I stand corrected, then. But I still think it's outdated.
No comic books are (here in Toronto anyway); the best place to buy them is at dedicated comic book stores, or online from an online store.
Last edited:
Should there be a free star trek.
- Thread starter Rigelkent
- Start date
I stand corrected, then. But I still think it's outdated.
No comic books are (here in Toronto anyway); the best place to buy them is at dedicated comic book stores, or online from an online store.
Similarly, Paramount publicity materials for TOS syndication packages, Filmation's TAS, and then each trek movie used to estimate, quite proudly, how many Trek clubs, newsletters and fanzines were published since TOS began.
When the first "Star Wars" movie arrived in 1977, many Trek fanzine publishers had turned their hands to a new universe... and were hit by "Cease & Desist" letters from Lucasfilm.
I think the one you can't remember the name of is "Federation Rising", the sequel to Star Trek: Horizon.
So it would seem that they did shorten the run to avoid conflict with CBS, but CBS itself didn't ask them to do so.Trek Continues Blog said:
True, although the copyright would still expire at the same time as the respective movie or TV episode it was used in.
This is an excellent point. CBS acted within the scope of the law to protect their property. Continues seeed pretty aware of the need to respect that fact.
Not really. You could argue that simply suing Axanar would have accomplished the same thing. Furthermore, the Trek Continues crew were hardly in a position to complain, given that the Guidelines were basically custom-written to end their series. It's basically the metaphorical samurai committing seppuku so that the Emperor doesn't execute the rest of his family.
Your use of the word "scope" implies a finite limit that in any practical terms doesn't exist. Their scope so greatly exceeds their necessity that it's not really an effective justification, unless of course the only justification you personally need is "they're within their current legal rights".
Spot on.
Wrong. Just suing Axanar would not have accomplished the same thing. It was clear the fanfilm arms race had gone out of control with all this money being raised and professional talent being hired in front of the cameras and behind the scenes and people making running series of full length episodes. Axanar was merely the straw that broke the camel's back and they decided to make an example of it to send a message. Acting like Continues was any more of a target than Renegades or even NV is to forget how preposterous this had become. This is what the guidelines were meant to curb.
Allow me to clarify: CBS could have included a few simple statements in its press releases regarding their legal action that stated their grievances regarding Axanar and other fan films. They need not write a full page of detailed legal jargon and then paradoxically frame it in the context of "guidelines".
Well funded fan series with professional acting, makeup, sets and CGI? I believe the humans would say "Don't threaten me with a good time".
That's not to suggest I'm naive about the abuses that occurred with some of these projects, and I have quite a bit of interest in how such problems can be addressed and prevented. I just don't think that a scorched earth policy for long-form and serial fan films is the best way to handle it.
Well it can't be both "Axanar single-handedly destroyed fan films for everyone forever" and "Axanar was just the last straw" at the same time. Quite frankly, I think it's more of the latter than the former (so I guess I agree with you, after a fashion), but the entire approach of CBS has been to react without regard for the concerns of the fan film community, and it's this lack of dialogue that largely led to the problem to begin with. This problem is, of course, not unique to CBS. It's inherent to the industry in general.
I never meant to imply that the Guidelines solely target Continues, although STC couldn't be a clearer target. It's obvious that the Guidelines were meant to eliminate entire categories of fan films.
It would have been nice if they could have been nicer about it. But, the string of violations was too long and too much for them to use kid gloves. The same mission creep would have happened again.
The mission creep will happen anyways. All this has happened before and it will happen again. An endless cycle. The Guidelines are just variation on a theme.
Sad but true. Which is why I think the heavy handed tactics were inevitable.
The problem was that CBS was too lenient initially, so the fans took advantage of them.
No other IP holder let people spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to make counterfeit movies and TV episodes, they nipped that shit in the bud before it could become an issue.
No other IP holder let people spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to make counterfeit movies and TV episodes, they nipped that shit in the bud before it could become an issue.
Had a tightly controlled guidance and small film presentation that wasn't trying to compete with the IP owner.
Their behavior is the natural consequence of their philosophy (and the philosophy of their lawyers) regarding the franchise, which is entirely concerned with protection and control. When your only tools are lawyers with a pre-open-source, pre-Creative-Commons, insular concept of copyright, your responses are going to consist entirely of DMCA takedowns, copyright lawsuits and non-licenses consisting of heavy-handed legalese, and the legal bills will make their use infrequent. Meanwhile, how much would it cost to have an intern do a survey of what fans think is fair or unfair regarding fan films? If they did such a survey, perhaps they'd find that most fans actually support many of the guidelines. Who knows? We're never going to know, because they're not going to do that!
I'm pretty sure there are quite a few Star Wars fan films that break the official rules. Aren't they all supposed to be parodies and/or documentaries? It would not surprise me if such productions have flown under the radar of other various franchises as well.
If you look hard enough you can find films for almost anything. Most of them just tend to be keep a much lower profile than the big Trek ones, like New Voyages and Continues, did.
For a while now, I've wondered if there was possibly some kind of a quiet, behind the scenes agreement between CBS and the teams from New Voyages and Continues, that as long as they didn't cross certain lines they'd be OK.
As high profile as they were, I find it very hard to believe that CBS wasn't aware of them, and there must have been something going on that convinced CBS to leave them alone.
For a while now, I've wondered if there was possibly some kind of a quiet, behind the scenes agreement between CBS and the teams from New Voyages and Continues, that as long as they didn't cross certain lines they'd be OK.
As high profile as they were, I find it very hard to believe that CBS wasn't aware of them, and there must have been something going on that convinced CBS to leave them alone.
Why wouldn't they be concerned with protection and control? I do not understand why they wouldn't do exactly that? What incentive is being offered to look at it another way?
And why would they survey the fans?
I know there are several that flew under the radar, and no, not all are parodies or documentaries. I've been around (and made enough) SW fan films to be aware of some aspects of the ins and outs of that side of fandom. And there was an awareness that at any time LFL could say no. So, people tried to limit how long the films were, what type were released and minimizing funding. In short, a lot of films were more cautious than what many Star Trek fan films have endeavored to do which is entirely mimic productions.
No different to fanzines in the 70s and 80s. Paramount used to calculate the numbers of Trek fanzines and newsletters for promoting the official movies in their media releases, and the "Handbook of Production Information" for each movie. Fanzines and fanfic were tolerated, except when someone would decide to create a zine that looked to have the same format as a Pocket Books' Trek novel. Then the fan writer and publisher would be hit by a "Cease & Desist" letter. Very smartly.
Similar threads
