Picard and 25%

[The Wormhole]

Either they were going to be lazy and decide "different enough" counts as 25% different, or CBS was actually going to hire a team of lawyers for the sole purpose of determining how different something needs to be to be 25% different. In which case I could see that becoming amusing.

"Back to the drawing board, this is only 23% different. It needs an extra 2% difference."

 

[Tim Thomason]

Okay, the 25% thing has been long debunked as a miscommunication on Eaves' part. But there's no need to denigrate your and our intelligence. 25% just means a quarter. It was never supposed to be taken at face value, even if semi-official at one point behind-the-scenes, it's just another way of saying "make it a little different, but still mostly the same".

Like, if you were to make something completely different (or "100%") we wouldn't argue about how that's impossible or "it still moves, so it's not 100% different". It's just artistic license. We could then say make it half different ("50%"), i.e. half brand new design, but half stylistically reminiscent of the original. Then, to make it a quarter different (our "25%"), you're just telling the artist to add his or her own touch, of course, but still keep it recognizable and mostly the same as the original.

Some people, I feel, are being disingenuous when they say that something being a quarter different is impossible. They're just trying to cause drama where their doesn't need to be any.

I'm not saying anyone here is being disingenuous. Just that the use of a percent symbol is making it seem like their would be some sort of calculation going on, when in fact, any quarter different portrayal would clearly be an artist given a little more slack (but not too much) to redesign a known thing. Overthinking it is what those YouTubers are doing, and has led to sour results.

 

[fireproof78]

Ok, but how would we know it was 25% different? It's not disingenuous to seek clarification for something that makes little sense in context of the statements.

Sorry, even if it wasn't debunked the standard being applied feels incredibly nebulous on purpose.

 

[NCC-73515]

I would say the NASA worm and meatball are 95% different, cause the letters at least spell the same thing.
A Borg cube is certainly more different from the TOS 1701 than the 1701-A.
The Excelsior could be seen as a little closer to the Sovereign compared to the Ambassador, which is closer to the Galaxy.
You can find ships and other things more or less different to others, so relative difference is a thing.

 

[JamesRye]

Whether the 25% thing was a 'legal' decision or not. The designers certainly believed and acted on making the ships 25% different. This screen grab came from TrekCore who attributed it to Eaves' book.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PHHG2XwKv1rBXfkUbI_m3YoHYtoVrZnr/view?usp=sharing

 

[Tim Thomason]

Eaves: "Here's my design for the NCC-1701, boss."
(hands over 1965 drawing by Matt Jefferies)

Unknown Executive Ruining Star Trek: "John, we went over this. If you want to get paid, you have to do your own work. It's legally required. Make the ship a little different, please."

Eaves: "How different?"

Executive: "I don't know. 25%. Now, go do your job, and leave me out of this."

Eaves: "Got it." (Later that evening on the interwebz) "Boss says I have to make the ship 25% different for legal reasons."

 

[CorporalClegg]

Even if we pretend the core supposition wasn't itself utterly ridiculous, how does one quantify 25% in plastic digital bits and pieces?

 

[rfmcdpei]

Okay, the 25% thing has been long debunked as a miscommunication on Eaves' part. But there's no need to denigrate your and our intelligence. 25% just means a quarter. It was never supposed to be taken at face value, even if semi-official at one point behind-the-scenes, it's just another way of saying "make it a little different, but still mostly the same".

The point was made well, by Joseph Reineman, that the 25% rule makes no sense.

https://www.quora.com/Is-the-25-difference-rule-of-Star-Trek-Discovery-a-real-thing

[H]ow exactly do you break design elements down by percentage points? If I change the color of something, is it a 1% shift or a 5% shift? What about if I move a window? Does it count as more of a difference if I shift it by three feet than if I do two? The whole concept is completely unenforceable, which makes it extremely unlikely that any lawyer would have written it into a licensing contract.

This "25% different" is something fundamentally non-quantifiable. How big of a difference would it be if the Enterprise was beige instead of eggshell white? How would this be quantified? How could disputes—because you know there would be disputes—possibly be ajudicated? Especially since CBS does own all of the rights, why would it go on to to create a legal environment that could hugely complicate the franchise that it depends upon?

Some people, I feel, are being disingenuous when they say that something being a quarter different is impossible. They're just trying to cause drama where their doesn't need to be any.

I'm not saying anyone here is being disingenuous.

You contradicted yourself in the space of two paragraphs.

It is quite fair to ask why people want to believe a rumour that makes little sense and that has been renounced as false by the person whose statement sparked the whole thing. Blaming the people critical of the 25% myth for responding to that percentage and not bothering to address the people who have been specifically spreading that figure is, IMHO, bizarre.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Does it really matter that Disco and SNW have essentially rebooted the 23rd century part of Trek, with replacement ship designs, technology and costumes? It's still immediately obvious it's Star Trek. It's not like TOS has been pulled, the original look is still out there.

 

[Tuskin38]

It is quite fair to ask why people want to believe a rumour that makes little sense and that has been renounced as false by the person whose statement sparked the whole thing. Blaming the people critical of the 25% myth for responding to that percentage and not bothering to address the people who have been specifically spreading that figure is, IMHO, bizarre.

I mean, the 25% isn’t a rumour, we have concept art (posted above) with notes written on it saying something needs to be 25% different.

So it was something that happened and was requested by whoever wrote that note (probably his superior, the art director who reviewed the concepts) it just, as you and others have said, It doesn’t make any logical sense. The ‘H:’ before the note might be the initial of the writer. The Scott the note is directed to is most likely Scott Schneider.

Also Eaves didn’t renounce the 25% part of his statement, what he renounced was what he thought it meant, he though it had to do with the CBS/Paramount split not letting CBS use the original design.

 

[MakeshiftPython]

Does it really matter that Disco and SNW have essentially rebooted the 23rd century part of Trek, with replacement ship designs, technology and costumes? It's still immediately obvious it's Star Trek. It's not like TOS has been pulled, the original look is still out there.

Don't give them an inch! We need to make Kurtzman and his cronies pay for their crimes of not adhering to a TV set from nearly 60 years ago!

 

[Lt.Smokey]

I don't think this is a thing, at least not now. Star Trek doesn't really have a caretaker. To the extent they bother with continuity at all is because the fans demand it. If not for the fans, we would get a straight up reboot of the whole universe every time a new production team takes over, like Batman or James Bond.

 

[fireproof78]

Does it really matter that Disco and SNW have essentially rebooted the 23rd century part of Trek, with replacement ship designs, technology and costumes? It's still immediately obvious it's Star Trek. It's not like TOS has been pulled, the original look is still out there.

Because it demonstrates a lack of respect or something.

 

[Tim Thomason]

You contradicted yourself in the space of two paragraphs.

It is quite fair to ask why people want to believe a rumour that makes little sense and that has been renounced as false by the person whose statement sparked the whole thing. Blaming the people critical of the 25% myth for responding to that percentage and not bothering to address the people who have been specifically spreading that figure is, IMHO, bizarre.

I'm not trying to say anyone here is being disingenuous (or not sincere or lying), just that enough people are either pushing the "25%" myth or are using it or its supposed existence to promote their agenda, on other sites (I referenced YouTube) and that has been cascading out. People see the "25%" and start talking about quantifying it or as a legality of some sort, when that at face value is impossible, of course.

25% just means a quarter. If Eaves had said "a quarter", people would understand that it was just a stylish approximation, I believe, and 96.2% of the arguments would have fallen by the wayside. But, thanks to some insincere people elsewhere, we are still arguing about quantifying the unquantifiable.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

The TNG actors were 25% older, so there's that.

 

[fireproof78]

25% just means a quarter. If Eaves had said "a quarter", people would understand that it was just a stylish approximation

No, it still makes very little sense to my non artistic brain.

 

[rfmcdpei]

25% just means a quarter. If Eaves had said "a quarter", people would understand that it was just a stylish approximation, I believe, and 96.2% of the arguments would have fallen by the wayside. But, thanks to some insincere people elsewhere, we are still arguing about quantifying the unquantifiable.

25% can mean any number of things, like a quarter or like 25%. Assuming that the specific percentage being cited is actually that percentage is not an obviously wrong thing to do. This is especially the case if it is being raised as a specific legal requirement: You cannot introduce a specific figure in a legal document and not have it mean something.

Eaves got it wrong, and people who were inclined to look for a problem with newer Trek shows have chosen to make things rather worse.

 

[Sci]

I would assume that "25%" was Eaves's supervisor's way of saying, "Make it different, and make the differences noticeable but not overwhelming. Make the Enterprise fit into the DIS design aesthetic, but don't change it so much that it's not immediately recognizable as the starship Enterprise to most audience members." I wouldn't take it to be a literal quantification.

I always found the idea that CBS would be legally prohibited from using the Matt Jeffries design as a result of the CBS/Viacom split nonsensical. During the split, CBS retained ownership of all of the ST TV shows and of ST as an intellectual copyright; Viacom had to make its films under license from CBS. So the idea that CBS would own Star Trek as their intellectual property, and would own TOS as their intellectual property, but wouldn't own an element from TOS as their intellectual property, is... counter-intuitive.

Edited to add:

As for the Enterprise... perhaps she was launched in her Discovery configuration (let's call it Mark I design) and this is what she looked like during "The Cage". In the next seven years, she'll undergo a massive refit to Mark II design (WNMHGB & TOS & TAS), with a few changes here and there. Another massive overhaul will take place in 2271-2273, where we get the Movie era/"Enterprise class" design (Mark III). Two massive refits, retconning only The Cage, works better than other ideas that would involve some backtracking and as many as five refits.

That would work for me! Given how many elements of "The Cage" were subsequently retconned -- laser pistols being replaced by phasers in TOS proper and phase pistols in ENT; Taylor's reference to "breaking the time barrier" since the Columbia crashed and references to "time warp factor X;" Spock behaving emotionally; the Enterprise being referred to as an Earth ship rather than a Federation starship; Pike being uncomfortable with women on the bridge, as though women in leadership positions is a new thing in his society; Pike telling the Talosians he comes from "the other end of this galaxy" vs. later shows making trans-galactic travel something that takes decades; and the fact that the Enterprise already had a different configuration in "The Cage" vs. TOS (taller bridge dome, larger deflector dish, spikes at the Bussard collectors, plates instead of round orbs at the back of the nacelles)... Yeah, I think so much of "The Cage" is already subject to later retcons that I'm okay with going with the DIS configuration as the 1701's launch configuration, with the TOS configuration as the result of a refit some time between 2258 and 2266.

My assumption, right now, given that Discovery Season 2 was all about returning to the status quo, and SNW seems to be all about "bringing back classic Star Trek" (literally even), they'll probably 'explain' the starship's appearance during the run of the series, with little changes here and there and perhaps a grand finale that will merge the ship with it's design from Enterprise's finale. The 'explanation' is not going to be pretty.

Oh, I dunno, I think it might be a fun element for the finale to feature the ship reaching its TOS configuration!

 

[fireproof78]

I'm okay with going with the DIS configuration as the 1701's launch configuration, with the TOS configuration as the result of a refit some time between 2258 and 2266.

Same here. My own personal head canon is simply that the Constitutions were designed to be a very modular class, allowing for swapping bridges or engines as appropriate for the mission profile.

 

[Tuskin38]

This screen grab came from TrekCore who attributed it to Eaves' book.

Are you sure you read that right? That picture isn't in Eaves' book (I own it). Also your Embedded image didn't work so here

Can't make out what the top text is trying to say, but the bottom text I think says:
"H: Scott(?) - -word I can't make out- this too was a part of the 25% Difference Between the two ships"

I'm actually starting to think that this isn't a note from a superior, but something one of them did for the presentation. Just based on the wording.