Lucasfilm Sanctions Star Wars Fan Films

BigBragger sent us a story that talks about a deal between Lucas and Atom Films to allow Star Wars parodies to be distributed legally. It's a mixed bag: Lucasfilm gets a piece of the pie, and gets to choose what goes online at the site. But it does create an official place to get those vid clips like Troops which are just awesome but somewhat underground. I guess as long as they don't go after other parodies I'm cool with it, but there's something that I can't describe about this leaving a funny taste in my mouth. It's probably just paranoia.

Comments

they aren't "allowing" anything

[L-Train8]

The way I read it, this will be the "official" SW parody site. LucasFilms cannot restrict parody, that fair use right has been upheld by the supreme court. What they can do is work with parodyists whom they like in order to make the "official" website.

LucasFilms gets some advertising money from the deal, so does Atom Films. The parodyists get exposure. No unauthorized or unapproved parodies will be restricted, they just won't be hosted on the "official" site. They are actually throwing their support behind the people who make good parodies. That sounds great to me.

ATTN: Paranoid /. First Amendment Freaks

[Shiva Lingham]

READ-THE-FUCKING-ARTICLE. They (LucasFilms) are not hunting down or trying to restrict in any way unauthorized Star Wars parodies on the web, and this is not implied in any word of the article. They (LucasFilms) are sponsoring and judging a Star Wars parody contest on AtomFilms, and are generously providing original sound effect files from the films. They are also getting a piece of ad revenue from traffic generated by this contest. Your rights under the law to spoof, satire, and parody to your hearts content are still protected. This is still Amerikkka the Free.

We now return you to your scheduled paranoid ranting.