Dear Senator/Representative(Last Name):

I'm writing you regarding the patent infringement lawsuits currently being pursued by Acacia Media Technologies. Acacia's patents have been broadly interpreted to give these companies ownership of the basic method of transmitting compressed audio and video content via the Internet, cable or satellite services.

They are using strong-arm legal tactics to coerce small entrepreneurs, like me, into acquiescing to their demands. But unlike other recent patent cases, they have not gone after the software companies, RealMedia or Microsoft or Apple, that make the streaming of audio and video possible. Instead, they chose to attack the end users of the technology - anyone offering audio or video-on-demand.

Possible offenders include universities that offer lectures and courses on-line; adoption agencies that post videos of prospective adoptees; volunteer organizations like the American Council of the Blind that archive audio from blind poets and musicians as well as news services, on-line radio and webmasters who make their content accessible to the general public. The list of offenders goes on and on: artists, entertainers, businesses, churches that archive prayers and sermons; and even political parties/candidates.

These patents attack We the People, We the small business owners, We the Churches and Families and the Creative Community.

Why is Acacia Research targeting the end user of the technology and not software manufacturers?

According to an Acacia representative, "It makes more sense from a business perspective for us to license the user of the technology É rather than trying to license a software manufacturer that is giving away the software or licensing it for small amounts on a one-time sale."

Going after those without means to fight is easy money. In 1999, the American Intellectual Property Law Assn. said the average patent infringement case in California cost each party $2 million.

So this is the choice: pay the license fees or stop transmitting recorded audio and video content. Stop and Acacia can still sue for past infringement. It is a no-win situation that legitimizes extortion.

Acacia Research is not a company of inventors who labored to realize a dream. No, they are financiers who bought five patents then assembled a team of lawyers and engineers to defend them.

Their model is Gemstar whose stock flew from $2.00 to $100 on the basis of a single patent and incessant litigation before a series of courtroom defeats sent the stock plummeting. Of course, that was not before the chairman had become a billionaire.

In 2002 the US Federal Trade Commission had a conference to discuss Patent Law and Policy Reform. This year they published their findings: create new procedures to make it easier to challenge a patent's validity without having to raise an expensive and time-consuming federal court challenge, tighten certain legal standards used to evaluate whether a patent is 'obvious' and allow courts to find patents invalid based on the mere preponderance of the evidence, as opposed to clear and convincing evidence.

But reports are not procedures, and we all know that unless public outcry and intervention from elected officials move the process forward, this 315 page report may remain just that -- a report not a procedure.

I am asking you to take steps, through legislation and all other appropriate means, to curtail these attempts to acquire and enforce such vague and overly broad patents.

Please stop these unethical practices and establish penalties for using such tactics. I think everyone would agree that we need just and reasonable protection for our intellectual property. But a balance needs to be made in order to stop companies like Acacia Media Technologies from perverting our intellectual property laws, and undermine a critical sector of our educational and economic growth.

Thank you very much for your time and attention,

[your name]

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