For those thinking about settling w/Acacia
 

After some additional investigation of the Webmaster License, there is some information that you need to know.

Assuming you make less than $50,000 per year, your license would be $1,500.

It was my understanding that if you did choose to settle, it would cost you only $1,500 for the next 12 months...

The answer is, you would pay $1,500 before Nov. 30th, and then on Jan 1, 2004, you would pay them ANOTHER $1,500 for the next year.

http://www.acaciatechnologies.com/pr...eAgreement.pdf

Refer to section 3.1

"...Licensed User shall pay AMTC an initial prepaid royalty payment based upon.......projected Gross Sales .....from the Effective Date of this Agreement through the following 12 months."


Now scroll up to the top of the document:

This Webmaster License Agreement is entered into as of January 1, 2003 the ("Effective Date")


So, in reading better in details....you pay the $1,500 now before Nov. 30 that catches you up for prior infringement, and then 12/31/2003 is when the 12 months period expires.... then a new licensing fee starts on Jan 1st!



Fight the Patent!

:1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh

that's insane

someone making less than $50k GROSS a year can't afford to go throwing around $1,500 here and $1,500 there and not getting anything back for it.

on top of paying for content, hosting, taxes, traffic, visa fees, etc, this $1,500 is completely unreasonable.

cant you include that in your tax return?

better make sure it's not recurring $1,500 for your 1st two months 1,500 every month after.. lol maybe they been watching the porn industy a little too close :1orglaugh

any business related expense can be written off, its a cost of operating your business

ya, it was pointed out to me about the definition of "effective date" was 1/1/2003 and the contract runs by calendar year.

So a new year starts 1/1/2004.

Only goes to prove that I am not a lawyer since I had missed this subtle point.

Of course, ask your attorney to read the contracts and get involved in your business/legal discussions.


Fight the Patent!

Gross Revenue $40,000

Expenses
Overhead, etc $30,000
Patent Licenses
Acacia $3,000
XYZ $3,000
ABC $3,000


Net Revenue $1,000


It's just bizness......


Fight the Patent!

FTP, i didnt say I agreed with it I just said that it is most likely deductable as a cost of doing business to those that settle.
With that being said dont settle, cause your flushing your $$ down acacias gold plated toilets

its simple


don't settle

Not saying that at all..just throwing in some satire :Graucho

But you are right, it is a business decision to settle or not....


Fight the Patent!

FightThisPatent,

Hypothetical only...

Let's says that the majority of the *Final Notice* recipients let the clock tick past Nov. 30th without even acknowledging the snail-mail. They looked at the envelope.... figured it was junk mail.... and trashed it. So, it leaves... let's say 10,000 unanswered *Final Notices*. Just a number... might be alot more or less. So, what's next? Can they file one *huge* class action lawsuit against everyone they sent letters to in able to not get into separate dinky lawsuits? If so, can all of those accused in the class action law suit hire their own lawfirm and class action their ass right back?

Or would they be required to sue everyone individually? I know you are not a lawyer, but it's just a question someone might be able to answer.

Acacia can't file a class action lawsuit to sue people, but people who have been targeted by acacia for lawsuits can file together as a class action.

The advantage is you go in as a group, the disadvantage is if you lose the case for whatever reason, all the members of the group suffer the same outcome.

Another problem is finding an attorney that will take on the case.. most class actions involve alot of money for settlement, so plenty of lawyers come to the surface.

In this case, it's a pure defense, so that means paying an attorney to handle the class action... which is fine since all members could contribute money....

The 11 current defendants have pooled their money, but are individually going to court...so that there are many chances at bat.

I am expecting Acacia to be filing lots of lawsuits come December 1st...and use a lawsuit as a way of forcing a webmaster to settle, since they won't have the money to fight in court....

They are starting the groundwork i believe with the cold-calling (as i posted earlier).

Given the corrected way of reading the license, $3,000 at a minimum is alot of money to webmasters in the less than 50K bracket...so having people band together would certainly create a sizeable class-action pool where your ticket costs you atleast $3K.

It will be very interesting to see what happens in Dec.

Fight the Patent!

Here is my thread about Acacia reps cold-calling people to verify contact info:

http://www.gofuckyourself.com/showth...hreadid=194655


Fight the Patent!

i hope they dont call me.

i think its illegal to abuse people verbally in most states.

FightThisPatent,

That's an interesting answer that you think there will be alot of lawsuits going out on Dec. 1. Do you really think they are going to hire firms to go out and serve someone that has some obscure site on the internet and lives in some bumfuck town in Idaho? Or can they send legal papers via certified snail-mail(UPS, Fedex) with signature required? Just fishing here.

I personally think there is plenty of money out here to drag them into a fight they don't want until the patents are possibly overturned. I don't think it's a coincidence that they are going on this big push right after the USPO started examining their patents. They probably know it will take 3-6 months for due process and in the mean time they attempt to use the patents for their own good. Dispute it if anyone wishes, but just my thoughts.

I think it's possible to serve someone using a summons server in different states from my experiences in watching tv and movies..... :)

Since it will be filed in a federal court, the defendant would have to go to California to answer the charges along with getting a Cali attorney..so, it could get nasty if you get served.. which is a very intimidating reason to settle at that poin.

I hope that my conspiracy theory is wrong...but it's my guess that they will use this tactic...which is based on an article i read that Berman said originally in filing lawsuits to the early companies, because they had sent out letters and no one took them seriously...so they were 'forced' to do legal action for adult webmasters to take them seriously.



Fight the Patent!

Summons a P.O. Box?

:1orglaugh :1orglaugh :1orglaugh

Plan on being there awhile.

Ok,

So what do I do ?

Acacia assholes are on my ass...

by the time they get to you. it will all be over

in the mean time go to www.ftc.gov and file a complaint

Thanks for the great info, we rush our business from Australia, servers hosted in CA, USA. I was wondering if Acacia were targeting any overseas companies and sueing them, we have a US incorperation but no offices in Nevada. How do they go about sueing us? Do they send a lawsuit at our US paper company and then shut down our servers or sue us in USA and since our servers are "infringing" in the USA then they can sue us in CA and we have to hire lawyers in CA to show up?

Thats a lot of questions, we really appreciate all your work.

WOW, that'd actually be neat if they took all of us to court at once. We could have one big webmaster blast :)

That is really fucked up.

If anyone was on the fence, about paying or not, that probably made the decision for them.

no.

they have to sue you for damages on your own home turf.

they have to serve you with a summons and complaint on your own home turf.

and they have to appear in YOUR OWN HOME TURF or HIRE OUTSIDE COUNSEL to represent the acacia interests in YOUR OWN HOME TURF.

even in backwater alabama.

intimidation is the only thing they have working for them.

it will cost acacia a minimum of $5000 to sue an individual webmaster.

it is not cost effective for them to this for the vast majority of webmasters who earn less than 100k/year.

I figured the same thing. Otherwise, they would have sued most of us right up front. I'm wondering if anyone has thought about putting together a database that is available to everyone who has never bought video/audio content or had it on their site, yet is included in this *Final Notice* in defense of others that might get sued. It might be helpful to shoot down the crap and more proof that Acacia was sending these randomly. You can put the site I edit on top.

People need to understand a few things about this.


suing you is an expensive and arduous task for a plaintiff, despite what you may think, it is not an easy slam-dunk for acacia should they decide to bring suit against you.

why?

1. because they first must prove that you are actually infringing, and they must prove the EXTENT of your infringement to get a JURY to award them appropriate damages.

2. the logistics to sue a vast number of litigants (and win) for past infringements means they must have a historical record of 50,000 websites, subpoena 1000's of webhosts for file download info, and demonstrate to a JURY of ordinary people that your little mpg files have damaged their business enterprise---a difficult task if you are suing one fortune 500 company---now try it for 50,000 mostly mom-and-pop websites.

3. the jury will be made up of ordinary people, some of whom have AOL, and have already watched downloadable video on the net. acacia will not be able to find a jury of people that have never downloaded a mainstream video off the net. ANY REASONABLE juror will wonder why microsoft or sony or CNN isn't being sued for damages and why you are being sued for damages---ANY REASONABLE juror will come to the only logical explanation for this---that you cannot adequately defend yourself and THAT IS THE REASON acacia IS TARGETING YOU. Your "smallness" in this situation is your BEST ASSET.

this is why if nothing else, an in "pro per" appearance has much more weight than you can imagine. IF you are sued, appear in pro per and DEMAND a jury trial---it is your constitutional right, and you have NOTHING TO LOSE by taking this posture (if you do not have significant income.)

4. and finally, the best reason why the acacia shakedown attempt will ultimately fail---it only makes sense to sue entities that have some serious money. this is the very first thing attorneys learn in law school (it's the course that comes right after "arrogance101"). the simple fact is that the VAST MAJORITY of potential litigants do not have significant income.


IF acacia has to SUE you to collect, their scheme will fail.

Don't anyone forget that in most places filing an LLC is cheap...

Go ahead and sue my website division... If you win you won't get squat...

Yes ...but don't you have to prove your net worth?

I'm not worried about them sueing me for money, I'm more concerned with them getting a judge to put a temporary block on my hosting servers in USA like they did with David Lace etc. If the servers are in USA and the infringement is on those servers then surely they must have ways of sueing inside America.

I talked to a lawyer here in Australia who said if someone sued me for copyright infringement for instance, they could sue me in USA where the servers were hosted and if I didn't show up they win by default and then they bring the lawsuit to Australia and have a high court approve it as valid for a small fee. Making it so the Australian govtement recognizes the lawsuit result as valid and then they come after me for money. If this is true I'm wondernig if acacia can do the same or at least use the DMCA or some other law to do this or put a block on hosting services.

Are we 100% sure about this foreign lawsuits stuff?

I agree, FIGHT IT. This whole ordeal is absolutely rediculous. Its nothing more than a group of conartists making money off the expense of others. They had this whole thing planned out and bought the patent from some guy who didnt think twice about what it could be used for. They found some little loophole and are trying to use it to their advantage. If you notice all of their income is from settlements. Im sure most everyone already knows this. I dont think this will last much longer. I cant wait to see these morons loose all their precious scammed money. ...A crooked poor scheme to get money quick. IMHO they are no better than scammers themselves.

if you are sued you must answer, if you do not answer acacia will get a default judgment against you and notify your hose who will probably shut you down (maybe :)


will acacia then put you out of business?


maybe not:

http://www.lacecontentworld.com/



see them in court!

In order for you to have a POB, by federal law you had to show them some ID or whatever so that your real address is on file. It might be different if you run a corporation though.

If you are a private person with a POB, that information can be kept private.

HOWEVER, if you are doing business with the public then this information is available to anyone who requests it.

Don't think just because you have a POB that someone isn't going to show up to your front door with a lawsuit. :2 cents:

The point was that many of us do NOT allow the world to see who we are in this industry unless it is asked for specifically where it has to be given out. Acacia obtained all of our names from some list(whomever gave it out) and many were just P.O. Boxes where the checks were sent. It was a random list... get a life. They have absolutely no proof to what they are going after.

If there are many people fighting this patent what happens if someone gets a ruling that this patent is not valid...and then someone gets a ruling that this patent is valid...what happens then?

You've missed the main point here. Most 'smaller' people aren't concerned about being sued per se. For the most part when they talk about court they are more worried about having their sites, so effectively their business, closed. For this Acacia have to prove very little. Simply turning up in court with the correct paperwork is almost enough if you do not turn up to fight it. Even if you do decide to fight it is then down to the judge to decide if you can continue to operate in the meantime.

Granted it still costs them money but (initially at least) not the huge bucks and hassle your post seems to indicate to completely destroy somebodies livelyhood.

Once one of the 11 defendants gets a ruling that the claims are invalid, then the game is over.

Problem is that it could take years to reach that final verdict.

SightSound has been at it for 7 years to sue CDNOW/BMG and just recently got the chance to go to Summary Judgement.

More news about the defendants first day (attorneys only) with the judge will come out next week.


Fight the Delay!

Perhaps I can ride this out a bit longer, the only contact
Acacia has for me is a PO BOX in a town & state that I no longer live in.

Not to mention, sending a packet of info that is not signed for by me is not legal proof of mailing.

They need have my signature that I received it to be vaild, I am guessing ?

For those companies that did settle, I am sure your attorneys pointed this issue out to you... so that come Jan 1, 2004, you will already have known to write ANOTHER check to Acacia.


Fight the Small Print!

Something to to also consider... Patent Law allows the patent holder to selectively choose who they wish to allow to license/use their patent.

Which means Acacia could very well not like your particular attitude, posts, phone conversations, full moon, etc and decide not to give you the opportunity to license, and instead, sue you to stop using their "technology".

The scary part of patents is that it can be used as an anti-competitive measure to shut businesses down.

Fight the Measures!

Just saw that i broke the 1,000 posting mark....

Given the lengths of my usual posts, I'd say i have written the equivalent of 10,000 typical GFY posts

:Graucho


Fight the Sore Fingers!

What kills me is that if you only made $10 bucks on a website they feel they are entitled to $1500 now and $1500 in January.

I'm not as optimistic in the short-term outcome of this as some here are... I think some judge will screw webmasters and it will have to be hashed out in appeals for years while all but the big players are forced out of business. Many judges are ignorant in technology issues yet decline to recuse themselves from cases where they make case law. One only has to look to internet radio to see how judges deal with internet cases. Internet radio now has to pay royalties many times greater than over-the-air stations.

Normally I would agree with you....patent dispute cases can take up to 2-3 years before a verdict is given...something that Acacia is firmly aware of.

But, a good news turn of events on Friday between the defendants attorneys, Acacia, and the new judge might make this a short term case.

Official news comes out today sometime...so for now, i have been sworn to secrecy since Friday evening, so i am waiting for the PR so i can post my commentary.

Fight the Waiting!

From what I have read so far, the judge was just doing conference calls with the attornies, and information collecting, to get a handle on the case.

Yes, they do have to sue you in your own state, but if they sue you in the wrong state; you still have to hire an attorney from the state you were sued in, to do some legal work to prove that they have served you in the wrong venue. It will be dismissed and then they do have the right to file the suit in the proper state. If it is not a state they are licenced in - they will probly not persue it.

As far as I know, Scores is the only one out of Californina they have actually sued????

What you have to remember is this is also costing Acacia. Even if you take Bermans calculations of them worth $30m, you have to wonder what we are scared of.

That compared to what flows through the adult Internet is chicken feed. The problem is some the big companies who should be standing op are lying down and the rest just do not seem to be able to get their act together and support the ones who are4 carrying the fight.