On-line geographical directory
First Claim
1. A method of categorising and searching for businesses, organizations and individuals in a geographically-based manner over the Internet, including the steps of:
- (a) registering in a database the names of businesses, organizations and/or individuals;
(b) for each name entry, registering a geographical location identifier;
the geographical location identifier indicating the precise geographical location at which the corresponding business, organization or individual is located; and
(c) for each name entry, optionally registering further information such as address, telephone number, and information about the goods or services offered by the business, organization or individual;
(d) the user nominating a catchment area by reference to one or more geographical points; and
(e) searching the database to identify name entries within the catchment area nominated by the user.
2 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A method of categorizing businesses, organizations and individuals in order to facilitate geographically-based searching over the Internet, includes the steps of: (a) registering in a database the names of business, organizations and/or individuals; (b) for each name entry, registering a geographical location identifier; and (c) for each name entry, optionally registering further information such as address, telephone number, and information about the goods or services offered by the business, organization or individual; wherein each geographical location identifier indicates the precise geographical location at which the business, organization or individual is located.
151 Citations
16 Claims
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1. A method of categorising and searching for businesses, organizations and individuals in a geographically-based manner over the Internet, including the steps of:
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(a) registering in a database the names of businesses, organizations and/or individuals;
(b) for each name entry, registering a geographical location identifier;
the geographical location identifier indicating the precise geographical location at which the corresponding business, organization or individual is located; and
(c) for each name entry, optionally registering further information such as address, telephone number, and information about the goods or services offered by the business, organization or individual;
(d) the user nominating a catchment area by reference to one or more geographical points; and
(e) searching the database to identify name entries within the catchment area nominated by the user. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4)
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5. An Internet site for facilitating geographically-based searching by a user over the Internet, including:
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(a) a database having the names of businesses, organizations and/or individuals;
(b) the database further having a geographical location identifier for each name entry;
each geographical location identifier indicating the precise geographical location at which the business, organization or individual is located;
wherein the database is searched from the Internet site by having the user nominate a geographical catchment area to allow for searching of businesses, organizations and/or individuals located within the geographical catchment area. - View Dependent Claims (6, 7, 8)
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9. A method of categorising items in order to facilitate information retrieval by a user, including the steps of:
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(a) registering in a database the identity of the item;
(b) for each item, optionally registering further information about the item; and
(c) registering in the database a spatial co-ordinate identifier corresponding to the location of each item wherein each spatial co-ordinate indicates the precise spatial location identifier of the entity at which the item is located;
(d) the user nominating a geographical catchment area by reference to one or more geographical points;
wherein when the database is searched by the user, the search is conducted on a sub-set of the database which consists of items located within the geographical catchment area. - View Dependent Claims (10, 11, 12)
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13. A method of delivering geographically based advertising over the Internet, including the steps of:
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(a) registering in a database one or more goods or services being offered by one or more advertisers;
(b) for each good or service offered by the advertiser, registering an advertiser geographical area indicating the area in which the advertiser wishes to receive customers;
(c) determining a geographical location identifier from the user, being the precise geographical location of the Internet user;
(d) displaying to the Internet user an advertisement, the advertisement displayed being selected from one or more advertisements for goods or services wherein the geographical location of the Internet user is within the advertiser geographical area corresponding to one or more of the goods or services presented in the advertisement. - View Dependent Claims (14, 15, 16)
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Specification