CBS property, so CBS is under no obligation to stroke your or anyone else ego.
If one can't be ambitious in 30 minutes with $100,000 in cash, they need to find something else to do.
The Axanar Case - did it wreck our community?
- Thread starter Danlav05
- Start date
CBS property, so CBS is under no obligation to stroke your or anyone else ego.
If one can't be ambitious in 30 minutes with $100,000 in cash, they need to find something else to do.
Yeah, I feel bad for the people who contributed too. Hopefully they'll at least get something for their money, and I think that's the biggest up side to the settlement.
Exactly. There was always going to be an Axanar and an Alec Peters of some kind. It was inevitable.
The real problem is that CBS/Paramount had no dialogue with the community to start with. At any point, they could have invited people from the fan community to help them form policies and guidelines regarding fan content, but instead they just dropped some lawyer-written guidelines one day and told us that it was their way or the highway. They had a choice on how to handle this. They chose poorly.
Furthermore, the guidelines provide no real legal defense. They grant no license (or even a covenant not to sue, for that matter), they can be changed at will, and CBS/Paramount can just change their minds at any time and sue you anyway. The problem isn't that we lost any legal rights. The problem is that we never had them in the first place.
It was never worth the time or the PR to sue the small fry to begin with. It was always highly ambitious groups like Star Trek Continues that had the most to lose, and several of the guidelines hit them squarely in the chest.
The whole idea of a time limit is preposterous. For example, the average length of a novel is 60,000 words or more, so imagine they came out with a guideline that said that fan fiction can't be longer than 15,000 words, and that you can't do a series of stories. However, if you split a story into two separate files, you can use 30,000 words (including the words from the title page and license in both documents, and the words in the foreword). Just that simple change in context shows how absurd it really is.
A number of you are suggesting that compelling stories can still be told in 15 to 30 minutes. That is certainly true, but that doesn't mean EVERY compelling story can be told in that time, and it certainly doesn't mean YOUR story can be told in a compelling manner given that kind of time limit.
Assuming 15 minute short films can be as compelling per minute as longer fair, the guideline serves no purpose. If the time constraint is supposed to prevent people from watching fan films in lieu of watching "the real thing", it will fail as soon as there is enough compelling short films. Hate the new J.J. Abrams films? Watch a playlist of short films in the same amount of time.
I would argue that the 15 minute guideline only makes sense if there is a difference in the kind of story telling you can do with a longer format. Just look at The Last Airbender and compare it to the first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender. Yes, I know there were a lot of problems with writing, directing and casting that had nothing to do with the source material, but there was no way anyone could cram a full season's worth of characters into a 103 minute movie and do them all justice. The proper format for that story was a full series, not a single movie. Similarly, the best format for some stories will not be 15 or even 30 minutes.
Character development takes time. Exploring a topic deeply and from many angles takes time. Trying to cram everything into a time period that isn't suitable encourages exposition and faster pacing that may not be suitable for the subject matter.
Bottom line: The time and series limitations are intended to exclude a specific type of long-form storytelling, and we should make excuses for it.
Which doesn't matter, because you can't do a series anyway.
Seriously, though, the A and B plots often build on each other, reinforce each other, and combine at the end of a story. Some B plots are even superior to some A plots. Irrelevance is not a characteristic of B plots, it's a characteristic of bad writing.
Not having enough time to properly tell that kind of story is the whole idea.
You seem to fail to accept the concept of "their sandbox, their rules" when it comes to using IP owned by CBS and Paramount Pictures. To lead off from what @USS Intrepid said, if you've got a story you're burning to tell so bad and it can't be done within the restrictions of the guidelines, change the character names and settings to make it an original story (the filing off serial numbers approach). A good story doesn't need to rest on the laurels of a known franchise or concept, it can exist and flourish on its own. The most creative filmmakers in history made their art within guidelines and codes forced upon them by studios - Hitchcock, Welles, Wilder, just to name a few. If you interpret the guidelines as a complete stopping block to creating anything, your story must not have been important enough for you to tell.
One has a lot harder time vacuuming up cash from a sycophantic fan base though.
Indeed. That's really what the core issue seems to me for the folks bitching about the guidelines. They wanna make something good, the way they want, but they don't wanna pay for it themselves. They can thank AP for making it harder to shear the sheep.
Really? They choose poorly? They could have just come out and stated:
"Hey, due to this whole Axanar situation - no more Star Trek fan films...Period."
They didn't. They gave non-binding (meaning they can change or revoke them at any time) guidlines that STILL allow for Crowdfunding. And while many people love to bring up "Star Wars" fan films - realize that the ONLY guidlines Lucasfilm/Disney has put out for those is the ones they use for fan competitions - and those state:
- No Crowdfunding.
- No more that 5 minutes in length.
and some even more draconian things when compared to what CBS/Paramount allow.
So, in the end, sorry, I don't see how CBS/Paramount "choose poorly" since they could have completely said "no more" to any Star Trek fan films.
I'm surprised they continue to allow crowdfunding at all. If I were them, that would've been the first thing to go.
Exactly. And to be honest, a lot of the "hour-long" fanfilms, like New Voyages and Continues, have a lot of wasted air in them. The episodes are often not tight and plod along.
This was never in dispute. In fact, I basically say as much in the SAME POST:
Let's stop pretending I'm making an argument about the legal rights of fan film makers. Whether or not a guideline is legal (and we all know they are) is not the only criterion by which to judge the guidelines, and I think it's perfectly fair to use other criteria, such as the potential impact on the fan film community, or the negative impact a guideline might have on public relations or revenue. If such discussions don't interest you, you don't have to participate.
You offer no evidence to support this claim, nor do you disprove that a rant can contain valid arguments.
Irrelevant. You certainly offer no evidence that every potential story can reasonably be told in 40 minutes, let alone 30 or 15. Also, why should I care what the Academy considers a short film, especially when they define the maximum length of a short film as longer than the guidelines in the first place? In fact, these days an "hour long" show is about 43 minutes, so and Academy short film approaches the length of an actual Star Trek episode.
Lawful is not the same as good. For instance, you're exercising your legal rights by replying to my previous post, but I don't have to agree with your post simply because it's legal for you to make one. Similarly, I don't have to agree that the guidelines are in any way good simply because CBS and Paramount are within their legal rights to use them.
You're mixing concerns (the behavior of Axanar versus the behavior of everyone else producing a fan film). CBS and Paramount are hardly "victims" of productions like Renegades or Aurora. In fact, such fan productions are a net benefit. They are only "victims" in a legal sense, and only because copyright law was never written with fan content in mind.
That's like saying the price of a replacement organ is fair because a repo man is legally entitled to repossess it. It's substituting an argument of fairness with an argument of legality.
But you can't disagree with that guideline, because CBS/Paramount are completely within their legal rights!
If you cut off all crowd sourcing, then only rich people would make fan films, because even very modest productions are often far beyond what one person can afford. Some reasonable crowd funding is always going to be necessary to get a production off the ground. One need not allow all the excesses of Axanar to permit basic funding for projects.
Which is bull because New Voyages/Phase II existed before the era of crowdfunding. And you aren't going to try and tell me that every Star Wars fan film is only made by rich fans with money to burn?
If you can't do it within the guidelines then the answer is clear: don't do it as "Star Trek".
And if this is the mindset, then Alec will proceed to ignore the guidelines and make Axanar pretty much any way he wants.
I really think fandom needs to stop being so two-faced and decide whether it wants to abide by rules or not. The guidelines feel too restrictive, so people seek out rationalizations, while simultaneously roasting Alec at the spit. It's not for us to decide where to draw the line. It's CBS/P.
I thought CBS said that everyone that had stuff already in motion prior to the guidelines being issued could finish their projects?
In the settlement, Peters agrees to make Axanar according to the guidelines, so I think what other fan film are doing wouldn't represent an excuse for him to circumvent the settlement.
In the settlement, Peters agrees to make Axanar according to the guidelines, so I think what other fan film are doing wouldn't represent an excuse for him to circumvent the settlement.
While I couldn't find an article stating how they raised funds prior to the existence of crowd funding Web sites, I did find this:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/2075083284/star-trek-new-voyages-phase-ii-2015
You think I'm opposed to this, but because I disagree with the guidelines, I actually couldn't agree more. Fans don't have to contribute their fan efforts to Star Trek any more than CBS/Paramount have to permit them to. If CBS/Paramount doesn't want our stories, we can create our own universe...with blackjack...and hookers...In fact, forget the universe.
I'm pretty sure they only grandfathered in existing, completed works, but I could be mistaken. Anybody have a link for this?
Actually, the current Axanar film has limited exemptions from specific guidelines, such as no professional actors or actors from Star Trek (although they agree not to hire any additional ones). They have, however, agreed to the guidelines for all future fan films, so Peters really has no excuse in that regard. It's part of a legal settlement.
^^^
That has to be one of the most ridiculous strawman arguments I've seen. If you going to compare an entertainment IP somehow to repossession of an organ someone received (which would never happen)...wow.
The loss of Star Trek fan films could hardly be seen as 'life threatening in any fashion - but to use such a ridiculous argument as a response - dude, get a life.
Feel free to call it hyperbolic (as it was intended), but you've made no argument against the underlying analogy. The guidelines don't have the power to kill you, obviously, but they can easily kill your fan film if you don't concede to them. If you're concerned less with my underlying point than with the manner in which my message is presented, then perhaps I do need to "get I life" because I'm wasting it on the likes of you.
Then either concede to them, or don't. What the fuck does it really matter? I gotta be honest, I tired of the TOS rehashes after the New Voyages Doomsday Machine episode (and I love TOS). Money can't replace talent and drive. All the swanky sets and CGI do is remind me that there is no creative spark in most of these high-dollar fan films. It is mostly paint-by-numbers.
Money needs to be taken out of fan films, so they can be fan films again.
The Guidelines don't 'kill' anything - IF you decide tom make a Star Trek fan film and follow them (you CAN make one and ignore them, BUT you take a risk because C/P doesn't say they will take any legal action if you don't follow them, but they MAY take action.) If you do follow them, they simply place constraints on what type of story you can present,
And that's true of ANY endeavor that takes money/resources. Do you think CBS and or Paramount don't take into consideration how much a Star Trek film or TV episode script will cost to produce BEFORE they okay it?
Everything has constraints. If you can't come up with a story that you like that fits the constraints, then refine it or come up with one that does.
You're ignoring my entire earlier argument that many stories can't be told in the allotted time frame. A story that can't conform without being significantly compromised is effectively eliminated. (I'm not going to waste time on a lax enforcement argument. Ducking your head down and hoping you don't the DMCA'd is not a plan.)
Thank you for acknowledging that the guideline does indeed place constraints on what type of stories you can tell.
I wasn't making any specific arguments about the specific guideline that governs crowd sourcing. I was reacting to someone saying that the guideline should be changed to eliminate crowd sourcing. Are you taking a position that CBS/Paramount should modify the guidelines to eliminate crowd sourcing?
Or choose Option C: tell the story without the Star Trek backdrop, which is the option I actually advocate for, given the circumstances. If an idea is good enough to make into a long-form fan film, it's good enough to put in a little extra effort to make it a stand-alone film. I applaud the Renegades team for taking this road.
ORLY? Here's a fan film done and released prior to the guidlines - and it's story is fairly compelling (IMO):
Oh and the original comment thread on this very film on TREKBBS is here:
http://www.trekbbs.com/threads/needs-of-the-many.278593/