CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar

[jespah]

I think, you and I, we both know, where she can or probably will place it for everone to see... Who socializes the social media?

I'm a socialist for social media?

Will repost - but after tonight. Podcasting night.

Feel free to nudge me if I forget. Many thanks and now I need to prepare myself/figure out WTF we're talking about. Oh yeah, fan fiction. Cheers!

 

[Professor Zoom]

^^^^
I ULTRA-LIKE the quoted post above. Too bad that in all honesty I doubt enough people will see it BEFORE they Pledge to Mr. Peters new Kickstarter. Weel see; but my hat is off to Madame Jespah who summed everything up regarding Alec Peters and the Axanar/Industry Studio situation.

I do have to say though that I CAN'T BELIEVE that using Star Trek and Axanar (both are mentioned in that pitch video) to do public crowdfunding for a for profit business is within the terms of the CBS/Paramount V. Axanar settlement. <--- If it is, then yeah, I have to wonder myself why CBS or Paramount bothered to sue - because in the end Mr. Peters HAS USED the Star Trek IP in part to obtain start up capital and (if this latest Kickstarter is successful) continued funding for his for profit business.

Maybe that's why they haven't officially launched the kickstarter--a lawyer told them they were just asking for trouble.

Or not.

I also think its going to be a lot harder to raise money for a studio than for something called Star Trek. I bet they won't get nearly as much as they need to keep the lights on--such as they are.

 

[muCephi]

I also think its going to be a lot harder to raise money for a studio than for something called Star Trek. I bet they won't get nearly as much as they need to keep the lights on--such as they are.

I wonder how they can keep afloat no matter what.

15-18k$/month is a lot of donor money to count on indefinitely. I think they aren't going to have it for long no matter what. So they have to achieve steady for-profit rentals before too long. If they don't get nonprofit status they will be taxed on it too I imagine.

Do they owe back taxes for the money already collected?

How much rental per day might they achieve, and how does that compare with 18k$/month? 50% occupancy? What's the typical occupancy of studios in that area? What about figuring in corporate taxes on that income?

How exactly are they going to attract professional productions when any professional labor at the studio is paid non-union rates? Can they actually run a studio without any union jobs on their studio staff? How much would that add to costs to meet any minimum a professional production might require?

And all the other miscellany mentioned, insurance, marketing, etc..

Obviously other studios are hanging on with whatever their rates they collect and whatever their occupancy levels are. So there is a sweet spot somewhere.

After all this time, the studio financials still seem to be put forward as a wish and a dream rather than a careful plan. One would hope professionals would donate their $5 and then ask the hard questions over on Kickstarter.

 

[ThankYouGeneR]

I don't know, and this is purely speculation, mostly just entertaining myself as I think about it I guess, but I do sort of 'feel' there's a plan somewhere within all this. Not that I think the defendant is really the planner, or at least a good planner, or at least knows how to carry out a plan. He's more like a front man. He's very good at that. That's where I see his strength to be; live and in person.

So I wonder to myself, if I think there's a plan going on, who is the Planner?

And I keep circling back to Mr. Bawden again and again.

He impressed me in the Trekzone interview. There was something....


Independent ST is gone. $15,000 monthly rent is still there, upwards towards $3,000 utilities is still there. Why is Mr. Bawden still there?
(from the Pitch video: 00:13 "Our mission is to help independent fan and student film makers bring their science fiction, horror, and fantasy projects to life.")

Sci-fi, Horror, & Fantasy? Those are genres that are heavily populated with fanboys & fangirls.

Fanboys & fangirls, like myself for instance, often more freely spend what I think is an atypical amount of $$ on 'stuff'. And ST is only a very small part of my real life. Most people I know have only a passing awareness that I am fan of ST, but, I have costumes I've made, I've purchased. More than too many ST action figures & ST space ships to talk about in polite company. 750+ ST episodes/movies and stuff 'about' ST. Books about ST. I happily spend an obscene percentage of my income to go spend five or six days among thousands of ST people. I buy a $15 publication just because it has 'a' picture of one of my characters on the cover. $25 or more if there are ST articles in it. I have ST music, ST audio books, ST knickknacks. Grocery store items that have ST in 'some' way on the box or can. My com-badge collection is in reality rather ridiculous. I mean, how many com-badges do I 'need' anyway. And I'm on the low end of the spending/collecting spectrum, and not necessarily by choice either. My friend is about in the middle of spending spectrum, for decades now. Lots of us, people I personally know and have met, have ST costumes that rival movie costumes, rooms dedicated to their ST costumes, genre filled rooms that far surpass anything people chuckle about The Big Bang Theory showing. They are on the high end of the spending/collecting spectrum.

Now, our, the ST fanboy/fangirl thing is no different from hobbyist, fantasy, musician, gamer, sci-fi, sports, cooking, horror, wine, el al. fanboys & fangirls. I mean, seriously, I have a close friend whose home is filled, some rooms floor to nearly ceiling with records: LPs, 45s, 78s. Multiple thousands of attractively organized, catalogued... records. Just name a song or artist he has and he will walk right to it. But what I'm thinking about the sci-fi, horror, & fantasy fanboys/girls is that lots of us can sometimes be a willing 'bank' for things clever enough to push our buttons. *I* donated to the litigated production three times. And several other times to other productions. In the Before time.

So I put these things together:
-These wacky wacky high rent digs
-This great front man who thrives on center stage (just please, like my president, keep.him.away.from.
social.media.keyboards.when.he.is.irritated.)
-Sci-fi, horror, fantasy fanboys/girls
-kickstarter to payallthebills for a year, maybe two, until the studio is on its feet and supporting itself
-a come to Eden and make your fan film dreams come true Pitch
*and*
-Mr. Bawden, with his decades of connections, and his Trekzone demonstrated ideas

And I see a plan. And at its center I see Mr. Bawden.

The Way To Eden

 

[wtriker1701]

Why does everybody take the monthly rent $15.000 (now almost up to $18.000) so seriously as a given? Have we seen the rent contract with the landlord?
AP has been criticized for renting out a warehouse for such an expensive rate, even though it seems to up to no code in whatever area it needs to be. Jody has pointed out the usual costs for rent normally could have been between $2.000 to $3.000 per month. So it seemed, among many, many, maaaany other things, as a bad (stupid) business decision.
I can't point my finger on it... but as every new PR looks like a desaster caused by amateurish decisions... here comes a "What If" to play.
What if they are NOT that stupid?
What if just serves as "an explanation" for money being burned - while some might argue it could also be a way of money laundering?
What if the real rent is much lower than we all were made to believe?
The expenses and costs have varied over the months, mostly sounding higher than before, we were led to believe.

Is that really so? Are there documents to prove it? Can we take that for granted? Should we?
I certainly can't, because nothing really adds up.
@carlosp - your thoughts?

 

[ThankYouGeneR]

Interesting.


I know I got the rent price off one of their podcasts for sure. And I may be remembering wrong on this but I 'think' I read it in a Captain's Log on the site back when they, he I mean, announced he had signed for the studio.

But your 'What If' is interesting. I mean I'm pretty sure *I* haven't seen paperwork. (I could be wrong) At this time I will continue to be confident the $15K is accurate..... but I'm not married to it if something else comes to light.

 

[RedForman]

So I put these things together:
-These wacky wacky high rent digs
-This great front man who thrives on center stage (just please, like my president, keep.him.away.from.
social.media.keyboards.when.he.irritated.)
-Sci-fi, horror, fantasy fanboys/girls
-kickstarter to payallthebills for a year, maybe two, until the studio is on its feet and supporting itself
-a come to Eden and make your fan film dreams come true Pitch
*and*
-Mr. Bawden, with his decades of connections, and his Trekzone demonstrated ideas

And I see a plan. And at its center I see Mr. Bawden.

The Way To Eden

Bawden as puppet master? Interesting. If (and that's a big "if") he has an ultimate motive, it's probably buried under more layers of LFIM's garbage than anyone would care to dig through. I could see him as the guy who lit Alec's 'spark' so to speak and pushed it and pushed it and pushed it until Alec really started to believe it was all his idea (clever, as it kept him well insulated from the legal dealings). That's quite a stretch though.

 

[jespah]

Why does everybody take the monthly rent $15.000 (now almost up to $18.000) so seriously as a given? Have we seen the rent contract with the landlord?
AP has been criticized for renting out a warehouse for such an expensive rate, even though it seems to up to no code in whatever area it needs to be. Jody has pointed out the usual costs for rent normally could have been between $2.000 to $3.000 per month. So it seemed, among many, many, maaaany other things, as a bad (stupid) business decision.
I can't point my finger on it... but as every new PR looks like a desaster caused by amateurish decisions... here comes a "What If" to play.
What if they are NOT that stupid?
What if just serves as "an explanation" for money being burned - while some might argue it could also be a way of money laundering?
What if the real rent is much lower than we all were made to believe?
The expenses and costs have varied over the months, mostly sounding higher than before, we were led to believe.

Is that really so? Are there documents to prove it? Can we take that for granted? Should we?
I certainly can't, because nothing really adds up.
@carlosp - your thoughts?

^^ This. Plus the $15k figure keeps creeping to $18k anyway.

Either way, it looks bad, because either it is a bad business decision (which should make donors wonder about business acumen in general), or it's a lie.

So, which one is it?

And it's interesting (@ThankYouGeneR ) thinking of Bawden in more of a leadership capacity than they have led people to believe. Certainly he seems to be more of a planner than all of the other folks combined. Certainly somebody wants to retire off the Valencia property.

Once again, for the potential donors: they have significant and superior competition, and lots and lots of it in the area. And how free is 'free', really? Either they make rent with paid studio usage or crowdfunding because, except for Bawden, no one else seems to have a day job or is even trying to get one.

Regardless of how much the rent and utilities are, they are not free. Somehow, they must be paid.

 

[muCephi]

...
And it's interesting (@ThankYouGeneR ) thinking of Bawden in more of a leadership capacity than they have led people to believe. Certainly he seems to be more of a planner than all of the other folks combined. Certainly somebody wants to retire off the Valencia property....

You don't have to look for some complicated explanation.

Mr. Bawden says he is working in or has hankerings for working in "native advertising", that is ads that pretend to be other content, like news site "sponsored content", only do it for video.

He said straight out in a TrekZone interview that a reason he was interested in this studio was to have a place to shoot native advertising, which needs facilities for short times.

This would completely explain his business interest at the time -- have insider access to a facility partly paid for by fan operations and possibly offered at a discount for his projects, just like Propworx gets a ride since the "owner" of the studio can decide what they want to charge themselves or their buddies.

 

[GeorgeKirk]

So how is this crowdfunding campaign going to induce people to donate anything close to the $18K per month they're asking for? For the Axanar campaigns, they could show Prelude to excite potential donors. What do they have now? A video with a bunch of talking heads nobody's ever heard of telling you how there's no better use for your insulin money than to fund their studio, because gainful employment is too hard? Who would go for that apart from the handful of devotees who still worship at the Alec Peters shrine in their living room (Available for $199.99 in the Axanar donors' store. Kharn-branded incense not included)

It's almost as if (and prepare to be shocked) this whole thing wasn't thought through very well.

 

[Jedi_Master]

So how is this crowdfunding campaign going to induce people to donate anything close to the $18K per month they're asking for? For the Axanar campaigns, they could show Prelude to excite potential donors. What do they have now? A video with a bunch of talking heads nobody's ever heard of telling you how there's no better use for your insulin money than to fund their studio, because gainful employment is too hard? Who would go for that apart from the handful of devotees who still worship at the Alec Peters shrine in their living room (Available for $199.99 in the Axanar donors' store. Kharn-branded incense not included)

It's almost as if (and prepare to be shocked) this whole thing wasn't thought through very well.

Axanar Productions has experienced a critical amount of "brain-drain" over the past two years.

There isn't anyone left who has the experience and know-how to pull this scheme off, and certainly no-one with the proper work ethic.

 

[Noname Given]

Well at least now I know why Jonathan Lane is such a huge Axanar Sycophant:

http://fanfilmfactor.com/2017/03/16/its-my-party-and-ill-reply-if-i-want-to/

Taken from the above Blog Post:

Mike Bawden, Axanar PR guy, helped me get this blog off the ground last year. And we still chat fairly regularly. He’s a very smart businessman, a friendly and upbeat individual, a great judge of character, and—as I’ve discovered many times in the months that I’ve known him—a very wise and insightful fellow.

When Mike returned my call yesterday, I was not in a good place. Maybe it was daylight savings and not getting enough sleep. Maybe it’s tax season. Or maybe—just maybe—it was all these darn detractors submitting one irate post after another after another. I hadn’t intended to spend any of the call talking about them, but when Mike opened with, “Hey, man, how you doing?” before I could even think, I found myself saying the following…

“Remember Kirk at the end of ‘The Gamesters of Triskelion’ when he had to fight three different Thralls at the same time? And if Kirk didn’t completely kill one and only injured it, another fresh Thrall would come in and take its place?”

“Yeah…” he said, having no idea where I was going with all this.

“Well, I feel like Kirk right now. And all these detractors are like those damn Thralls! The only thing that they have to do is just gang up on one guy. I, on the other hand, have to spar with all of them simultaneously…all day long! It’s frickin’ exhausting, Mike.”

“Then why do you do it?” Mike asked.

“Why DO I do it?” I repeated, in a lighthearted tone.

Yep - it appears Axanar's PR person helped get "Fan Film Factor" started. So yet again we see that Mr. Jonathan 'Slow' Lane has at no point ever not just another fan on the outside of Axanar looking in - he's been part of their PR group pretty much from day one.

 

[carlosp]

Well at least now I know why Jonathan Lane is such a huge Axanar Sycophant:

http://fanfilmfactor.com/2017/03/16/its-my-party-and-ill-reply-if-i-want-to/

Taken from the above Blog Post:


Yep - it appears Axanar's PR person helped get "Fan Film Factor" started. So yet again we see that Mr. Jonathan 'Slow' Lane has at no point ever not just another fan on the outside of Axanar looking in - he's been part of their PR group pretty much from day one.

I actually reported the Bawden-FFF connection in October 2016, and the Bawden-Small Access connection in August 2016. Jonathan Lane, of course, is the principal of both those endeavors.

 

[muCephi]

Well at least now I know why Jonathan Lane is such a huge Axanar Sycophant:

http://fanfilmfactor.com/2017/03/16/its-my-party-and-ill-reply-if-i-want-to/
...

Mr. Lane is Kirk in the Triskelion arena?

More like he's Harry Mudd facing an awakening army of Stella donors and observers.

 

[Mudd]

The latest begging letter:

March 17, 2017
Dear friends, fans and donors:

I'm pleased to announce that after an extensive amount of groundwork, we're ready to launch our crowdfunding campaign to secure Industry Studios' future. On Monday morning, at 9 am PDT, we'll be launching a 30-day Indiegogo campaign to help fund the hard costs associated with maintaining our soundstage facility in Valencia, California.

We've decided to launch this crowdfunding campaign at this time for a few reasons ...

1.) In order to secure Axanar Productions' unique position as a non-profit film production company, it's important we are able to offer (and use) high-quality production facilities at very low costs to independent filmmakers, fan film producers and students learning about filmmaking by actually doing it. Industry Studios - from the green screen to the soundstage to the dressing and make-up rooms - is the crown jewel in this "portfolio" we hope to offer this generation of up-and-coming writers, producers, directors and talent.

2.) While we won't rely solely on donations to operation (we are continuing to approach possible commercial projects about short-term facilities rentals), it is important for us to have as much donor support as possible and then manage our "inventory" of available time to lower-budget productions like fan films, student projects and fledgling independent productions based on that cashflow.

3.) We have several producers and directors who have already heard about our plans and have approached us about working together. We also have heard from schools in the LA area that they are interested in developing working relationships with us so their students can get experience working in genres of filmmaking that usually elude educational institutions with limited production facilities.

4.) And last, but certainly not least, we have a number of fan-related projects of our own we want to move ahead with - projects in addition to PROJECT: AXANAR. Securing our financial future with regard to our soundstage and offices will allow us to focus on producing content to share with all of you.

So stay tuned for what promises to be a very exciting - and important - point in the on-going development of Axanar Productions. We're excited about what we have to share with you about future projects and think we have a very interesting proposition for you to consider.

Have a great weekend!

Alec Peters
Axanar Productions

 

[Professor Zoom]

The latest begging letter:

Well... He's convinced me!

 

[Harvey]

Well... He's convinced me!

I know, right?

If Axanar Productions continues to claim they're a non-profit when this campaign goes live, shouldn't Indiegogo shut them down for violating their terms of service?

 

[trynda1701]

Indiegogo is the platform that allows you to accept the donations even if they don't reached their desired total, correct?

Allowing that we don't know for sure what the exact monthly rent figure may actually be, does anyone know how much a similar sized warehouse would have cost to BUY? Just curious, cos even if $15,000 is correct, over three years that comes to $540,000. Could a similar size building have been bought?

 

[ThankYouGeneR]

Bawden as puppet master? Interesting. If (and that's a big "if") he has an ultimate motive, it's probably buried under more layers of LFIM's garbage than anyone would care to dig through. I could see him as the guy who lit Alec's 'spark' so to speak and pushed it and pushed it and pushed it until Alec really started to believe it was all his idea (clever, as it kept him well insulated from the legal dealings). That's quite a stretch though.

I didn't mean to imply puppet master. But I do think what you say here may be at least part of it:
"I could see him as the guy who lit Alec's 'spark' so to speak and pushed it and pushed it and pushed it until Alec really started to believe it was all his idea."

Watching the Trekzone interview again I was reminded of what he said there:
41:45 Regarding prepping a client on talking 'before' an interview. Writing it out. Carlos says 'he' could even write it for the guy. Bawden laughs and says:
"It's been written. You do these things for clients. Whether they use them or not is a whole other matter sometimes..... I make lots of suggestions and I propose lots of solutions and... we are making 'some' progress"
---------------
43:32 "Like I try to tell clients our recommended approach to business is Ready, Aim, Fire. And unfortunately most of the clients we get have followed a strategy of Ready, Fire, Aim."

I'm figuring this went on for the past year; 'I advise, he takes or leaves it. But we inch forward.'

thiswholething concludes... and Mr. Bawden is still here.

Mind you I'm speculating again but it was this concluded outcome which just might have the defendant paying closer attention to Mr. Bawden now.

"And so you have to sit down and say 'Whadda ya doing? You're gonna have to stop some of these things. You're gonna have to walk some of this back."
1:06:33 "And the thing that's important, the prudent thing that has to be done, is you have to get back, refocus, get back to the things that matter."
1:07:30 "And, given the money that's available, what 'can' be done."

And I circle back to what you said, @RedForman, which makes a whole lot of sense to me given the personality of the client Mr. Bawden is working with:
"I could see him as the guy who lit Alec's 'spark' so to speak and pushed it and pushed it and pushed it until Alec really started to believe it was all his idea."


Then I listen to the @TREKZONE.org interview some more, the part where Mr. Bawden is going on at length about a future he sees.

1:00:00 "Fan films I think are initiating a whole new era in content development. Especially for web delivered video and keep in mind now a lot of people are watching web video on large screen high definition televisions. So it's not little teeny YouTube viewers that are watching this video on now."

The following part is where I speculate I see Mr. Bawden steering the defendant, and possibly one reason Mr. Bawden is still here. And because of the settlement the defendant may now be listening to him, like once upon a time he used listened to Christian Gossett which made the defendant himself appear to be a success and put him center stage in the limelight.

1:00:32 "You know, most of the work that I do is in the world of advertising and public relations, working with corporate clients and developing what we call Native Content. Stories about real people doing real things and I just today got an email back - I've got a $200K budget to produce a project like that."

1:00:52 "Now, while who knows what the future of crowdfunding is I think websites like kickstarter, indiegogo, and all of those other crowdfunding sites have a definite place. I imagine that they will continue to fine-tune their offering. And hopefully projects will continue to, creators will be able to continue to find that as a relative real source for their projects."

1:01:20 "But if you take a look at the Other Money that's out there in the marketplace now,"
[^^That is where I speculate Mr. Bawden's connections might now begin to be in play.]
"and the need to tell stories... and then you compare that to what ............ so many of these high quality fan film makers are doing, you're starting to realize a production value and an ability to tell stories in a variety of lengths that has really just never existed before."

1:01:49 "I'm very excited about where this could go. And while I share Carlos' concern for the future of fan films I think that the Real Opportunity long term is that creators are gonna look at what's able to be done for 1% of what a tent-pole feature costs today. And they're gonna realize that that becomes a much more attractive proposition to the prospective Investor who may give you enough money to produce five films hoping one of them 'hits' as opposed to trying to by 1% of a significant independent film production or a significant studio production."

1:02:27 "So, I think that's a very interesting future ahead. And I think that we're seeing, with shows like Continues, with shows like NV, shows like [Prelude] I think you're seeing the future of where this new wave of entertainment's going to come from."


Now, let's just say for a minute, you have/or have connections with a Film School... you have a ready made pool of people training to 'be' in all aspects of films, rushing to you to do all the volunteering you need on anything you're making. Just to get the experience. So your production costs drop significantly.

And what did @Serveaux just post?

We also have heard from schools in the LA area that they are interested in developing working relationships with us so their students can get experience working in genres of filmmaking that usually elude educational institutions with limited production facilities.

Check

And you want lots of films being made there so you pitch 'Come to us and make your films for next to nothing.'

Check

Not much says Success more than having lots of business 'seemingly' going on at your place.

Check

Mr. Bawden has ideas of his own, and connections to get them going with paying customers, and most probably... Investors.

Check

And you need to pay the bills until you're self supporting. So you do an upfront payallthebills crowdfund targeting fanboy & fangirls!

Check

To me, it's looking like a plan. A fairly good one too. One I speculate that has Mr. Bawden at the center.

With the lion's share being as you mention, @RedForman :
"I could see him as the guy who lit Alec's 'spark' so to speak and pushed it and pushed it and pushed it until Alec really started to believe it was all his idea."

 

[muCephi]

Well... He's convinced me!

"Dear donors who we stiffed out of almost 2 million of fan money specifically earmarked for Axanar... please help secure the future of the studio we bought with your money, so we can run Axanar Productions as a resource for all sorts of deserving low cost productions, and also a list of things we hope to do in SF ourselves, which eventually may include Axanar if you give enough. Sorry we didn't make the film to start with, but its all the lawsuit's fault."

The way I see it, he has the Axanar fanbase, which if they see that proposal, and how far down the list their movie is, may balk; and he has innocents who don't know his history with this studio, but who will probably be amply warned once the campaign starts.

Its like medicine man moving from town to town.

I know, right?

If Axanar Productions continues to claim they're a non-profit when this campaign goes live, shouldn't Indiegogo shut them down for violating their terms of service?

It is unbelievable he still thinks he can get away with "nonprofit"* (* "operating as a"* (* "we don't make any money and we spend all donations on investments we personally own and on benefits to ourselves"))