Axanar - Crowdfunded 'Star Trek' Movie Draws Lawsuit from Paramount, CBS

[NormanF]

After some speculation and stuff, it is official. The Horizons sequel is canned. Now all of us (producers of Trek fan projects) are fearing...

I don't know enough about the laws behind CBS vs Axanar, but I'm wondering if this is partly a way to go into court and say, "See, we're defending our copyright against other groups." Also, the way CBS handled that helps their image, at least to me.

 

[Moviefreak]

I don't know enough about the laws behind CBS vs Axanar, but I'm wondering if this is partly a way to go into court and say, "See, we're defending our copyright against other groups." Also, the way CBS handled that helps their image, at least to me.

Absolutely! I said it earlier in this thread:
CBS will now try to set an example across the board and you can't blame them. Last thing they want when taking Axanar to court is to have it shown that they are letting other makers do the same thing and get away with it.

 

[Apollo]

:lol So wrong on so many levels :lol

Somebody like Elon Musk or Bill Gates could commission their own ST movie with a personal check for $200 million. They could have it done on Hollywood soundstages/etc by the whole JJA cast & crew.

As long as the movie was only shown to family & friends and it never got circulated around to 10,000 unrelated people, the studio probably wouldn't have a decent legal case against it. The project did not cost the studio any money no matter how big it was.

 

[mistymills]

I produce a Trek fan series called Osiris. We haven't released anything in a couple of years now because of issues involving money. No, it wasn't anything to do with crowdfunding, we've just had several of our cast and crew that have since gone union and to be in our production we would need to pay them. As such, we've ran into a problem of do we recast the roles or do we (since we have a few other unrelated and minor issues that have caused us delays) just gracefully bow out of the Osiris storyline and begin a new one. We've had preproduction conversations about what our new Trek show would be, but we've now put it all on hold because of this.

So please understand that I look at this from a different standpoint than majority of people as I do, in fact, have a horse in this race.

That said, we have always known that there is a possibility that we could get shut down at any time. The reason we started was specifically because we all wanted to play in the Star Trek sandbox. We wanted to tell our stories, we wanted to wear the uniform, we wanted to make a Trek storyline we all had a passion to tell. Sure, we could do a generic sci-fi story that isn't Trek, but that isn't why we started.

All along, we've had a hammer over our heads that could come down at any time. There have been well-published guidelines that we all abided by that were based on suggestions to some producers from the studio, mixed in with some common sense. Two of the biggest areas of those suggested guidelines have been: Money and Production Values. We knew that even showing an episode at a convention would go against it because people paid an admission to the convention, so we made a behind the scenes documentary to show instead of an episode. We never sold anything with our series name or logo on it. We don't own anything Star Trek. We knew that if the studio ever contacted us to stop, we'd have to stop. We'd seen other projects get the C&D long before Axanar was even thought of and all along we would strive to not give them any reason to send us one. We were the Hermione Granger of our world, never doing anything that might possibly get us into trouble, all in hopes that we'd still get to play in this universe.

Other projects began crowdfunding before Axanar. It's not something they came up with. Their amount of funds raised far exceeded any other project and they purposely monetized their product, selling Axanar-themed things and stating that the crowdfunding was being used to build a studio that would be for-profit even if Axanar itself was "not-for-profit." They repeatedly said it was an indie film and not a fan film. They talked about striving for production values that would rival an official project, meanwhile we never tried to put out anything that could be mistaken for an official Trek film or series.

We are now in a very difficult position because of this. All fan productions have been very supportive of each other in the past. We don't have any rivalries, some shows have even had crossover episodes and we're all in this because of a passion we have for the product. So it's hard to both support a project but also not support aspects of it (such as crowdfunding). It's hard to see someone talking about using almost two million dollars of fan money to build a studio and sets and collect a salary when you're dealing with your 'studio' being someone's basement corner with a green sheet behind you and driving over an hour one way to film and not even get gas money for it or spending hours a day for weeks on end per episode working your butt off unpaid in every second of spare time you have. It's hard to be a cheerleader for someone cheating on a test after you spent all week studying really hard for it. So when some of us speak out against the actions taken by Axanar, it's coming from a place that is hard to explain to outsiders, where we want both outcomes at the same time. We want them to make their product and put it out because we are ourselves fans of fan productions, but we also want them to not continue because they're getting away with breaking the rules and the law and in the process they're getting closer to the hammer being dropped on everyone who has struggled for so long simply for the love of the universe and playing in it.

 

[Moviefreak]

I produce a Trek fan series called Osiris. We haven't released anything in a couple of years now because of issues involving money. No, it wasn't anything to do with crowdfunding, we've just had several of our cast and crew that have since gone union and to be in our production we would need to pay them. As such, we've ran into a problem of do we recast the roles or do we (since we have a few other unrelated and minor issues that have caused us delays) just gracefully bow out of the Osiris storyline and begin a new one. We've had preproduction conversations about what our new Trek show would be, but we've now put it all on hold because of this.

So please understand that I look at this from a different standpoint than majority of people as I do, in fact, have a horse in this race.

That said, we have always known that there is a possibility that we could get shut down at any time. The reason we started was specifically because we all wanted to play in the Star Trek sandbox. We wanted to tell our stories, we wanted to wear the uniform, we wanted to make a Trek storyline we all had a passion to tell. Sure, we could do a generic sci-fi story that isn't Trek, but that isn't why we started.

All along, we've had a hammer over our heads that could come down at any time. There have been well-published guidelines that we all abided by that were based on suggestions to some producers from the studio, mixed in with some common sense. Two of the biggest areas of those suggested guidelines have been: Money and Production Values. We knew that even showing an episode at a convention would go against it because people paid an admission to the convention, so we made a behind the scenes documentary to show instead of an episode. We never sold anything with our series name or logo on it. We don't own anything Star Trek. We knew that if the studio ever contacted us to stop, we'd have to stop. We'd seen other projects get the C&D long before Axanar was even thought of and all along we would strive to not give them any reason to send us one. We were the Hermione Granger of our world, never doing anything that might possibly get us into trouble, all in hopes that we'd still get to play in this universe.

Other projects began crowdfunding before Axanar. It's not something they came up with. Their amount of funds raised far exceeded any other project and they purposely monetized their product, selling Axanar-themed things and stating that the crowdfunding was being used to build a studio that would be for-profit even if Axanar itself was "not-for-profit." They repeatedly said it was an indie film and not a fan film. They talked about striving for production values that would rival an official project, meanwhile we never tried to put out anything that could be mistaken for an official Trek film or series.

We are now in a very difficult position because of this. All fan productions have been very supportive of each other in the past. We don't have any rivalries, some shows have even had crossover episodes and we're all in this because of a passion we have for the product. So it's hard to both support a project but also not support aspects of it (such as crowdfunding). It's hard to see someone talking about using almost two million dollars of fan money to build a studio and sets and collect a salary when you're dealing with your 'studio' being someone's basement corner with a green sheet behind you and driving over an hour one way to film and not even get gas money for it or spending hours a day for weeks on end per episode working your butt off unpaid in every second of spare time you have. It's hard to be a cheerleader for someone cheating on a test after you spent all week studying really hard for it. So when some of us speak out against the actions taken by Axanar, it's coming from a place that is hard to explain to outsiders, where we want both outcomes at the same time. We want them to make their product and put it out because we are ourselves fans of fan productions, but we also want them to not continue because they're getting away with breaking the rules and the law and in the process they're getting closer to the hammer being dropped on everyone who has struggled for so long simply for the love of the universe and playing in it.

I think it all comes down to Axanar's handling of this. You and many others followed certain protocol and even a few crowdsourced things but didn't push the envelope. CBS was patient and lenient about things until this situation. Now the way things are heading, it looks like Axanar is ruining this for everybody and CBS is no longer allowing others to play in the sandbox, they are taking their bucket, shovel and all the sand home since they own it.

 

[asalaw]

Somebody like Elon Musk or Bill Gates could commission their own ST movie with a personal check for $200 million. They could have it done on Hollywood soundstages/etc by the whole JJA cast & crew.

As long as the movie was only shown to family & friends and it never got circulated around to 10,000 unrelated people, the studio probably wouldn't have a decent legal case against it. The project did not cost the studio any money no matter how big it was.

This is completely wrong in every particular.

There is no relationship between the number of people shown an infringing work and legal liablity. Infringement arises from making a copy of something you don't have a right to. Hence "copy right." A derivative work, one based on the protected work but telling an original story, is also an infringement if it's unauthorized. A movie made from a novel is a derivative work. All fan films are derivative works made without authorization, and therefore infringing.

The scope of the infringement really only matters when it comes to damages, and in the case of Axanar, there are statutory damages available to the studios of up to $150,000 per work infringed. There could also be punitive damages, and I'm fairly sure there's no federal cap on those. So the sky's probably the limit there.

So in the above scenario, Musk and Gates would get their pants sued off, and lose very, very big.

 

[batguy]

So in the above scenario, Musk and Gates would get their pants sued off, and lose very, very big.

I'm not seeing the part where the studio loses any money off the movie that was made.

If I pay my friend $100 to write up & draw me a ST graphic novel, do I owe Paramount money? It's $200m cheaper than a personally funded JJA movie but it's the same principle.

 

[ghostryder]

http://www.newsweek.com/star-trek-fan-fiction-451320

 

[asalaw]

http://www.newsweek.com/star-trek-fan-fiction-451320

Nice piece.

 

[Edraven99]

I'm not seeing the part where the studio loses any money off the movie that was made.

If I pay my friend $100 to write up & draw me a ST graphic novel, do I owe Paramount money? It's $200m cheaper than a personally funded JJA movie but it's the same principle.

I think you're missing the point here... to use your example... you write and draw a graphic novel and sell it for $100... some dude commissions another graphic artist to draw him a novel using your concept, ideas and characters for $50.

That's $50 that someone else has now profited from using your ideas and characters and your efforts that you won't see a dollar of.

To go back to your other example, Bill Gates commissions a movie for $200 million and people get to see it for free... regardless of whether it's 10 people of 10,000 people, it's potential revenue lost for the studio... because why would someone pay $16 to go to the theatre to see a big budget production of Star Trek when I can just go over to my buddy Bill's house and watch one for free?

 

[Moviefreak]

I think you're missing the point here... to use your example... you write and draw a graphic novel and sell it for $100... some dude commissions another graphic artist to draw him a novel using your concept, ideas and characters for $50.

That's $50 that someone else has now profited from using your ideas and characters and your efforts that you won't see a dollar of.

To go back to your other example, Bill Gates commissions a movie for $200 million and people get to see it for free... regardless of whether it's 10 people of 10,000 people, it's potential revenue lost for the studio... because why would someone pay $16 to go to the theatre to see a big budget production of Star Trek when I can just go over to my buddy Bill's house and watch one for free?

You are wasting your time and breath here. There are just some fans of franchises out there that feel there are loopholes in everything. Be it Axanar, or an independent mask making company. You go read their Facebook posts about C&Ds they received from major studios who own the IP on the property, and they as well as their fans call it all BS and tell them to "fight back" and "stand your ground". You try to explain the law to them and it is like talking to a wall. They miss the fact that the IP holder OWNS everything associated to their property. Sure people seem to have gotten away with stuff for years, but by no means does that mean it is because they had a right to violate that law. The studios tend to be lenient within reason, but at any time they can decide to go after people and that is their right. They just get that, because you know... There's loopholes! :lol

 

[batguy]

I think you're missing the point here... to use your example... you write and draw a graphic novel and sell it for $100... some dude commissions another graphic artist to draw him a novel using your concept, ideas and characters for $50.

That's $50 that someone else has now profited from using your ideas and characters and your efforts that you won't see a dollar of.

To go back to your other example, Bill Gates commissions a movie for $200 million and people get to see it for free... regardless of whether it's 10 people of 10,000 people, it's potential revenue lost for the studio... because why would someone pay $16 to go to the theatre to see a big budget production of Star Trek when I can just go over to my buddy Bill's house and watch one for free?

You are wasting your time and breath here. There are just some fans of franchises out there that feel there are loopholes in everything. Be it Axanar, or an independent mask making company. You go read their Facebook posts about C&Ds they received from major studios who own the IP on the property, and they as well as their fans call it all BS and tell them to "fight back" and "stand your ground". You try to explain the law to them and it is like talking to a wall. They miss the fact that the IP holder OWNS everything associated to their property. Sure people seem to have gotten away with stuff for years, but by no means does that mean it is because they had a right to violate that law. The studios tend to be lenient within reason, but at any time they can decide to go after people and that is their right. They just get that, because you know... There's loopholes!

I don't feel entitled to profit off anyone else's IP. It's not about loopholes. Quite the contrary, I am thinking of the principles involved here.


I feel entitled to make or fund my own artwork and share it a few friends/family. That is what would be happening if a rich MoFo commissioned his own personal ST movie.

In theory it doesn't matter if the rich guy spent the yearly GDP of a small country. What matters is that the work was not exhibited for a profit, nor was it widely seen in general. The IP owner's potential profits were not threatened in any way.



I agree that IP owners do have rights over some fan-made works that are not technically sold for a profit. If a fan-made work is widely viewed then in theory it could influence public opinion about the IP (in the creative sense) and/or reduce ticket sales of the official stuff. That could potentially cost the IP holder money.

So far the big movie studios have mostly been looking the other way on fan-made stuff. I guess they expect to profit off the fans' goodwill & enthusiasm this stuff generates more than it costs them (almost always true). But the IP holders are allowing this to happen by choice. It's not a right that fans are automatically entitled to.




The Axanar project set out to combine too much quality + too much widespread viewership. They needed to compromise one or the other if they expected the studio to keep looking the other way.

 

[asalaw]

I think you're missing the point here... to use your example... you write and draw a graphic novel and sell it for $100... some dude commissions another graphic artist to draw him a novel using your concept, ideas and characters for $50.

That's $50 that someone else has now profited from using your ideas and characters and your efforts that you won't see a dollar of.

To go back to your other example, Bill Gates commissions a movie for $200 million and people get to see it for free... regardless of whether it's 10 people of 10,000 people, it's potential revenue lost for the studio... because why would someone pay $16 to go to the theatre to see a big budget production of Star Trek when I can just go over to my buddy Bill's house and watch one for free?

That's a nice explanation of the economic policy behind IP rights, actually.

And it applies in calculating damages. Let's assume away statutory damages here, and just deal with actual monetary damages. There are two ways a studio could prove damages: either by showing its own actual financial losses resulting from the infringement, or by showing how much money the infringer made from selling the infringing work.

As you might imagine, this is extremely difficult for a little guy suing a big company that stole his work. So that's why the law also has statutory damages. Our little guy doesn't have to pay big bucks to have an army of lawyers go digging through the big company's records (which is what I do for a living) to prove his damages. It levels the playing field.

Of course, it's also available to big companies, and they can use it as a hammer to discourage infringing little guys. Or infringing not-so-little guys, such as Axanar. Some swords have a double edge.

 

[batguy]

Even a million-dollar fan movie isn't likely to hurt Paramount's bottom line enough to bother with the legal costs. But setting a precedent is very important in the longer term. I'm sure Paramount is thinking they have to draw the line somewhere and this project is asking for it.

 

[Solo4114]

I don't feel entitled to profit off anyone else's IP. It's not about loopholes. Quite the contrary, I am thinking of the principles involved here.


I feel entitled to make or fund my own artwork and share it a few friends/family. That is what would be happening if a rich MoFo commissioned his own personal ST movie.

In theory it doesn't matter if the rich guy spent the yearly GDP of a small country. What matters is that the work was not exhibited for a profit, nor was it widely seen in general. The IP owner's potential profits were not threatened in any way.



I agree that IP owners do have rights over some fan-made works that are not technically sold for a profit. If a fan-made work is widely viewed then in theory it could influence public opinion about the IP (in the creative sense) and/or reduce ticket sales of the official stuff. That could potentially cost the IP holder money.

So far the big movie studios have mostly been looking the other way on fan-made stuff. I guess they expect to profit off the fans' goodwill & enthusiasm this stuff generates more than it costs them (almost always true). But the IP holders are allowing this to happen by choice. It's not a right that fans are automatically entitled to.

There's a little more to it than that.

IP law, generally speaking, is designed to protect the rights-holder (assumed to be the creator, although creators can transfer their rights, and that doesn't address works-for-hire) to allow the rights-holder the maximum ability to control the work they create. PART of that is the profit aspect, but a big part of it is just about control. Most people instinctively "get" the "you made money off of it" argument. What they don't get is "you messed with the owner's exclusive control."

So, consider the following scenario.

I'm Al Gore. I decide to make another environmental movie, only this time it's a sci-fi film. I spend $180 million making my movie. I then intentionally give it to theaters to show it for free, using a portion of the $180 million as my marketing budget to pay for the costs for showtimes. I set up a deal with the movie theaters that requires them to show the film only under certain conditions. What kind of sound set-up, color balance for the display, a speech given at the beginning of each show, etc. Someone comes to the movie with a handheld digicam, shoots a copy, and uploads it to the Youtubes. I sue the crap out of them. They say "But I didn't make any money off of it!!" Not the point. The point is that I'M the one with exclusive control of the work, under the law. I get to decide how and when and where my movie is shown. I get to decide whether any merchandise is sold based on my movie. I control ALL of it. If someone took my movie and -- without my permission -- made a sequel or a side-story or whatever, they're still stepping on my exclusive rights. Even if, say, Greenpeace takes my movie and makes a sequel, or a spinoff featuring the same characters or set in the same fictional universe or whatever, it's still entirely up to me whether Greenpeace is allowed to make the movie. Even if Greenpeace is "on my side" or whathaveyou, I chose to make the movie on my own and not include them for whatever reason. It's all up to me, and Greenpeace has screwed with my control. The law protects that: it protects my exclusive control of the work.

The Axanar project set out to combine too much quality + too much widespread viewership. They needed to compromise one or the other if they expected the studio to keep looking the other way.

Even a million-dollar fan movie isn't likely to hurt Paramount's bottom line enough to bother with the legal costs. But setting a precedent is very important in the longer term. I'm sure Paramount is thinking they have to draw the line somewhere and this project is asking for it.

Bingo. Most of the time, the studios turn a blind eye to this because (A) it's too much of a pain to pay to send out C&Ds (which, by the way, aren't legally binding or anything. They're just "nastygrams," basically, but they suggest much worse consequences to come.), and (B) because the fan films aren't enough of a threat in any way, and (C) they don't want to risk the goodwill of their fans by crushing EVERY fan-driven project. But mostly (A). It's just too expensive and time consuming.

Axanar, though, put itself squarely within Paramounts sights, and practically dared Paramount to come after it. It is, quite simply, mind-boggling that they actually thought they'd get away with it.

 

[mistymills]

Well, yes, but they've proven to be supportive of fan projects to the point where they brought in Michael Gummelt to pitch his idea for the new Star Trek series based on his own fan series.

This is a very specific sort of case, though, where they would typically not interact with the fan projects at all because of the potential of crossover infringement issues, but it's an important aspect to keep in mind. This is why I get so irritated when I see people say that the lawsuit is just because they're against their fans and fan productions. This is not true. It's all about claiming their copyright and exercising their rights to it.

 

[mkstewartesq]

The Axanar project set out to combine too much quality + too much widespread viewership. They needed to compromise one or the other if they expected the studio to keep looking the other way.

Um. no. "If they expected the studio to keep looking the other way", they needed to not (i) bill the project as the first "officially sanctioned" fan-film, (ii) attempt to create a full-on tie-in merchandising push (Axanar Coffee, Axanar model kits, t-shirts and other Axanar-branded items), or (iii) openly promote the project as a stepping-stone (and funding source for) an operating studio that would then be used for for-profit productions and the creation of a new online distribution channel.

People who attempt to dumb this down into a simple calculus of "they made a movie but they didn't charge people to see it" are just simply ignoring all of the other (IMHO egregious) factors present in the Axanar case that forced CBS' and Paramount's hands here. This was not a simple "let's make a movie and show our friends" scenario - it was a pretty open effort to leverage the film into a mini-franchise of sorts (complete with merchandising spin-offs) as well as the launch-pad for other commercial ventures that most likely would never had been funded without the initial Star Trek connection.

M

 

[Solo4114]

Um. no. "If they expected the studio to keep looking the other way", they needed to not (i) bill the project as the first "officially sanctioned" fan-film, (ii) attempt to create a full-on tie-in merchandising push (Axanar Coffee, Axanar model kits, t-shirts and other Axanar-branded items), or (iii) openly promote the project as a stepping-stone (and funding source for) an operating studio that would then be used for for-profit productions and the creation of a new online distribution channel.

People who attempt to dumb this down into a simple calculus of "they made a movie but they didn't charge people to see it" are just simply ignoring all of the other (IMHO egregious) factors present in the Axanar case that forced CBS' and Paramount's hands here. This was not a simple "let's make a movie and show our friends" scenario - it was a pretty open effort to leverage the film into a mini-franchise of sorts (complete with merchandising spin-offs) as well as the launch-pad for other commercial ventures that most likely would never had been funded without the initial Star Trek connection.

M

My point was more "Even if all they did was make a movie and show it for free," that's still infringement. People get all hung up on the profit angle of infringement and ignore the control angle. Although, in this case, the profit angle was also significant and egregious (and really, really stupid).

 

[mkstewartesq]

My point was more "Even if all they did was make a movie and show it for free," that's still infringement. People get all hung up on the profit angle of infringement and ignore the control angle. Although, in this case, the profit angle was also significant and egregious (and really, really stupid).

Dan - my post wasn't in reply to yours - and I agree with all your points. Mine was more a comment on the the myopic view that seems to pervade many of the discussions around Axanar - in effect, that the only issue at play is a binary correlation between "did they make a fan film" and "did they profit directly from the fan film?". I was merely pointing out that it was neither Axanar's quality nor the volume of their audience that ultimately drew CBS's eyes here. Instead, it was likely all of their conduct that went beyond "just making a fan film" - the things that other fan film makers historically haven't done because it obviously crosses a line - that made Axanar the case that CBS decided to take a stance on.

Best,
M

 

[The Terminator]

Well, yes, but they've proven to be supportive of fan projects to the point where they brought in Michael Gummelt to pitch his idea for the new Star Trek series based on his own fan series.

This is a very specific sort of case, though, where they would typically not interact with the fan projects at all because of the potential of crossover infringement issues, but it's an important aspect to keep in mind. This is why I get so irritated when I see people say that the lawsuit is just because they're against their fans and fan productions. This is not true. It's all about claiming their copyright and exercising their rights to it.

They even used fan scripts for TNG, not to mention, even hired fans.