Benjamin Rosen looked at Tommy who appeared in front of him again and said, "It seems like you have seen that kind of business?"

"To make a long story short, Mr. Benjamin, I don't have time to talk to you about my disgusting experiences in Quincy. I need ten million now. Lotus has replaced their vice president in charge of daily operations, and I guess the new guy hasn't figured things out yet. Now is the best time to pick up a baseball bat and hit him on the head a few times." Tommy got straight to the point without exchanging pleasantries.

Benjamin looked at Tommy, who was more active than before. "But I just made an appointment with Mr. Cohen, who is in charge of IBM's personal computer business, to have a chat in two days. According to what you said..."

"IBM will agree." Tommy took a deep breath and gave a positive answer for Benjamin.

Benjamin smiled and nodded. "Okay, Tommy, I'll ask my secretary to arrange it. Do you want me to buy your 15% shares personally or in the name of Compaq, or do you just want it to be an investment?"

"I hope it's a donation. I hope our deal is a gift." Tommy leaned forward slightly toward Benjamin and emphasized, "A gift of goodwill."

Benjamin sighed, "But I don't want to give gifts."

"I have previously registered a non-profit computer industry advocacy organization called the Electronic Future Foundation. I hope you will donate 10 million to it. As a token of gratitude for your support, I will transfer 15% of Actor's shares to you free of charge. At the same time, you will be invited to serve as the first executive director of the organization." Tommy glanced at the butler in the distance, lowered his voice slightly, and spoke to Benjamin.

Benjamin's pupils shrank slightly. After a few seconds of silence, he stared into Tommy's eyes and slowly said, "I guess you don't just want to avoid taxes."

"I, Jason White, and Susan Curtis quietly initiated the establishment of this organization not long ago. Ms. Delia Case serves as the legal director of this organization. Our goal is to promote the prosperous and healthy development of the computer industry." Tommy said seriously.

Hearing his words, Benjamin laughed and said, "You are the initiator and I am the donor, but what our two companies do is definitely not conscientious for the computer industry. You plagiarized Lotus and I plagiarized IBM."

"Electronic Future Foundation, or EFF for short, was established to help small and medium-sized companies in the computer industry, such as providing financial support during research and development, providing relevant support to member companies that encounter court defense problems, representing their cases, or acting as amicus curiae to protect computer industry developers and technologies from various legal threats, resist patent abuse in the computer industry, etc., to prevent those poor small studios and small companies in the industry from encountering patent blackmail like Actor Company, and to protect the creative freedom of practitioners to the greatest extent possible." Tommy ignored Benjamin's ridicule and self-mockery, and still spoke seriously about the original intention of establishing this organization. After that, he asked Benjamin Rosen, whose smile was gradually disappearing:

"After listening to this, do you feel my conscience, Mr. Rosen?"

"Does it have any members?" Benjamin and Tommy looked at each other for a moment and asked.

Tommy answered his question very quickly, almost without thinking: "We currently have 27 individual members, most of whom are founders of small companies that were sued by Lotus and closed down. There are also a few corporate members, all of whom are small startups opened in garages by Stanford students."

"It sounds a bit like the Computer and Communications Industry Association, but the difference is that one sets a high threshold to select members, while yours is to absorb them first and then slowly select them." Benjamin gave an example and gave his own opinion after listening.

The Computer and Communications Industry Association is an organization initiated by several giants in the computer and communications industry. Its members include only seven or eight large companies in the industry, such as Microsoft, IBM, AT&T, Motorola, and Intel. Other companies are not eligible to be invited to join. Although the major companies compete with each other, many cooperations are also completed through this organization. For example, although IBM was stabbed in the back by Microsoft, when IBM encountered antitrust lawsuits, Microsoft and other companies donated to this organization and hired lobbying companies to help IBM in the name of the association. In addition, several major companies all supported IBM as friends of the court, etc.

"No, it's more like the backyard of those big companies. They use the slogan of committing to patent reform to attract small companies to join, and by the way, they use Actor Company to shape the public impression of Lotus into a patent troll, and then help the big companies in the computer industry provide a list of small companies worth investing in. EFF is an external auxiliary organization of the Computer and Communications Industry Association. It does not conflict with EFF. Its existence also allows the association to announce to the outside world that they do not control this industry." Tommy said to Benjamin.

Benjamin nodded and said slowly: "Everyone misjudged you, including me. Everyone thinks you are greedy, but in fact you are doing a good thing. For those small companies, although they need to contribute eff donations and members have implicit conditions such as priority investment rights, at least you are willing to help newcomers in this industry, and those big companies are also very happy to join. eff provides this priority investment right and selects supporting companies worthy of investment according to their own company's future plans. In short, small companies think they are in a fair and open industry environment, while large companies successfully use eff to select supporting objects. Both parties complete patent sharing and the construction of industry ecology in this organization. On the contrary, those who do not join will be targeted in the end. Any other computer practitioner who creates it may make those young people and the outside world suspicious. Only you are the most suitable one, because your experience with actor makes people believe that you did this after going through pain, but now I know that you were preparing to establish this organization first, and then chose the poor lotus company."

“If you have any compliments, you can tell me slowly when you have free time later, sir.” Tommy looked Benjamin straight in the eyes and said.

Benjamin said to Tommy, "You can go now. The money will catch up with you quickly. You are right. IBM will agree to cooperate. How can a big company refuse to feed the entire industry and have a reason to deceive the government to have no monopoly and keep it fair and open?"

"Goodbye. By the way, can I borrow your phone?" Tommy got a response and stood up quickly.

He made a phone call: "Delia, keep an eye on the bank account. Once the funds appear, start working in the name of Eff. Prepare to have 176 lawyers in place. I want news about this case to appear in newspapers and on television in New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Boston. I want news interviews and newspaper pages. Tommy Hawke, the founder of Actor Company, must start listening to his mother and do the right thing."

"The first thing I want to do is to tell ordinary people how terrible the resistance that actors encountered in order to allow low-educated people to learn computers and increase their income was. They even deliberately replaced the incompetent vice president and found a member of the Kennedy family who was high up and powerful to stop me. Ordinary people like this kind of confrontation story."

…

When there are no guests, photographer Pete O'Brien spends most of his time watching TV in his small photo studio in Boston's South End.

The sound of wind chimes rang out, and he stood up and greeted him with a smile: "Sir, do you want to take a photo?"

"Mr. O'Brien, nice to meet you." The man, wearing an Armani suit and slicked back hair, shook hands with the bewildered Pitt with a big smile on his face. "I'm Eugene Brown from the New York Center for Creative Photography."

Pete was stunned for a moment: "Sir, where did you say you were from?"

"New York Center for Creative Photography, NCCP." The other party repeated it again.

Pete blurted out in amazement: "Wow, that's a holy place for American photographers."

"That's right. All photographers hope that their works will be collected by NCCP. This is why I came here. Congratulations, Mr. Pete O'Brien." The other party looked around the environment of the photo studio and said.

Peter seemed to be struck by lightning. It took him a long time to recover from the news. "But I'm just an ordinary photographer. I mean, I never sent it to you..."

"One of your female portraits was discovered by chance by Ms. Rosalind Solomon, a well-known photographer at the center, and she praised it. She hopes that NCCP can permanently collect your artwork that shows the strength and perseverance of women, so I am here." Eugene said with a smile: "After the contract is signed, we will pay you a fee of about 15,000 yuan to buy out the copyright of the photo."

Pitt felt like it was all a dream. Rosalind Solomon, a well-known female photographer, once took a series of portraits titled "Outside the White House" during the administration of President Kennedy.

Any American photographer may have seen her portrait works, hoping to learn some portrait shooting techniques, but now, this female photography master actually likes her own work? And recommended it to NCCP?

For a photo, the other party is willing to pay you 15,000 yuan?

"Do you have time to go to New York recently? I mean, what is your schedule in the near future, because you need to sign a contract, and Ms. Solomon also wants to talk to you in person about photography." The man who called himself Eugene asked.

Pete felt his legs were a little weak, and he nodded vigorously: "Of course there is time, I can temporarily stop business, I... Oh, by the way, I have been selected as a jury member for a lawsuit. Serving as a juror is mandatory, I can't refuse, but I... I think if Ms. Rosalind Solomon is willing to see me, I can apply to the court to request a backup juror to replace me."

"Is it the lawsuit that the software company filed against the plagiarist?" Eugene turned his head and stared into Pete's eyes and asked.

Pete nodded, "Yeah, you heard about that?"

"Of course, NCCP uses Lotus' software and is familiar with this company. So which side selected you as a juror? The plaintiff, the defendant, or the court?" Eugene asked as if he was chatting.

Pete shrugged. "I think I was selected by the defendant's legal team from the jury pre-selection pool."

"Then you'd better not mention this matter when you meet Ms. Solomon. She hates plagiarists because she has had her work plagiarized. Although I know you won't cast a vote of judgment casually, I guess if she knew that you personally tend to be sympathetic to plagiarists, she probably wouldn't want to see you too much." Eugene said with a smile, as if he was kindly reminding Pete to pay attention to some small issues in the meeting.

But Pete was not so stupid as to be exaggerated. He seemed to understand something from Eugene's eyes and slowly asked:

“I seemed to understand. I became a juror, and then my photography works were appreciated and will be collected permanently.”

"It sounds like a coincidence. I hope it won't delay the trial." Eugene nodded, but did not admit it, just calling it a coincidence.

Pitt continued: "But I thought the formal signing of the contract and the meeting with Ms. Solomon would take place after the trial?"

"Yes, according to the time calculation, it has to be after the trial is over. After all, there are many contract terms to be drafted. And now although Ms. Solomon has decided to collect it, there may be some changes in the middle. For example, Ms. Solomon has discovered a better work. After all, our funds are limited, so we can only strive for excellence." Eugene was very satisfied that the photographer in front of him understood what he said.

Pete continued, "I sympathize with the plagiarist, maybe that will make Ms. Solomon change her mind."

"That's your own fantasy. Believe me, we decided to collect your work mainly because your work is good enough." Eugene extended his hand to Pete and said goodbye with a smile: "I just came to inform you that your work will soon be collected by NCCP. I hope you can arrange your time. We will contact you at any time later. Goodbye, Mr. O'Brien."

"I won't sympathize with plagiarists, I won't..." Pete said repeatedly after thinking it through.

Eugene walked out the door without responding to Pete's words behind him. When he walked out of the photo studio, Eugene got into a black business car and said, "Inform Mr. Kennedy that the other side has selected another juror."

Second update ~ Sorry, it’s a little late ~ The child had some minor problems, so it took some time.

(End of this chapter)