The ships is based from StarTrek and owned by StarTrek.
There is no such corporate entity. Star Trek doesn't own itself... it's primarily owned by CBS (thanks to a variety of corporate mergers, splits, and so forth). Over the years, they've licensed it to various software companies for games, and also to other companies for other products. Many of those companies have created additional content. The key is though, that that "additional content" is not solely owned by CBS, so CBS can't then license it out without the third-party who created it being involved. (In the case of Legacy, any *new* ships created for it would be partially owned by that game's developer.)
In our case, the game is run/created by Cryptic, and they can only use stuff actually owned by CBS (which is virtually the same thing as things created or seen in the various TV series and films) and/or by themselves, without extra obstacles. There are a few cases where they have gone ahead and jumped through those hoops to get specific things not covered by the CBS license, but don't expect it to happen again as they've also gotten burned by it.
It's still StarTrek as in the Franchise.
As far as Copyright goes that's irrelevant.
Here's a very rough explanation on how copyright works for Star Trek.
CBS owns the overall copyright IP as well as the specific copyright for the TV series. This means CBS can granted a license(aka permission) for other companies to produce works within the Star Trek IP.
Paramount Pictures owns the copyright for the movies all of them.
Various License holders hold copyright to the original content within the works they're made (CBS can IIRC take parts of that original content and add it to parts they directly hold copyright for, but they cannot grant the permission for original material within Licensed products, for example someone at Cryptic had to approve the Odyssey-class appearing in the Picard tie in comics as far as I know those comics were a Licensed product).
Oh and just to make things clear Bad Robot does not and has never owned copyright to any part of Star Trek, they made the Kelvin Timeline movies for Paramount who owns the copyright to those movies. Also as far as I can tell NBC also never owned Copyright to any part of Star Trek, Desilu Productions/Studios (it was known by both names) owned the Copyright until it was bought by CBS (well it's more complex then that but the details aren't important).
Technically, Desilu has always had the copyright and the studio still has it to this day (they never sold it). What happened is that when Gulf+Western bought the studio from Lucille Ball (Desi Arnaz had already sold his part of the studio to her) they renamed it "Paramount Television Division" instead of keeping the name or reverting to the original name (RKO) and grouped it with Paramount Pictures. During the Viacom split the studio went to CBS and so they acquired the right by way of owning the studio the rights resided in. That is why so much of Star Trek has been filmed in the old RKO/Desilu/Paramount TV studio lot.
I probably should have been more clear but I meant Desilu itself and not the Trek rights when I said "it was bought by CBS" yes it's way more complex but I wanted to keep as simple as possible to explain that no, Cryptic cannot just use what ever parts of Trek they wish, they don't have the rights for it.
As for "Gene made it" by that metric nothing made after October 24th 1991 cannot count as Trek as Gene Roddenberry had 0 involvement on it on the account of being dead. If we go by if there was man called "Eugene Wesley Roddenberry" involved in the production then most of TNG era doesn't count but Discovery and Picard do. Since Gene Roddenberry's full legal name is Eugene Wesley Roddenberry senior and his son's (who goes by Rod Roddenberry) full name is Eugene Wesley Roddenberry junior.
Either way what is legally possible for Cryptic is clear, we don't have to like it but we must learn to accept it.
as for the old FASA designs, I'm not even sure who owns the IP for that these days, FASA's a bit of a mess, hell MICROSOFT might even be whom would need to be negoitated with to bring them into the game
as for the old FASA designs, I'm not even sure who owns the IP for that these days, FASA's a bit of a mess, hell MICROSOFT might even be whom would need to be negoitated with to bring them into the game
Technically the FASA designs were jointly owned by FASA and Paramount because of the unusual terms of the license the game was produced under. The problem is that the provisions are unusual and never tested in court, and CBS probably doesn't want to poke a potential hornets nest by doing much with them (the same caution that Paramount displayed even though they were the ones who put that clause in the license).
Paramount's part would reside with ViacomCBS (in the form of what was once Desilu), and except for FASA's Interactive division which it sold to Microsoft (which included the electronic-only rights to Mechwarrior, Shadowrun, and Crimson Skies) all of FASA's IP belongs to the holding company that FASA became in 2001, either directly or via its subsidiaries like WizKids (except for The Maelstrom, which went back to its individual designer due to a legal snafu).
Getting FASA designs into STO could potentially be the least painful negotiation wise (assuming ViacomCBS does not step in and block it for some weird unforeseeable reason) since that is what FASA corporation does nowadays, lease its IP to other companies. On the other hand, it would definitely expect to profit from that license so it may be too pricy to be attractive to STO.
Also, while it would be great to see designs like the Wanderer and the Winged Defender in the game CBS seems to have STO busy by bringing out all sorts of designs of their own, and the more traditional styles seem to have been pushed to the back burner except for the Legendary stuff and a few quality passes here and there.
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,669Community Moderator
Also, while it would be great to see designs like the Wanderer and the Winged Defender in the game CBS seems to have STO busy by bringing out all sorts of designs of their own, and the more traditional styles seem to have been pushed to the back burner except for the Legendary stuff and a few quality passes here and there.
I feel like the Winged Defender might be easier to get a hold of, based on the fact that it appeared not only in Armada II, which was from Activision, and Legacy, which was from Bethesda.
However without knowing the details... its hard to say one way or another.
Although I also have to wonder about the Wing Defender's canon status due to its appearance in at least one Kelvin Timeline comic if I remember correctly, attacking a Klingon colony from orbit.
I can't take it anymore! Could everyone just chill out for two seconds before something CRAZY happens again?!
The nut who actually ground out many packs. The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
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Also, while it would be great to see designs like the Wanderer and the Winged Defender in the game CBS seems to have STO busy by bringing out all sorts of designs of their own, and the more traditional styles seem to have been pushed to the back burner except for the Legendary stuff and a few quality passes here and there.
I feel like the Winged Defender might be easier to get a hold of, based on the fact that it appeared not only in Armada II, which was from Activision, and Legacy, which was from Bethesda.
However without knowing the details... its hard to say one way or another.
Although I also have to wonder about the Wing Defender's canon status due to its appearance in at least one Kelvin Timeline comic if I remember correctly, attacking a Klingon colony from orbit.
You probably did see one, FASA is in the business of leasing out stuff like that nowadays.
The Wanderer canonicity is kind of like that too, it actually appeared in DS9 on an operations control center info readout (in wireframe) as part of the the dossier of the light cruiser that they were talking to at the moment (apparently the Federation was strapped for ships enough that they bought at least one from the Orions or they put a captured one into service) though they never showed a 3D model of it in space (though technically they could according to that joint ownership clause if they wanted to test it). It was on the show in a way so it has at least a fuzzy quasi-canon status.
Issue with any copy right stuff can get messy fast and can cause issues beyond the copy right stuff, look wat happened with discovery over a tardigrade that was just purely used to move the plot and point along someone else got hurt and sued CBS then lost his case.
Actually that thing did involve copyrights, the way that whole thing went was that a game maker from Kuwait(IIRC) noticed similarities in his idea and season 1 of DSC when he talked about it people who wanted DSC taken out of air for crime of not being "their trek" convinced that game maker to sue CBS and were more or less the true driving force behind the lawsuit. During the lawsuit it was discovered that the similarities were kind of basic and there was not really enough substantial similarities for copyrights to apply.
Honestly I don't blame the game maker here too much as he's not from US and thus probably knows only the "hollywood" version of the US legal system. Bare in mind that I'm also not from US though my knowledge about these things is somewhat better then average European has due the fact that my mother spent a year as exchange student there and thus still has friends in the states.
Issue with any copy right stuff can get messy fast and can cause issues beyond the copy right stuff, look wat happened with discovery over a tardigrade that was just purely used to move the plot and point along someone else got hurt and sued CBS then lost his case.
That was a joke from the get-go. We only had the guy's word that he was even working on a game, and... what was he making it in, Atari?
It was a joke don't get me wrong but it still happened and as was previously put many got behind him cause it wasn't the trek they wanted, so yeah emotions where flying around on that one but as was predicted he lost the case. But it is a good recent example of how murky copy right laws can be.
I think it also exposed how much that developer had ripped off Stargate and Dune.
But that is a disccusion for another thread.
I can't take it anymore! Could everyone just chill out for two seconds before something CRAZY happens again?!
The nut who actually ground out many packs. The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,669Community Moderator
Technically its pretty clear. Anything Canon or Cryptic Original is fair game, with the only stipulations being the Vesta and Luna and having to negotiate a bit with their creators despite canon status. Other than that its generally a no go.
I can't take it anymore! Could everyone just chill out for two seconds before something CRAZY happens again?!
The nut who actually ground out many packs. The resident forum voice of reason (I HAZ FORUM REP! YAY!)
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Technically its pretty clear. Anything Canon or Cryptic Original is fair game, with the only stipulations being the Vesta and Luna and having to negotiate a bit with their creators despite canon status. Other than that its generally a no go.
Yeah the thing is that we're not saying it's not likely because we want to be killjoys who feed on other people's misery (well at least I am not, though I assume that's true for others as well). I'd love if Cryptic could use things from other Star Trek EU sources , hell the list I'd love to see from those sources isn't short by any means.
However the truth of the matter is this, Cryptic cannot openly and willingly break copyright laws if they wish to remain operational, this means that they cannot add things from Star Trek EU without the permission of the maker of those EU materials, as their license doesn't cover them as default.
This restriction isn't really political for Cryptic or us, yes politicians make laws but once a law is made you can't just ignore it when it becomes inconvenient. Part of being a responsible adult is accepting that laws are in place for a reason and we cannot just make up our own rules when those set by society don't suit us.
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I probably should have been more clear but I meant Desilu itself and not the Trek rights when I said "it was bought by CBS" yes it's way more complex but I wanted to keep as simple as possible to explain that no, Cryptic cannot just use what ever parts of Trek they wish, they don't have the rights for it.
As for "Gene made it" by that metric nothing made after October 24th 1991 cannot count as Trek as Gene Roddenberry had 0 involvement on it on the account of being dead. If we go by if there was man called "Eugene Wesley Roddenberry" involved in the production then most of TNG era doesn't count but Discovery and Picard do. Since Gene Roddenberry's full legal name is Eugene Wesley Roddenberry senior and his son's (who goes by Rod Roddenberry) full name is Eugene Wesley Roddenberry junior.
Either way what is legally possible for Cryptic is clear, we don't have to like it but we must learn to accept it.
When we get to the details of Copyright laws and Licensing things get really complex, really fast.
Technically the FASA designs were jointly owned by FASA and Paramount because of the unusual terms of the license the game was produced under. The problem is that the provisions are unusual and never tested in court, and CBS probably doesn't want to poke a potential hornets nest by doing much with them (the same caution that Paramount displayed even though they were the ones who put that clause in the license).
Paramount's part would reside with ViacomCBS (in the form of what was once Desilu), and except for FASA's Interactive division which it sold to Microsoft (which included the electronic-only rights to Mechwarrior, Shadowrun, and Crimson Skies) all of FASA's IP belongs to the holding company that FASA became in 2001, either directly or via its subsidiaries like WizKids (except for The Maelstrom, which went back to its individual designer due to a legal snafu).
Getting FASA designs into STO could potentially be the least painful negotiation wise (assuming ViacomCBS does not step in and block it for some weird unforeseeable reason) since that is what FASA corporation does nowadays, lease its IP to other companies. On the other hand, it would definitely expect to profit from that license so it may be too pricy to be attractive to STO.
Also, while it would be great to see designs like the Wanderer and the Winged Defender in the game CBS seems to have STO busy by bringing out all sorts of designs of their own, and the more traditional styles seem to have been pushed to the back burner except for the Legendary stuff and a few quality passes here and there.
I feel like the Winged Defender might be easier to get a hold of, based on the fact that it appeared not only in Armada II, which was from Activision, and Legacy, which was from Bethesda.
However without knowing the details... its hard to say one way or another.
Although I also have to wonder about the Wing Defender's canon status due to its appearance in at least one Kelvin Timeline comic if I remember correctly, attacking a Klingon colony from orbit.
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
You probably did see one, FASA is in the business of leasing out stuff like that nowadays.
The Wanderer canonicity is kind of like that too, it actually appeared in DS9 on an operations control center info readout (in wireframe) as part of the the dossier of the light cruiser that they were talking to at the moment (apparently the Federation was strapped for ships enough that they bought at least one from the Orions or they put a captured one into service) though they never showed a 3D model of it in space (though technically they could according to that joint ownership clause if they wanted to test it). It was on the show in a way so it has at least a fuzzy quasi-canon status.
Honestly I don't blame the game maker here too much as he's not from US and thus probably knows only the "hollywood" version of the US legal system. Bare in mind that I'm also not from US though my knowledge about these things is somewhat better then average European has due the fact that my mother spent a year as exchange student there and thus still has friends in the states.
That was a joke from the get-go. We only had the guy's word that he was even working on a game, and... what was he making it in, Atari?
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I think it also exposed how much that developer had ripped off Stargate and Dune.
But that is a disccusion for another thread.
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
Yeah the thing is that we're not saying it's not likely because we want to be killjoys who feed on other people's misery (well at least I am not, though I assume that's true for others as well). I'd love if Cryptic could use things from other Star Trek EU sources , hell the list I'd love to see from those sources isn't short by any means.
However the truth of the matter is this, Cryptic cannot openly and willingly break copyright laws if they wish to remain operational, this means that they cannot add things from Star Trek EU without the permission of the maker of those EU materials, as their license doesn't cover them as default.
This restriction isn't really political for Cryptic or us, yes politicians make laws but once a law is made you can't just ignore it when it becomes inconvenient. Part of being a responsible adult is accepting that laws are in place for a reason and we cannot just make up our own rules when those set by society don't suit us.