James Turk applied for his patents in 1993. E-gold began operation in 1996, so e-gold cannot claim prior art. I've read the patents and am unconvinced that there was any unique invention. He simply put together accounting, a computer, a network, and gold as the medium being accounted. But apparently the patent office thought it was unique enough to grant two patents. The patent is only valid inside the United States and any countries that have an agreement with the U.S. to honor U.S. patents. The patent could probably be overturned if challenged; but for now it does serve the useful purpose of preventing one of the giants like Chase-Manhattan or Citybank from patenting the idea and then shutting down e-gold with lawsuits. HK-Kid ________________________________________________________________________ Protect your privacy! - Get Freedom 2.0 at http://www.freedom.net --- You are currently subscribed to e-gold-list as: archive@jab.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
