A polarized τ factory at the Next Linear Collider

We discuss the importance of using the Next Linear Collider to study polarization effects in τ lepton decay. Our proposal is to Compton backscatter circularly polarized low energy laser pulses off an unpolarized electron beam of energy in the hundreds of GeV. The resulting backscattered photons also will have energies in the hundreds of GeV range and will be circularly polarized as well. Upon striking a fixed target, these polarized hot photons can produce copious polarized τ lepton pairs, which could be used to study τ decay, CP violation, and a number of other physics issues.