Note to self.Yep. That's where the donor money was.
Dear Self,
It is unwise to consume first swig of morning coffee while reading Urbandefault's comments.
signed
What a mess.
CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar
- Thread starter Richard Baker
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Dear Self,
It is unwise to consume first swig of morning coffee while reading Urbandefault's comments.
signed
What a mess.
Tribble Creator in Trouble Axanar advocate David Gerrold is among defendants named Thursday in a copyright infringement suit by the Dr. Seuss estate for his part in producing a Seuss-styled Star Trek book. Story from TMZ | Court filing naming Gerrold (his full legal name) from Justia.
The Seuss estate is known for zealously protecting its copyrights and trademarks, including a significant 1997 case similar to this one, where creators claimed parody made their infringement fair use.
The Seuss estate is known for zealously protecting its copyrights and trademarks, including a significant 1997 case similar to this one, where creators claimed parody made their infringement fair use.
Finally he has a dog in a fight.Tribble Creator in Trouble Axanar advocate David Gerrold is among defendants named Thursday in a copyright infringement suit by the Dr. Seuss estate for his part in producing a Seuss-styled Star Trek book. Story from TMZ | Court filing naming Gerrold (his full legal name) from Justia.
The Seuss estate is known for zealously protecting its copyrights and trademarks, including a significant 1997 case similar to this one, where creators claimed parody made their infringement fair use.
What's his defense going be? He has no dog in this fight? Horton didn't hear a who is suing me now?Tribble Creator in Trouble Axanar advocate David Gerrold is among defendants named Thursday in a copyright infringement suit by the Dr. Seuss estate for his part in producing a Seuss-styled Star Trek book. Story from TMZ | Court filing naming Gerrold (his full legal name) from Justia.
The Seuss estate is known for zealously protecting its copyrights and trademarks, including a significant 1997 case similar to this one, where creators claimed parody made their infringement fair use.
Aw, yeah, This will be fun.Tribble Creator in Trouble Axanar advocate David Gerrold is among defendants named Thursday in a copyright infringement suit by the Dr. Seuss estate for his part in producing a Seuss-styled Star Trek book. Story from TMZ | Court filing naming Gerrold (his full legal name) from Justia.
The Seuss estate is known for zealously protecting its copyrights and trademarks, including a significant 1997 case similar to this one, where creators claimed parody made their infringement fair use.
Too bad for him it's a Chihuahua.
I meant what I said
And I said what I meant….
Seuss' copyright is faithful
One hundred per cent!
Can I claim "transformative" use for that?
Actually, I think you could. It's valid commentary on the litigiousness of the Seuss estate.
Digging up an older post, on David Gerrold and his unlicensed Dr. Seuss parody...
At Farpoint in February, he also had a Star Trek/Doctor Who crossover graphic novel he was selling. I remember him talking about it online as a "parody," but it didn't look especially parodistic to me.
As for the book that Ted Geisel's estate is suing him over, I didn't know about the lawsuit until last night, when I saw a tweet about it from AxaMonitor. I wasn't surprised at all. More disappointed that my friend Glenn Hauman has to be caught up in this as the publisher, but not surprised. When the Kickstarter for the book went live, my second thought was, "Gerrold's getting sued by someone. CBS, Geisel, someone. This won't ever happen." (My first thought, for the record, was, "I'd really like to own this." But the second thought was why I didn't contribute to the Kickstarter.) The Geisel estate is notoriously litigious, and Axanar made CBS sit up and take notice of IP violations. After Fun with Kirk and Spock, this is a book that, imho, should exist, but you do it officially, you work with CBS (through Pocket Books) and the Geisel estate. Yes, they're going to take their financial cuts, and maybe that makes the book financially unviable, but that's infinitely better than thumbing your nose in two IP owners who aren't shy about throwing around C&Ds and getting a Kickstarter shut down.
At Farpoint in February, he also had a Star Trek/Doctor Who crossover graphic novel he was selling. I remember him talking about it online as a "parody," but it didn't look especially parodistic to me.
As for the book that Ted Geisel's estate is suing him over, I didn't know about the lawsuit until last night, when I saw a tweet about it from AxaMonitor. I wasn't surprised at all. More disappointed that my friend Glenn Hauman has to be caught up in this as the publisher, but not surprised. When the Kickstarter for the book went live, my second thought was, "Gerrold's getting sued by someone. CBS, Geisel, someone. This won't ever happen." (My first thought, for the record, was, "I'd really like to own this." But the second thought was why I didn't contribute to the Kickstarter.) The Geisel estate is notoriously litigious, and Axanar made CBS sit up and take notice of IP violations. After Fun with Kirk and Spock, this is a book that, imho, should exist, but you do it officially, you work with CBS (through Pocket Books) and the Geisel estate. Yes, they're going to take their financial cuts, and maybe that makes the book financially unviable, but that's infinitely better than thumbing your nose in two IP owners who aren't shy about throwing around C&Ds and getting a Kickstarter shut down.
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Those images are pretty damning, aren't they? I didn't realize the duplication was so literal. Having been ages since I opened the Dr. Seuss original, my impression was that the book was mainly a stylistic appropriation, not something this brazen. Gerrold is going to lose this one, big time.
A couple noteworthy items in the 1997 link @carlosp provided:
Not a fair use. A defendant in a music file sharing case could not claim a fair use defense since he had failed to provide evidence that his copying of music files involved any transformative use (an essential element in proving fair use). Important factors: The court held that the defendant was confusing “fairness” and “fair use”–“In the end, fair use is not a referendum on fairness in the abstract …”
Not a fair use. An artist created a cover for a New Yorker magazine that presented a humorous view of geography through the eyes of a New York City resident. A movie company later advertised their film Moscow on the Hudson using a similar piece of artwork with similar elements. The artist sued and a court ruled that the movie company’s poster was not a fair use. Important factors: Why is this case different than the previous case involving the Leslie Nielsen/Annie Leibovitz parody? In the Leibovitz case, the use was a true parody, characterized by a juxtaposition of imagery that actually commented on or criticized the original. The Moscow on the Hudson movie poster did not create a parody; it simply borrowed the New Yorker’s parody (the typical New York City resident’s geographical viewpoint that New York City is the center of the world).
Not a fair use. An author mimicked the style of a Dr. Seuss book while retelling the facts of the O.J. Simpson murder trial in The Cat NOT in the Hat! A Parody by Dr. Juice. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals determined that the book was a satire, not a parody, because the book did not poke fun at or ridicule Dr. Seuss. Instead, it merely used the Dr. Seuss characters and style to tell the story of the murder. Important factors: The author’s work was nontransformative and commercial.
That last one is interesting. If I understand it right, one could copy Seuss style as a parody to make fun of Seuss itself, but to use the style to make fun of something else, such as Trek (while that part would be a parody of Trek and thus preventing CBS/Paramount from winning any law suit there), the use of the Seuss style becomes non-protected satire. It seems like a fine line of distinction, but it's pretty clear (to me, now).
Not a fair use. A defendant in a music file sharing case could not claim a fair use defense since he had failed to provide evidence that his copying of music files involved any transformative use (an essential element in proving fair use). Important factors: The court held that the defendant was confusing “fairness” and “fair use”–“In the end, fair use is not a referendum on fairness in the abstract …”
Not a fair use. An artist created a cover for a New Yorker magazine that presented a humorous view of geography through the eyes of a New York City resident. A movie company later advertised their film Moscow on the Hudson using a similar piece of artwork with similar elements. The artist sued and a court ruled that the movie company’s poster was not a fair use. Important factors: Why is this case different than the previous case involving the Leslie Nielsen/Annie Leibovitz parody? In the Leibovitz case, the use was a true parody, characterized by a juxtaposition of imagery that actually commented on or criticized the original. The Moscow on the Hudson movie poster did not create a parody; it simply borrowed the New Yorker’s parody (the typical New York City resident’s geographical viewpoint that New York City is the center of the world).
Not a fair use. An author mimicked the style of a Dr. Seuss book while retelling the facts of the O.J. Simpson murder trial in The Cat NOT in the Hat! A Parody by Dr. Juice. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals determined that the book was a satire, not a parody, because the book did not poke fun at or ridicule Dr. Seuss. Instead, it merely used the Dr. Seuss characters and style to tell the story of the murder. Important factors: The author’s work was nontransformative and commercial.
That last one is interesting. If I understand it right, one could copy Seuss style as a parody to make fun of Seuss itself, but to use the style to make fun of something else, such as Trek (while that part would be a parody of Trek and thus preventing CBS/Paramount from winning any law suit there), the use of the Seuss style becomes non-protected satire. It seems like a fine line of distinction, but it's pretty clear (to me, now).
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I've never trusted Axanarians, and I never will. I could never forgive them for the death of my fanfilms.
I think it's safe to say that no science fiction writer has ever lived in a real star ship. Adventures are built upon other works and experiences familiar to both the writer and the audience. Star Trek is filled with elements borrowed from past works and modified lines taken from previous works of literature.
I guess my concern comes when certain would be authors and executive producers who don't have an original brain fart in their head push the envelope, causing lawsuits to happen, resulting in litigation which could redefine the lines of illegal plagiarism for better or worse.
You see it in the music industry where some poor person is dragged into court over a few lines vaguely similar to some long forgotten tune from decades in the past. Seems a lot of those get tossed out but what about the modern composer living in a time where everything has become data based?
So here I begin my post with twenty words of which eighteen are well known and are in the exact combination belonging to Star Trek.
I can't help but wonder if we will ever live in an age where some corporate Goliath's computer will automatically spit out a court summons because an algorithm finds a matching phrase within a certain parameter?
Today's improbable so often becomes tomorrow's probable.
I think it's safe to say that no science fiction writer has ever lived in a real star ship. Adventures are built upon other works and experiences familiar to both the writer and the audience. Star Trek is filled with elements borrowed from past works and modified lines taken from previous works of literature.
I guess my concern comes when certain would be authors and executive producers who don't have an original brain fart in their head push the envelope, causing lawsuits to happen, resulting in litigation which could redefine the lines of illegal plagiarism for better or worse.
You see it in the music industry where some poor person is dragged into court over a few lines vaguely similar to some long forgotten tune from decades in the past. Seems a lot of those get tossed out but what about the modern composer living in a time where everything has become data based?
So here I begin my post with twenty words of which eighteen are well known and are in the exact combination belonging to Star Trek.
I can't help but wonder if we will ever live in an age where some corporate Goliath's computer will automatically spit out a court summons because an algorithm finds a matching phrase within a certain parameter?
Today's improbable so often becomes tomorrow's probable.
From what I remember, they were selling this for something like $25. I've only seen an online scan, so I don't know if it justified that price by being hand-painted on vellum and bound in leather, but as I recall, it was short (shorter than a standard comic issue), it was not terribly parodic, and it was not good.
There have been times in Gerrold's career when he has been creative and critically acclaimed and popular, sometimes simultaneously. This ain't one of any of those times.
My poor dad films local events and doesn't understand why Youtube takes them down just because the marching band is playing "25 or 6 to 4" in the background. I've shown him that very same video.
I didn't even ask Gerrold how much it was. I was annoyed enough that he wanted five dollars to sign four books I'd brought and that he wouldn't sign my authors autographed copy of Constellations where I wanted him to.
Twenty-five? Hmm. I think I paid less than that for a copy of Blue Guardian #13, a Doctor Who fanzine with Jean Airey's sidequel to "The Doctor and the Enterprise." For what that was, it was decent. I had my doubts that Gerrold's comic would be anything special.
AN EARLY END to the Axanar lawsuit? Both sides plan on Wednesday to submit motions for summary judgment. What's it all mean? Here's AxaMonitor's Explainer.
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