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

Post by wageslave99 » Thu, Dec 21, 2023, 5:27 PM UTC

chasil wrote: post #10

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.

A similar action was taken with the 1922 film Nosferatu , but prints of the film survived. I would wager that the current work will also avoid destruction. "Even with several details altered, Stoker's heirs sued over the adaptation, and a court ruling ordered all copies of the film to be destroyed. However, several prints of Nosferatu survived, and the film came to be regarded as an influential masterpiece of cinema…

Post by squidbeak » Thu, Dec 21, 2023, 5:28 PM UTC

duskwuff wrote: post #5

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.

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...

Post by spywaregorilla » Thu, Dec 21, 2023, 5:28 PM UTC

luma wrote: post #15

ycombinatrix wrote: post #12

this is really depressing to read

Read the facts of the case, I am strongly anti-copyright but this dude is just an asshole and has earned every bit of this.

Post by forgetfreeman » Thu, Dec 21, 2023, 5:29 PM UTC

ToucanLoucan wrote: post #34

s1artibartfast wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think us courts for courts should be in the business of handing out stupid prizes. Instead, they should be measured and consistent with our longstanding social agreements. Someone has to be the adult in the room and seek the moral high ground.

Courts aren't moral entities, they're legal ones. This person went out of their way to put a completely unnecessary legal target on their back. This is absolutely 100% a stupid prizes scenario. I love fan creation and believe it should be enshrined properly in fair use doctrine, but god damn, I cannot imagine being stupid enough to make fan work of an IP and then sue the IP holder because I think they took my idea. H…

Post by wageslave99 » Thu, Dec 21, 2023, 5:30 PM UTC