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CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar

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Ion said:
I was raised to be skeptical: before you give money to someone you've never met before, make absolutely certain that they're not out to scam you. I was not active in the Star Trek fan community, and didn't even know that TrekBBS existed. I actually liked Prelude a lot and was looking forward to Axanar, but an evening of research on Alec Peters (before I had even a hint of his reputation) turned me right off to donating. I wasn't willing to say "he's a scam artist," but I wasn't willing to risk it either; there were too many questions.

And so much of it looked like astroturfing on Alec's part.

When I look at the number of people who vehemently and blindly defend him (without so much as a single allowance that they might be wrong), I begin to wonder if I was raised on a different planet.
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I was the same way. I like the kind of Star Trek Axanar shaped up to be and figured that perhaps once things got rolling and moved further along in the process, I might chip in. Little to nothing happened from the time I stumbled upon the project until the news about Tony Todd leaving popped up (can't remember where I saw that). I started digging and that's when I found out all about Alec's sordid & shady past. I was honestly still on the fence at that point, but when the lawsuit broke and he just started blasting everybody, of course that was it.

Now when it comes to the 'Axalytes', I get where they're coming from, I mean we both like that kind of Star Trek Axanar represented. After all this time though and all that's transpired, why there are so many who continue to defend, let alone stick with him, is something I just can't understand.

If they donated some large sum of money, I could understand how matters of pride, ego & embarrassment would come into play. If not, why do some even feel the need to take sides in this fight?? Has the 24hr news cycle/this political season conditioned us so that we automatically pick a side of any given topic without thinking or doing basic independent research??

It's not like anyone is asking them to admit to anything, nor is anyone seeking to publicly embarrass them. I did some research though and came up with a number of links having little to nothing to do with Axanar, but which paint him in a less than flattering light. I'm betting that if some of these donors just stopped.......that if they pulled back from the us vs them fight, did some research on their own and came upon some of this for themselves, that they'd start to change their minds.

http://www.therpf.com/showthread.php?t=157673

http://www.ripoffreport.com/r/Propw...-Alec-Peters-Battlestarprops-Battlesta-429078

http://www.originalprop.com/blog/20...-star-trek-props-costumes-and-auctions-forum/
 
I expect that as usual about 5% of the community in question, in this case 5% of the Axanar donors, are making 95% of the noise and having 95% of the public indignation. If you wanted them to get off it, you'd have to give them something more serious in their life to worry about. Trek would come back into perspective.

My impression is the vast majority of criticism here of Axanar fans has been directed towards those few who push defective ideas onto the public, like "the studios are acting out of fear". General donors have just been urged, with guidance, to get a class action going if they don't like the situation.

I think for most donors, the healing will come when the court makes it crystal clear how the law was broken and to what extent. It is Axanar that inflicted the wound with its enrichment strategy, not the studios in their opposition to same.
 
RedForman said:
I was the same way. I like the kind of Star Trek Axanar shaped up to be and figured that perhaps once things got rolling and moved further along in the process, I might chip in. Little to nothing happened from the time I stumbled upon the project until the news about Tony Todd leaving popped up (can't remember where I saw that). I started digging and that's when I found out all about Alec's sordid & shady past. I was honestly still on the fence at that point, but when the lawsuit broke and he just started blasting everybody, of course that was it.

Now when it comes to the 'Axalytes', I get where they're coming from, I mean we both like that kind of Star Trek Axanar represented. After all this time though and all that's transpired, why there are so many who continue to defend, let alone stick with him, is something I just can't understand.

If they donated some large sum of money, I could understand how matters of pride, ego & embarrassment would come into play. If not, why do some even feel the need to take sides in this fight?? Has the 24hr news cycle/this political season conditioned us so that we automatically pick a side of any given topic without thinking or doing basic independent research??

It's not like anyone is asking them to admit to anything, nor is anyone seeking to publicly embarrass them. I did some research though and came up with a number of links having little to nothing to do with Axanar, but which paint him in a less than flattering light. I'm betting that if some of these donors just stopped.......that if they pulled back from the us vs them fight, did some research on their own and came upon some of this for themselves, that they'd start to change their minds.

http://www.therpf.com/showthread.php?t=157673

http://www.ripoffreport.com/r/Propw...-Alec-Peters-Battlestarprops-Battlesta-429078

http://www.originalprop.com/blog/20...-star-trek-props-costumes-and-auctions-forum/
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Same here. What really got my antennae up, however, was when I read that the reason they were making Axanar was

Because we want to make something so spectacular, that it serves as a resume and calling card for our work in the industry.
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(Links 1 and 2)

That reason felt very commercial to me and not at all the way I thought a fan project should be approached. That's when I started looking into who exactly was asking for me to financially support their dream.

First, I ran into this guy. From the tone of the site, I figured it was equally possible that I was reading online drama or that there was a fire under the smoke.

So I kept searching.

Then I found this forum. At that point, I settled into a "wait and see" mentality. I hoped my gut instinct was wrong and that Axanar would be everything that was promised.

Unfortunately, I saw this. I thought CBS and Paramount were going to come down on Axanar like a ton of bricks, but nothing happened so I was cautiously optimistic.

There's a reason I'm usually a pessimist.
 
RedForman said:
http://www.therpf.com/showthread.php?t=157673

http://www.ripoffreport.com/r/Propw...-Alec-Peters-Battlestarprops-Battlesta-429078
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Heh -- I was aware of Hillenbrand (how can one not be if they research Alec?), but those two links in particular I hadn't seen. The ripoffreport one is interesting, but I found the same information elsewhere. I remember thinking at the time that there was a lot of he said/she said going on, and it was impossible to dig out the truth -- but a lot of Alec's vitriol (especially against Mignogna) was a real turnoff, and made me doubt him severely. Decided it was best not to risk it.

And boy am I glad I did.

And no, I can never remember how to spell Mr. Vic's name. :devil:

muCephi said:
I think for most donors, the healing will come when the court makes it crystal clear how the law was broken and to what extent.
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For normal donors, I think the healing will come when they move on from Axanar and forget about it (which a great many of them probably already have). For the vocal variety, I doubt the verdict will change much. If the ruling is against Axanar, there will be complaining about unfair trials, the studios being heavy-handed, etc.; if it goes for Axanar, they'll be crowing.

In other words, prepare for the complaints about the court case being unfair. It's coming!
 
Ion said:
And no, I can never remember how to spell Mr. Vic's name
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Vic Mignogna pronounced the same as tomorrow in Spanish..lol
When Star Trek Continues first began there were horrible posts being put out about him. I didn't find any of them to be credible but the more I looked into him, the less I thought about the people putting out those posts.
Don't you love social media?
 
muCephi said:
It would be a little ironic if the only assets of value Paramount could go after would be items they auctioned off 10 years ago. The facility is not owned, only some improvements that arguably might accrue to the landlord (unless the 'investor group' bought the building I suppose). Maybe they could go after the Axanar donated funds, but how well would that go over? Maybe the Axanar mailing list asset would let them do a refund to the extent possible. And throw in an All Access patch.

If they got statutory damages, how easy would it be to get out from under those through bankruptcy?

If W&S gets shut out of all their discovery arguments, I wonder if they will have the appetite to keep fighting.
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muCephi said:
It would be a little ironic if the only assets of value Paramount could go after would be items they auctioned off 10 years ago.
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If they auctioned off items can't it be argued that they consented to the use or did the items have a limtation on them.
 
dmac said:
Vic Mignogna pronounced the same as tomorrow in Spanish..lol
When Star Trek Continues first began there were horrible posts being put out about him. I didn't find any of them to be credible but the more I looked into him, the less I thought about the people putting out those posts.
Don't you love social media?
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A lot of that was being pushed everywhere, by one obsessed, repetitive troll in his various guises. Since then, I have heard nothing but accolades for Vic and Company.
 
Phoenix219 said:
A lot of that was being pushed everywhere, by one obsessed, repetitive troll in his various guises. Since then, I have heard nothing but accolades for Vic and Company.
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Most of it came from one guy with many names who would post his rants on trekbbs, run to my fan page and point to his own posts on bbs as conformation of fact (deleted) and anywhere else someone allowed him to cross post his rants. It would have been comical if it wasn't blatant defamation of character. (IMHO)
 
Karzak said:
Honestly, it's not so much that people didn't research that bugs me. It's that any call to attention of the fishy bits about the whole thing before the lawsuit were almost always met with vehement shouting down by the Axanar fans, as if it were simply too impossible to consider that they'd been 'had.'
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Ironically, some of those who did the shouting down are now on the side of those who they once shouted at.

That must hurt.
 
DWolfson said:
If they auctioned off items can't it be argued that they consented to the use or did the items have a limtation on them.
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I can't find verification of it yet but I 'think' an item of theirs sold at auction can be resold and auctioned endlessly after that. If anyone has better knowledge on this than I please correct me. Until then, my thinking goes that they 'could' become an asset even to the original seller. And again I 'think' art items such as these specialty costumes rarely have intrinsic value like a bed or an auto but instead the value is artificially determined by interest from the few & the willingness to purchase at the same time they are for sale. So as an asset claimed by the Plaintiffs in this litigation their actual value may be quite hard to pin down since they must have a market to determine their worth.

I 'think' I'm close on this.
 
dmac said:
Most of it came from one guy with many names who would post his rants on trekbbs, run to my fan page and point to his own posts on bbs as conformation of fact (deleted) and anywhere else someone allowed him to cross post his rants. It would have been comical if it wasn't blatant defamation of character. (IMHO)
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Yes, I remember. It is ironical to me that I was told on good authority that one aspect of the marines was to monitor the internet for negatively non-supportive posters using duels. Which, you know, was what the defendant kept getting caught doing in supporting the production and ragging on those questioning it.
 
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dmac said:
Most of it came from one guy with many names who would post his rants on trekbbs, run to my fan page and point to his own posts on bbs as conformation of fact (deleted) and anywhere else someone allowed him to cross post his rants. It would have been comical if it wasn't blatant defamation of character. (IMHO)
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Yeah, I ran into that also when I was doing my research. ISTR that I decided that Alec was going after the guy for some reason unknown to anyone but Alec. I also recall reading an accusation against Mignogna (which I won't repeat here) that went far beyond fan film shenanigans. It was not corroborated anywhere else, and I associate the post with Peters (though I may well be recalling incorrectly there; it's been a year or so since I looked into all this, and there's been so much crap from Camp Axanar that everything has kinda blended together).

In the end, other than the kerfuffle with P2 (and I have no idea how or even if that was ever resolved), I've not heard anything verifiable that paints the guy in a bad light. Then again, I don't exactly spend time looking, either. :biggrin:
 
dmac said:
Most of it came from one guy with many names who would post his rants on trekbbs, run to my fan page and point to his own posts on bbs as conformation of fact (deleted) and anywhere else someone allowed him to cross post his rants. It would have been comical if it wasn't blatant defamation of character. (IMHO)
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I encountered him on IMBD's STC board, where we dwelled daily for weeks, spewing vitriol and nonsensical accusations. Many guises, many handles; I'd see the same stuff posted on every comment section for every STC article anywhere on the internet. He would cut and paste and quote from TrekBBS often enough, that it was one of my early introductions to this place.
 
Ion said:
Yeah, I ran into that also when I was doing my research. ISTR that I decided that Alec was going after the guy for some reason unknown to anyone but Alec. I also recall reading an accusation against Mignogna (which I won't repeat here) that went far beyond fan film shenanigans. It was not corroborated anywhere else, and I associate the post with Peters (though I may well be recalling incorrectly there; it's been a year or so since I looked into all this, and there's been so much crap from Camp Axanar that everything has kinda blended together).

In the end, other than the kerfuffle with P2 (and I have no idea how or even if that was ever resolved), I've not heard anything verifiable that paints the guy in a bad light. Then again, I don't exactly spend time looking, either. :biggrin:
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Was that the bogus "inappropriate at conventions" rumors?
 
Phoenix219 said:
Was that the bogus "inappropriate at conventions" rumors?
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If it's what I think it was it was of a personal nature and even if the story was true, and the only evidence that it was came from the mouth of Alec Peters of all people, it was entirely irrelevant. Essentially, Alec wanted to be nasty so he went as nasty and as personal as he could.

I should add that I didn't find the suggestions all that interesting to be honest. What a world we live in. Now if Peters had revealed the Mignogna had been siphoning donor money to line his own pockets then....
 
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