Intellectual Property Smothering Good Story Ideas

[Tropical_Night]

How often has this happened? I've read two examples lately, the notion that they could not sing happy birthday to Worf in Paralells because they'd have to pay someone for the song (how the hell is that sane!!!!!!!???????) seemed to indicate to me these laws had gone beyond the point of absurdity, then to read if they used Nick Locarno in Voyager instead of creating Tom Paris they'd have to pay royalties to the writers of the episode every single time Nick was in a Voyager episode!!!!

I get the idea "your using the character I created so I get to have input/control" but the notion that you'd have to pay for every time you want to use someones character seems really really ridiculous to me and I'm dying to know how they justify that level of greed, not to mention how the idea does not just go against someones common sense.
If we take this absurdity to its extreme I could say i invented (insert social expression that becomes widespread here, like "phat" or something" and so I get to make money off it every time someone speaks it.

It's not dangerous or immoral like gene patents or drug patents but it does seem to defy common sense and go beyond the bounds of reason to have to pay someone for a song every time you sing it when there is a camera pointed at you, in the case of the song in Paralells it was not even a part of the story as such so you can't even make the very flimsy justification of "well in a way if they use my stuff they're making money off it without sharing that money with me".

I saw a thread where writers complained about the use of pirate sites to download the e-versions of their books without paying and it occured to me that writers are going to get less sympathy in those kind of cases becasue of this kind of stuff, the person downloading it can rationalize it by saying that they're greedy or that they "must be getting streams of income from other sources royalties etc" and won't be hard off etc

 

[Sector 7]

Intellectual property means just that, it is the property of the person whose intellect thought of it. Do you get paid doing your job? The creator should get paid for doing his/her job, too.

I still receive an occasional royalty check for work I have done. I have no guilt about depositing the check because I did the work.

The Happy Birthday song may seem to be carrying it to extremes, but at home you can sing it without charge because you are not making money by doing so. At a restaurant, when they sing that song it is to make money, therefore they must pay for the privilege or sing a different song.

Intellectual property laws are not smothering good story ideas. You have two options:
- tell your story based on the original author's ideas and characters AND pay for the privilege
- tell your story based upon characters and situations YOU create... in other words YOUR original idea

The only time intellectual property law does not apply is in the case where the rights to that property was forfeited. One author has made a career out of bringing lawsuits after giving up those rights... and he even wins.

 

[scotpens]

. . . It's not dangerous or immoral like gene patents or drug patents . . .

Gene patents and drug patents are "dangerous and immoral"?

Maybe this is a topic for TNZ.

 

[sojourner]

Just think how mad you would be if everybody could use James T. Kirk, captain of the Enterprise, in any story they publish?

 

[Greg Cox]

I'm not sure "level of greed" is the right term. Is a dentist or a plumber or an inventor being "greedy" when he or she wants to be compensated for their work, and to pass on the fruits of their labors to their children? Writers work hard to make a living, just like everyone else.

It sometimes seem like people hold artists and writers to a different standard than, say, insurance agents or lawyers. Like we're supposed to starve in garretts for our art, and not worry about getting paid . . . .

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

How often has this happened? I've read two examples lately, the notion that they could not sing happy birthday to Worf in Paralells because they'd have to pay someone for the song (how the hell is that sane!!!!!!!???????) seemed to indicate to me these laws had gone beyond the point of absurdity, then to read if they used Nick Locarno in Voyager instead of creating Tom Paris they'd have to pay royalties to the writers of the episode every single time Nick was in a Voyager episode!!!!

I get the idea "your using the character I created so I get to have input/control" but the notion that you'd have to pay for every time you want to use someones character seems really really ridiculous to me and I'm dying to know how they justify that level of greed...

You're way off base, in both cases. People who created these things own certain rights to them - it's no more a matter of greed than (to use a really imperfect analogy) your refusal to turn over the keys to your car to a bystander who would like to drive it. I mean, he/she likes your car and wants to use it - might even feel he needs to use it. Maybe you loaned it to him a few weeks ago for the cost of gas and mileage - how can you be so greedy as to refuse to let him have it any time he wants, for free, after he's paid you once?

I can justify taking money for the re-use of my characters, or for that matter for the sale or rental of the episodes I wrote, because my contract lets me retain some rights to those things that I created. I was not an employee of Paramount studios, doing those things in exchange for a salary.

I don't think that "ownership" is quite the right term for the limited rights we retain to characters, etc. It's something fairly short of that in many respects, but I'm not a lawyer.

it occured[sic] to me that writers are going to get less sympathy in those kind of cases becasue of this kind of stuff, the person downloading it can rationalize it by saying that they're greedy or that they "must be getting streams of income from other sources royalties etc" and won't be hard off etc

I don't want your "sympathy," and please don't expect any of mine if you "pirate (that is, steal)" something and happen to get busted. I'd be more likely to applaud.

 

[sbk1234]

What confuses me about this is the issue of public domain. The song "Happy Birthday" is an old song. As I understand it, more than a hundred years old. Wouldn't it be considered public domain now, and therefore free for use?

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Wouldn't it be considered public domain now, and therefore free for use?

No, although its copyright status is evidently in some dispute.

It's very simple, really - if people want to use something that belongs to someone else, all they have to do is pay the price for it. Paramount can afford to do that if and when they choose - they simply choose not to do so.

 

[Stoek]

Besides the excellent points made in this thread I would like to add a reminder of what working under limitations can do to bring one's creativity to the fore. Thanks to using "For He's A Jolly Good Fellow" instead of "Happy Birthday" for Parallels, we got one of the funniest lines ever from TNG about their not being a Klingon word for "jolly".

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Paramount is a big corporation, not some fanfic writer. They have legions of lawyers to put a stop to anything that will get the big corporation sued for big amounts of money. Big corporations are more skittish about these things because having big amounts of money, people are much more likely to go after them as compared with a fanfic writer who probably has a hundred bucks in a checking account.

There is no sci fi idea so "brilliant" that it's worth a lawsuit over (and the employees responsible getting fired). Every idea has already been done a thousand times. Any writer so lacking in imagination that they figure out a good story that doesn't infringe on copyright needs to find another career.

 

[The Wormhole]

It can cost up to $10 000 to use Happy Birthday? I thought it was only $2 000.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

It can cost up to $10 000 to use Happy Birthday? I thought it was only $2 000.

Putting a price on these things can certainly cause the folks writing the checks to ask themselves just how "good an idea" it is that they're paying for. The examples cited by the OP - not singing "Happy Birthday" and not getting to use Nick Locarno - aren't great ideas worth paying for. Three people in the world would have been terribly impressed to see Nick Locarno pop up on Voyager.

 

[Tropical_Night]

Intellectual property means just that, it is the property of the person whose intellect thought of it. Do you get paid doing your job? The creator should get paid for doing his/her job, too.

I get paid for doing my job.
I created this book at work, a guide so to speak, everything in one place, I did not get paid every time someone else used it.
If someone took that book and wrote a better version of it I'd not get paid every time someone consulted that book either.

The Happy Birthday song may seem to be carrying it to extremes, but at home you can sing it without charge because you are not making money by doing so. At a restaurant, when they sing that song it is to make money, therefore they must pay for the privilege or sing a different song.

Firstly, thats complete bullshit, I'm sorry mate, but it is, my common sense finds that attitude totally laughable, only the most ingrained corporatist mentality could find the happy birthday thing sensible.
The question you have to ask, is it a central part of the product the other person is selling, ie would the person be making more money off using your creation than they would otherwise, in the case of Tom Paris, you can make that claim, because its a major character and you could argue every DVD sale, every ratings boost, is partly because he's there.
Nobody comes to a restaurant just to hear happy birthday, you can sing happy birthday at home, your friends or family can sing it to you, you go to the restaurant for the food, they're making money off their food and the service not the song. Even if they were charging for the song, the song has become such a part of the commons, the wider culture that its stupid to keep asking people to pay for it.

I'd be happy my creation was so widespread and part of society, not lookin to charge everyone who sang it to me.

Secondly, I think you have to decide if your creating just to create or if your in it for the money, I think the capacity for piracy etc is getting to the point where you cant be in writing just for the money, it can't be your main career either.

Intellectual property laws are not smothering good story ideas. You have two options:
- tell your story based on the original author's ideas and characters AND pay for the privilege
- tell your story based upon characters and situations YOU create... in other words YOUR original idea

When your story is part of a highly interconnected universe like star trek, its inevitable thats going to be difficult, which means they have to waste their money paying one guy and production suffers with re-used shots and effects, cast sharing uniforms etc like the farce that was generations.

. . . It's not dangerous or immoral like gene patents or drug patents . . .

Gene patents and drug patents are "dangerous and immoral"?

Maybe this is a topic for TNZ.

Millions of people can't afford HIV antiretrovirals and other drugs, and die, because they're too expensive and manufacture of generic brands is banned.
You can make your money back from research plus a profit in 1-3 years, and still make profits after, yet the period is an absurd 12 years of monopoly.
12 years where millions and millions of people die despite humanity having the capacity to prevent their deaths.

Just think how mad you would be if everybody could use James T. Kirk, captain of the Enterprise, in any story they publish?

I totally understand creative control, I can only imagine the garbage that would come out in the above case, its the being paid for it every time I have an issue with.

I'm not sure "level of greed" is the right term. Is a dentist or a plumber or an inventor being "greedy" when he or she wants to be compensated for their work, and to pass on the fruits of their labors to their children? Writers work hard to make a living, just like everyone else.

It sometimes seem like people hold artists and writers to a different standard than, say, insurance agents or lawyers. Like we're supposed to starve in garretts for our art, and not worry about getting paid . . . .

When your a plumber your work is whatever the building your workin on that day, when its done thats your work complete.
When your a writer you write your material and you sell it, thats your work done.
When your a tv writer your work was creating the character, your works done when you created him, your not doing any work at all when the other guy reuses your character, your sitting at home on your ass, and getting paid for it because someone else is improving on your work.

If I wrote a book about economics and someone else takes my theories and further develops them, I'd not get paid a portion of every one of that guys book sales, and rightly not.
He's still, in an indirect way, making money off my ideas, but thats life, we live in a society were not all separate islands, as soon as you say something out loud other people hear it.

I'd put it in their contracts that we'll pay you well for writing with us, but once you create a character, you will have a say over how its developed further by others but your not getting paid every time he's re used.

I don't want your "sympathy," and please don't expect any of mine if you "pirate (that is, steal)" something and happen to get busted. I'd be more likely to applaud.

I did have sympathy then, and after the assaholic attitudes displayed here that sympathy has frankly evaporated. I would not be so brutish in batting that sympathy away, because thats what stops a lot of people pirating material considering how easy it is. My point was that others who DO pirate material can rationalize this when the people doing it act a certain way.
See...the use of the word rationalize usually means someone stuggling to justify something they know inherintly is wrong, if you'd understood this word, which you should, you could infer that I was in fact disapproving of such people, which I'm no longer sure I am...

It can cost up to $10 000 to use Happy Birthday? I thought it was only $2 000.

Putting a price on these things can certainly cause the folks writing the checks to ask themselves just how "good an idea" it is that they're paying for. The examples cited by the OP - not singing "Happy Birthday" and not getting to use Nick Locarno - aren't great ideas worth paying for. Three people in the world would have been terribly impressed to see Nick Locarno pop up on Voyager.

The idea of it acting as a filter for bad ideas is a good point, however it does not justify such a twisted system.


As for the "I deserve to be paid for my ideas" argument, the creators of happy birthday are long dead, yet this stupid system insists we pay 5 figure sums to sing it.


Why can't i patent the argument that intellectual property in star trek is smothering good story ideas, and demand to be paid €5,000 every time someone else uses that argument?

 

[Tropical_Night]

Look the idea that you should retain control of a character you developed is fine, but I sense its ALL the money, not what they do with your creation, that people are worried about here.
A simple idea has been taken to absurd extremes, youtube is a simple but devastating example in the creativity department:

-The BBC taking a documentary from 1992 down off youtube that has never been aired on TV since, someone posted it from a VCR, its not on sale anywhere and even if it was on TV they'd not be loosing ad revenue because they don't have ads!!! They took it down just cos, they exercised their rights because they could, not out of any rational reason.
-The people who own the rights to Downfall taking the Hitler rant parodies down, leaving aside the fact that parody is protected speech, and instead of protecting creation there are willfully stifling it in this case, I can't tell you how many comments I saw that said "whats this from?" and when they get the answer they decide they should check the movie out! They were MAKING money from it, but they took it down...again just cos they could.
-WMG muting the videos of people who were not making a cent from the videos, but just had WMG music in the background for several seconds, so they mute the entire video...whereas before the person had links to the itunes store for the song in question and others in cases where there was no link asked "wheres this song from" and clearly liked it and may have wanted to go to itunes and download it. Once a video is muted people are very angry and theres a huge boycott of WMG now as a result, which is costing them poitential customers, like this threads answers are doing with me.


Not to mention the irony of a franchise that lectures us about growing beyond the obsession of things, greed etc being positivly manic about intellectual property.

 

[scotpens]

Intellectual property means just that, it is the property of the person whose intellect thought of it. Do you get paid doing your job? The creator should get paid for doing his/her job, too.

I get paid for doing my job.
I created this book at work, a guide so to speak, everything in one place, I did not get paid every time someone else used it.

Then, presumably, there’s an agreement between you and the company you work for that anything you create in the course of your employment becomes the employer’s property, and you forfeit any royalty rights. That’s a matter between you and your employer.

Secondly, I think you have to decide if you’re creating just to create or if you’re in it for the money, I think the capacity for piracy etc is getting to the point where you can’t be in writing just for the money, it can't be your main career either.

If you’re creating just for the love of art, you can stand on a street corner and play the guitar or recite stories and pass the hat. Professional writers, artists and musicians are in it for the desire to create and to make a decent living at it.

Millions of people can't afford HIV antiretrovirals and other drugs, and die, because they're too expensive and manufacture of generic brands is banned. . . 12 years where millions and millions of people die despite humanity having the capacity to prevent their deaths.

Sources? Citations? Links? Really, “millions and millions of people die”?

When you’re a plumber your work is whatever the building your working on that day, when it’s done that’s your work complete.
When you’re a writer you write your material and you sell it, thats your work done.

And when you’re an actor, you act in front of a camera for a movie or a TV show, and your work is done. But every time that movie or TV program is broadcast over the airwaves or transmitted by cable or satellite, and every time a DVD of that movie or TV show is sold, someone is making a profit off your work. You deserve a cut of that. Writers are no different.

 

[TheLobes]

How often has this happened? I've read two examples lately, the notion that they could not sing happy birthday to Worf in Paralells because they'd have to pay someone for the song (how the hell is that sane!!!!!!!???????) seemed to indicate to me these laws had gone beyond the point of absurdity, then to read if they used Nick Locarno in Voyager instead of creating Tom Paris they'd have to pay royalties to the writers of the episode every single time Nick was in a Voyager episode!!!!

What exactly do you mean by 'good story ideas'? I wasnt really eaten up inside by the fact they couldnt sing happy birthday to Worf, and the writing for Voyagar would have sucked just as hard if that character had been Tom Locarno. Its not like him being the same character from 'The First Duty' would have produced any noticable progression in his character.

I saw a thread where writers complained about the use of pirate sites to download the e-versions of their books without paying and it occured to me that writers are going to get less sympathy in those kind of cases becasue of this kind of stuff, the person downloading it can rationalize it by saying that they're greedy or that they "must be getting streams of income from other sources royalties etc" and won't be hard off etc

Er...no. If you do a piece of work, you should expect people to pay for it. If someone writes something popular they deserve to get 'streams of income', and did you ever think about everyone else involved? How about all the publishers and stuff who helped produce the book? The reason writers, musicians, actors etc are getting less sympathy is because if people can rationalise theft and not get caught, they're going to do it.

 

[Timo]

"Rationalizing theft" is what economy is based on. If I took your car and gave you 50 cents, that'd be theft because you want more than 50 cents. If I took your car and gave you 50,000 dollars, that'd be a business transaction. The difference is completely quantitative, not qualitative. It's your greed that dictates whether the transaction is theft or not.

Greed also dictates that transactions be somewhat formalized, so even if you happily took the 50,000 dollars for the 10,000 dollar car, somebody would call it theft because they didn't get paid the taxes they wanted to steal from us against our will.

If, OTOH, you didn't settle for 50,000 dollars but demanded 150,000 dollars, that'd be theft from my POV - I was already being generous with the original bid, and now the transaction is taking place against my will.

In the music business, this is particularly relevant: the music is essentially worth half a cent per CD, so taking 15 dollars for it is theft. And paying zero dollars for it is less of a theft in quantitative terms. But business transaction is always theft: it takes place against the wills of both parties, with one getting paid less than he wanted, the other paying more than he wanted, and there simply emerges an agreement on the issue, either in the short term (after a brief haggling), or then through extensions (say, I pay less than you want and run, I pay extra through getting fined by the authorities; or I pay nothing and run, keep on doing it until you understand not to offer the product any more, or to offer it in different terms).

Wholly apart from that, the people currently getting paid for public performances of "Happy Birthday" don't deserve a cent for it, as they never did anything to create that music or to offer it for use. They are simple thieves, without a moral leg to stand on.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[TheLobes]

"Rationalizing theft" is what economy is based on. If I took your car and gave you 50 cents, that'd be theft because you want more than 50 cents. If I took your car and gave you 50,000 dollars, that'd be a business transaction. The difference is completely quantitative, not qualitative. It's your greed that dictates whether the transaction is theft or not.

Greed also dictates that transactions be somewhat formalized, so even if you happily took the 50,000 dollars for the 10,000 dollar car, somebody would call it theft because they didn't get paid the taxes they wanted to steal from us against our will.

If, OTOH, you didn't settle for 50,000 dollars but demanded 150,000 dollars, that'd be theft from my POV - I was already being generous with the original bid, and now the transaction is taking place against my will.

In the music business, this is particularly relevant: the music is essentially worth half a cent per CD, so taking 15 dollars for it is theft. And paying zero dollars for it is less of a theft in quantitative terms. But business transaction is always theft: it takes place against the wills of both parties, with one getting paid less than he wanted, the other paying more than he wanted, and there simply emerges an agreement on the issue, either in the short term (after a brief haggling), or then through extensions (say, I pay less than you want and run, I pay extra through getting fined by the authorities; or I pay nothing and run, keep on doing it until you understand not to offer the product any more, or to offer it in different terms).

Wholly apart from that, the people currently getting paid for public performances of "Happy Birthday" don't deserve a cent for it, as they never did anything to create that music or to offer it for use. They are simple thieves, without a moral leg to stand on.

Timo Saloniemi

Thats not theft, thats business. Those people that own 'Happy Birthday' probably forked out big bucks for it, risking that money because they thought it would work out in the long run. How on earth are they 'thieves'? Its not like they broke into a bankvault and stole 'Happy Birthday'.

When people were moving west in the depression, they sold their property for a pittance, but that wasnt theft. They werent forced to do it, but so much of the same thing was being sold that it made those goods essentially worthless, nobody is going to pay for something that isnt worth anything anymore. Same with your theoretical car. If I were to sell mine for 50 cents, Id either be incredibly feeble minded (to the point where driving a car is dangerous for all involved) or the car just wouldnt be worth anything. In which case, why should anyone buy it for more than that? If I got 150,000 i'd just be a great businessman. How can a transaction pass 'against your will'? If you dont want to make it, dont make it! If you do, then its because you know you can make more out of the car than that anyway, and you were just trying to get a better profit from your 50,000 bid.

Same with the CD's, people are making a killing because people are buying them. Nobodies forced to buy a CD. If they own the music, and people are willing to pay their prices, then they have the right to sell at that price. In no way is it less of a theft to totally steal it.

 

[The Laughing Vulcan]

For me corporate greed really does stifle the creative industries, and rain on everyone's parade.

I live in a country where the Performers' Rights Society, ostensibly created to ensure that musicians get their dues, charges every time a song is broadcast on a radio station. Fair enough. But then they say that if someone is listening to that radio broadcast in a public environment, they have to pay for the privilege as that constitutes a performance. So they have been paid twice, for one thing. I call that theft, especially when you consider how much profit goes to a musician, and how much lines the pockets of the corporations.

And just because of the digital age, allowed companies to renegotiate contracts anew, and whap their prices to the sky, when before they used to be reasonable, it means if I want to watch a classic TV show on DVD, the chances are that the incidental music will have been scrubbed, and I'll have to watch the show with muzak instead. Still, the UK isn't that bad in that respect yet. Or has the US got Dark Skies yet?

There needs to be a rebalancing between corporate greed and fair use in the arts. Especially when some artistic creations have a cultural impact across the board. Once everyone is singing Happy Birthday, or everyone knows of Sherlock Holmes or indeed Star Trek itself, then using those things as cultural references in new artistic creations shouldn't be prohibitively expensive.

And retroactive renegotiation should be banned. I don't want to watch the original episode of Quantum Leap on VHS one day, then find that it's been ripped to shreds and turned into elevator music on DVD the next. Once an artistic work exists, it should remain whole by law, unless the original creator wants to alter it.

 

[scotpens]

In the music business, this is particularly relevant: the music is essentially worth half a cent per CD, so taking 15 dollars for it is theft.

The physical disk may cost half a cent to manufacture, but the commodity is the content, not the medium. And the value of any commodity is, by definition, determined by the marketplace. That’s not “theft”; it’s supply and demand.