Star Wars and Disney
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With the recent acquisition of Lucas Films by Disney, do you think this will spell the end of fan films, mods and models?
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No, I don’t think so. One can always protect fan art through the first amendment argument (like “I love this content and have a right to express this in any way I want as long as I do not cross copyright and trademark law”). Besides, as long as there are lightsaber builders who can with no problem design and build Star Wars inspired blasters and illuminated sabers, I doubt there will anything happen to modders and modelers. They only have to keep the sentence that their work is inspired but not created, supported or in any other way related to LucasFilm Ltd. or the Walt Disney Company and their rights are reserved.
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If you think people would use the first amendment, you’re deluded, Gisteron. The legal battle to do this would utterly annihilate any fan project.
I’m hoping Disney won’t meddle too much into the expansive fan projects Star Wars has spawned, but if Disney decides to axe them, there’s not much to be done.
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FriendlyFire wrote:
If you think people would use the first amendment, you’re deluded, Gisteron. The legal battle to do this would utterly annihilate any fan project.[…]
Not sure where you got that information from. For people over at DeviantArt have been using the first amendment as an excuse often enough to resolve copyright issues on their fan art and according to a copyright lawyer working for the same platform, it works pretty well. Sure, Disney might just say “Thou shalt never again dare to build a sculpture of our Millenium Falcon under any circumstance”, but its not that they are known to have sued people for drawing a Mickey Mouse or model a Buzz Lightyear. And even if they did, I doubt it would work in any case, just because we do have the right to express our appreciation after all.
So, yes, Disney is a powerful company. But there is neither a reason nor an absolutely effective way they can “axe” fans who aren’t violating their rights by challenging ownership of the concept.
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If they want to go in courts, the little guy is doomed. That’s just a fact of life, because good luck paying your lawyers through a protracted lawsuit.
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I guess I should get out of this thread… If the supporting evidence for a stance start being self-evident and apparent “facts of life” one simply has to believe with no observed examples for induced patterns and deductible and testible prognosis whatsoever, I’m afraid I cannot argue any longer… Have fun, those who’s yet to join in on this topic
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There are plenty of pre-established incidents of a large company axing fan projects without recourse. Most recently, NBC Universal killed the Nexust:TJI BSG mod. It was quite public, and it was quite cut and dry. If the owner of an IP is large and can bring the legal firepower to bear, there is NOTHING you can do about it in the US. Very rarely will you get a decent judge that will defend you, and more often than not, the next judge up in the appeals system will side with Corporate. And going all the way to the Supreme Court rarely happens, because they choose what cases they hear, you are NOT guaranteed a SCOTUS case as a right.
The point is that the situation is so nebulous right now. Disney could leave us alone. Disney could axe everything they can find. Disney may only axe high profile projects. Disney may do anything. All we have is speculation.
EDIT: Also, you can get a lawyer to express any opinion under the sun. Lawyer opinions don’t mean spit in copyright case law these days. What matters is the judge you get, and the school of thought he subscribes to. And these days, there is a decreasing number of ‘Fair Use’ judges in the US court system.
EDIT 2: In regards to an actual case. You may notice that the BSG Mod never went to a case. NBCU told MDB to remove the project, as well as I think 19 other mods. Now, these mods were allowed to continue existing, but they were essentially banned from all mainstream game media. You’ll notice that said mod teams did not try to fight this legally. The reason for this is risk. The likelihood of winning a case on this issue these days is sufficiently small that the risk of being saddled with the cost of the case on losing is far too high. Most mod teams are made up of kids - college students and young adults just starting out. We don’t have a few hundred grand to throw away on losing the case. And even if they win, there’s always the (rather large) chance of the court NOT awarding cost to the mod team. Either way, you end up financially boned. Hence, there is never a case, and the large companies can just do whatever they want. This is an increasing trend, and it is one that doubles upon itself with each incident of a C&D being issued.
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Actually Disney has been known to sue people for copyright infringement and was one of the companies who did major lobbying for copyright extension in 2009 (search for Mickey Mouse protection act). In effect it extended copyright protection to 95 years in the US.
Personally I hope they leave it as it is now, there are some SW fan films I have really enjoyed and they would never have been made without Lucas Films liberal permission to use SW content.
At least Viacom didn’t buy it, the lawsuits would already be in the works. For example they are currently suing Google for copyright issue pertaining to Youtube. That is understandable since there is lot of infringement going on at that site. But they also have a bad habit of sending cease and desist letters to anyone showing anything from one of their shows. That has also backfired on them as well since they are considered patent trolls other companies will sue them at the drop of a hat now if they infringe on their copyright (recent one is Demi Moore on VH1)…
