|  | ||||||||||||||||||||
| | ||||||||||||||||||||
| Chilling Effects Clearinghouse > E-Commerce Patents > Notices > Acacia claims patent on Internet streaming technology (NoticeID 546, http://chillingeffects.org/N/546) | Location: https://www.chillingeffects.org/ecom/notice.cgi?NoticeID=546 |
January 28, 2003
|
Sender Information: |
Recipient Information:
[Private]
ioMedia Partners, Inc.
Jacksonville, FL, 32256, USA
Sent via: Via Federal Expre
Re:
Congratulations on the success of radioio. We appreciate your efforts to legitimately bring music and videos to the online community while respecting the intellectual property rights of artists, composers, and publishers. Acacia is a publicly traded company that develops and acquires patented technologies for licensing. We own a portfolio of five U.S. and seventeen International Patents covering the transmission and receipt of digital audio and video content via various means, including the Internet. We call the technology covered by these patents "DMT" or Digital Music Transmission technology. Our engineers and lawyers have reviewed the streaming services made available at the radioio.com website and have determined that these activities are covered by our DMT Patents. We have entered into Licensing Agreements with several companies that stream digital audio and video content over the Internet, including Radio Free Virgin. We have also initiated patent infringement litigation in the United States District Court Central District of California, against several companies in the adult entertainment industry that stream audio and video content. Enclosed is a packet of information regarding our DMT techonology licensing program. The packet includes detailed information about the patents, as well as our standard License Agreement covering streaming music services. As you will note in Section 3 of the Agreement, our introductory licensing fees are extremely reasonable. Our goal is to enter into a licensing arrangement with radioio. Upon your request, we are willing to provide you with additional information about our patents including file histories, engineering charts, claims analyses and other pertinent information that will save you time and money in your due diligence of our patents. Once you look at the patents, we are confident that you will elect to enter into a licensing arrangement with us. Additional information about our company and our DMT Patents is also available at www.acaciaresearch.com. We will make our attorneys and engineers available to answer any questions you may have as you proceed with your due diligence. Please contact me directly at [private] and let me know how you would like to proceed. We hope that you will give our intellectual property the same respect as you give to the intellectual property of the creator and publishers of the music and video content that you promote and sell. [For more information see http://www.radioio.com/acacia.pdf]
|
Question: What is intellectual property? Answer: Intellectual property consists of property created through human creativity. It includes, for example, literature, the visual arts, music, drama, compilations of useful information, computer programs, biotechnology, electronics, mechanics, chemistry, product design, and trade identity symbols. Intellectual property law is designed to promote human creativity without excessively restricting dissemination of the fruits of such creativity. Intellectual property rights are embodied in patents, trade secrets, copyrights, and trademarks. Question: What is a patent? Answer: A patent is a form of intellectual property. A U.S. patent is a right granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office to an inventor to exclude others from making, using, selling, offering for sale, or importing an invention for a limited time. In the U.S., Patent law is driven by the language of the Patent Act, 35 U.S.C. Question: Where can I find U.S. patent law? Answer: The Patent Act is codified at 35 U.S.C. 100 and following, available from http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/35/pII.html. Question: What can be patented? Answer: [not yet answered] Question: What may not be patented? Answer: The following subjects are not entitled to patent protection: Question: What does it mean to "infringe" a patent? Answer: If you are accused of patent infringement, you are accused of having made, sold or offered for sale an invention described in one of the claims of a valid patent, without the patent owner's authorization. To determine if infringement has occurred, a court will look at the patent's claims, interpret them, and compare them to your device, process, method etc. Infringement occurs if your accused item performs each of the elements of any of the claims. Note that you may be liable for inducing infringement or contributing to infringement, even if you did not directly infringe a patent, if you encourage or assist someone else to infringe a patent. Question: What does it mean to obtain a license for a patent? Answer: A license, in its simplest terms, is a promise by the patent owner (the licensor) not to sue the licensee for exercising one of the patent owner's rights. Patent laws grant the patent owner rights to exclude others from making, using, or selling the patented invention. Using a contract called a "license," a patent owner may choose to allow one or more others to make, use and/or sell the invention, usually in exchange for payment. As long as the licensee abides by the terms of the license contract, a patent owner cannot sue the licensee for infringement. Patent infringement cases are often settled by the accused infringer entering into a license agreement with the patent owner and promising to pay the patent owner royalties. Question: What is "prior art"? Answer: Publicly disclosed inventions, including patented inventions, are known as "prior art" that can be cited against a new patent applicant. Publicly disclosed inventions are considered prior art without regard to where (United States, Europe, Asia, etc.) or in what form the public disclosure occurred (a journal article, an archived PhD dissertation, an online publication). Question: What are patent "claims"? Answer: A patent consists of an abstract, a description of the invention, disclosures of prior art, drawings, and one or more claims. The claims are the only truly enforceable part of a utility patent, and they define the property right owned by the patent holder. They are written in technical language, and must embody subject matter that is within the scope of patent law, is novel and is not obvious. The more broadly written the claims, the less likely they are to avoid rejection or invalidation on the grounds of obviousness or anticipation by prior technology. The more narrowly written, the less likely a competing technology or device infringes the claims. To infringe a patent, one must practice every element of a claim. If you do not practice one or more of the elements of a claim, then you do not infringe that claim. Question: What is due diligence? Answer: Due diligence is an intellectual property investigation that, among other things, determines what the intellectual property is, who owns the rights to the property, and whether those rights are enforceable. The information can then be used to evaluate the viability of a particular business transaction. Question: What are the defenses to patent infringement? Answer: There are two basic lines of defense: non-infringement and invalidity. Non-infringement: To infringe a patent, one must practice every element of a claim. If you do not practice one or more of the elements of a claim, then you do not infringe that claim. This determination often rests on how a court interprets the language of the claims you are accused of infringing. Invalidity: Only a valid patent can be enforced. Issued patents are presumed valid, but this presumption can be overcome if prior art exists that demonstrates an invention was not novel or that it was obvious at the time the patent application was filed. Especially in the case of software and Internet business method patents, articles disclosing or describing the patented inventions may exist in trade publications that would not have been found by the patent examiner and would not have been part of the prosecution file of an issued patent on file with the USPTO. The patent holder's failure to name all inventors may also invalidate a patent. |
|
|
