Social networking is hot, hot, hot as we all have read about in the media. With the ability to rack up hundreds or thousands of "friends" in a short amount of time keeping track of those people and relationship becomes more and more important. While there are plenty of ways a person can do this (and Tech Confidential profiled several of them in its latest issue) so far these sites have not gained the cachet and frenzied media coverage of the social networks.
Until now. Perhaps seeking some attention and a way to distinguish itself from the MySpace, Facebook and SmallWorld sites hogging all the coverage, Reunion.com Inc. has turned to both technology and lawsuit to bring itself into the limelight. In 2004 Reunion.com which had started in 2002 as a place for people to find friends from high school, decided more than just helping people reconnect, it should help folks stay connected. To that end, it purchased GoodContacts Research Ltd., a Canadian startup that allows people to maintain their address books automatically through an automated e-mailing program and database update. It competed with companies like Plaxo Inc. and AccuCard from Card Scan Inc.
That's the technology part, now here comes the lawsuit for added flavor and media palatability. In March 2004 GoodContacts got a patent on its automated database updating technology. Tracy Garcia, a spokeswoman for Reunion.com says several months after Reunion.com purchased GoodContacts in October 2004 it sent a letter to Plaxo asking it to stop infringing on the patent. In a suit it later filed in federal court in Los Angeles it says Plaxo ignored the letter. The suit alleges that Plaxo, which was co-founded by one of the Napster co-founders (guilt by association or just more fodder for the media?) used information from the 2000 GoodContacts patent filing to build its own software, which launched in 2002 a year after Good Contacts' original software. Plaxo spokeswoman Mischa Dunton said Plaxo is aware of the companies involved and believes any claims of infringement are without merit.
The goal is to get Plaxo to change the way it manages automatic updates, but my guess is, the extra attention won't hurt Reunion.com either. With 25 million members it's a third of the size of MySpace, but it is profitable, funded by subscribers who pay $3 a month to access their profiles. By suing Plaxo, it can draw attention to a feature that differentiates itself from its competitors in the crowded social networking space. If it wins it will have a differentiator that's "defensible," a word venture capitalists love to toss around when it comes to the sector.
While Reunion.com has not raised venture funding yet, Garcia said something might be "in the works." Maybe soon after Plaxo and Reunion reach a resolution, a funding release could follow. — Stacey Higginbotham
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