copyfight – Page 19

CONAN attacks fans

SFFaudio News

Meego Conan An intellectual property company has been harassing fans that were making audio versions of public domain Robert E. Howard CONAN stories.

They’d keep going, but the new fucked-up New Zealand copyright law will shut down their whole operation if the company complains.

Broken Sea Audio Productions, headquartered in New Zealand, has shut down all their Robert E. Howard projects after receiving another threatening letter from the lawyers for Conan Properties International LLC (aka Paradox Entertainment).

CPI is the limited liability company that claims all licensing powers over works by Robert E. Howard worldwide.

The whole situation is absolutely rotten. CPI is muscling a non-profit audio drama fan group that makes audio dramas and audiobooks, for fun, out of public domain stories, all so it can defend its trademark on “CONAN: The Barbarian” (the stories for which are in the PUBLIC DOMAIN).

Things might look different were it not for the horrendous new legislation set to be implemented on ~~February 28th, 2009~~ March 27th, 2009 in New Zealand. The new NZ law makes websites that are accused of infringement subject to arbitrary-ISP pulldowns.

Here is the most recent letter from CPI/Paradox Entertainment |PDF| in its entirety.

What make this all the worse is that its an echo of a fight BSAP, in NZ, had thought it had already won. See, back in August 2008 BSAP received a similar cease and desist letter from the same firm. In that letter CPI threatened a lawsuit over the use of “CONAN” (for which they claim a trademark)…

In response to it BSAP removed their unique, but still offending, “CONAN” logo and the CPI lawyers sent a follow-up letter. Saying…

CPI Lawyer Letter #2

After that, with the Conan audiobooks and audio dramas no longer displaying any “CONAN” label, all seemed well for the non-profit audio drama group. Paul Mannering, and staff, continued to cast Conan fans as voice actors and work on the script for a new audio dramatization based on another Robert E. Howard public domain work, Hour Of The Dragon.

Later, in November 2008, something rather cool happened. Paul Mannering got an email from the CPI/Paradox’s branding department offering BSAP a free “CONAN” license. It was to be a “royalty free” license too, that would forever keep a threat of lawsuit from CPI/Paradox at bay and allow BSAP to brand its Conan audio as “CONAN” audio.

But then, just yesterday, an unexpected email from the CPI lawyers arrived…

…dashing the possibility of a license AND renewing the threat of a lawsuit…

…

It seems to me that given that the Robert E. Howard stories are PUBLIC DOMAIN, that Howard is 73 years dead, had no spouse, nor children, that Broken Sea is giving away their productions to Robert E. Howard’s Conan fans – only one judgment is reasonable:

CPI LLC/Paradox Entertainment is being an asshole.

And that’s the situation as it now stands. All future BSAP audiobooks and audio dramatizations based on the PUBLIC DOMAIN writings of Robert E. Howard are canceled – or at least it’s all put on hold until someone can offer some legal advice to Paul Mannering and the Broken Sea creative team.

Posted by Jesse Willis

If this blog had a lawn…

SFFaudio Commentary

Three reasons to vote NDP:

1. A prime minister named Jack would be very cool. A bald PM named Jack would be even cooler. A bald PM who’s a terrific leader is even cooler. A gloriously bald PM named Jack, who doesn’t need no damn sweater, and who is well mustachioed – that would be the coolest.

2. MP Charlie Angus talks smart on copyright and net neutrality. We need smart.

3. NDP supports CBC. CBC good.

Posted by Jesse Willis

CBC Radio One’s IDEAS: Who Owns Ideas?

SFFaudio Online Audio

Just in time to educate voters and candidates about Bill C-61 and the upcoming federal election, CBC Radio One’s Ideas has posted an hour long |MP3| on the topic of Who Owns Ideas?. They talk to lots of folks including SF authors Eric Flint, Cory Doctorow, and about Baen Books and Random House. Podcast listeners take note, this particular show isn’t in the regular podcast feed (which is sadly still only podcasting one show out of five).

[via BoingBoing]

Posted by Jesse Willis

P.S. Free Apocalypse Al!

WALL-E, a Bill C-61 copyright criminal.

SFFaudio Online Audio

WALL-E, copyright criminal.

I just saw Pixar/Disney’s WALL·E.

What a sweet and wonderful film!

The theatre was full of kids, many of whom were absolutely terrified when it looked like WALL-E might die.

Have a listen to the director, Andrew Stanton, talk to reporters about his movie |MP3|. Stanton makes no bones about this being an homage to many of his favorite flicks. And it’s true, there are so many SF references in it. At one point Stanton even says ‘I wanted this to be “R2D2 the movie.”‘ I think he really nailed that.

But the really sad part, the part none of those young kids in the theatre knew, the truly despicable part, is that poor Wall-E would be deemed a dirty copyright criminal under Canada’s new copyright law. Bill C-61 would criminalize much of Wally’s behavior in the film. Now that’s something to really cry about!

Here’s the evidence against WALL-E documented in the movie (**SPOILER WARNING**):

1. WALL-E records audio from his favorite movie, Hello Dolly, putting in onto his own digital recorder (bypassing the macrovision DRM on the tape). A COPYRIGHT CRIME UNDER C-61

2. WALL-E archives the audio, he doesn’t merely time-shift it. He listens repeatedly! A COPYRIGHT CRIME UNDER C-61

3. WALL-E shares his DRM-broken music with his friend, another robot named EVE. A COPYRIGHT CRIME UNDER C-61

4. WALL-E watches Hello Dolly on multiple evenings, on the screen of an iPod. Hello Dolly is not available through the iTunes store, therefore he broke the videocassette DRM when he platform shifted it. A COPYRIGHT CRIME UNDER C-61

If for no other reason than to save the poor tear-drop eyed robot from being destroyed we should stop Bill C-61!

Posted by Jesse Willis

UPDATE: Here’s a terrific interview with with MP Charlie Angus (the NDP parliamentary critic on digital issues) – it mentions this post and lots of other great points about the utter terribleness of C-61.|MP3|

UPDATE: This post, or at least the graphic made for it, will be used by Marcia Wilbur, in a talk called “A Decade Under the DMCA,” which will be presented at The Last Hope which is a long-running hacker conference in New York on Sunday July 20th!

UPDATE: Here’s the Power Point Presentation by Marcia Wilbur, as was used in her presentation at the Last Hope hacker conference in New York on Sunday July 20th 2008. It covers the fallout of 10 years of the USA’s Digital Millennium Copyright Act (which is the US equivilent of Bill C-61) |POWERPOINT PRESENTATION|

Copyfighting (and Hugo Winning) Science Fiction from Spider Robinson: Melancholy Elephants

OnlineAudio

The Spider On The Web podcast, has a terrific Hugo winning story from 1982! This is a story made for BoingBoing.net, its creative commons licensed, a Heinleinesque Science Fiction tale in which a shadowy killer meets with a corrupt senator who’s been paid to back a proposed copyright extension bill. As Robinson sez “Copyright is a hot-button topic these days. Does information want to be free…or just reasonably priced?” Find out the answer, in this FREE tale. Spider Robinson is amazing, as writer and narrator both!

Melancholy Elephants
By Spider Robinson; Read by Spider Robinson
1 |MP3| – Approx. 34 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Podcast: Spider On The Web
Podcaster: November 17th 2007
“She sat zazen, concentrating on not concentrating, until it was time to prepare for the appointment. Sitting seemed to produce the usual serenity, put everything in perspective. Her hand did not tremble as she applied her make-up; tranquil features looked back at her from the mirror. She was mildly surprised, in fact, at just how calm she was, until she got out of the hotel elevator at the garage level and the mugger made his play. She killed him instead of disabling him. Which was obviously not a measured, balanced action–the official fuss and paperwork could make her late. Annoyed at herself, she stuffed the corpse under a shiny new Westinghouse roadable whose owner she knew to be in Luna, and continued on to her own car. This would have to be squared later, and it would cost. No help for it–she fought to regain at least the semblance of tranquility as her car emerged from the garage and turned north. Nothing must interfere with this meeting, or with her role in it.”

Grab the podcast feed here:

http://www.spiderrobinson.com/iTunes_feed.xml

Posted by Jesse Willis