The adult Internet's challenge to Acacia Research Corp.'s streaming media patent claims has just acquired what may be its most visible partner - adult gigastar Jenna Jameson, whose activities include a popular Web operating and marketing company, has joined the challenge.
Jameson said May 6 that she wants to help fight what she called Acacia's "strong-arm tactics, which effectively want to put a tax on every single person using the Internet for video-on-demand services, Internet radio, pay-per-view movies, video news clips from sites like CNN.com, and even songs from iTunes or Amazon.com."
Jameson thus joins a challenge spearheaded by New Destiny/Homegrown Video chief Spike Goldberg, VideoSecrets chief Greg Clayman, and a group of adult Internet companies known as the Internet Media Protective Association, challenging Acacia's litigation against them by claiming the Acacia patents - known collectively as Digital Media Transmission - are invalid and don't otherwise cover the systems used by those companies.
"Acacia is making a blatant attempt to target the adult industry in its effort to extract unwarranted fees for alleged infringement of its patents," Jameson said. "I don?t think people realize the implications of what Acacia is trying to do. If Acacia succeeds in intimidating adult site owners, they will move to mainstream sites and begin charging fees that will have to be passed on to everyone who uses the Internet."
ClubJenna was hit with legal action from Acacia in late December 2003, along with seven other new adult Internet litigants regarding DMT.
"What can I say? I'm happy as can be that they've come on board," said Goldberg when learning of Jameson's announcement. "It's nice to see people come on board and see ClubJenna is in this fight. She exemplifies the type of independent small businesses that are not going to let Acacia roll over us."
Calling Jameson a cultural icon, Goldberg said that status will help her make more people aware "that everybody using the Internet is at risk. We cannot allow Acacia to bully our industry. And Jenna will be a big help in knocking them down...If they get their way, everyone will pay the price for Acacia's predatory practice, as Acacia's 'tax' will ultimately be passed on to consumers... While we respect the intellectual property of others, we cannot sit idle while Acacia abuses the patent system this way."
Acacia executive vice president Robert Berman was unavailable for comment before this story went to press.
Last month, the second session in the so-called Markman process discussed whether the elements of an invention and their sequencing are significant in asseting an invention's validity, as the New Destiny/Homegrown side argues; or, whether there is no strictly-required sequencing of elements before an invention is validates, as Acacia argues.
Named for a Supreme Court ruling saying a patent's limits must be known to protect the patentee and encourage invention, the Markman process is a pre-trial process, in which a judge weighs evidence and definitions before determining patent claims as matters of law, with both sides presenting how they view the claim language. The next scheduled dates for the Markman process, before federal judge Joseph Ware in Santa Ana, are May 18-20.
