and collapses the damages window.
2. If the letter cites claims other than 12: those claims are untested, so you cannot rely on the 2009 judgment directly. Your cleanest paths are (a) the same § 103 art (Winamp + IUMA Radio + mp3.com + server-side Java/JavaScript, all documented in the 2007 SJ papers and the CAFC opinion), and (b) an Alice/§ 101 challenge, which is exactly what killed the Friskit continuations in Bluebonnet v. Pandora in 2022.
3. Do not budget for an IPR. It is not a cost-effective play: no estoppel exists to exploit, the patent is expired, and the 2009 judgment already gives you the invalidity story on the only claim ever asserted.
4. Verify before you rely. Because I could not exhaustively pull every Friskit patent number against PTAB E2E, treat "zero proceedings" as the well-supported default rather than a certified negative. A one-click confirmation is available at USPTO Patent Center and PTAB E2E using application 10/251,307 / patent 6,735,628, plus the Google Patents family/litigation panel, which for this patent lists only the two district/CAFC litigation entries — no PTAB tab.

I'll research the assignment record and ownership chain for US 6735628 before writing anything.

Good leads. Let me dig into the assignment chain, the Bluebonnet entity, and any assertion history.

Let me pin down the specific reel/frame records and the Bluebonnet chain.

Ownership Reconstruction — US 6,735,628 B2

Scope note / data-quality caveat up front. The authoritative patent text supplied (Google Patents, fetched 2026-09-28) renders the legal-events block for US 10/251,307 without reel/frame numbers, and USPTO Assignment Center (https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/) is an interactive database that I could not query directly in this session. The two 2003 events below are reported from the patent's own legal-events record; the only reel/frame numbers I can ground in a primary litigation document are 041217/0628 and 041675/0788, cited by Bluebonnet itself. I flag every gap rather than filling it. No assignment has been invented.

Inventors

Unusual patterns worth flagging:

1. Name-vs-assignment mismatch. Google Patents lists only Aviv Eyal as Inventor, yet the recorded 2003-12-24 conveyance lists both "APOSPOROS, GEORGE" and "EYAL, AVIV" as assignors (USPTO reassignment record). That means Aposporos held a recordable interest in the '628 application chain even if he is not a named inventor on its face. This is not resolved in the record I obtained.
2. Founder take-back, not inventor flight. The classic warning sign — inventors leaving the original assignee before grant — is inverted here. Friskit assigned the portfolio back to its own co-founder George Aposporos on a recording dated 2003-12-29, and Aposporos later reappears as the corporate representative of the asserting entity. Founders staying attached through an NPE conversion is a stronger troll-pattern tell than founders departing.
3. Inventor-name spelling drift in the record. The assignee is recorded in the same file as both "FRISKIT, INC." (Google Patents current-assignee field and the 2003-12-29 event) and "FRISKITT, INC." (2003-12-24 event). Minor, but it matters when reconciling chain-of-title.

Original assignee

Friskit, Inc. (recorded in places as "FRISKITT, Inc."), San Francisco, California.

• Primary line of business: consumer streaming-media search and continuous playback. Friskit launched the Friskit.com streaming music service, in beta by ~June 2000, reportedly reaching 100,000+ beta users. It was one of the earliest playlist/streaming discovery services.
• Did they ship a product embodying the claims? A commercial service existed before grant, but the record is explicit that nothing covered by the patents was sold after issuance: Bluebonnet's own complaint (¶¶20–21) alleges that neither Bluebonnet nor its predecessor Friskit ever made, offered for sale, or sold any "patented article" within the meaning of 35 U.S.C. § 287 after issuance of parent US 6,389,467 (issued 2002-05-14). Friskit's own November 2003 statement describes it as "a San Francisco-based technology licensing company," and states the company "changed its business strategy from a consumer service to a technology licensing model."
• Current status: Ceased operating / defunct. No bankruptcy filing was located (see Signal 6). The portfolio was moved to co-founder George Aposporos by recorded assignment on 2003-12-29, and the family was later asserted by Bluebonnet Internet Media Services, LLC. Google Patents still shows "FRISKITT Inc" as the current assignee for the '628 patent specifically — which, if accurate, means the Bluebonnet conveyance may not have captured this particular patent (see timeline entry 3).
• Litigation posture of the original assignee: Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc. et al., No. C 03-05085 WWS (N.D. Cal.) — asserted the '467, '275, '648 and '628 patents; Friskit lost on summary judgment of obviousness (§ 103), with the district court noting "Friskit's invention has never reached the market." Appeal to the Federal Circuit (07-1583). A separate dispute with Microsoft was resolved by a confidential settlement agreement in 2011.

Assignment timeline

Recorded events (no post-issuance assignment to a later acquirer is visible on the face of the '628 legal-events block; the entries below are, in order, the inventor→company conveyance, the company→founder conveyance, and the family-level conveyance to the asserting entity):

1. Executed date not retrieved / recorded 2003-12-24 — Reel/frame not retrieved (Google Patents legal events; USPTO reassignment entry)

• Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest
• Assignor: George Aposporos; Aviv Eyal
• Assignee: Friskit, Inc. (recorded as "FRISKITT, INC.")
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: Original inventor-to-company assignment — recorded roughly three years late, in the same week Friskit began repositioning itself as a licensing-only entity.

2. Executed on or about December 2003 (exact date not retrieved) / recorded 2003-12-29 — Reel/frame not retrieved

• Conveyance: Assignment
• Assignor: Friskit, Inc. ("FRISKIT, INC.")
• Assignee: George Aposporos (natural person)
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: Internal reorg / founder take-back — the operating company moves its patent rights to its co-founder and CEO, five days after the inventor→company recording and within weeks of the 2003 RealNetworks/Listen.com infringement filing. This is asset-stripping of the portfolio away from the operating entity.

3. Executed date not retrieved / recorded circa 2011 (reel series inference) — Reel 041217/0628 and Reel 041675/0788

• Conveyance: Assignment
• Assignor: George Aposporos and/or Friskit, Inc. (not specified in the excerpt I obtained)
• Assignee: Bluebonnet Internet Media Services, LLC
• Correspondent: not retrieved
• Context: Transfer to an asserting NPE. Caveat — this is the critical gap: these two reel/frame citations come from Bluebonnet's own complaint (Bluebonnet Internet Media Services, LLC v. Pandora Media, LLC, W.D. Tex. 6:20-cv-00731, ¶ 18), which cites them as the chain of title for the four later continuations it asserted (US 9,405,753; 9,547,650; 9,779,095; 10,318,647) — not for the '628 patent. I could not confirm from a primary record that US 6,735,628's abstract was included in those conveyances. Google Patents still lists "FRISKITT Inc" as current assignee for '628, which cuts against a recorded Bluebonnet assignment against this patent. Treat entry 3 as family-level, not patent-confirmed.

Reel-series inference only — USPTO reel numbers in the 041xxx range correspond broadly to 2010–2011 recordations; I did not retrieve the execution dates.

Non-assignment events for context (not conveyances): 2003 N.D. Cal. suit vs. RealNetworks/Listen.com; 2007–2008 summary judgment of § 103 invalidity; 2011 Microsoft confidential settlement; 2020-08-12 Bluebonnet sues Pandora in W.D. Tex.; 2021-10-13 Federal Circuit mandamus transferring to N.D. Cal. (In re Pandora, No. 21-172); 2022-09-07 § 101 judgment on the pleadings; 2024-03-29 Federal Circuit affirmance.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 6735628
    2000 : Provisional application filed
         : Friskit Inc formed by Eyal and Aposporos
         : Friskitcom streaming service launched
    2003 : Inventor to company assignment recorded Dec 24
         : Friskit sues RealNetworks and Listen
         : Company to Aposporos assignment recorded Dec 29
    2004 : Patent US 6735628 issued May 11
    2008 : RealNetworks litigation ends in invalidity
    2011 : Microsoft dispute settled confidentially
         : Family recorded to Bluebonnet per Litigation
    2020 : Bluebonnet sues Pandora
         : Patent term expires
    2022 : Claims invalid under Section 101
    2024 : Federal Circuit affirms invalidity

(Check the last three tokens of the 2003 block against Assignment Center; the two December 2003 recordings are the load-bearing entries.)

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — PRESENT.
Two concrete steps, both recorded: (a) Friskit, Inc. → George Aposporos individually, recorded 2003-12-29, converting the portfolio out of the operating entity at the moment Friskit publicly recast itself as "a technology licensing company"; (b) the family's conveyance to Bluebonnet Internet Media Services, LLC, cited in Bluebonnet's complaint at Reel 041217/0628 and Reel 041675/0788. Corroborating evidence that this is not naming alone: Bluebonnet's own complaint ¶¶ 20–21 admits neither it nor Friskit ever made, offered for sale, or sold a patented article; it is a Texas LLC with essentially no online presence (Wikipedia-level reporting: DMN, 2020-08-26); and its registered office street address in the Texas comptroller database matches the address of one of the plaintiff's litigation counsel (reported by Digital Music News from the comptroller's own data). That is the registered-agent-service / single-purpose-LLC tell, evidenced — not inferred.

2. Known asserter in the chain — PRESENT (qualified).
Bluebonnet Internet Media Services, LLC is a litigating NPE: it filed W.D. Tex. 6:20-cv-00731 on 2020-08-12, was characterized by Pandora as a "shakedown" plaintiff, and was described in commentary as a non-practicing entity that "does not implement the patented technology" (UNC NC JOLT blog; MoFo client alert). It does not, however, match any entity on the enumerated list (Acacia, Marathon, IV, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Mosaid/Conversant, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, Document Generation Corp, Spangenberg). Qualified: an NPE by record and by conduct, but not a named-list match. I found no Unified Patents or RPX "high-frequency plaintiff" entry for Bluebonnet in the results I retrieved — I did not exhaustively verify that.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR (unretrieved data).
I could not retrieve the correspondent of record for any of the three entries. This is the single most valuable field for linking Bluebonnet-style LLCs to a repeat attorney, and it is exactly the field the Google Patents legal-events rendering omits. This must be pulled manually from Assignment Center for reel 041217/0628 and reel 041675/0788 (and, if the '628 has its own post-2003 record, for that reel/frame as well). Do not mark this signal either way until the correspondent names are read off the face of those recordings and compared across the family.

4. Cascading transfers — PRESENT IN PART.
Two recordings five days apart (2003-12-24 and 2003-12-29) is a compressed chained conveyance, and it happens inside the window of the 2003 RealNetworks/Listen.com suit. But the classic outward signature — consecutive LLC-to-LLC hops inside 24 months — is not observed: the intermediate holder is a natural person, and the next hop (to Bluebonnet) appears to be ~8 years later. Marked partial rather than present.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — NOT PRESENT (on available evidence).
The conveyance to Bluebonnet is cited at reels in the ~2011 range, while the suit naming the family was filed 2020-08-12 — roughly nine years, far outside the 6-month window. For the 2003 RealNetworks/Listen.com suit, the recorded Friskit→Aposporos assignment (2003-12-29) post-dates the filing reported in November 2003 press coverage — i.e., concurrent/after, not pre-suit. Venue-shopping note (not a transfer signal): Bluebonnet filed in the Waco Division of W.D. Tex. and was removed by Federal Circuit mandamus (No. 21-172, 2021-10-13), which is a separate NPE-behavior indicator from this checklist item.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT.
No Chapter 7 or 11 proceeding for Friskit, Inc. was located in the results I retrieved. Friskit's wind-down appears to have been voluntary (consumer service → "technology licensing model" → founder take-back). Absence of a bankruptcy record is a finding here: the portfolio left the operating company without a court-supervised sale, which is why there is no public price or buyer disclosure.

7. Privateering — NOT PRESENT.
This is the inverse pattern. Friskit asserted its own patents on its own behalf in 2003 (RealNetworks/Listen.com) while it was still the named owner; there is no operating-company-to-NPE transfer in which the operating company retains a beneficial interest and sues competitors. The 2011 Microsoft settlement was confidential and Bluebonnet's complaint expressly states Pandora "is not a licensee and has no rights" under it — a carve-out, not a privateering arrangement.

8. Defensive aggregator — NOT PRESENT.
The chain does not terminate at RPX, Allied Security Trust, LOT Network, Unified Patents, or Open Invention Network. It terminates (at the family level) at an asserting LLC that litigated to judgment and lost. Anti-NPE note: the patent has effectively been neutralized anyway — US 6,735,628 reached its adjusted expiration on 2020-07-11 ("Expired – Fee Related"), and the asserted continuations were held § 101-invalid on 2022-09-07, affirmed by the Federal Circuit on 2024-03-29.

Verdict

NPE — high confidence.

Two strong signals are documented on the record rather than inferred: a shell-entity/asset-stripping transfer out of operating company Friskit, Inc. to founder George Aposporos (recorded 2003-12-29, five days after the inventor→company recording of 2003-12-24) and onward to a Texas LLC, Bluebonnet Internet Media Services, LLC, cited at Reel 041217/0628 and Reel 041675/0788; and a known asserter in the chain — Bluebonnet, which filed W.D. Tex. 6:20-cv-00731 on 2020-08-12, was described as a non-practicing entity, and whose complaint (¶¶ 20–21) admits it and its predecessor sold no patented article after issuance. Aggravating corroboration: Bluebonnet's registered office matched plaintiff's litigation counsel's address in the Texas comptroller data, and Friskit's own 2003 statement recasts it as "a technology licensing company."

Two honest gaps, both of which could move the verdict, and one of which could shrink it to "Insufficient data" for this patent alone: (i) the correspondent of record is unretrieved — Signal 3 is untested and is the field most likely to reveal the repeat-player attorney behind the Bluebonnet recordings; and (ii) I could not confirm that this patent, as opposed to its continuations, was included in the 041217/0628 and 041675/0788 conveyances — Google Patents still lists "FRISKITT Inc" as current assignee for US 6,735,628, which is inconsistent with a Bluebonnet assignment having been recorded against it. Note also that even in the strongest reading, US 6,735,628 expired 2020-07-11 and is no longer assertable, so the practical exposure is historical.

Verify at: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent number 6735628; also pull reel 041217 frame 0628 and reel 041675 frame 0788 and read the correspondent field on each) — cross-check https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html and https://patents.google.com/patent/US6735628/en.

I'll research the prior-art citations for US 6,735,628. Let me run targeted searches.

Let me pull the citation tables directly from patent databases.

Let me get the actual front-page "References Cited" list for this patent.

Prior Art for US 6,735,628 B2 — Tiered Analysis

Important framing correction before the tables. The task asks which references "potentially anticipate under 35 U.S.C. § 102." The authoritative invalidity record for this patent does not contain a § 102 anticipation holding. The '628 patent was held invalid for obviousness under § 103(a) (N.D. Cal., July 26, 2007, Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc., No. C 03‑05085 WWS), affirmed by the Federal Circuit (Friskit, Inc. v. Real Networks, Inc., 306 F. App'x 610 (Fed. Cir. 2009), No. 2007‑1583). No reference was found to anticipate claim 12 (or any claim) as a single prior-art disclosure. References that do not disclose every element cannot anticipate and were instead combined under § 103. I flag this because a § 102 answer that is not so qualified would misstate the record.

0. Sourcing limitation (read this with the table)

I could not retrieve the literal front-page "(56) References Cited" / "U.S. Patent Documents" block for US 6,735,628. The Google Patents full text I was given contains front matter, classifications, and the Summary ("Definitions") section only — it stops mid‑description at FIG. 12 and omits both the claims and the citation tables. My attempts to pull the citation tables directly (Justia, patentimages PDF, the Google Patents "Patent Citations" anchor) returned the description text and other patents' citation lists, not the '628's own (56) block.

Per my operating rules, I will not fabricate US patent numbers and dates for that list. What follows is (a) the prior art actually applied against the '628, which is fully documented, and (b) patent-document art I can ground in retrieved sources, with the basis for each stated.

1. Most relevant prior art — the references actually applied against the '628

These are the references RealNetworks relied on and the district court accepted. Claim 12 ("a client module being executable to (i) provide one or more interfaces … to receive a search request; and (ii) control a media player") is the only '628 claim that was asserted and construed, so the mapping targets that claim family.

Source for items 1–7: N.D. Cal. summary‑judgment order, Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc., 499 F. Supp. 2d 1145 (N.D. Cal. 2007) (2007 WL 2156239) — https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[1871910](/patent/1871910)/friskit-inc-v-realnetworks-inc/ ; and CAFC opinion 07‑1583 — http://cafc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/opinions-orders/07-1583.pdf (also at 306 F. App'x 610, https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[209377](/patent/209377)/friskit-inc-v-real-networks-inc/).

Key evidentiary point for § 102 purposes: items 1–5 are non‑patent literature / public‑use references (websites and software), not "patent citations." They are the most relevant art for the '628, but they are documented as system art with video exhibits (e.g., winamp-mp3-dot-com-adam-pfeffer.avi, winamp-iuma-bees-capture-to-disk.avi), which is why the case was decided on § 103 rather than § 102.

2. Patent-document art in the same family's cited-references list (caveated)

I retrieved the front-page "(56) References Cited — U.S. PATENT DOCUMENTS" list of US 9,405,753 B2 (Eyal et al.), a continuation in this same family with substantially the same specification (US 9,405,753 is one of the '628's listed priority descendants). That list is the '753's citations — not the '628's — but because the two share a specification and examiner art accumulates across the family, it is the closest grounded proxy available to me for the patent-document art in this field. Treat as family-context art, not as the '628's verified (56) block.

Retrieved entries include (as printed on the '753 front page): US 6,484,199 B2 (Eyal), US 6,725,275 B2 (Eyal), US 6,721,741 B1 (Eyal et al.), US 6,735,628 B2 (Eyal), US 6,502,194 B1 (Berman et al.), US 6,526,411 B1 (Ward), US 6,519,648 B1 (Ward), US 6,539,335 B1 (Gjerdingen et al.), US 6,564,213 B1 (Ortega et al.), US 6,633,874 B1 (Nusbickel), US 6,563,799 B1 (Van Der Meulen), US 6,584,492 B1 (Cezar et al.), US 6,662,826 B2 (Kokawa), US 6,675,195 B1 (Chatterjee et al.), US 6,401,118 B1‑era entries, and others — plus "OTHER PUBLICATIONS" including Ajgaonkar, Sandeep, "How to — MP3," Times Computing (June 30, 1999) and Ajgaonkar, "Access Your Music Collection on the Net," Times Computing Online (Feb. 2000).

• Source: US 9,405,753 B2 front page, https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/09/07/88/30e27954ddced8/US9405753.pdf

Note the family self-citations (Eyal's own '199, '275, '741) are not § 102 art against the '628 in the usual sense; they share priority. The genuinely adverse patent art above (Berman, Ward, Gjerdingen, Ortega, Nusbickel, Van Der Meulen, Cezar, Kokawa, Chatterjee) is directed at search/playlist/metadata handling — the same functional space as the '628 claim families 1, 5, and 6 (search → playlist → rating).

I cannot state which of these appeared on the '628's own (56) block, or which claim each maps to, without the literal '628 citation table — which I could not retrieve.

3. Forward citations (documents citing the '628) — for completeness, not § 102 art

The '628 has been cited as prior art by later documents, including in PCT/US2008/10002 and PCT/US2009/048528 international search reports (per the previously generated sections), and on the face of US 9,405,753 B2. These are forward citations; they cannot anticipate the '628 because they post-date its 2000‑01‑24 priority date.

4. Bottom line

• Most relevant prior art for US 6,735,628: the seven references actually applied in Friskit v. RealNetworks — IUMA Radio, Winamp (with mini‑browser), mp3.com, IUMA.com, M3U playlists, RealPlayer 4.0/IE4, and RealJukebox. These were the art that invalidated the patent.
• Statutory basis: § 103 obviousness, not § 102 anticipation. The task's premise that a cited reference "potentially anticipates" a claim is not supported for any reference in the record; the references were combined.
• Claim mapping: the only '628 claim with a documented, construed scope is claim 12 (client module with search interface + media-player control), which Winamp's mini‑browser was held to meet. Mappings for other claims are functional estimates derived from the patent's Summary‑of‑Invention families, because the supplied text omits the claims.
• Unverified / flagged: the literal front-page "(56) References Cited" list of the '628 itself. I did not fabricate it. To complete that list authoritatively, pull the '628 front page from USPTO PatentCenter or the patent PDF at patentimages.storage.googleapis.com for US 6,735,628 (the direct PDF hash was not retrievable in my searches), or the Google Patents "Patent Citations" table at https://patents.google.com/patent/US6735628/en.

I'll research the prior art for this patent — both the references cited on its face and the references the courts actually relied on in the Friskit litigation.

Let me pull the actual claim text and the patent's own cited references.

Let me get the verbatim claims and the front-page cited references.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 6,735,628 B2

Under 35 U.S.C. § 103 (pre‑AIA), priority date 2000‑01‑24

Builds on the previously generated Patent Summary and Litigation Summary. Those sections established the bibliographic facts, the asserted‑claim history, and the validity outcome. I do not repeat them here; I extend them into a full § 103 element‑by‑element treatment.

0. Two flags before the analysis

(a) New contradiction — claim terminology. The prior Patent Summary (section 3) described the '628 claim families in terms of "network addresses" and "classes of information." The verbatim issued claim 1 (Official Gazette, 2004‑05‑11) instead uses "media resource identifiers" and "a set of information items." These are the same concepts under different labels, but the labels matter for claim‑charting. I use the verbatim language below. The Google Patents "Prior art keywords" field for this document — media, network, media resource, musical work, identifiers — corroborates that "identifiers" is claim language, which is a useful cross‑check.

(c) Prior‑art retrieval limitation — stated up front. I was not able to retrieve the front‑page "References Cited" list for the '628, and the authoritative full text supplied to me omits it. I therefore do not name any U.S. patent number as an asserted § 103 reference, because I would be transcribing from memory rather than from the record. Everything below is grounded in (i) the judicially found prior art in Friskit v. RealNetworks (district court and Federal Circuit), (ii) the applicant's own admissions in the '628 specification, and (iii) documented public systems of record. If the Prior Art section you are working from lists specific patent numbers, the element mappings below should be re‑run against those references' own dates and teachings.

1. Governing standard and the person of ordinary skill

Legal framework. The '628 has a 2000‑01‑24 priority date and is therefore governed by pre‑AIA § 103(a). The controlling test is Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1 (1966), as refined by KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007) — which is precisely the framework the district court applied in granting summary judgment and which the Federal Circuit affirmed, Friskit, Inc. v. Real Networks, Inc., 306 F. App'x 610 (Fed. Cir. 2009).

Relevant KSR rationales available here:

• "the predictable use of prior art elements according to their established functions," 550 U.S. at 417;
• "a finite number of identified, predictable solutions" → "a person of ordinary skill in the art will have reason to pursue these options," id. at 421;
• "if a technique has been used to improve one device, and a person of ordinary skill in the art would recognize that it would improve similar devices in the same way, using the technique is obvious," id. at 417;
• "A person of ordinary skill is also a person of ordinary creativity, not an automaton," id. at 421.

PHOSITA. A person with a bachelor's degree in computer science or electrical engineering (or equivalent) and approximately two years of experience building networked client‑server multimedia software, including exposure to web browsers, browser plug‑ins, and streaming media players. The district court's evidentiary record (expert testimony of Zellweger for Friskit and Smith for Real) is consistent with this level.

Critical date. All prior art must predate 2000‑01‑24 (or, for claims not supported by provisional 60/177,786, the 2000‑05‑02 filing of ancestor application 09/563,250). Every reference discussed below comfortably predates both dates.

2. The claims to be analyzed

The document contains 108 claims. I have verbatim claim 1 (Official Gazette) and judicially quoted fragments of claim 12 (the sole asserted claim). I do not have the remaining 106 claims; the family‑level analysis in section 5 is therefore a functional grouping, not a claim chart.

Claim 1 (verbatim) — independent method claim

"1. A method for playing media, the method comprising:
receiving a search request from a network enabled device, the search request specifying one or more search criteria;
accessing a memory medium that comprises one or more memory components, wherein the memory medium stores data corresponding to a plurality of media resource identifiers, wherein each media resource identifier identifies a media resource located in a corresponding network location, and wherein the one or more memory components stores data that corresponds to a set of information items that are associated with each media resource identifier;
selecting one or more information items from the set of information items using the one or more search criteria;
communicating the one or more information items to the network enabled device, wherein the one or more information items are used to at least partially configure one or more programmatically displayed interfaces on the network enabled device;
receiving selection data based on a user interaction with the one or more displayed interfaces;
identifying a set of media resource identifiers from the plurality of media resource identifiers based on the selection data and the one or more information items;
causing a media player on the network enabled device to sequentially play back media resources identified by media resource identifiers in the set of media resource identifiers, wherein each of the media resources that is played back is retrieved from a corresponding network location;
wherein in response to termination of a first playback of a first media resource having a first network location and identified by one of the media resource identifiers in the set of media resource identifiers, automatically initiating a second playback of a second media resource from a second network location that is different from the first network location, wherein the second media resource is identified by another one of the media resource identifiers in the set of media resource identifiers."

Claim 1 element decomposition:

Claim 12 (as quoted by the district court and Federal Circuit)

System comprising a network‑enabled device with a media playback component; a database/memory of media resource identifiers; a network server module that receives the search request, selects matching identifiers, signals them to the device, and programmatically controls the media playback component to automatically load the resource; and a client module being executable to (i) provide one or more interfaces… to receive a search request; and (ii) control a media player.

Constructed terms (N.D. Cal. Markman order, May 20, 2005):

• "client module" = "a module that is installed and executed on a user‑terminal"
• "media resource" = "at least one media file including audio, video or combinations thereof, capable of being loaded into a user accessible playback component"
• "network server module" = "a software module located on the server‑side in a client‑server network"

3. The prior art

3.1 Prior art established by the litigation record (judicially found)

3.2 Applicant's admitted prior art (the '628 specification itself)

Under MPEP § 2129 and In re Nomiya, statements in the specification about what was known are admissions usable as prior art. The '628 specification supplies several:

• Background (col. 1): users "locate streaming media on the Internet by manually selecting links," "browse the media sites that contain numerous sub‑links," and "select through a chain of links"; "Some services provide media search engine capabilities"; search engines "display[] links to categories and/or sub‑links" and the "search results are outputted to the user as a display of links for the user's selection."
• Commercially available components: "Examples of commercially available media playback components include Real Network Player™, Apple Quicktime Player™, and Microsoft Windows Media Player™."
• Programmatic control already known: "the network server module may include applets or Java script delivered to the user terminal for execution of processes and functions, as disclosed herein."
• Directories already known: the FIG. 6 discussion names "Yahoo.com® and Lycos.com®" as web directories to be crawled.
• Browser components already known: "the web browser component… may be a reconfigured Netscape Navigator™ or Internet Explorer™ browser."

In other words, the '628's own field‑of‑the‑invention section concedes the existence of the search‑engine, browser, player, index/directory, and server‑to‑client scripting technologies that its claims combine.

4. Element‑by‑element obviousness mapping

4.1 Claim 1

Conclusion on claim 1. Limitation 1.8 — the apparent point of novelty — is met squarely by PA‑1 alone. IUMA Radio is literally a system in which termination of one playback automatically triggers retrieval and playback of a different media resource whose URL is selected by the server. The remaining limitations are met by PA‑1, or by PA‑3 + PA‑2 + PA‑4. Under § 102, PA‑1 arguably anticipates; under § 103 it is at minimum a complete prima facie case.

Anticipation by construction point. If "network location that is different" were read narrowly to require a different host/domain (rather than a different URL), the limitation is still met by the combination of PA‑3 (custom playlists drawn from a portal's catalog) and PA‑4 (M3U lists specifying addresses of media files that may reside on multiple servers), with PA‑2 providing the integrated search‑plus‑playback client. The specification's own multi‑site embodiment ("a first network address locates a first media network resource on a first network site, and a second network address locates a second media network resource on a second network site") confirms that serving different sites back‑to‑back was the stated object — and M3U/portal playlists already did exactly that.

4.2 Claim 12 (the sole asserted claim)

Conclusion on claim 12. The Federal Circuit held expressly that the contested limitation "was taught by Winamp," and that "claim 12 requires only that the 'client module… control a media player'; it does not require 'direct control.'" The "programmatic control" element was satisfied by IUMA Radio "even under Friskit's [narrowest] definition." Accordingly, PA‑2 + PA‑1 renders claim 12 obvious.

4.3 Other independent claim families (grouped)

5. The combinations, with motivations to combine

Combination A — PA‑1 (IUMA Radio) + PA‑2 (Winamp mini‑browser) + PA‑3 (mp3.com)

Renders obvious: claim 1 and claim 12, at minimum.

Motivation / why the PHOSITA would combine:

1. Same field, same problem. All three address the '628's own stated problem — the "tedious" process of browsing, clicking through chains of links, and manually launching playback. This is the strongest KSR "design need" rationale.
2. Known interaction, not a new architecture. PA‑1's player was a RealPlayer Internet Explorer plug‑in and PA‑2's player was already integrated with a browsing pane. Combining search UI + player + server‑driven selection required no re‑architecture.
3. Predictable result. PA‑4 already proved that a list of network addresses would be "automatically played back in the predetermined sequence." Substituting a server‑generated, dynamically updated list (PA‑1) for a static downloaded list (PA‑4) is a predictable substitution of one known data source for another, with an expected benefit (fresh content without user action).
4. Finite, identified, predictable solutions. As the district court put it, control of sequential playback could be placed in one of three known loci — network server module, search module, or media player module; each of Friskit's claims "achieved an anticipated success by merely selecting a different, previously identified solution." KSR, 550 U.S. at 421.
5. Market forces. RealNetworks' October 1995 announcement that content providers would "plug their own interface," "embed instructions," and let users "browse, select and play back audio… on demand, in real time" is contemporaneous evidence of strong, long‑standing demand for exactly this integration — evidence that the combination was sought, not avoided.
6. Reasonable expectation of success. With Java, JavaScript, and ActiveX "in widespread use," and with player APIs deliberately exposed for third‑party control (PA‑5), the PHOSITA had both the tools and the documented intent.

Combination B — PA‑4 (M3U) + PA‑3 (mp3.com) + PA‑2 (Winamp)

Renders obvious: the playlist / designated‑order / multi‑site families and the "different network location" limitation of claim 1.

Motivation: M3U is a file format whose documented function is to cause sequential automatic playback of multiple network addresses — the same function the claims assign to the server‑selected identifier set. mp3.com already let users build custom playlists from search results and dispatch them to a player. Winamp already parsed and played them and already provided the search interface. Combining them yields the claimed result as a predictable use of known elements according to their established functions (KSR at 417); the only alleged contribution is where the list comes from, and moving list generation from client to server was the explicit alternative architecture.

Combination C — PA‑5 (RealPlayer 4.0 + IE 4.0; Real's 1995 API publication) + PA‑1 (IUMA Radio)

Renders obvious: every "programmatic control" / "control signals" / "causing… to load" limitation.

Motivation: Real's own published statements demonstrate that exposing the player API for network‑driven control was the intended purpose of the API. IUMA Radio then demonstrated a working implementation. Selecting a server‑driven control model was, per the Federal Circuit, "plainly the alternative to the client‑server model," and "the benefits of network control of local processes and the methods for implementing such control were well known at the time."

Combination D — any of A–C + PA‑6 (RealJukebox) or the admitted prior‑art players

Renders obvious: the "media playback component" / "media player on the network enabled device" limitations and the jukebox‑style continuous playback. Motivation is trivial: any of the admitted commercially available players supplies the recited component.

5.1 Teaching away — why it does not save the claims

• The client‑controlled architecture is not a teaching away. The CAFC rejected the argument directly: server‑side control "was contrary to the then‑conventional… architectures," but "server control was plainly the alternative to the client‑server model, [a]nd with programming tools such as Java, Javascript, and ActiveX in widespread use, the benefits of network control of local processes… were well known."
• Mere disclosure of an alternative is not teaching away. In re Fulton, 391 F.3d 1195, 1201 (Fed. Cir. 2004). At most, the record shows the art preferred client control while also disclosing and enabling server control (PA‑1, PA‑5).
• Criticism of the alternative's reliability helps the patentee's opponent, not the patentee. Friskit argued the prior art would not work "seamlessly" if "used incorrectly or misconfigured." The district court held this "proves" only that misconfiguring known, working components produces a worse result — i.e., that the components worked.

5.2 Secondary considerations

Friskit advanced commercial success, praise, long‑felt need, failure of others, and copying. Both courts rejected them:

• No nexus. "The party asserting commercial success… must prove a nexus between the commercial success and the claimed invention." In re Huang, 100 F.3d 135, 140 (Fed. Cir. 1996); see the district court's analysis at 499 F. Supp. 2d 1145 (the success was attributable to economic and commercial factors unrelated to the quality of the claimed subject matter).
• Choice of design path ≠ long‑felt need or teaching away. As the headnote to the SJ order states, "Inventor's choice of different design path, by having network server control media player to give user improved experience, did not demonstrate long felt need, failure of others, or teaching away."
• Strong prima facie case trumps. Leapfrog Enters., Inc. v. Fisher‑Price, Inc., 485 F.3d 1157, 1162 (Fed. Cir. 2007); Pfizer, Inc. v. Apotex, Inc., 480 F.3d 1348, 1372 (Fed. Cir. 2007); Ryko Mfg. Co. v. Nu‑Star, Inc., 950 F.2d 714, 719–20 (Fed. Cir. 1991). The CAFC applied all three.

6. Bottom line

Claim 1 is at minimum obvious — and, on the record as described by two courts, arguably anticipated — over IUMA Radio (PA‑1) alone, because PA‑1 discloses the server‑generated, user‑selected, automatically chained, multi‑URL playback that limitation 1.8 recites. Claim 12 is obvious over Winamp (PA‑2) in view of IUMA Radio (PA‑1) and mp3.com (PA‑3); the Federal Circuit so held.

The remaining independent families fall to well‑motivated combinations: M3U + mp3.com + Winamp for the playlist/ordering/multi‑site families; RealPlayer 4.0/IE 4.0 and Real's 1995 API publication + IUMA Radio for the programmatic‑control families; and web crawlers + directories + browser and player APIs for the backend harvest/verify/extract families — the last of which rests substantially on the patent's own admissions that crawler‑targeted directories (Yahoo, Lycos), reconfigured commercial browsers (Navigator, IE), and commercial media players all pre‑existed.

Net: every independent claim family I was able to chart is invalid under § 103, and the broadly asserted claim (12) was in fact so held, affirmed on appeal. The single family I could not map — the rating‑system claims — remains unanalyzed for lack of a verified reference.

7. Explicit uncertainties

1. Front‑page "References Cited" not retrieved. I named no U.S. patent number as an asserted § 103 reference. If the Prior Art section lists specific patents, they should be charted against the limitation tables in § 4.
2. Claim set incomplete. I have verbatim claim 1 and quoted fragments of claim 12 only; the remaining 106 claims are uncharted.
3. Claim terminology conflict flagged in § 0(a) between the earlier summary's "addresses/classes of information" and the issued claim's "identifiers/information items."
4. "Claim 12 of the '678 patent" in the CAFC slip opinion — as flagged in the prior Litigation Summary, that number does not exist in the asserted set; the surrounding language matches the '628. Reported literally, not corrected.
5. Search result discrepancy re the district court venue — Google Patents labels 3:03‑cv‑05085 as "California Eastern District Court"; the court's own orders and the CAFC caption place it in the Northern District of California. Both reported literally.
6. No 2026 activity verified. Nothing in this analysis depends on post‑2009 events, and I found no 2026 docket for this number.

Sources

• U.S. Patent 6,735,628 B2 full text (authoritative document supplied): https://patents.google.com/patent/[US6735628](/patent/US6735628)/en
• Official Gazette, Issue 1282‑2 (claim 1 verbatim; biblio; 108 claims): https://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/virtual_disk_library/index.cgi/[5628977](/patent/5628977)/FID3294/OG/html/1282-2/us06735628-20040511.html
• Friskit, Inc. v. RealNetworks, Inc., 499 F. Supp. 2d 1145 (N.D. Cal. 2007) (SJ order, Schwarzer, J.): https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[1871910](/patent/1871910)/friskit-inc-v-realnetworks-inc/ · https://storage.courtlistener.com/harvard_pdf/1871910.pdf
• Friskit, Inc. v. Real Networks, Inc., 306 F. App'x 610 (Fed. Cir. 2009) (No. 2007‑1583): https://www.courtlistener.com/opinion/[209377](/patent/209377)/friskit-inc-v-real-networks-inc/ · http://cafc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/opinions-orders/07-1583.pdf
• N.D. Cal. Markman order (May 20, 2005), constructions of "client module," "media resource," "network server module": https://ipmall.info/sites/default/files/hosted_resources/Markman/pdfFiles/2005.05.20_FRISKIT_INC_v._REALNETWORKS.pdf
• Docket copy of the SJ order: https://www.archive.org/download/gov.uscourts.cand.[175168](/patent/175168)/gov.uscourts.cand.175168.157.17.pdf
• USPTO grant record (uspto.report): https://uspto.report/patent/grant/6735628