Poll The Guidelines are...

Agreed.

Yep.

 

BurgerTime Delight (2008) was my only involvement with the game, which we had licensed. No idea what's happening with it now. My one big regret about working in mobile during the feature phone era is that a lot of those games cannot be played any more. I love our Popeye and Mr. Do! ports in particular and have no way to play them now.

 

OT: So, what you're saying is... you know the person I need to talk to get my spec Burger Time feature made, imirite? Because it's tots going to be a hit.

 

Hahaha. I don't even recall who the rights-holder was!

And "tots"? Tater tots? Yum.

 

Tots = totally.

All the kids are saying it. Or so I'm told.

 

What were they ported to? I here they are doing wonderful things with emulators these days.

I've been told not to say it by younger co-workers, for what its worth

 

Here is my struggle-why do fan films need "long form story telling?" That's the part that I find most difficult to overcome, largely because, unless you put in a lot of time and effort and resources, it is very difficult to do so. I respect fan filmmakers, and have done more than a few, but I know that finding people willing to do the project for free who can act, write, render, etc. is difficult.

To me, 15 minutes is a reasonable about of time.

Secondarily, and more generally on your additions, it sounds like you want more clarification on certain points. Also, why in the world would it be difficult to identify "bootlegged" merchandise over officially licensed? I'm not the brightest person but I certainly can do that at least.

 

"totes"

 

I think the "bootlegged" merchandise restriction is solely to stop people from making costumes and props into a business and thus making money off fanfilms by selling those items to fanfilm productions.

 

Huh. IP owners not liking other people taking IP that doesn't belong to them and making money from it?! Huh.

 

OTOH you apparently can't copyright a clothing design per se, which is why so many name designers' work gets copied so shamelessly, and why halloween costume makers can get away with making shameless copies of known designs without licenses, just so long as they don't call them by trademarked names or include trademark things like the flying-A arrowhead badges.. So if someone just happened to make velour shirts/dresses in a certain three colors CBS could not really go after them, and I doubt they'd actually go after a fanfilm group for using them. They'd simply use it, as per Axanar, as an example of how much a fanfilm infringes upon their copyrighted property should they choose to come after you. Props be a different matter.

 

I’ve always been surprised that you can’t copyright the design of clothes and costumes. That’s so strange to me.

 

I think that's in part because there's so much prior work that almost anything would fail to be very original.

 

Thanks for that, Jespah. This stuff is always fascinating. I think what this illustrates is that even in such a shift as this case suggests, the basic construction of a garment still would not be copyrightable without an additional changes in the law or its interpretation.

 

*starts filing paperwork*
What now?

 

Or the letter "I" in front of a name.

Doesn't keep people from trying.

 

I think there's a basic misunderstanding of what I meant by "Argument from Authority". I didn't mean that he had no authority (though it would seem to me that his experience comes almost entirely from one side of the court room). Rather, I was indicating that I felt he was substituting his authority for an actual argument. There's a difference between having experience and sharing pertinent examples thereof with others. If someone told you that you were wrong, and didn't tell you why, would you simply take it on faith because the person is an authority on the subject? Or would you ask them to explain themselves?

Wouldn't this actually have the effect of creating competition for CBS, though? True, they wouldn't be able to get funding from an established fan base, so getting anything off the ground would be difficult, but any original films that succeed would be competing for the same general eyeballs. Isn't it possible that this might negatively impact the profitability of the franchise in the long term?

I can understand your position that short films are better, even if I do disagree with it. What I don't understand it is the idea that one's work history should dictate whether or not they get to make a fan film. (Keep in mind, people have no control over what professional experience they already have just prior to the Guidelines being announced.) Nor do I understand the sentiment that the amount of quality put into a film determines whether or not it's a fan film . The quality of one's work or the content of one's resume do not determine the purity of one's heart with regards to their love of the franchise, and what is a fan work if not an expression of one's love for a franchise?

By contrast, I fully understand, and agree with, the sentiment that people should not personally gain from the production of a fan film, but that has nothing to do with job history or quality of work.

If I could "like" only part of a message, I would done so in this case.

If that's the case, they could have just gone after all the Kickstarter-funded projects over $50,000 and left it at that.

The problem is that, when it comes to TOS (and in the future, other Trek series), it will eventually become possible for nearly anyone to create a 1 to 1 replica because of the advancement of technology and the availability of information and tutorials from the maker community. At some point, people would have to start deliberately doing a half-a$$ed job just to avoid a recreation that indistinguishable from the respective series. I think we've basically already hit that point with TOS. Given enough time and effort, anyone can create something of similar quality to TOS, even if they have no professional experience. It's a situation where commitment to quality is treated as a negative.

What's with the quotes? It's not like the industry doesn't already distinguish between different content lengths, if only for scheduling purposes.

I don't buy the idea that we should limit people to 15 minutes because it's hard to do anything longer than 15 minutes. If it's so hard to do, then the degree of effort would serve as a natural barrier, and the people who overcome that barrier with careful planning and effort would would be cheated by such a rule, assuming the reason for such a rule in the first place is actually their protection.

That's a fair assessment. I'd say half of my issues with the Guidelines revolve around clarity.

There are a lot of Chinese knockoffs out there, and some are marketed as the real thing. I've read Amazon reviews by people who found out after the fact that the LG headset they ordered wasn't authentic. It's not a stretch to believe that they could produce a product that's indistinguishable from official.

However, I'm also concerned about grey situations. For instance, if someone from another fan production recommends someone they had previously hired to make uniforms for them, and you ask that person to make the same uniforms for you, is that person now an unlicensed commercial producer of Star Trek merchandise? Should fan film makers even be put into the position of trying to figure that out?

He sure told you, Scarecrow!

Well, it either infringes or it doesn't. Perhaps it may infringe as part of a greater whole. Is that what you're suggesting?

Are props covered by copyright? Or is that solely the domain of design patents? (Trademark would probably cover things like insignia pins...)

I'm not sure the TOS uniforms, minus the delta insignia, would be covered here. They're too simple, and a lot of the flourishes, such as the rank on the sleeves, are things that came from the Navy. Later uniforms may be a different story, though.

What if you use a split infinitive?

 

Because someone else had said it, so I quoted it. Respect.

That's not my argument is that it is "hard to do." My argument is that the 15 minute limit could be beneficial for those who feel the need to craft a full length episode style and yet struggle to do so.

Secondarily, why would CBS encourage, in essence, recreating the format of Trek? The limit makes sense from their standpoint.

Again, I am reasonably certain individuals can figure it out with minimal effort on this one.

To answer your hypothetical, yes that costume maker is unlicensed producer. They exist all over the place. I think due diligence in this case is reasonable.