Peters tried to use an IP that he did not own to get funding to start a movie studio of his own, something which is very illegal, end of story.
"If you can't take a little bloody nose, maybe you ought to go back home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wondrous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid." - Q
People seem to be forgetting or never knew that Star Trek was supposed to be different. It's not Disney. That's the whole point of it. Of course I realize it is now fully corporatist. But for many years it was all about the fans - which is why the elaborate fan films were left alone for so many years.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
People might like his fan film. What they don't like is his IP theft and his use of the Star Trek brand to make money for himself. Peters forced CBS and PAramount into taking those steps by refusing to back down in court after his attempt to get rich off of the back of other people's property failed.
So now Renegades, Horizon, Phase Two, and Continues are screwed thanks to his greed.
I suspect the more important aspect was that CBS finally started working on a new TV show. Previously, these fan projects - regardless of how professional - were free advertisement for Star Trek merchandise. But now - it risks costing them viewers.
I won't disagree that Alec Peters might have gone too far, but I think that might have made it mostly easier to get things rolling, rather than being the only reason.
And quite honestly, I think if CBS kept sitting on its IP without actually delivering new shows, I think they would have deserved losing control over it as more and more fan productions were coming around.
But the didn't. Let's hope they deliver something good.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
People seem to be forgetting or never knew that Star Trek was supposed to be different. It's not Disney. That's the whole point of it. Of course I realize it is now fully corporatist. But for many years it was all about the fans - which is why the elaborate fan films were left alone for so many years.
People seem to be forgetting that Roddenberry got Nimoy to wear an IDIC medallion in the show so that he could sell it for money, and added pointless lyrics to an instrumental song so that he could get royalties for it. Trek was never pure.
I'm not talking about Gene. I'm talking about the fans who kept the series alive when it was dead - the ones who have been going to conventions for 45 years.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
People seem to be forgetting or never knew that Star Trek was supposed to be different. It's not Disney. That's the whole point of it. Of course I realize it is now fully corporatist. But for many years it was all about the fans - which is why the elaborate fan films were left alone for so many years.
Fan productions have one rule that MUST be followed no matter what. DON'T MAKE MONEY! Peters was living off of the money people gave him and hadn't even started making Axanar.
I'm not talking about Gene. I'm talking about the fans who kept the series alive when it was dead - the ones who have been going to conventions for 45 years.
What about them? So what if they kept it going? That has nothing to do with ownership. It does not mean they can make money off it. If you want to dress up and make a Star Trek film. Go for it. Have fun make it great and I'll watch it. However if you try to make MONEY off that film then you are in the wrong and will suffer legal repercussions.
Dr. Miranda Jones: I understand, Mr. Spock. The glory of creation is in its infinite diversity.
Mr. Spock: And the ways our differences combine, to create meaning and beauty.
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though. JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
I like how that video the OP posted also ignores all the BS that's come to light about how Peters acted and took a dump on so many of the people that made "Prelude" possible. It Further ignores how his own staff warned him he was crossing too many lines so he got rid of them and tried to ruin them.
I'm not talking about Gene. I'm talking about the fans who kept the series alive when it was dead - the ones who have been going to conventions for 45 years.
What about them? So what if they kept it going? That has nothing to do with ownership. It does not mean they can make money off it. If you want to dress up and make a Star Trek film. Go for it. Have fun make it great and I'll watch it. However if you try to make MONEY off that film then you are in the wrong and will suffer legal repercussions.
technically they can shut you down even if you don't make money. the only legal thing you can do is parody and fair use. legality is not the issue here and never has been with the fan films. the issue is the relationship with the fans. I'm not an Axanar supporter. But I'm also not so blind that I don't see that Axanar was just a convenient excuse to shut all the films down. that is my complaint. for me Renegades is Star Trek right now, even without the name. The Admirals (Nichols and Koenig) just finished filming their next episode. I will not ever forgive cbs/paramount for taking their names away. But I commend the entire Renegades crew for persevering.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
@sheldonlcooper I agree. If you read the new guidelines that cbs and paramount have released you can easily conclude that they want to kill fan films. Following their guidelines won't allow for the creation of anything decent. Lucasfilms has guidelines for star wars films and they aren't even as strict.
I'm not talking about Gene. I'm talking about the fans who kept the series alive when it was dead - the ones who have been going to conventions for 45 years.
What about them? So what if they kept it going? That has nothing to do with ownership. It does not mean they can make money off it. If you want to dress up and make a Star Trek film. Go for it. Have fun make it great and I'll watch it. However if you try to make MONEY off that film then you are in the wrong and will suffer legal repercussions.
technically they can shut you down even if you don't make money. the only legal thing you can do is parody and fair use. legality is not the issue here and never has been with the fan films. the issue is the relationship with the fans. I'm not an Axanar supporter. But I'm also not so blind that I don't see that Axanar was just a convenient excuse to shut all the films down. that is my complaint. for me Renegades is Star Trek right now, even without the name. The Admirals (Nichols and Koenig) just finished filming their next episode. I will not ever forgive cbs/paramount for taking their names away. But I commend the entire Renegades crew for persevering.
I call BS on that agreement. It was about a greedy, unoriginal LFIM (As he is called on TrekBBS aka Lord Foot in Mouth) who tried to use someone else's IP to try and build his own Ferengi empire. He sold merchandise based on the IP, he even tried patent merchandise based on the IP (USS Ares novels), tried to sell novels based on the IP (including trying to coax established authors into breaking their contracts with the publisher of the IP novels), gave himself and a few others salaries (not a very fan film-like feature), and paid himself fees from one company (Propwerx) to his studio. Prelude was not horrible, but the very anti-JJ trek movie was filled with JJ Trek ships along with JJ Trek style action. This is not about perceived quality of fan vs perceived quality of developer nor is it about whether you (the general fan) feel that the Trek is not being made up your standards or made consistently throughout the years (which is ludicrous anyways due to the number of tie-in novels, games, and movies that were made since the end of Enterprise), this is about the IP holder protecting their legal rights against someone trying to take them away.
It could very well be that they feared "fan films" would make them look bad, dilute the brand or hurt their bottom line. It would be nice if someone hadn't handed them this excuse on a silver platter, but the only verifiable facts we have point to this all being the fault of the person who handed it to them.
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,588Community Moderator
The way I see it, Peters ruined it for everyone when he let greed get in the way. All he saw was $$$ and it didn't matter that he didn't own any rights to the IP. It is theft plain and simple.
CBS did the right thing in throwing the book at him. The restrictions I can see sticking around for a few years to get the point across before they loosen up again. CBS knows the fans are passionate about Trek. I doubt they will punish the fans for it. But a message had to be sent. "Do not steal our work for profit".
If CBS had decided to buy out Axanar and take over production because of the quality, maybe things would have been different. But the fact remains, Peters was in the wrong in this. He tried to turn a fan project into an official product to make money. And he got caught. So for now everyone has to deal with the fallout. If you want to blame anyone for it, blame the greedy prick Peters. CBS just followed established laws.
The point of a fan project is to tell a story while respecting the owners of the IP. When I write a fanfic, I always put a disclaimer on it saying I own nothing except for the story I wrote. I don't own the characters or the universe unless it is a character I created for said story. Its common sense really. And yet here we have someone who blatantly defied the law and defiled the trust the owners had in fans because he wanted to make money off something that wasn't his to begin with. It will take time to recover. We just have to be patient.
The way I see it, Peters ruined it for everyone when he let greed get in the way. All he saw was $$$ and it didn't matter that he didn't own any rights to the IP. It is theft plain and simple.
CBS did the right thing in throwing the book at him. The restrictions I can see sticking around for a few years to get the point across before they loosen up again. CBS knows the fans are passionate about Trek. I doubt they will punish the fans for it. But a message had to be sent. "Do not steal our work for profit".
If CBS had decided to buy out Axanar and take over production because of the quality, maybe things would have been different. But the fact remains, Peters was in the wrong in this. He tried to turn a fan project into an official product to make money. And he got caught. So for now everyone has to deal with the fallout. If you want to blame anyone for it, blame the greedy prick Peters. CBS just followed established laws.
The point of a fan project is to tell a story while respecting the owners of the IP. When I write a fanfic, I always put a disclaimer on it saying I own nothing except for the story I wrote. I don't own the characters or the universe unless it is a character I created for said story. Its common sense really. And yet here we have someone who blatantly defied the law and defiled the trust the owners had in fans because he wanted to make money off something that wasn't his to begin with. It will take time to recover. We just have to be patient.
He wasn't trying to sell Axanar it was going to be free to watch there was no profit to be made, but he raised a hell of a lot of money for it through donations and he was going to pay for real actors with it. So not only was it going to be visually good, but he was going to have real actors in the movie.
0
rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,588Community Moderator
Oh and Nike, one of those professional actors, mister Tony Todd (Kurn, elderly Jake Sisko, & others) left the project saying that Alec was misuing funds.
Can you provide a link please? I haven't heard anything about that.
He was tweeting about with the hashtag #noaccountability
I don't use twitter so I'll have to do a web search on my own and see if I can find anything. Thanks either way...I will check it out and if what you say is true then my opinion on this will change to reflect the new info.
He was tweeting about with the hashtag #noaccountability
I don't use twitter so I'll have to do a web search on my own and see if I can find anything. Thanks either way...I will check it out and if what you say is true then my opinion on this will change to reflect the new info.
what's more damning, is that Axanar's website never showed he left the project(as far as I know his name is STILL on there) and they continued using Mr Todd's name in material for generating more funds.
He wasn't trying to sell Axanar it was going to be free to watch there was no profit to be made, but he raised a hell of a lot of money for it through donations and he was going to pay for real actors with it. So not only was it going to be visually good, but he was going to have real actors in the movie.
That makes me wonder on the "Continue" series. Those are actors/actresses as well. As you can look them up and see they done several shows, movies, VOs, etc. Are they doing it for free, or getting paid for their time? So far they are still working on their next episode. At least what their site says.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
but don't think for a second that wanting to make an example of someone outdoing them using a fraction of their budget and not pandering to the guilds and executive bank accounts didn't play a part.
It didn't. This was a clear violation. And Paramount just did the same thing Disney always does. They reacted. With the force of law.
So let's put this to a test shall we?
Give us some of your most creative ideas. Post them right here. In this thread. I'll go take those ideas and do my own creative thing with it. Maybe some others up in here will. We have the technology. We can crowd source this.
And if any of it is awesome and successful, we'll move on. Without you. Because we're fans!
Then we'll see how draconian and outdated copyright laws feel to you.
Let's put your love of fandom and the communal spirit of creativity and the bold new world that easy access to quality production software to a real test! Give us your ideas!
Technically, because PWE owns these forums, it's in the EULA that any ideas we give in these forums becomes property of PWE.
ok... what if Adam Sandler crashed his space ship on a planet made of pie and he fell in love with a robot.
Captain Jean-Luc Picard: "We think we've come so far. Torture of heretics, burning of witches, it's all ancient history. Then - before you can blink an eye - suddenly it threatens to start all over again."
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
Comments
Peters tried to use an IP that he did not own to get funding to start a movie studio of his own, something which is very illegal, end of story.
I'm Shocked!
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
I suspect the more important aspect was that CBS finally started working on a new TV show. Previously, these fan projects - regardless of how professional - were free advertisement for Star Trek merchandise. But now - it risks costing them viewers.
I won't disagree that Alec Peters might have gone too far, but I think that might have made it mostly easier to get things rolling, rather than being the only reason.
And quite honestly, I think if CBS kept sitting on its IP without actually delivering new shows, I think they would have deserved losing control over it as more and more fan productions were coming around.
But the didn't. Let's hope they deliver something good.
People seem to be forgetting that Roddenberry got Nimoy to wear an IDIC medallion in the show so that he could sell it for money, and added pointless lyrics to an instrumental song so that he could get royalties for it. Trek was never pure.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
My character Tsin'xing
What about them? So what if they kept it going? That has nothing to do with ownership. It does not mean they can make money off it. If you want to dress up and make a Star Trek film. Go for it. Have fun make it great and I'll watch it. However if you try to make MONEY off that film then you are in the wrong and will suffer legal repercussions.
Mr. Spock: And the ways our differences combine, to create meaning and beauty.
-Star Trek: Is There in Truth No Beauty? (1968)
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though.
JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
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technically they can shut you down even if you don't make money. the only legal thing you can do is parody and fair use. legality is not the issue here and never has been with the fan films. the issue is the relationship with the fans. I'm not an Axanar supporter. But I'm also not so blind that I don't see that Axanar was just a convenient excuse to shut all the films down. that is my complaint. for me Renegades is Star Trek right now, even without the name. The Admirals (Nichols and Koenig) just finished filming their next episode. I will not ever forgive cbs/paramount for taking their names away. But I commend the entire Renegades crew for persevering.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
I call BS on that agreement. It was about a greedy, unoriginal LFIM (As he is called on TrekBBS aka Lord Foot in Mouth) who tried to use someone else's IP to try and build his own Ferengi empire. He sold merchandise based on the IP, he even tried patent merchandise based on the IP (USS Ares novels), tried to sell novels based on the IP (including trying to coax established authors into breaking their contracts with the publisher of the IP novels), gave himself and a few others salaries (not a very fan film-like feature), and paid himself fees from one company (Propwerx) to his studio. Prelude was not horrible, but the very anti-JJ trek movie was filled with JJ Trek ships along with JJ Trek style action. This is not about perceived quality of fan vs perceived quality of developer nor is it about whether you (the general fan) feel that the Trek is not being made up your standards or made consistently throughout the years (which is ludicrous anyways due to the number of tie-in novels, games, and movies that were made since the end of Enterprise), this is about the IP holder protecting their legal rights against someone trying to take them away.
CBS did the right thing in throwing the book at him. The restrictions I can see sticking around for a few years to get the point across before they loosen up again. CBS knows the fans are passionate about Trek. I doubt they will punish the fans for it. But a message had to be sent. "Do not steal our work for profit".
If CBS had decided to buy out Axanar and take over production because of the quality, maybe things would have been different. But the fact remains, Peters was in the wrong in this. He tried to turn a fan project into an official product to make money. And he got caught. So for now everyone has to deal with the fallout. If you want to blame anyone for it, blame the greedy prick Peters. CBS just followed established laws.
The point of a fan project is to tell a story while respecting the owners of the IP. When I write a fanfic, I always put a disclaimer on it saying I own nothing except for the story I wrote. I don't own the characters or the universe unless it is a character I created for said story. Its common sense really. And yet here we have someone who blatantly defied the law and defiled the trust the owners had in fans because he wanted to make money off something that wasn't his to begin with. It will take time to recover. We just have to be patient.
He wasn't trying to sell Axanar it was going to be free to watch there was no profit to be made, but he raised a hell of a lot of money for it through donations and he was going to pay for real actors with it. So not only was it going to be visually good, but he was going to have real actors in the movie.
Can you provide a link please? I haven't heard anything about that.
I don't use twitter so I'll have to do a web search on my own and see if I can find anything. Thanks either way...I will check it out and if what you say is true then my opinion on this will change to reflect the new info.
https://twitter.com/tonytodd54/status/682286369385807872
There you go
what's more damning, is that Axanar's website never showed he left the project(as far as I know his name is STILL on there) and they continued using Mr Todd's name in material for generating more funds.
That makes me wonder on the "Continue" series. Those are actors/actresses as well. As you can look them up and see they done several shows, movies, VOs, etc. Are they doing it for free, or getting paid for their time? So far they are still working on their next episode. At least what their site says.
USS Casinghead NCC 92047 launched 2350
Fleet Admiral Stowe - Dominion War Vet.
Made all the more hilarious by Richard Hatch's involvement in the project.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Hatch_(actor)#Battlestar_Galactica_revival_attempt
Technically, because PWE owns these forums, it's in the EULA that any ideas we give in these forums becomes property of PWE.
"With the first link, the chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably."
Get Rob Schneider on board, and you have a movie.