Slow Lane ... he's a special sorta fellow.
CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar
- Thread starter Richard Baker
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Ack, I may have reversed them. I think, now that you mention it, that it was KS that came first. Hmm. Either way, whichever one did the courting was on notice, and the first one likely was as well (I mean, in all seriousness, does any crowdfunding platform honestly think anyone using them would have IP rights to Star Trek?)
Indiegogo was the one that did the courting. (Of course, knowing how Peters likes to spin things, it's quite possible he received a marketing email that IGG sends to all successful crowdfunding projects and decided that meant that IGG was trying to get his business specifically because he was just that special.)
Lane, an 'expert witness' ??
"my own information from that point on is merely conjecture."
Your own information from that point on isn't information, then.
Found not only from analysis of the emails turned over (which probably will be made difficult to review by turning them over on paper with brief headers and without attachments), but emails turned in by other deponents (in terabytes of data, for example
). I suspect, thus Terry's warning.
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In extreme cases, a court can dismiss a case due to discovery violations. But it's rare.
Okay, stuck in a hotel room on a tiny little screen, so... I'll probably miss some things.
The way I see it, there are three effective contracts involved here:
A: Between Peters and Kickstarter (TOS)
B: Between Donor and Kickstarter (TOS)
C: Between Peters and Donor (as mentioned, Kickstarter is not a party to this one).
The first two are (AFAIK) the only ones that mention the requirement to own the IP. I have no doubt that Peters breached (A), presuming that he didn't make other arrangements with KS; I'm not disputing that. But that would be breach of contract, not criminal fraud IMO (and I could easily be wrong here).
The last one (C) is a different beast entirely.
And that would support a breach of contract with KS; but I personally don't think it's relevant to fraud.
As you yourself said, not reading it is no excuse.
On a more serious note, though, the question becomes: what are the terms of the contract between Peters and the donor? Since I didn't donate (and have never donated with Kickstarter), I don't have a clear view on this -- but from an outside perspective, I would argue that the "sale contract" is effectively defined by the campaign advertisement. Unless I'm missing something, the TOS is not incorporated into that contract either directly or by reference, thus (A) and (B) are irrelevant from this perspective.
That would mean that, as far as the donor is concerned, the lack of ownership of the IP (and the risk involved) was disclosed. No fraud. Stupidity, yes, but no fraud.
Now this one is more interesting. While I think he would be hard to pin for fraud, a claim for breach of contract would probably be a different beast. The question is: what does the contract say about the risks? I've always been under the impression that this is the risk of donating with Kickstarter, and what makes it a "donation" instead of a purchase: if delivery doesn't come off, you have no recourse.
If that's the case, then it's possible that the only way donors will truly have recourse is if someone can make a successful fraud claim; then the contract would essentially have been agreed to under false pretenses, and I would think that would open Peters up to a nasty class action or something, and maybe even criminal proceedings.
I'm with @jespah on this: I would really like to see more clarity (and probably regulation) around what's legal with crowdfunding. To my logic, "donating for a perk" is equivalent to "making a sale" -- which means you should damn well get what you paid for!
Two words: Sushi and Damages.
Is that true about KS and Axa?
I seem to recall that when the Indiegogo campaign started it was openly stated that they had courted Axanar, so IGG is almost certainly on the hook there. Did KS court Axanar also? I can't recall if that's the case or not, but I'm thinking not.
Regarding risk: in the Kickstarter, under risks, Peters did say CBS could come and shut them down. So, donors knew that as a possible risk.
Yep. And since defense doesn't seem to have clean hands, I suspect a truly harsh penalty as against the plaintiffs is not in the cards.
As for Mr. Lane - I doubt he's being called as an expert on fan films. The parties could much more readily (and legitimately) qualify Christian Gossett as an expert thereupon.
Lane is (likely) being called because his name was mentioned in another's deposition (probably AP's) and/or is cc'd or directly addressed in emails that are turning out to be germane to the case.
In their previous geek high profile case, Axanar's law firm was also representing a small company accused of IP infringement by the biggest tabletop miniatures/game manufacturer in the industry. In that case, the firm asked for contact info for the original artists involved in creating the works that were allegedly infringed upon and the big company said they didn't have the contact info. At the same time behind the scenes, it turned out that the big company was contacting those same supposedly uncontactable artists and asking them after 20+ years to "reaffirm" that they signed over the perpetual rights to their creations to the company in the 1980's instead of just the right to publish the works in the books they were paid for (I don't recall the legal term for this). We (the public and the defendant) only found out because several of the artists who weren't dependent on the big company for future work went public with the whole thing and said that the company at that time did NOT typically have artists sign over the full rights to their work. What happened when the judge found out they withheld that contact info during discovery? Nothing. He chided them verbally a little bit in court and nothing else. In that case, the general feeling you got from the transcripts was that the judge was annoyed he was being bothered with months of work regarding little plastic army men. Neither the company nor the firm involved in that were affected in any way as I don't believe the jury later on in the actual case heard about any of those actions; they did however decide to drop some of the alleged infringing works though voluntarily. It might affect either side in the case if they withheld information they were supposed to share... or it might not. The above (don't recall if it was mentioned in this thread already) might also shed some light on why Axanar's firm was trying so hard to make sure who owned Star Trek.
This post was interesting until the last sentence.... one thing doesn't follow the other.
Lane, an 'expert witness' ??
Jonathan Lane, Axanar Shill, everyone.
You don't see why a firm that had intial success in disproving ownership of allegedly infringed upon IP despite "common sense" certainty about that ownership by the lay public would try the same longshot tactic (albeit unsuccessfully this time) again?
But that would have to be only for plaintiff misbehavior, yes?
So could the
So is he trying to say that Discovery only happened because of Prelude to Axanar? I find that really hard to believe.Lane, an 'expert witness' ??
So could the fact that one of them knowing brought an IP violator onto their service open them up for some kind of legal action?
It would mean CBS had the 'Star Trek: Discovery' series in the works for 2+ years before it was announced...yeah, I don't think so as they wouldn't have had to move the premiere date to May 2017. As usual Johnathan Lane is full of crap - or probably just parroting one of the more ridiculous/delusional theories verbatim from Alec Peters as to the "real" reason Axanar got sued.
No.
The difference between "one of the biggest tabletop miniatures/game manufacturer in the industry" and CBS/Paramount is rather significant. It was a shot in the dark prompted by some random BS spun by the extremists in the fan community that CBS/P 'must not really own' Star Trek because Gene 'would have never given a soulless corporation full control.'
If crowdfunding sites want the standard ISP protections they should charge flat fees for listings, rather than seek a cut of the results. By doing the latter, I believe they are making themselves blatantly liable for any fraud they allow.
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