CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar

[Allyn Gibson]

Problem is to defend such a claim IN COURT - the copyright has to be legally valid - and Mr. Peters copyright claim would fail on those grounds and the case would be dismissed as Mr. Peters would be unable to prove he had a valid claim (Hell, Axanar is TRYING to claim CBS/Paramount's copyright is not 'clearly defined' thus the case should be dismissed.)

Not necessarily. Rights revert to the script writers in Hollywood per WGA rules. This is how Harlan Ellison and Neil Gaiman can publish their scripts; they, not the studio, hold the rights.

That said, I'm doubtful that Axanar is covered by the WGA agreements.

My point is that while it's possible that a blogger or writer would prevail if they published parts of the script and Peters sued for copyright infringement, it's not a slam dunk and would probably be an enormous nuisance.

 

[carlosp]

According to the US Copyright Office, copyright is automatic. Peters can certainly assert his rights over his original material.

I admit, this situation is messy in that his original material exists because of someone else's copyrighted material. But that should not be taken as a carte blanche to distribute and quote from his work. The words, in the script, belong to whomever wrote them.

I'm not sure on what basis you claim a journalist can't quote from a source like this. There's tons of precedent about that; fair use covers critique, commentary and review of copyright materials with a fair amount of direct quotation from the source. Perhaps you can cite something different?

This would all be true even /if/ Peters had a valid copyright on the screenplay.

 

[Noname Given]

Not necessarily. Rights revert to the script writers in Hollywood per WGA rules. This is how Harlan Ellison and Neil Gaiman can publish their scripts; they, not the studio, hold the rights.

That said, I'm doubtful that Axanar is covered by the WGA agreements.

My point is that while it's possible that a blogger or writer would prevail if they published parts of the script and Peters sued for copyright infringement, it's not a slam dunk and would probably be an enormous nuisance.

Apples and Oranges - IE Ellison and Gaiman were most likely hired/contracted to produce a spec script for a studio. The issue with Axanar is NO ONE associated with CBS/Paramount hired Alec Peters to do any such script - so it's not even in the same realm as what you describe. What Mr. Peters did is illegal.

 

[MikeH92467]

A link woulda been nice.

Yeah, it would have, but I was in the doctor's office and I didn't think I should ask him to wait while I posted one.

 

[Allyn Gibson]

I'm not sure on what basis you claim a journalist can't quote from a source like this. There's tons of precedent about that; fair use covers critique, commentary and review of copyright materials with a fair amount of direct quotation from the source. Perhaps you can cite something different?

This would all be true even /if/ Peters had a valid copyright on the screenplay.

The J.D. Salinger case over his letters would be on-point. He asserted his copyrights over their contents and was able to force a rewrite of a biography based on them to remove any direct quotes.

An article that quoted from the script might be able to survive a copyright infringement claim on Fair Use grounds, but again, it would be a nuisance.

 

[muCephi]

Huh? You mean outside of movies?

by the musicians. from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_film (underlining added):

As talking pictures emerged, with their prerecorded musical tracks, an increasing number of moviehouse orchestra musicians found themselves out of work.[127] More than just their position as film accompanists was usurped; according to historian Preston J. Hubbard, "During the 1920s live musical performances at first-run theaters became an exceedingly important aspect of the American cinema."[128] With the coming of the talkies, those featured performances—usually staged as preludes—were largely eliminated as well. The American Federation of Musicians took out newspaper advertisements protesting the replacement of live musicians with mechanical playing devices. One 1929 ad that appeared in the Pittsburgh Press features an image of a can labeled "Canned Music / Big Noise Brand / Guaranteed to Produce No Intellectual or Emotional Reaction Whatever" and reads in part:

Canned Music on Trial
This is the case of Art vs. Mechanical Music in theatres. The defendant stands accused in front of the American people of attempted corruption of musical appreciation and discouragement of musical education. Theatres in many cities are offering synchronised mechanical music as a substitute for Real Music. If the theatre-going public accepts this vitiation of its entertainment program a deplorable decline in the Art of Music is inevitable. Musical authorities know that the soul of the Art is lost in mechanisation. It cannot be otherwise because the quality of music is dependent on the mood of the artist, upon the human contact, without which the essence of intellectual stimulation and emotional rapture is lost.[129]

By the following year, a reported 22,000 U.S. moviehouse musicians had lost their jobs.[130]

 

[Michael Hinman]

Actually, the draft script would be protected by copyright, simply by existing (even though it does contain the copyrighted material of others), and Alec Peters and his cowriters could justly claim that their copyrights are being violated by its unauthorized distribution.

My unsolicited advice to the person who has the leaked script is not to quote from it at all. Summarize it, review it, whatever. But don't quote any of Peters' material, just to be safe. Or, safer, anyway.

And you are an attorney? Who is experienced in Fair Use?

 

[Michael Hinman]

I suppose what's not clear to me is what value there is in reviewing a three year-old first draft script. That's not the script they're shooting. Two other writers have supposedly completely reworked it. In fact we don't even know how relevant "Prelude" is to what they intend to do now.

If Peters and company are smart, they'll say nothing more about the article than "we're not shooting that script and, in this instance, they may be telling the truth.

The value, Dennis, is that if this is the script that was "active" while they were fundraising.

 

[Michael Hinman]

Not necessarily. Rights revert to the script writers in Hollywood per WGA rules. This is how Harlan Ellison and Neil Gaiman can publish their scripts; they, not the studio, hold the rights.

That said, I'm doubtful that Axanar is covered by the WGA agreements.

My point is that while it's possible that a blogger or writer would prevail if they published parts of the script and Peters sued for copyright infringement, it's not a slam dunk and would probably be an enormous nuisance.

I'm not a "blogger," and it IS a slam dunk. Seriously. I've been through this a thousand times over.

 

[Michael Hinman]

The J.D. Salinger case over his letters would be on-point. He asserted his copyrights over their contents and was able to force a rewrite of a biography based on them to remove any direct quotes.

An article that quoted from the script might be able to survive a copyright infringement claim on Fair Use grounds, but again, it would be a nuisance.

Ummm ... you do know that Congress followed up on that case, right? You should look into the 1992 amendment to the Copyright Act, which adds to the Fair Use doctrine: "The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors."

 

[Mudd]

The value, Dennis, is that if this is the script that was "active" while they were fundraising.

What does "active" mean here? It means that the script existed during that period of time? That bears on what?

 

[Mudd]

Well, in any event here's a review of it
https://www.reddit.com/r/startrek/comments/48dv1q/i_have_the_axanar_script_heres_my_review/

 

[Michael Hinman]

What does "active" mean here? It means that the script existed during that period of time? That bears on what?

I am not exactly sure what you are trying to challenge. But to be honest, I am not up for philosophical, the sky is blue, debates.

 

[Squiggy]

I don't know, but I won't be releasing the script.

It'd be a shame if you tripped and fell and accidentally uploaded it to somewhere.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Well, in any event here's a review of it:lol
https://www.reddit.com/r/startrek/comments/48dv1q/i_have_the_axanar_script_heres_my_review/

"commences to pew".

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

I am not exactly sure what you are trying to challenge. But to be honest, I am not up for philosophical, the sky is blue, debates.

Lets drop that - we all know the sky is purple

 

[Allyn Gibson]

And you are an attorney? Who is experienced in Fair Use?

I'm not a "blogger," and it IS a slam dunk. Seriously. I've been through this a thousand times over.

Ummm ... you do know that Congress followed up on that case, right? You should look into the 1992 amendment to the Copyright Act, which adds to the Fair Use doctrine: "The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors."

You know, I shouldn't have said a damned thing. I should have known better. Thanks ever so much. :-/

 

[Mudd]

I am not exactly sure what you are trying to challenge. But to be honest, I am not up for philosophical, the sky is blue, debates.

I suppose whether this is anything more worthwhile than trolling those guys. Doesn't really seem to be, and I'm fine with that.

In any event, the leaker seems to have sent it to quite a few people; I was aware of it yesterday afternoon, and it's been synopsized and reviewed on Reddit this evening.

 

[Mudd]

It'd be a shame if you tripped and fell and accidentally uploaded it to somewhere.

It'll be all over the place in a couple of days, never fear.

 

[Michael Hinman]

You know, I shouldn't have said a damned thing. I should have known better than to say a few words that even looked slightly favorable to Peters' legal rights.

If the few words were correct, then no one would give you an issue. It's not that you were "slightly favorable" to someone, it was that you were wrong. Plain and simple.

Fair Use is an amazing doctrine in law. And while it is great that your referenced things like Salinger's letters, please look up what happened as a result, so that you can stay accurate in what is happening in the here and now.