Thought this was relevent to nanog readership.. Abstract The state of an apparatus is reported to a remote computer using an embedded device in the apparatus. The embedded device detects the state, generates an electronic mail message that reports the state using a self-describing computer language, and sends the electronic mail message to the remote computer. The remote computer receives the electronic mail message and extracts the state of the embedded device from the message. http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6,757,714.WKU.&OS=PN/6,757,714&RS=PN/6,757,714 Further, "Axeda has 11 additional patents pending in the United States and 10 international patents pending covering other aspects of the remote management of intelligent devices." http://www.axeda.com/products/drm-technology/patented-technology.html