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Given the stipulation that CBS/Paramount can do whatever they want with their IP:

I still think Rule #4 is unnecessarily onerous as well.

4. If the fan production uses commercially-available Star Trek uniforms, accessories, toys and props, these items must be official merchandise and not bootleg items or imitations of such commercially available products.

I get that this is basically forbidding cheap imitation outfits and props, which is reasonable. However, I feel that while technically it *could* permit making your own costume, in practice CBS/Paramount might feel like they're able to shut down any production that doesn't actually use official merchandise. Imagine the uproar if Lucasfilm said that if you made a Star Wars fanfilm, you could only use outfits from Anovos. Or-- for the other side of *that* coin-- Rubies (semi-legendary for shitty replica costumes).

Rule #5 already made it so that they can't use professional services or pay anybody for doing the effects, filming, and everything else, so anybody making a film now has to do it all entirely on their own. No renting cameras or paying a stunt company to make a small explosion; now they have to either scrounge, borrow, or outright buy the stuff they need. Now they're going to add having to buy costumes-- they can't even pay someone to make the costume for them, I suspect-- to the list.

http://www.anovos.com/collections/star- ... -pre-order

(funnily enough Anovos does Trek too, apparently) That's $250 for a TOS female dress. Not as expensive as their Star Wars stuff... but it's still up there.

Fact of the matter is this is going to mean that we're going to get a lot of fan-films that are along the lines of crappy '70s 8mm basement films. I mean, it's not like a lot of them aren't like that already, but we've started to see a rise in some really good fan work thanks to the Internet. This could well shoot that right down.

Rogue 9 wrote:Well yes, of course. CBS is, in case you failed to notice, suing them. Having been in that situation, I can say from personal experience that when you're in it, you use every bit of leverage you've fucking got.

Or you just accept that trying to build a studio off of donations given based upon somebody else's IP in order to boost your own career was maybe not the best idea ever and stop trying to poke CBS in the eye.

But that would require them not being assholes so I guess not.

Rogue 9 wrote:They're posting about the Fan Film Factor initiative because it benefits them to do so, but it doesn't appear to be their initiative; it only started after the fanfilm guidelines came out, not when the lawsuit was initiated six months ago.

I mean, Axanar is basically the reason for these guidelines in the first place, so...

I guess they're hoping CBS will go back entirely on them so that they can continue trying to build their professional careers and a business off of intellectual property they don't own?

RogueIce wrote:

Rogue 9 wrote:Well yes, of course. CBS is, in case you failed to notice, suing them. Having been in that situation, I can say from personal experience that when you're in it, you use every bit of leverage you've fucking got.

Or you just accept that trying to build a studio off of donations given based upon somebody else's IP in order to boost your own career was maybe not the best idea ever and stop trying to poke CBS in the eye.

But that would require them not being assholes so I guess not.

Thing is, giving up and rolling over won't protect them from the lawsuit, so they still take a big hit. Hence "use every bit of leverage they've got."

Simon_Jester wrote:Thing is, giving up and rolling over won't protect them from the lawsuit, so they still take a big hit. Hence "use every bit of leverage they've got."

It depends on what kind of settlement they can get out of CBS. Although at this point it's probably going to be some fines because of the donation kerfluffle, I don't see CBS just being content with "no movie" after they tried to build a business off of donations made with the Star Trek name attached.

Of course, understanding why they're being assholes doesn't change that they're assholes so there's that.

Turns out that paying yourself 38,000 dollar salaries, selling Axanar Brand Coffee, models, and getting a shiney new studio (which you'll use for for-profit ventures) plus a career, all over the back of a large IP, is a bit too much for a studio to allow.

Rule #1 of making fan films: Do Not Make Profit Out Of It.

They didn't do anything other large fan productions haven't done; they just made the mistake of publishing financial statements to their donors in public. Plenty of other productions have paid for actors and production work. Hell, Black Sheep Studios had a fundraising drive for the third chapter of I.M.P.S. a couple of years ago explicitly so they (professional production staff in their day jobs) could stop taking jobs and work on the project, i.e. explicitly to pay themselves. No lawsuit. What got Axanar was its own success and their openness about it, not their mode of operation.

Simon_Jester wrote:Thing is, giving up and rolling over won't protect them from the lawsuit, so they still take a big hit. Hence "use every bit of leverage they've got."

Sometimes that just results in the other side deciding the screws need to be turned tighter.

Rogue 9 wrote:They didn't do anything other large fan productions haven't done; they just made the mistake of publishing financial statements to their donors in public. Plenty of other productions have paid for actors and production work. Hell, Black Sheep Studios had a fundraising drive for the third chapter of I.M.P.S. a couple of years ago explicitly so they (professional production staff in their day jobs) could stop taking jobs and work on the project, i.e. explicitly to pay themselves. No lawsuit. What got Axanar was its own success and their openness about it, not their mode of operation.

The scale and publicity is a factor, yes. They were open about large quantities of money- and the 'starting their own studio,' certainly didn't help, that threw up, "Hey, these people really are trying to become competition," flags even more than something like BSS.

Rogue 9 wrote:They didn't do anything other large fan productions haven't done; they just made the mistake of publishing financial statements to their donors in public. Plenty of other productions have paid for actors and production work. Hell, Black Sheep Studios had a fundraising drive for the third chapter of I.M.P.S. a couple of years ago explicitly so they (professional production staff in their day jobs) could stop taking jobs and work on the project, i.e. explicitly to pay themselves. No lawsuit. What got Axanar was its own success and their openness about it, not their mode of operation.

Did I.M.P.S. try to open their own studio to create later for-profit works and sell I.M.P.S. merchandise using these donations?

Of course, even if they did, that just means they got lucky the IP holders didn't notice. But anyone with half a brain should know that these sorts of things for a fan film are a terrible fucking idea and trying it just makes you a target should the rights holders notice you.

They gave out backer rewards, which amounts to the same thing as merchandise (at least according to CBS/Paramount, and I can see the logic).

This is all bullshit at any rate. The only reason Star Trek is still under copyright fifty years after its creation and twenty-five years after the death of the author is the increased copyright terms of the 1976 copyright overhaul followed by the Mickey Mouse Protection Act of 1998. Even under the maximum renewal term of the previous law, we'd only be a few years from it passing into the public domain. The only reason I give a shit about Axanar is the same reason CBS does; if the now probably not going to be made movie was in line with its Prelude, it would have been superior to any of CBS' efforts for the past few decades.

I understand why they sued and wish Axanar Productions hadn't been so dumbshit about spending the donation money directly on a studio (it would have been much better for them to make the movie and then use that success to solicit investment, so they wouldn't be directly profiting), but would still have liked to see the final product. (It is worth noting that the lawsuit against Alec Peters and his organization doesn't complain of building the studio or its potential future use, though; only copyright issues.) My primary concern is massive copyright creep and the blatant public corruption that led to it. Keeping works under copyright for nearly a century after the death of the author (a term that will doubtless get longer still next time Steamboat Willie nears the end of its copyright again) doesn't serve to protect the author at all, as he or she is by definition dead once "after the death of the author" is in play, and only works to enrich corporations and keep our culture under lock and key.

Q99 wrote:It really isn't all that heavy handed. I could see them loosen up some, but most of these rules are likely there for what they feel is necessary to defend their property. Stuff like the 'no trek actor' thing was likely lawyer-insisted to avoid confusion. Maybe even the length bit might've been legal rather than what they actually want.

It's just laying down the hammer pretty hard.
But I suppose they have to be for any impending court case, to go "See! SEE! We defended it!" or some sort of legalese reason.

But hey, Star Trek is their big IP, fair enough they have to defend it. They're well within their rights.

Rogue 9 wrote:They gave out backer rewards, which amounts to the same thing as merchandise (at least according to CBS/Paramount, and I can see the logic).

Interesting. I guess either Lucasfilm either didn't care or was unaware.

This is all bullshit at any rate. The only reason Star Trek is still under copyright fifty years after its creation and twenty-five years after the death of the author is the increased copyright terms of the 1976 copyright overhaul followed by the Mickey Mouse Protection Act of 1998. Even under the maximum renewal term of the previous law, we'd only be a few years from it passing into the public domain. The only reason I give a shit about Axanar is the same reason CBS does; if the now probably not going to be made movie was in line with its Prelude, it would have been superior to any of CBS' efforts for the past few decades.

As you note, even under the old law Star Trek would still be protected, so Axanar is fucked in any event, unless they waited until 2021.

I understand why they sued and wish Axanar Productions hadn't been so dumbshit about spending the donation money directly on a studio (it would have been much better for them to make the movie and then use that success to solicit investment, so they wouldn't be directly profiting), but would still have liked to see the final product. (It is worth noting that the lawsuit against Alec Peters and his organization doesn't complain of building the studio or its potential future use, though; only copyright issues.)

While not by name, part of their suit does actually bring up the financial benefit Axanar enjoyed:


SOURCE: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents ... ingon.html

IANAL but I'd imagine the specifics of the studio and such would, probably, be brought up in further filings or during arguments in court.

My primary concern is massive copyright creep and the blatant public corruption that led to it. Keeping works under copyright for nearly a century after the death of the author (a term that will doubtless get longer still next time Steamboat Willie nears the end of its copyright again) doesn't serve to protect the author at all, as he or she is by definition dead once "after the death of the author" is in play, and only works to enrich corporations and keep our culture under lock and key.

TBH I really have no problem with indefinite corporate ownership of their intellectual property, but that's an argument for another thread.

You know what my biggest bitch is about all this? We won't get Axanar now. That's it. Axanar looked well prepared to resolve the massive discontinuity introduced with Enterprise, then amplified with the JJTrek crap, and bring it back in line with TOS. We won't get that now, because you can bet your ass CBS/Paramount doesn't give a shit. They use the marquee to sucker fan ass-cheeks into theater seats, but they don't give a shit about the people who provide their bread and butter once those buttocks are planted. They'd happily slap "Star Trek" on a "Lost In Space" remake, because the fuck do they care?

In fact, not only would they, they already did (Voyager, anyone?).

By the end of Season 4 ENT wasn't that bad about equal to average TNG, DS9 or TOS and certainly worth the name of Star Trek, the main problem with both Voyager and Enterprise was that they weren't different enough from the TNG formula (or more accurately they didn't use the premise they were given) both those series had a lot of issue but the premise wasn't one those and to say that Voyager was a "Lost in Space" remake would like saying Voyager was a "Battlestar Galactica" remake as both have about as common with Voyager's premise, the "lost spaceship" premise isn't even close to being unique to "Lost in Space".

there's only so much you can do with the TOS/TNG formula before you start to seriously repeat yourself. You'll probably brand me as heretic but I'd say TV Trek was at its best during season 3-5 TNG, TOS suffered often from the lack of budget and technology, season 1-2 TNG suffered from the cast being often quite unlikeble and with season 6-7 TNG was starting to run out of ideas and it showed, the parts of DS9 that I've seen were mostly good, while Voyager and Enterprise season 1-2 suffered from having more bad quality episodes then good ones, though seasons 3-4 of Enterprise were decent enough.

EDIT:and Axanar included a character from ENT played by the same actor even.

I think one could do a show of the TNG/TOS formula... but, one, you really gotta embrace it and be willing to go after controversial stuff like TOS did and *good* SF premises. And two, don't throw us a premise that implies we'll be getting a plot arc separate from that!

Hm, plot arcs are the norm in TV nowadays, but I could easily see a good Trek show do 1/3rd arc 2/3rd exploration....

edaw1982 wrote: It's just laying down the hammer pretty hard.
But I suppose they have to be for any impending court case, to go "See! SEE! We defended it!" or some sort of legalese reason.

But hey, Star Trek is their big IP, fair enough they have to defend it. They're well within their rights.

Pretty much0 they do not want to be caught out not defending themselves. And even though it is a hammer blow, it is not nearly as strict as it could be, and in putting out guidelines, for the first time it is safe to say, "Ok, you can *definitely* do this stuff." It turning grey area into black and white- and sure, it sucks to have some stuff now in the harsh white of not-allowed, but a lot is now more clearly safe in the white than it's ever been. Not great comfort, to be sure, but I'm glad they didn't try and wipe the fanfilm movement.

Q99 wrote:I think one could do a show of the TNG/TOS formula... but, one, you really gotta embrace it and be willing to go after controversial stuff like TOS did and *good* SF premises. And two, don't throw us a premise that implies we'll be getting a plot arc separate from that!

Hm, plot arcs are the norm in TV nowadays, but I could easily see a good Trek show do 1/3rd arc 2/3rd exploration....

The way I see the main problem with Voyager and especially early ENT was that they set up essentially an arc story (Voyager getting lost in the Delta Quadrant and the Temporal Cold War in ENT) but didn't have any reals plans as to how to execute that arc. I mean B5 is a good example on how to execute a arc story that's mostly stand-alone episodes where the arc stories are rarely the A-plot but you need to plan that out.

IMHO if you want to use the TNG/TOS formula what's most important is that stuff that's important is important all the time and you don't hit the "reset button" after the episode and secondly that our heroes make mistakes even if it's mostly solved within that episode or multi-parter, hell you can even make an episode about "character screwed up and now has to deal with the mess he has put himself/herself into"

Axton wrote:You know what my biggest bitch is about all this? We won't get Axanar now. That's it. Axanar looked well prepared to resolve the massive discontinuity introduced with Enterprise, then amplified with the JJTrek crap, and bring it back in line with TOS. We won't get that now, because you can bet your ass CBS/Paramount doesn't give a shit... [snip bitterness]

You were never getting Axanar, because Axanar was created by a bunch of people who decided to paint big bullseyes on their backs with "SUE ME!" in bright orange letters plastered all over the center. They did basically every single thing that trademark and copyright law was intended to prevent in the first place, because the exact reason such laws even exist is to ensure that a bunch of random people can't just start making money and selling merchandise and building their careers on the strength of someone else's intellectual property.

I think it's in the interests of the trademark holder to support fans who want to create extra content for the love of doing so (i.e. nearly all written fanfiction). But Axanar went a long way past "for the love" and into "for the money and for building up our studio." And it was bluntly obvious they were doing this, to an extent that they had to know they were jumping up and down on the tail of a sleeping dragon, while wearing big spiky boots.

In that situation, blaming the dragon for the fact that somebody gets roasted is obtuse and childish.

RogueIce wrote:

My primary concern is massive copyright creep and the blatant public corruption that led to it. Keeping works under copyright for nearly a century after the death of the author (a term that will doubtless get longer still next time Steamboat Willie nears the end of its copyright again) doesn't serve to protect the author at all, as he or she is by definition dead once "after the death of the author" is in play, and only works to enrich corporations and keep our culture under lock and key.

TBH I really have no problem with indefinite corporate ownership of their intellectual property, but that's an argument for another thread.

I wouldn't mind except for two caveats.

One is that I think corporations ought to have to keep using the IP in a significant way. If Mickey Mouse went out of style and Disney stopped using him as a mascot, and the character is essentially forgotten from the public mind, then Disney shouldn't be able to sue someone fifty years after that for creating a character that resembles Mickey Mouse. Similarly, a modern movie studio shouldn't be able to sue someone for creating a romantic comedy whose plot is essentially identical to some obscure movie from the 1960s, if they haven't used any element of that IP since. There are only so many possible cartoon animals, so many possible plots, so many possible jokes, and the sheer volume and churn of popular culture means that most good ideas will eventually be reused by chance. This is already to some extent a problem, but it's only going to get worse over time if there isn't some kind of limit.

The other is that we need some way to deal with the fact that this effectively gives corporations a steadily, continuously growing share of overall control over popular culture within our society. The fraction of all our culture- our stories, myths, and archetypes- that belong to some ageless collective entity will keep getting larger, because once a corporation owns a trademark or copyright it doesn't go away.

For instance, in the US the last year from which all published work is now in the public domain was 1923. We've already reached a point in our society where many of the fables, much of the mythology, that would have been familiar to the people of 1923 is utterly forgotten. It's been replaced by a huge array of compelling fictional characters and stories and traditions... much of which is still the property of some corporation.

That's a problem I'm not sure how to solve without putting some upper limit on how long a corporation can own things.

Simon_Jester wrote:

Axton wrote:You know what my biggest bitch is about all this? We won't get Axanar now. That's it. Axanar looked well prepared to resolve the massive discontinuity introduced with Enterprise, then amplified with the JJTrek crap, and bring it back in line with TOS. We won't get that now, because you can bet your ass CBS/Paramount doesn't give a shit... [snip bitterness]

You were never getting Axanar, because Axanar was created by a bunch of people who decided to paint big bullseyes on their backs with "SUE ME!" in bright orange letters plastered all over the center. They did basically every single thing that trademark and copyright law was intended to prevent in the first place, because the exact reason such laws even exist is to ensure that a bunch of random people can't just start making money and selling merchandise and building their careers on the strength of someone else's intellectual property.

You've got fair points, and it's hard to argue against them. But let me point out that it's not Paramount or CBS I'm necessarily put out with, but with the Axanar showrunners for doing exactly what you've pointed out. They screwed themselves, and in so doing, screwed all of us out of what looked like a mind-blowingly well-executed fan experience, one that Paramount and CBS would never have the balls to execute themselves.

Recently saw the "Prelude to Axanar" film and have been doing a bit more looking into this matter here are my thoughts at present:

Axanar looks fantastic. It looks like Trek, it is well written (actually, in some ways the "Prelude" reminded me of both a Ken Burns documentary and Tora! Tora! Tora!, feeling like a historical dramatization/documentary/docudrama), the CGI is spectacular especially given what must be a very limited effects budget, and it was clearly made with love and passion. I want to see Axanar. I think any Trekker who sees "Prelude" is going to want to see Axanar.

However, there seems to be an element in fandom that fails to grasp a simple concept regarding copyright and intellectual property. I've heard from several places the rebuttal "But they don't/didn't make money on it!" to defend fan works. Look, profit or non-profit has no relevance to copyright and never has. The copyright owner has the authority to either grant or withhold permission for use and if permission is not granted then no, it is not alright to go ahead and use it anyway and excuse it by saying "but-but-but I didn't profit! I didn't sell it, I gave it away!". That's a copyright violation. I'm sorry but if the producers of Axanar did not secure permission from CBS/Paramount/the IP owner in advance they did, in fact, violate copyright.

The only prayer I see of the Axanar group escaping bad news in court is that Paramount has been tolerating fan works of various sorts for years. It might be argued that since Paramount was not rigorously enforcing its rights the defendants had some basis to assume what they were doing was somehow OK. Maybe they'll escape punitive damages (especially if they can show the IP owner was not actually harmed by their actions) but Paramount would still own Star Trek lock, stock and barrel and could still demand that Axanar never be released, or even that all copies be destroyed.

Of course, I am not a lawyer and I could be wrong on the above.

Let it be said, though, that if I could wave a magic wand and get the decision I want.... I'd like to see Paramount allow the release of Axanar up to and including the selling of copies, merchandising, etc. with all profit going to Paramount (those participating would be able to get a nice entry on their resumes, which, considering they signed on for minimal or no pay, seems about what they expected anyway). Going forward Paramount would own all rights to Axanar. I'd also like to see Paramount more open to allowing longer length/better funded fan films, allowing for those making them to receive fair wages for their work but with Paramount retaining the rights and profits, if any. I doubt that would happen, but this is an instance where I'd be happy to be wrong.

I'm with you every step of the way on that. I don't care who profits by Axanar -- they were clearly doing top notch work based on the Prelude. Seriously, it looked as good to me as anything CBS had done with the property; I would prefer to have had CBS say, "Okay, you create it, but we profit by it. And if it's well received, your next Trek project will be as our employees."

Axton wrote:I'm with you every step of the way on that. I don't care who profits by Axanar -- they were clearly doing top notch work based on the Prelude. Seriously, it looked as good to me as anything CBS had done with the property; I would prefer to have had CBS say, "Okay, you create it, but we profit by it. And if it's well received, your next Trek project will be as our employees."

Trying to retroactively get something under copyright sets bad precedent- I'm pretty sure their lawyers would veto that.

That wouldn't be retroactively getting something under copyright; they already own the copyrights to Star Trek. That would just be setting terms by which their copyrighted material could be used.

They'd be within their rights to do that. The real problem from Paramount's point of view is that this is encouraging people to infringe on their copyright in hopes that, if they do a good enough job, they can get a paycheck out of it.

Rewarding people for something that, on the whole, you don't want more people doing is a risky strategy, even if profitable in the short term.

Simon_Jester wrote:They did basically every single thing that trademark and copyright law was intended to prevent in the first place, because the exact reason such laws even exist is to ensure that a bunch of random people can't just start making money and selling merchandise and building their careers on the strength of someone else's intellectual property.

The purpose of trademark law is to protect producers and consumers from other people using a producer's good name to sell their own shoddy work. As long as Axanar Productions were not giving Paramount/CBS a bad name by producing crappy films and falsely implying that they were official Star Trek films, and they weren't tricking fans into watching their films by falsely implying they were official Star Trek films, they were not violating the purpose of trademark law.

The purpose of trademark law is to protect producers and consumers from other people using a producer's good name to sell any work, not just inferior work. "But my derivative work that uses your IP is really good!" is not a recognized defense against charges of trademark violation.

Simon_Jester wrote:The purpose of trademark law is to protect producers and consumers from other people using a producer's good name to sell any work, not just inferior work. "But my derivative work that uses your IP is really good!" is not a recognized defense against charges of trademark violation.

But Axanas aren't doing that either. Nobody who wanted to see Axanas's fanfilms did so under the false assumption that they were produced by CBS/Paramount. Trademarks do not exist to protect content, they exist to protect origin.