Trademark, Copyright etc.

[guest1523]

Have a question: How are you dealing with the Star Trek trademark stuff and the copyright so that CBS doesn't come after Shadow Fleet?

[Vem, son of Motag]

I think I can speak for the site by saying that if a representative from CBS or Paramount sent us a cease and desist letter; we would oblige.

However, Star Trek has addressed this in a way (Link).
They explain that fan films are ok, under certain guidelines. They start it by saying, "CBS and Paramount Pictures are big believers in reasonable fan fiction and fan creativity, and, in particular, want amateur fan filmmakers to showcase their passion for Star Trek.  Therefore, CBS and Paramount Pictures will not object to, or take legal action against, Star Trek fan productions that are non-professional and amateur and meet the following guidelines."

While this is particularly talking about fan films, it addresses other efforts and we fall under this banner pretty solidly. Sites like ours are the lifeblood of the fandom and fuel the community that continues to support the show.

[guest1523]

Interesting. I had assumed there was some kind of licensing for this site

[Vem, son of Motag]

No site that I am aware of has any sort of license from CBS or Paramount. That's true in almost any fandom / genre. RP boards are really just a fan creation and only really helps the franchise.

[guest1523]

Mhm, I did not know that. I'm just getting started reading about "fan-fiction" and a lot of it is sailing pretty heavy sea when it comes to copyright and that sort of thing.

So CBS is  basically merely tolerating (some) fan-created content?

I don't know man, that's not really a solid base to stand upon...

[Judith Eastman]

Mhm, I did not know that. I'm just getting started reading about "fan-fiction" and a lot of it is sailing pretty heavy sea when it comes to copyright and that sort of thing.

So CBS is  basically merely tolerating (some) fan-created content?

I don't know man, that's not really a solid base to stand upon...

Look at the business side of it, then. Money does make the world spin.
Fan sites like ours don't make money for anyone. There's no potential revenue stream for CBS here.
However, it does increase the fandom's engagement, leading to fans consuming more media that does earn CBS money (merch, books, DVDs, etc).
So really, the bean counters benefit from our existence, and at the end of the day that's what matters.

[Kirok]

I believe Vem is right about this!

[guest1523]

Well maybe it's just my experience in the non-anglo-american legal sphere talking here.

And this experience also tells me, that money and business may make the world spin, but the law on the other hand has the awful habit of ignoring business and money and reason all together and hitting you over the had with a heavy stick.

[Dylan Torngate]

I'd agree with Vem. If we get CBS/Paramount telling us to shut down, you wouldn't be able to find us on the web again. But AFAIK there's never been an instance of an operation this small running into legal issues.

[guest1523]

Well nevertheless there are some pretty interesting questions arising regarding fanfiction in general. I'm not familiar with the US-law that would be applicable when it comes to Star Trek (would US-law be applicable anyway?)

So for the lawyers here:

Is this stuff we are doing maybe protected under fair use?
Is it even an infringement to begin with?
Did CBS/Paramount by tolerating fanfiction for many decades maybe forfeit the opportunity to go after creators of fanfiction?

It boggles my mind anyway how generations of fanfic-creators over the years - not only with regards to Star Trek - didn't go to the right's owners and got some permission. Especially if the stereotype is true and there really is a culture of trigger-happieness when it comes to sueing people in the anglo american legal sphere...

[Judith Eastman]

Well nevertheless there are some pretty interesting questions arising. I'm not familiar with the US-law that would be applicable when it comes to Star Trek (would US-law be applicable anyway?)

So for the lawyers here:

Is this stuff we are doing maybe protected under fair use?
Is it even an infringement to begin with?
Did CBS/Paramount by tolerating fanfiction for many decades maybe forfeit the opportunity to go after creators of fanfiction?

It boggles my mind anyway how generations of fanfic-creators over the years - not only with regards to Star Trek - didn't go to the right's owners and got some permission. Especially if the stereotype is true and there really is a culture of trigger-happieness when it comes to sueing people in the anglo american legal sphere...

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. I, like the character of Judy (although I'm planning to change that in her case), just know a lot about the law.

It's non-commercial, so we should be fair use. The donate button puts us in slightly testier waters, but as long as we don't take any more than we need and don't pay out any salaries, we ought to be able to pass it on.

On to the oh-so-litigious Americans: those are private citizens. Corporations, to my knowledge, exercise a little more discretion on whom they sic their lawyers on. If we're not making money, there're no damages for them to sue for in a civil suit, and no money for them to stand to gain from shutting us down and taking our niche. Hence, CBS/Paramount, being more logical than a middle-aged man whose car you scratched, is far less likely to sue us because it does not benefit them (even if our donate button makes our activities not fair use).

[Dylan Torngate]

The cost of having the lawyers file suit against us, as we're not a corporation or a legal entity, would be more than money that they'd get from us likely. (Also not a lawyer, just guessing)

It's simply just not worth their time, IMO

[Solluk]

Elias, there is currently no profit in suing nonprofit fan sites.  In fact, it would cost a company money via negative press and disgruntled fans who fail to consume branded product.

As long as that situation remains true, nonprofit fan sites will not be sued.

If that ever changes, then they will be sued.

As for securing licenses, that is a fairly unworkable idea.  The moment a company licenses someone to use their product, they become partially responsible for the form which that use may take.  No company wants that responsibility when they can have free publicity with zero consequences instead.

Cheers!

[Judith Eastman]

I read some legalese.
While our work is not educational, and there is no established jurisprudence (legal decisions), we would be considered fair use by most, and therefore legal, because we are noncommercial (our donate button only founds the server costs, right?), appropriate relatively little, and don't detract from the market for Paramount/CBS work (of anything, we bolster it).
So yeah, it is my opinion as a non-lawyer that we are fair use and therefore in the clear.
Not that we're worth suing. We're such small fry that the legal costs for them are not financially justifiable.
[EDIT: I can legalese, but I can't English]

[Vem, son of Motag]

Is this stuff we are doing maybe protected under fair use?
Short answer "No" but you have to look at is as a scale rather than a binary. Like "It would be easier for us to claim fair use than Axanar."
Here is the relevant qualifications for being covered under fair use (Link):
(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
(2) the nature of the copyrighted work;
(3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
(4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

We are not educational (though we are not commercial either).
We are referencing a LOT of their content.
One thing you need to remember is that copyright applies to prevent reasonable confusion with the actual product. No one is mistaking our site for a legit Star Trek production.

Is it even an infringement to begin with?
Yes

Did CBS/Paramount by tolerating fanfiction for many decades maybe forfeit the opportunity to go after creators of fanfiction?
Debatable, but that's likely a can of worms they don't want to open. A case could be made but any ruling to that effect would essentially mean "if you don't sue everyone on the internet and every fan ever- you lose it". Copyright is typically invalidated if it's a habitual ignoring of competing products. For example if Coke ignored a company making "Coce" for 20 years and it was basically Coke with a different label; yeah that's grounds for revoking a copyright. If it's not reasonably known that someone is doing this (for example: If Coce was only sold in small villages in the Amazon Basin and Coke sued when they were made aware of it- they wouldn't lose their copyright).

That was one of the problems with Axanar; it was competing with their IP and was sufficiently well known. CBS/Paramount COULDN'T ignore it reasonably and had to take a step to defend it. Sites like this no one knows about and it's not competing with their product. We are not at risk of invalidating their copyright.

One thing worth noting is that by ignoring fanfiction for so long they'd have a hard case to make if they wanted to suddenly go after a particular piece of fan fiction. There is a good case for discrimination or some other shenanigans there.