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posted by martyb on Monday October 01 2018, @11:51PM   Printer-friendly
from the Stage-9-From-Outer-Space dept.

Stage 9 was a non-commercial, virtual reality recreation of Star Trek The Next Generation's Enterprise starship. It allowed fans of the series to explore the beloved vessel and immerse themselves in the chief setting of the series. It was built over the past two years using Unreal Engine 4 by fans who have taken great pains to state that the project was not affiliated or licensed with CBS or Paramount and that they weren't doing this to make money, only to artistically demonstrate their fandom. That did not stop CBS from sending a cease and desist letter, thus shutting down the project as CBS was reportedly unwilling to engage in dialog.

From Techdirt : CBS Bullies Fan Star Trek Project To Shut Down Despite Creators' Pleas For Instructions On Being Legit
and at Ars Technica : Amazing NCC-1701-D simulator issues final command: "all stop"
and at TorrentFreak : CBS Shuts Down Stage 9, a Fan-Made Recreation of the USS Enterprise


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  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by takyon on Tuesday October 02 2018, @01:40AM (10 children)

    by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday October 02 2018, @01:40AM (#742583) Journal

    Or folks could host their creations on torrent sites and not use their real names in connection with their projects. How is it that CBS can just stop this fan effort in its tracks? Because the fans are naïve.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @02:06AM (9 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @02:06AM (#742601)

    Funding is the problem. Cryptocurrencies may solve that, but we must keep in mind Bitcoin in particular is not anonymous. An army of lawyers would be dispatched to tear somebody a new asshole.

    Otherwise, it seems to me that fans could create "not-Trek," that is, it's basically Star Trek, everybody knows it's Star Trek, but the future history and names have been changed to protect the innocent artists. IANAL so I dunno how much exactly would need to be changed to be free of being a derivative work.

    Of course copyright reform (or revolution) is the only real solution to the problem of immortal corporations locking up our culture.

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by takyon on Tuesday October 02 2018, @02:34AM (7 children)

      by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday October 02 2018, @02:34AM (#742607) Journal

      Stage 9 didn't require funding:

      they weren't doing this to make money, only to artistically demonstrate their fandom

      Again, why is it that they need to make "Not-Trek"? Every episode of Star Trek, and pretty much every TV show and movie in existence, is available somewhere online for free.

      All they needed to do to prevent this outcome was to not identify themselves, and throw the end result or updates onto various hosting and torrent sites. The project lead, Bryan, appears to have fouled that up since I see his name in the DNS record [securitytrails.com].

      They even handed a copy to Ars Technica, apparently. They could distribute it 5 minutes from now if they wanted to. But CBS Legal knows who they are. Ego did them in.

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      • (Score: 2) by Fluffeh on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:08AM (4 children)

        by Fluffeh (954) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:08AM (#742637) Journal

        But CBS Legal knows who they are. Ego did them in.

        As a fan of something, you want to be able to have fun in creating it and not have to hide like a thief in the shadows. This sort of fan participation is much more about enjoying yourself in your object of enjoyment. If it was just about modelling, they could easily flick over to a Star Wars ship, a BSG carrier, heck, the Babylon 5 station. If it was just about the show itself, they would be watching it non-stop.

        It's not about distributing the final outcome only (which of course they could do via any way quite trivially), it's much more about being able to enjoy themselves and feel truly a part of the journey for fans like this. That's what CBS can however shut down.

        • (Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:21AM (3 children)

          by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:21AM (#742639) Journal

          They could have easily created pseudonyms, Discord chats, subreddits, and whatever else they needed to feel like a community. They could have kept discussion "in-house" and only publicized it after it was done. Can Viacom or Disney sue "Fluffeh"? Not without some serious legwork, I'd hope.

          It's not like they didn't know this was a possibility. There was the Axanar [wikipedia.org] lawsuit filed in late 2015, a pretty fresh event, but apparently before work started on Stage 9.

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          • (Score: 2) by Fluffeh on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:52AM (2 children)

            by Fluffeh (954) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:52AM (#742644) Journal

            I'm not disagreeing completely, I just don't think it was ego. Naivety more likely - hoping that because their project is art and it's also non-profit and stuff they hoped they could be included and allowed to do it. In any case, it doesn't really matter - another fan-made production has gotten shut down because someone thought they were losing money.

            I wish we had more of the franchise-embraces-fans type stories rather than these.

            • (Score: 2) by Fluffeh on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:54AM (1 child)

              by Fluffeh (954) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 02 2018, @04:54AM (#742645) Journal

              Fuck.

              </i>

              Wondered where that was from...

              • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @10:12AM

                by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @10:12AM (#742694)

                Close tags, the final frontier.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @01:30PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 02 2018, @01:30PM (#742759)

        Again, why is it that they need to make "Not-Trek"? Every episode of Star Trek, and pretty much every TV show and movie in existence, is available somewhere online for free.

        To avoid infringing trademarks. I don't understand what your observation has to do with this. Maybe you're confused about getting something gratis with getting the rights to it? All rights reserved and selling price are orthogonal issues.

        • (Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday October 02 2018, @01:54PM

          by takyon (881) <reversethis-{gro ... s} {ta} {noykat}> on Tuesday October 02 2018, @01:54PM (#742775) Journal

          I'm not confused at all. My point is simple. There is no way for CBS to purge fan-made content from the Internet. They can't even purge their own content. Best case scenario for CBS, they prevent it from getting on "legitimate" platforms like YouTube, so it's a little harder to find the infringing fan-made content.

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    • (Score: 2) by acid andy on Tuesday October 02 2018, @03:45PM

      by acid andy (1683) on Tuesday October 02 2018, @03:45PM (#742846) Homepage Journal

      Otherwise, it seems to me that fans could create "not-Trek," that is, it's basically Star Trek, everybody knows it's Star Trek, but the future history and names have been changed to protect the innocent artists. IANAL so I dunno how much exactly would need to be changed to be free of being a derivative work.

      Already happening. Check out Tim Russ's Renegades.

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