OT:Jackill

[Shoshuro]

I don't know if it's been discussed before.

Jackill has released an updated Jackill's Guide to Starships Vol.1.
$24.95 for a 160 page book, 2 shuttles and 5 starships added.

You can order it Here if your interested. There is also a PDF sample of the ships included (side comparison).

[Ergi]

Does anybody know what's in there? Just exterior blueprints?

[Sho-sa Kurita]

Given that he has no license, he can't legally sell the thing. But I know a lot of folk don't care about that.

EDIT: Unless he's not in the U.S. I guess, then it would depend on country. Oi!

[Ergi]

Given that he has no license, he can't legally sell the thing.

I thought the same thing. But I don't believe that you can circumvent Paramounts intellectual property rights simply by being based outside the US. I suppose that in pretty much all countries you can watch Star Trek, there is a legal way to stop IP violations.

BTW, he lives in Texas.

[Phoenix]

BTW, he lives in Texas.

Like we said, OUT SIDE the U.S.

As for the question, he cannot sell the produce with out some form of writen agreement with Paramount or maybe Armadillo. (do they still have the old SFB licence?)

[AngryTree]

Because the product is a reference work, it may be protected under U.S. fair use, which allows use of copyrighted works for "criticism [and] comment." Whether statting out the Enterprise counts as "comment" on Paramount's IP is an iffy question, but ultimately is a moot point.

(From Wikipedia: Copyright Infringement)
The failure of a copyright holder to bring a timely lawsuit against known infringers may later block such a claim by establishing an implied license, as may other acts or omissions that could informally signal consent to use the work.

"Unauthorized" Trek reference works have been produced and sold for almost as long as there's been Trek. There's pretty much nothing Paramount can do about it now.

[Shoshuro]

Also consider that he's come out with 3 books on starships (yeah, I know there was another on shuttles, but still, these are solely Trek).

And to answer one question, the stats normally contain 3 sided shiloutte(sp) shots, along with ships names/numbers (majority unofficial and conjecture of course). It also details weapons, crew information, tonnage, dates in service, etc. No matter if you use LUG/FASA/Coda, there is more then enough information to write up a ship and toss it into a game.

if anyone wants I'll try scanning a page or two out of the book I have and putting it up as a sample.


edit to add:
Oh, and I have talked to him before (2003, 2004?) he doesn't mind rpg fans writing up his ships for their games, he just asks that it be noted where the ship came from.

[TFVanguard]

One very quick word of advice, never ever rely on Wikipedia for legal advice. Ever.

Paramount isn't suing Jackill for thee sole reasons:
1) The amount of monetary damage provably sustained is miniscule at best.

2) Jackill couldn't even afford to pay Paramount's attorney's fees, much less any amount of an infringment suit.

3) The bad publicity on suing a fan site would outweight even a successful suit. Even a mere 'cease and desist' flurry in the early 1990s got fans outraged and cost Paramount's reputation plenty.

It is not because Jackill has any sort of implied license. And, to date, I'm unaware that any fan site has ever invoked that 'protection' in court and won.

So, in short, never rely on Wikipedia for legal issues.

[AngryTree]

1) The amount of monetary damage provably sustained is miniscule at best.

The nature of copyright law is "use it or lose it." The actual amount of monetary damage, while not irrelevant, is not the point of copyright suit. The IP holder brings action to protect their exclusive rights, which otherwise may be diminished by allowing a copyright infringement to continue.

2) Jackill couldn't even afford to pay Paramount's attorney's fees, much less any amount of an infringment suit.

You are almost certainly right, which would indicate to me to that a simple cease and desist letter from the Paramount legal department would be enough to stop Jackill. (I actually assumed that since he went several years without publishing, he wasn't putting out any more books because he had received a c&d letter.) The fact that he is continuing with putting out the book means that either he has not received said letter, or that he has, and he is independently wealthy and has a copyright attorney on retainer

It's possible that he hasn't received a letter because Paramount hasn't noticed his possible IP violation; however, given that he's already had three books published, I'd consider that unlikely.

3) The bad publicity on suing a fan site would outweight even a successful suit. Even a mere 'cease and desist' flurry in the early 1990s got fans outraged and cost Paramount's reputation plenty.

When you say fans, you are talking about at most a couple of thousand people. The vast majority of Trek fans (numbering in the millions) were blissfully unaware of any sort of dispute over IP rights, and continued to buy anything and everything Trek. The loss of income from those couple thousand people might hurt, but the loss of being able to enforce your copyright would hurt a lot more in the long run. (And, how many of those people actually quit Trek altogether, and never came back. Pitifully few, I'll bet)

It is not because Jackill has any sort of implied license. And, to date, I'm unaware that any fan site has ever invoked that 'protection' in court and won.

But we aren't talking about fan sites. We aren't even talking about the cheesy fan-produced, stapled-together "tech manuals" that you see at conventions. We're talking about a professionally-bound, illustrated book with an implied connection to Paramount's established universe that directly infringes on one of Paramount's exclusive rights under copyright law: the right to create derivative works based on the original work (See the U.S. Copyright office.) Every one of Jackill's books that are bought means that there are $25 less dollars going to buy books licensed by Paramount (including a directly competing product, Starship Spotter). If Paramount could stop Jackill from publishing, they would. Even if the amount of damage is small (or even nonexistent). Even if he couldn't afford the damages that the court levied against him. Even if it damaged their reputation with the fans. If they could stop him, they absolutely would.

So, in short, never rely on Wikipedia for legal issues.

I'd actually extend that statement, and say never rely on the internet for advice on legal issues.

When replying, I thought I remembered that lack of action in prior copyright infringements might be a factor in future cases, so I did a quick Google search, and Wikipedia had a concise sentence that summed up the idea. (It also didn't help that I didn't know the correct term). I'm sure that if I continued looking, I could have come up with the federal statute and/or court decisions that outline that principle. Just because it came from Wikipedia does not mean that it's incorrect, just that it needs to be verified by other sources.

Here are some other sources that confirm what I'm talking about:

Any infringement action must be brought within three years after the infringement occurs. {FN82: 17 U.S.C. §507(b)} But in many instances, the infringement is of a continuing nature, such as distributing copies or performing the work. For example, consider the making of a large number of infringing copies and distributing them until all the copies have been sold. If it is over three years since the copies were made, the copyright owner can’t sue for infringement of the reproduction right but can sue for infringement of the distribution right if any copies were sold within the previous three years.

However, if the copyright owner acts in such a way as to lead people to believe that he or she will not bring an infringement suit, such as ignoring open infringement for a long time, with no other reason preventing him from bringing suit, a legal principle called “laches” may prevent a later suit. The determination is very fact-intensive, based on the actions (or lack of action) of the copyright owner, the amount of delay, and the prejudice worked against the infringer by the delay.

laches
n. the legal doctrine that a legal right or claim will not be enforced or allowed if a long delay in asserting the right or claim has prejudiced the adverse party (hurt the opponent) as a sort of "legal ambush." Examples: a) knowing the correct property line, Oliver Owner fails to bring a lawsuit to establish title to a portion of real estate until Nat Neighbor has built a house which encroaches on the property in which Owner has title; b) Tommy Traveler learns that his father has died, but waits four years to come forward until the entire estate has been distributed on the belief that Tommy was dead; c) Susan Smart has a legitimate claim against her old firm for sexual harassment, but waits three years to come forward and file a lawsuit, after the employee who caused the problem has died, and the witnesses have all left the company and scattered around the country. The defense of laches is often raised in the list of "affirmative defenses" in answers filed by defendants, but is seldom applied by the courts. Laches is not to be confused with the "statute of limitations," which sets specific periods to file a lawsuit for types of claims (negligence, breach of contract, fraud, etc.).

August 1, 2005
Panel Upholds Copyright Ruling for Country Joe McDonald
By Draeger Martinez
Daily Journal Staff Writer

LOS ANGELES - The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday issued some legal tips for music makers: If you write an original song, better copyright it quickly. And if someone else violates that copyright, don't wait decades to sue them over it.

In doing so, a three-judge panel of the court affirmed a trial-court decision in favor of Country Joe McDonald.

McDonald is best known for performing at Woodstock in 1968 as part of Country Joe and The Fish. Babette Ory, who holds the copyright to the 1926 Dixieland/jazz classic titled "Muskrat Ramble," sued McDonald.

She claimed MacDonald ripped off "Ramble" via his war-protest anthem "I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag," known better for its signature lyric, "And it's one-two-three, what are we fighting for?"

After McDonald recorded a new version of "Fixin'" in 1999, Ory - whose father Edward "Kid" Ory co-wrote "Ramble" with Ray Gilbert, now both deceased - registered copyright for "Ramble" in 2001, then sued McDonald in 2003 and 2004.

Babette Ory's lawsuits claimed the new version of "Fixin'" constituted a new infringement. But U.S. District Judge Nora Manella of Los Angeles disagreed. The 9th Circuit affirmed that decision. Ory v. MacDonald CV04-55858 (9th Cir. July 29, 2005).

In their ruling, 9th Circuit Judges Jerome Farris, Dorothy W. Nelson and Richard Tallman said failure to assert legal rights in a timely manner is the same as neglecting to assert rights at all.

"Ory's admission that 'every version of "Fixin'" contains the portion that infringes' demonstrates that there is no new infringing activity," the panel wrote. "Her mere assertion that the 1999 recording is a new instance of infringement [which] is 'qualitatively' different [is] not enough to defeat summary judgment."

The panel also upheld Manella's decision that Ory should pay MacDonald's legal fees.

MacDonald expressed satisfaction over the ruling.

"I'm very, very happy with the court's decision," said MacDonald, a longtime Berkeley resident. "This was a nightmarish experience for me, and I'm very glad that it's over with."

Neville Johnson of Johnson & Rishwain in Los Angeles, the attorney representing Ory, declined to comment. He said he had not read the decision.

Evan Cohen, a veteran music attorney with no connection to the case, said the MacDonald decision wasn't a close call.

Cohen argued and lost Jackson v. Axton, the 1994 9th Circuit case that centered on the copyright of "Joy to the World" and set the standard in such disputes.

"That case says that, notwithstanding any other statues of limitations, if a copyright suit is brought, sometimes it's not fair to wait that long," Cohen explained.

"The statute of limitations in these suits runs three years and it starts running as soon as you learn, or should have learned, of the violation," Cohen said. "Just because MacDonald made a new arrangement of 'Fixin'' doesn't mean that the clock would be reset."

Now in his 60s, MacDonald continues to record and tour -- in fact, last year he launched a reunion tour with two of his three former band mates. The sole holdout: guitarist Barry "The Fish" Melton, who became a lawyer and currently works as chief public defender for Yolo County.

[First of Two]

So is he still pulling ship names out of the phone book, or has the creativity quotient increased?

I might purchase one, but I've already got the first three books. If it's not substantially different/better, it's not worth the money I'd have to pay for it.

[AngryTree]

Yeah, the generic naming kind of bothered me, too. If you can't come up with original ship names, maybe you shouldn't have like 50 ships per class.

What really turned me off was some of the munchkin-ish ships, though. I had volume two back in the day, and it seemed like every third ship was the Fanboy-class Uber Mega Battle Cruiser. IIRC, one of his designs was a Miranda Class (complete with nacelles) on a Constitution-Class secondary hull (also with nacelles), with "Megaphasers" stuck on liberally. I probably lean more towards militaristic Starfleet than the average Trek fan, but that was a little much even for me.