Acacia Steps Up Content-Transfer Patent Claims

MarkRH writes "Over at ExtremeTech we've got an in-depth story on the 20-odd suits being filed against the online porn industry by Acacia Research Corp., which has been previously covered on Slashdot. Now, several online porn companies are forming an association called IMPA (the 'Internet Media Protective Association'). We sat in on conference calls held by the industry, and interviewed Acacia executives. Bottom line: the porn industry is just the beginning."

Comments

It's ironic...

[Anonvmous Coward]

... Ironic to me at least. The MPAA claims that video over the net has to be locked up in a chastity belt in order to survive. Yet, the porn industry has been able to thrive even in a highly saturated market.

It'd suck if this caused a damaging blow to the porn industry. It's probably the best proof out there that the internet *is* a place where people can make money with content without having to use DRM.

Re:It's ironic...

[sys$manager]

From what I've heard, the porn industry isn't thriving. Three companies control almost all of the Internet porn and everyone else barely breaks even, if that.

Re:It's ironic...

[ryochiji]

>Yet, the porn industry has been able to thrive even in a highly saturated market.

You don't ever mess with the porn industry. And the MPAA knows that.

I'm serious. The porn industry has proven itself to be vital in propogation of new technologies. Whether it's the internet, "rich content" or cable TV, the porn industry has always lead the industry at large. Killing the porn industry is equivalent to technological suicide.

Contact the big guys yourself

[Anonymous Coward]

--contact the big guys yourself. If these guys get an court settlement test cases in their favor, it's going to cost a lot of the big guys serious folding money to fight the case themselves. whereas-if you can convince them to help you fight your relatively small case NOW, they can potentially save BIG BUCKS later. That's the best idea I can think of right now. These guys are fishing, but they will start taking people to court, and bet a nickle that they have a tame judge's area picked out where to file in. That's just a logic train, in war, the dude who picks the battle and terrain and goes first has the upper hand right off the bat. I haven't looked at any of the patents yet though, so no idea if their claims have any merit, but potentially this is bigger than the e-commerce patent fights if what they say is true. Just think of real player and quicktime and windows media player stuff, it would appear that all of those efforts are in violation potentially. I mean, transmitting digital content on wires? Say whut? That's a very, very broad avenue for "the internet". You might have difficulty though seeing as how you have a porn site, could be none of the big guys would want to be seen publically as "in favor of" your ....uhhh... artistic efforts on the net. In that case, seek contributions from like minded webmasters and hosts from this "industry" that will be similarly affected. There's thousands of them, a few bucks apiece donated might be prudent.

I imagine all these parties have employees who read slashdot, so they will see this thread. good luck.

Re:something srtange

[jvj24601]

there seems to be something simply wrong with an alliance in the porn industry.....the Christian right is gonna have a fit. might make for some entertaining news...

Of course, the Christian right has some sites that also use streaming video (see the link titled "Watch the Program" from CBN).

Now, an alliance between the porn industry and CBN - that would be impressive...

They need to get the MPAA and RIAA in on this

[Paul Johnson]

The traditional media industries are not going to like this one little bit. At present Acacia is going after what they call "low hanging fruit", because in cases like this its often the bigger legal budget that wins. Once Acacia has some money and precedents under its belt it can tackle the bigger boys.

It seems to me that the fruit higher up should see how this is going to go. If they don't hang together they will assuredly all hang separately.

Paul.

Can anybody say Doctine of Laches?

[SirSlud]

http://www.lectlaw.com/def/l056.htm

or better

http://www.zurichre-na.com/web/converium/converi um .nsf/articles/5731FF9F4372B6ED85256B43006EA07D?Ope nDocument

Esentially, if you knew about it in 91, you can't wait till now to go after royalties.

This might be one of those Vapor-Laws that money speaks louder than, however.

Everybody read those links, because these submarine patents are bullshit and the more noise the public makes about them, the less likely Acadia, Pan IP, and every other non-innovative lawyer on the planet are to think they can get aware with this bullshit.

The contribution of business to the internet

[harangutan]

For a decade now we've heard free-market proselytes yap about how business will bring new innovations to the internet. But in practice what have we seen? The principal technologies in use are still those created largely academically and under research grants (some in partnership with very select members of the private sector, granted).

But principally what business has brought to the table is greed, squabbling and massively costly litigation, which far from encouraging innovation, increasingly inhibits it through fear and intimidation.

At the risk of overstating the case, I do think this is a further example of market forces alone being very far from the wholly benign influence they're so often touted as being.

Prior art

[afidel]

might be here ?

This is a message from 1989 talking about a talk by FCC chairman re: cable vs telco and what things might be possible.

For consumers, the promised land would be video on demand" - no need to rent tapes or wait for the network to schedule a particular program. One-way broadband delivery coupled with 2-way narrowband signalling thus might be the way such systems would start off.