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Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

nytimes.com

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Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#81

Post by toss1 »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #78
pikminguy wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're mixing up patents, copyright, and plagiarism. Similar but not the same ideas. Copyright exists to protect a creator's right to the proceeds of their creative output. Copyright is pretty broad. If I tell a different story with your characters I'm still violating copyright. Patents exist to protect an inventor's right to the proceeds of their invention. If you invent a true hoverboard and I buy one, reverse engi…

You are totally missing the point - the point made in the previous post was, that intellectual labour should be rewarded with some sort of IP, so that the creator of it is rewarded. The categorisation of different types of IP is not fundamental. The counterpoint I made is that we do not reward some types of intellectual labour at all. And some of the greatest contributions to humanity are of the type, that is not rew…

>>Authors of scientific intellectual labour are currently unfairly exploited and should be compensated

Yup, that is very true.

And it's why a number of universities are creating patent offices to help their scientists commercialize their works (with the university getting a share; I'm not up to date on how fair the sharing is)

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#82

Post by autoexec »

sugarkjube wrote: post #42
duskwuff wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that it's an extreme step, but given that the creator of the work was trying to use it to extort both the Tolkien estate and Amazon, confiscating the work to prevent further abuse is understandable. Also, the book was submitted as an exhibit in the court case, so you can read it there. It's genuinely awful. Nothing of value is being lost here. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cacd.88...

This is hilarious. So the judge forbids him to further distribute the book he wrote, but now publishes and distributes it on his behalf. For free. Go figure. Can the court now be considered guilty of violating copyright ?

I have a copy now, and I'd never even heard of this fanfic before today. Not sure that the system is working as intended...

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#83

Post by autoexec »

forgetfreeman wrote: post #38
sickofparadox wrote: post #2

I think it is unconscionable that we can use the force of the state to coerce someone to delete ALL copies of a work they created. I'm fairly anti-copyright but I get that they probably shouldn't be able to sell the books (even though the author has been in the ground for decades), fine. Give them a fine, write up a ticket, community service or whatever, but deleting everything just seems so brutish.

Pfft. This is a classic example of fuck around and find out. Dude decided to try to sidecar one of the most beloved canons in recorded history instead of coming up with his own IP, then decided suing the estate that controls said IP was his ticket to a life of luxury. Biting the hand that feeds doesn't even begin, they should have been profoundly grateful that the estate tolerated their existence up until that point.

I'd have a lot more sympathy for the guy if he wasn't selling his fanfic.

On the other hand, I'm not sure if we should be thrilled with the idea of companies searching though all the fanfic they can find with the intention of stealing fan's original ideas and storylines and then suing anyone who complains about it either.

In the end, it's copyright that needs significant reform. Under a sane system of copyright tolkien's works would already be in the public domain and this guy would have been well within his rights to sell his story and sue if his original contributions were used without his permission. Given how things are currently though I can't see things playing out any differently.

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#84

Post by _nalply »

jabroni_salad wrote: post #20
sickofparadox wrote: post #2

I think it is unconscionable that we can use the force of the state to coerce someone to delete ALL copies of a work they created. I'm fairly anti-copyright but I get that they probably shouldn't be able to sell the books (even though the author has been in the ground for decades), fine. Give them a fine, write up a ticket, community service or whatever, but deleting everything just seems so brutish.

This person tried to sue the estate for copyright infringement to the tune of $250M because he thinks think they lifted something out of his fanfiction for Rings of Power, as if he somehow had ownership of Tolkien's setting. This was just a countersuit because he put himself on their radar in the dumbest way possible. play stupid games win stupid prizes. There are plenty of fanfictions that go to market safely by fil…

So a case of reformatio in peius [0]?

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reformatio_in_peius

EDIT: in some (or perhaps many) countries this is explicitly forbidden in many cases.

One explicit legal norm in Germany: § 331 StPO: Verbot der Verschlechterung (Penal rules of procedure: prohibition of pejoration)

Switzerland also knows the prohibition of reformatio in peius in many cases but it stems from the legal maxime that in some trial types the judge never goes beyond what the party has requested, but this is a double-edged sword: on one hand you are protected from reformatio in peius but on the other hand you miss out on opportunities you did not think about and therefore did not request. Sometimes the judge even maliciously adds to the decision that there was a right to something but it won't be granted because it was not requested.

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#85

Post by pikminguy »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #78
pikminguy wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're mixing up patents, copyright, and plagiarism. Similar but not the same ideas. Copyright exists to protect a creator's right to the proceeds of their creative output. Copyright is pretty broad. If I tell a different story with your characters I'm still violating copyright. Patents exist to protect an inventor's right to the proceeds of their invention. If you invent a true hoverboard and I buy one, reverse engi…

You are totally missing the point - the point made in the previous post was, that intellectual labour should be rewarded with some sort of IP, so that the creator of it is rewarded. The categorisation of different types of IP is not fundamental. The counterpoint I made is that we do not reward some types of intellectual labour at all. And some of the greatest contributions to humanity are of the type, that is not rew…

I understood your previous post to be arguing against copyright on the basis of scientific work not counting. If you meant copyright is fine but the way we compensate scientific work is bad then I agree. It's a complex issue because I don't think you should be able to copyright a factual claim but I do think scientific work should be better compensated. I don't know of a solution to that problem but I would be eager to hear one.

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#86

Post by ndsipa_pomu »

ShamelessC wrote: post #48
ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I certainly do for certain film and tv series that have been banned or cancelled (e.g. Disney's Song of the South).

That’s quite strange.

It's kind of a hobby, but generally known as datahoarding.

Just this morning, I've been trying to find a copy of the "Science Fiction" series (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1380838/) that has Cliff Stoll's "Cuckoo Egg" tale for the first episode. Unfortunately, can't find it and it may well disappear as "Yorkshire Television" no longer exists as a separate entity. (It's not banned - just obscure enough to vanish)

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#87

Post by forgetfreeman »

autoexec wrote: post #83
forgetfreeman wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pfft. This is a classic example of fuck around and find out. Dude decided to try to sidecar one of the most beloved canons in recorded history instead of coming up with his own IP, then decided suing the estate that controls said IP was his ticket to a life of luxury. Biting the hand that feeds doesn't even begin, they should have been profoundly grateful that the estate tolerated their existence up until that point.

I'd have a lot more sympathy for the guy if he wasn't selling his fanfic. On the other hand, I'm not sure if we should be thrilled with the idea of companies searching though all the fanfic they can find with the intention of stealing fan's original ideas and storylines and then suing anyone who complains about it either. In the end, it's copyright that needs significant reform. Under a sane system of copyright tolki…

Right? Like the guy said, "If there's a new way I'll be the first in line, but it better work this time."

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#88

Post by runeofdoom »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #59
ceejayoz wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No; we take away your hammers. It's quite an old approach.

Taking away the hammer would placing the fanwork into public domain. Here, we are specifically destroying the hammer as a punishment.

It is, for all practical purposes. The court posted the whole thing in an official document.

Re: Tolkien estate wins court order to destroy fan's 'Lord of the Rings' sequel

#89

Post by RecycledEle »

rocmcd wrote: post #55
RecycledEle wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These allegations sound similar to the Mexican Inn Cafe Tragedy. Details deleted, sorry. Thank You, American Courts. \s Who is right does not matter in court if someone who is rich enough stands to lose enough money.

Do you have any citations for this case? I haven't been able to find anything that mentions such a court case (or anything mentioning connections between the Mexican Inn and the Frito Company).

No. Judge Carr is too smart and too crooked to leave any trace in the 5th Circuit Court.
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