"Hi! My name's Jarrod Hunt and camels in the desert have better grammar than me. The words it are hard!"
CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar
- Thread starter Richard Baker
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I think he's perfectly rational. He has raised 1.4M and he's spent it on what he wanted to spend it on. He cannot settle the case without opening himself up to fraud charges or a class action lawsuit. He has no choice but to pursue this to the bitter end. Perfectly rational. You don't like it, and you don't have to, but I can understand why this is the case.
Um irrespective of how the case turns out (IE You somehow believe that Alec Peters, assuming the case went in his favor he'd, still have the funds and ability to complete the 'Axanar' feature film as promised to pledgers - and deliver all Perks) - he's still open to either a civil Class action suit - as well as Criminal fraud charges should the FTC or the CA attorney general decide to file.
The RATIONAL thing would have been to accept a settlement offered by CBS/Paramount; and move on. Alec's irrational insistence that any settlement included C/Ps tacit approval that Alec could complete Axanar as he saw fit; and as a result be allowed to retrain/benefit financially in anyway from his actions is irrational given the situation (and the evidence). A rational person doesn't ignore the reality of his situation <--- and IMO that's EXACTLY what Alec Peters continues to do here.
Not at all. Alec Peters will continue the course until the bitter end where he loses in court.* He will then appeal to the 9th District, and will lose again. He will be forbidden by CBS/P to have anything to do with Trek, and he will play the victim here. "I want to ship you your perks and deliver you this movie, but CBS/P won't let me. And I went broke defending myself from their corporate tyranny." The result is no film, no perks, and no need to file suit against him. After all, he's the victim.
I don't think you get it. He MUST fight against the settlement offers because to accept one where he can't make the movie opens himself up to civil and class action lawsuits. I really think he has NO CHOICE but to press on. That's perfectly rational.
Now, if CBS/P really wanted to stick it to him, they'd say, "Okay, we'll settle with you, Alec. Make your movie, but no more crowd-source funding." I don't think he has the resources (talent, sets, props, costumes, makeup) to complete anything. And then he would be in a REAL bind. The result would be the same (no movie, no perks, no money), but he couldn't claim that he was the victim.
*Unless he finds a jury that he can sway and win the case, in which case CBS/P shuts down all fan films.
I know nobody here probably knows his exact net worth, but would he have enough money on his own to fund a decent quality film? Didn't he supposed put $150,00 of his own money into Axanar,? I'm assuming if he had that kind of money to throw at this before, and didn't completely empty out his bank account, then he could still have a pretty decent amount that he could put towards the movie.
You didn't really read what I wrote because bottom line - Alec Peters is STILL open to either a Class Action or Fraud lawsuit because REGARDLESS of how the copyright case turns out - it's now PUBLIC KNOWLEDGE he spent Pledged funds on things NOT RELATED to producing the film (IE that in itself = Fraud IF the FTC or CA Attorney General wish to pursue such charges).
It doesn't change the fact that he MUST fight the urge to settle. He MUST take it to court. He must be able to say, "See, CBS/P won't let me make the movie!" And he will be correct. And that makes his actions rational, something you asserted he is not.
I don't think he has any urge to settle. He's in this to the end, balls to the wall. This guy is a classic narcissist, playing the long con.
He'll never give up, never surrender, even if eventually faced with criminal charges and jail time. He's set himself up as the savior of real Star Trek and he'll play the innocent victim of evil corporate America to his last breath.
It occurs to me that there are probably more of those "We Want Worf" people lobbying for a Captain Worf show than there are Axanar fans.
Wrong. If he loses it won't just be CBS saying he can't make it, it will be the law that won't let him make the movie. What's more he risks higher costs and damages by going to trial and thereafter appealing. There is certainly a downside for him in refusing to settle. Decisions in litigation are not as cut and dried as some are making it. Litigants are often faced with very difficult choices, and often have to think about trying to minimize the damage in the event that they lose, why the chances of winning - and sometimes these choices have elements in conflict with one another.
If Peters goes on to lose the case then he can certainly use the public narrative that CBS/P ruined the chances of the movie. But it would also be true that all of this likely could've been avoided if Peters had listened to the CBS/P statement of August 2015 and stopped the project right there, paying back as much of the money as possible, cut his loses and triedmaking a movie with the serial numbers filed off, like Renegades ultimately did. It's his choice to fight it all the way, and it does represent his only chance of actually making the movie so on the face of it you could say this was the only rational option. However, in reality he has spent all the money he raised for the project and he has failed to deliver on his contractual obligations to his donors. So it's likely that as soon as this litigation started he realistically could no longer make the movie since he would have to spend all the money raised to keep the project afloat while the case rumbled on, and so his choice to continue fighting could indeed be said to be irrational as there is a significant rise that all he has done is made his own financial position much harder if he loses and made it that much easier for others to come after him to the extent that he may well end up facing individual bankruptcy, which at his age would probably wipe him out for good. So just how rational his decision to fight the case is is most certainly open to debate.
The real issues for Peter have always been whether or not he could deliver the movie and keeping the studio functioning to serve his own future intentions. It never will be about intellectual property law for him and what is right in law, but having conducted countless litigation cases I can tell you that many litigants find it hard to see the wood for the trees. He is likely in denial that he was screwed the day he was sued, but if he were honest with himself and looked at the ways he could keep the project afloat, he'd likely have to admit that from that point on it was highly unlikely he would be able to keep it going once the case started unless CBS/P refused to walk away and allow him to make the picture, and worse still that with each month that has passed the chances of being abel to keep the project afloat have continued to reduce, even if he goes on to win the case. So yes, it could well be said that his choice to fight were irrational, and that his honest position is likely to no longer be about making this movie, but rather how to minimize the damage to himself, irrespective of whatever bullshit he feeds he donors.
Ha ha. Can you imagine Michael Dorn crying about the nasties at CBS/P paramount "destroying it all for the fans"?!
Hater!
After Jonathan Lane's Fan Film Factor re-posted AxaMonitor's Illustrated Guide to the Axanar Lawsuit, the Axanar Facebook page deleted one of its own supporters' link to the FFF article. People noticed.
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