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Presenting a recipient of an e-mail with an option to instant message a sender or another recipient based on the sender's or the other recipient's address and online status

  • US 8,474,628 B1
  • Filed: 06/13/2005
  • Issued: 07/02/2013
  • Est. Priority Date: 05/04/2000
  • Status: Active Grant
First Claim
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1. A communications method executing on hardware for initiating instant messaging communication, the method comprising:

  • receiving, on a computer and on behalf of a user, an e-mail message having at least one address field;

    locating, within the address field of the received e-mail message, a sender address from which the e-mail message was sent;

    in response to locating, within the address field of the received e-mail message, the sender address from which the e-mail message was sent, identifying an instant messaging subscriber based on the located sender address from which the e-mail message was sent;

    in response to identifying the instant messaging subscriber, accessing a server to determine if the identified instant messaging subscriber is online; and

    in response to determining that the instant messaging subscriber is online, presenting to the user an option to initiate instant messaging communication with the instant messaging subscriber.

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