San Francisco - Online social network Friendster announced this week that it has been granted its third social networking-related patent, this time for a "system and method for managing connections in an online social network."

The company says the patent covers adding friends, personalizing a profile through arranging, ordering and classifying connections made in an online community, and managing these connections at will.

The new patent is the third to be granted in the past nine months to San Francisco-based Friendster, a pioneer in social networking with 40 million users that has seen its growth falter in comparison to rivals MySpace and Facebook.

"These three patents address some fundamentals of online networking -- establishing connections, distributing and sharing content, and managing connections over time," said Friendster vice president of marketing David Jones.

"Friendster has filed and will continue to file new patent applications to document its innovations, but Friendster remains focused on growing a very large, global business into an even larger and highly profitable one."

The company did not address whether it intends to pursue licensing or infringement actions against others in the social networking space.

Related Links: 
http://tinyurl.com/35rclk

http://tinyurl.com/35lu3q (Friendster patent)

http://news.com.com/2061-10802_3-6167728.html