Would YOU settle with Acacia?

This should be interesting.

yeap, it's anonymous and HOPEFULLY reflect the mood of the industry

Question is vague.

Are you asking if I would settle with them for what they're asking? or would I settle with them if they offered me a sweet deal?

I posted this link on other boards to make a better industry representation:

http://www.netpond.com/threaded/show...&threadid=7507

http://www.oprano.com/msgboard/index...=ST&f=1&t=6824

the querstion is simp[le, and so is the answer,
splitting hairs and looking for shades of grey will be a subject of another poll
;-)))

bump, this is important issue

Good for you Serge... Its about time that someone started a poll for this... for the record no way will I ever settle with them.

I suggest folks who visit other boards to post links to this thread EVERYWHERE, so we could have the biggest representation of opinions in one place

Good idea I will go post on a few boards as well

Ok Serge a here are three more

http://askmrporn.com/wmh/wwwboard/messages/56038.html

http://www.avsfriendly.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=6058

http://www.adultwebmasters.co.uk/cha...e=1&post=15342

umm no...hell no man, don't give in to the friggin vultures. the only hands i want in my pockets are mine or those of a scantily clad vixen(s)

the numbers I trust, people I don't
;-)))

let's see where exactly we stand

nope:D

hmmmm...signature whores won't settle, gran cosa!

doesn't reveal much yet...

I don't own a huge collection of sites or a big program... so I don't stand to lose a whole lot either which way....

that being said, I don't really have the big time resources it would take to fight them either.

If when the time came that the choice HAD to be made.... I really don't know what I'd do.

But for what I believe and feel right now, there's no way I'd sign anything of theirs or have anything to do with them. They're lower than scum for what they're doing and deserve to be put out of business for good.

I would have to 2nd what masked man said.

Before I settled and shelled out a shitload of money for a patent lawyer I would probably try to accumulate as much prior art that has already been submitted and go fight this pro se.

Seriously, I would do anything and everything in my power to make the trial as loud as possible...as crazy as possible and as lengthy as possible so they would have to keep paying their high priced lawyers to deal with the crazy guy studying case law in the local university's law library.

Acacia, If I have said it once I have said it 100 times "What a fucking joke!"

Oz

Never under estimate your enemy...this fallacy costed empires and not just a few websites

So true. Look at Hitler when he thought he could attack Russia and win.

In the end I think it all comes down to a simple business decision...

does it cost more to settle or more to pay lawyers to fight for you for the next 7 years.

I am not speaking for our company btw.. i'm speaking my personal opinion..

for simplistic numbers:
why spend $100K a year in legal fees when you could just settle for $50K a year to acacia... and just to be the devils advocate.. say acacia wins? then you subject to back payments.. plus regular licensing.. which could put most companies out of business anyway...

The only people who really win are the lawyers... funny thing is acacia is made up of lawyers ;-)

Never sign pull the links first

True

Oz

If Acacia wins or majority settles,
I'll force everybody into another business decission and either sue everybody or settle for $500 a year, which is far less from lawyers fees to fight my claim.

I am rooting for Acacia, I personally wanna follow in their footsteps and use the same logic to get rich of you folks.

C'mon, you wouldn't pay lawyers thousands, would you?
Settle with Uncle Serge for $500 a year and live happily years after.

If anybody wants to prevent me from suing them,
send me the check for $1000 ONE TIME Payment and I leave you alone, make a Good Business Decissions, folks!

Pay me peanuts and save on lawyers fees!

As one said, keep your friends close but keep your enemies closer!

I can't believe Acacia thinks they can get away with this. People have been using this technology for years and now they expect everyone that is using streaming media to pay up. Shit, that 90% of the Internet.

That would be like Thomas Edison coming back from the dead asking money from everyone who is using a fucking light bulb.

Anyone who settles could have special "*******" checks printed, just for their payments to Acacia.

This is a historic legal battle, one that will shape the future of the internet. Every company has to make its own decisions, but Lightspeed is here to fight. And we are feisty little bastards!

I have confidence that Acacias claims will not hold up in court. Yes it would be cheaper to settle, but the easy path is not always the best path.

The companies that are fighting need all the support we can muster. This is everyone's fight!


Steve Lightspeed

JamesP, I WANT them to succeed...because if they do, I'll succeed as well...
50 companies settles, another 20 gonna settles,
70*500 a year is $35,000 in my pocket for doing nothing...
I like this "good business decission" logic!

Darn...I guess I shouldn't count on your $500 a year?

OK, OK, I'll ask Ron, JB, Larry, they have more "Good Business Sense"

Serge, I'd be happy to pay you $500 a year, just send a join or two each month to LightspeedGirls.com ;)

What you do not understand is if this is not won by IMPA you will not get the chance to sign.

In one fell swoop they and a few companies control who has video on their sites. Think about it that way, no competition, no affiliates, 100,000s of members.

Why let 1,000 sign up when you can make more money out of 10?

naaahhh....I get those money from others doing nothing,
I just ask them and they pay,
because it's cheaper than fight me.

Your name could be a LightSpeed,
but it's ME who sees the Light
;-)))

Every word a gem.

This is basically down to who has the balls to spend the money to fight. If Acacia do then they win and when you think of the millions that flows through this industry on a daily basis you have to wonder who has the bigger balls.

not really.

vB has a "Who Voted?" section built into the admin that lists who voted for which option.

it's OK, you will be offered the option to pay me or be sued FIRST,
'cuz I know where you stand on it and you asre easy.

Wanna send me ONE TIME payment now and save yourself legal hussles?

A simple YES/NO answer that has far greater implications and issues.

It is so easy to say NO, that you wouldn't settle, but so many webmasters that I talk to, don't have the money to fight.

They don't have enough money to settle for the minimum $1,500/year from Acacia. They don't have the $2K/month to put into the defense fund....and sadly, don't seem to have the $100 to join as an IMPA member or pledge towards Fight the Patent Foundation.

It is a tragic irony and a sad overall observation that solutions such as IMPA and FTPF that look to protect YOUR rights to have audio/video on your website, or to have a defensive stance on upcoming patent cases, are not being supported by the webmasters.

It's great that there are 11 defendants like Lightspeed, pooling their money together to do battle against Acacia... but what happens once Acacia is knocked down, and another patent holder comes through?

Will the 11 defendants who spent their money (and don't get their money back in lawyer fees) be still willing to put in another $35K each to fight against the next patent abuse case?

If the big players continue to license (bogus) patents, who is going to be defending YOU?

A by-product of the larger players settling, is that it helps to reduce competition....the patent holder can then force businesses to shutdown, if they can't pay.

I believe the idea of a webmaster community is just a myth, that all are acting on their own self-interests..... but, I still hold optimistic that individual companies acting on their self-interests can form a community of like-minded businesses to unite against a common foe.

To me, the common foe is patent abuse...which has and will continue to come from mainstream, and more importantly, from WITHIN the adult industry as well. Patent licenses are really like taxes, asking for percentages of GROSS revenue and fixed fees.

Fight the Patent Foundation is about fighting against BAD patents. Patents are good if they are truly novel and no prior art existed. I am not anti-patent and neither is the non-profit organization that I am proposing.

It certainly is good to see that large percentage are able to check NO as the answer, but then the followup question would be:

What are YOU going to do about it?


The following are some possibilities that aren't mutually exclusive, you can pick all or some. The choice of NONE wouldn't be an option.

A) Invest money into the Defense Group (only applies to Acacia)

B) Become a member to IMPA / Donate to IMPA (goes towards future issues like trademarking, best practices, patents, etc)

C) Fight the Patent Foundation (if the inital $250K is reached, then I wil be soliciting mainstream for additional funding of the warchest. there is more money to be collected from mainstream companies to fight patent abuse then there is from the adult industry).


Learn more about my solution at http://www.FightThePatent.com/go


Fight the Patent!

I am sure Serge already studied my satirical piece, reposted below.... satirized for your sanity:



If you have a patent and are thinking about coming into the adult industry to "convince" people to license your patent, I have some observations and comments for you (for those that are satire-challenged, this is a satire):


1) It won't matter what your patent actually means, what will scare webmasters it what you WANT your patent to mean. Just point out how you SAY they are infringing, show them a patent application and a license fee, and they will most likely believe you.

You don't have to be right. Take advantage of Patent and Civil Law where they are guilty until proven innocent.... and as you know, only a court will be able to make that decision.



2) There is no community. Don't worry about the big players looking out for the smaller players.. just get sweetheart deals with them so you can parade their name around town. You can make so much more money by getting a mass number of webmasters to pay you a smaller amount, then to get a few big players to pay you a large amount.



3) Don't try to go after large mainstream companies or universities, you will only get yourself in to a huge court battle with people who have deeper pockets. Pick on the targets that make enough money to pay for a nice car and a nice house and who spend their time on GFY posting how great they are.



4) Don't charge alot of money or do any percentages of GROSS revenue.. That's just a bad idea.. make the fee structure simple like if you make less than $300K/year, the fee for the license is like $1000. Over $300K, charge $2000.

$1000 is cheaper than 3-5 hours of attorney time and a low enough threshold that they will just pay you the money to be done with it.

Think about it.. 10,000 websites giving you $1,000/year = $10M/year all for doing nothing but sending out information/infringement packets. You already know how to do spam, just print it this time and mail it. I bet you will see higher then 1:500 conversions.



5) Don't worry about people like me who are trying to bring awareness to patent abuse. While I am trying to help defend people's right to do business, free of any bad patent (a bad patent is one where the idea or invention was in use before the patent), I am being criticized and bashed for my efforts.

Don't worry about my Fight the Patent Foundation idea, just look at the pledge counter below.. i am open enough to display the total, and as you can tell, I am far off from reaching the total. The big players could contribute to the Foundation, since I am not focused on just one patent abuse case, but most likely they will just continue with their business and deal with people like you on a case-by-case basis.

Anyone who tries to get webmasters to contribute to a fund to band together gets seen as some kind of "scam artist" or a fraud. Even organizations that have been setup by fellow webmasters like IMPA have trouble getting webmasters to donate/become members.

By making a sweetheart deal with some big players, you could actually get people who admire those companies to actually bash anyone who tries to fight against your patent. Some of these people will have good credibility with the webmasters that others will automatically think that they must be right, so they too should take up the bashing. It's a brilliant strategy to help silence and defeat any effort that tries to go against you.



6) Don't worry about the 11 defendants that are standing up to Acacia... they will get burnt out financially from the expenses of their defense. They will also be jaded by the lack of industry support and will most likely not be standing up to fight against the next attack. Think about it.. paying like $15K-$50K each for defense, could pay your $1,000 license easily, for 15-50 years!



7) Go after everyone up the chain from web designers, web hosts, webmasters, content producers, domain registrars, etc. Target everyone.... you never know what will stick til you throw it on the wall. Even send out letters to webmasters who are in no way infringing on your INTERPRETED patent... they may just pay you anyways.



8) Don't bother thinking that I might want to join your company (had one company already ask). While I am very technically skilled with some business savvy, I would rather give up all my technological innovations, turn my computer off, disconnect from the internet, and go do some woodworking, rather than see patent abuse stifle innovation and financially drain companies.



9) The webmasters won't read this whole post, it's way too long for them.. anything longer than a 1 sentence jab is too much for them, so don't worry about me posting this in a public forum, they won't be reading it.



10) Use Affiliate progams as easy ways of getting mailing addresses of people to target. Maybe offer some stock to these companies. I know you think that's harsh, why bite the hand that feeds you? If you can get them sweetheart deal, maybe give them some stock, and keep it all confidential, then it's all good.

Sure, it may suck that the people who helped make them successful get hit with the license. They know it takes money to make money, so this low-cost patent license is just another cost of doing business. If they can't afford the $1,000/year, then they just aren't doing something right. Afterall, the sponsor worked so hard to build up their business, they know what it takes.



Summary:

You have picked a great target in selecting the Adult Industry.. Berman from Acacia said it best, they are "low hanging fruit".

Just follow along with the Acacia news, study their methods and you will have a blueprint for your own plans.

The only problem that I think you may have, is that other people already have similar ideas of targeting webmasters for patents.

If too many patent licenses come out at the same time, you could end up really pissing people off, and then they would join together (when that happens, i'll be long gone after my fingers have gone stiff from all the emails and posts trying to get support, from my voice going scratchy in all the phone calls in helping to bring awareness, and by the bruises I take for being bashed in defending people's rights).

Better that you join forces with the other patent players (just don't make it public because that could be an antitust issue) and schedule/time your efforts. Maybe like 1 per quarter.. spread out the schedule so you put things in rotation and then you won't hurt your individual efforts in leeching money from these hard working webmasters. Just when their wound starts to heal from the previous patent attack, you hit them with another.


------------



This is a satirical post. If you did not laugh at the end, then you would have realized that "truth is said in jest".

Everyone of these points you can see is going on right now (minus some stuff I made up for this fictional story).

If you want to take a stand against patent abuse, join me in my solution and my fight at http://www.FightThePatent.com/go

If you don't like my solution, come up with a better one. I will join it if you can come up with a better way.

Just wait a little longer... the fictional story above will be come a real one.


-Fight the Patent!

FTP, I see no satire whatsoever...I call it "Road Map"
;-)))

Good luck in your patent licensing scheme.... I am sure you would do a much better job than Acacia... they have made too many mistakes and don't know the industry (ie. they still don't understand what an Affiliate means).

It makes so much more sense to have adult industry people go after their own with patents.... oh wait, i think you are late to that party....others already on that path.




Fight the Patent!

that's OK, I don't care if others do the same thing, there is enough dough for everybody.
I have advantage over others though...

I have written 1/2 of the deman letters already and as soon as I get my Pitney Bowes postal metering machine-
I am ready to go!

Actually you don't know shit, other than what some misinformed kiss-ass told you.

I tossed my Acacia letter in the trash almost as fast as you turned over sexia.com to Cohen.

I have 4 top law firms that handle my legal matters.

Be sure to get some reprints from some mainstream articles that references your patent scheme.. it seems to give some kind of credibility to the matter..

If anything, it feeds the webmaster's hungry paper shredder or allows them to do creative things with your "information packet" or your "Final Notice".

So who's database are you doing to use?






Fight the Patent!

Heh This is just the first Salvo.... No matter how the Adult Industry does , the mainstream industry is next.... How many huge mainstream Internet companies stream audio or video???? Most of them....

It's been said before, Acacia is using us to try and get a bankroll to go after the big fishes.... Problem is... Will the big fishes turn out to be Sharks or Grouper???

they can go fuck themselves (no pun inteneded)

yeap, you right, sexia.com was a "Trojan Horse" which killed Cohen and made me rich
;-))

Incidentally, Cohen and me formed a partnership,
I wanna be guided by a pro in the next wave of the industry shakedown.

c'mon, don't be a shmuck! Send me $500 a year and fire them all, save money with me!
;-)))

Matrix's of course! Why should I invent the bike? I like using proven d/b's
;-)))

If they didn't graduate from Frankenstein University Law School, then they aren't very good sharks.

Everyone knows that attorneys with a J.D. from F.U. Law totally rock.





Fight the Patent!