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Harlan Ellison Sues For "Star Trek" Episode
Miracle Jones writes "The ever-quotable speculative fiction writer Harlan Ellison has launched a lawsuit against Paramount and the Writer's Guild West for rights to residuals surrounding his famous and award winning 'City on the Edge of Forever' episode for the original Star Trek series. Ellison, recently featured in the documentary 'Dreams with Sharp Teeth,' said that 'The Trek fans who know my City screenplay understand just exactly why I'm bare-fangs-of-Adamantium about this.' Regarding his lawsuit, he had this to say: 'The arrogance, the pompous dismissive imperial manner of those who "have more important things to worry about," who'll have their assistant get back to you, who don't actually read or create, who merely "take" meetings, and shuffle papers — much of which is paper money denied to those who actually did the manual labor of creating those dreams — they refuse even to notice... until you jam a Federal lawsuit in their eye. To hell with all that obfuscation and phony flag-waving: they got my money. Pay me and pay off all the other writers from whom you've made hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars... from OUR labors... just so you can float your fat asses in warm Bahamian waters.'"
Tell us what you really think dude ;)
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
This is not YRO. This did not happen online. The summary is so bad that I'm not even sure that this is about his rights.
He has a mouth and he must sue...
Get over it. Your copyright should have expired anyway by any sort of good definition of limited term.
I really enjoyed the Star Wars stuff he wrote...
A writer and his dog-and-pony show.
To hell with all that obfuscation and phony flag-waving: they got my money. Pay me and pay off all the other writers from whom you've made hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars... from OUR labors... just so you can float your fat asses in warm Bahamian waters.'"
Is there an actionable contract dispute here or is this guy just ranting since he is on the short end of the Hollywood stick? Guess what, dude, we all are.
Off topic much?
This is a perfect illustration of the problems facing content creators (artists). Because of the "industry groups" (read: cartels) all being in cahoots, creative types are forced to work under their unfair practices. Things like not paying performers for online distribution because it is "promotional" could not happen in any other climate. Sadly the entertainment industry is so involved in the US economy and politics that right now the only thing artists can do is suck it up and hope that things someday change. The more people like this guy who come forward and shine light on these tactics the better.
On one hand, we have the tired old story of a writer/creative not receiving due credit for his work. On the other hand, said creative is possibly the most obnoxious asshole still living that I've known of.
On the third hand, this is Star Trek.
God, I'm so conflicted here, who do I want screwed over the most?
Actually, he's on the long end of the stick, just that the stick is ramped up the part of his anatomy where sun don't shine...
Is it in your contract? No? too Fucking bad, boo hoo, you shouldn't sign contracts you don't agree with.
You whiny pain in the ass.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It's not an attractive way to raise the issue, but it's true: artists should be rewarded for their work. Look at how the studios screwed the Gilligan's Island people, who languished in poverty after the networks ran episodes for decades. The second issue is that is big corporations like those in Hollywood, no one takes you seriously until the lawsuit hits the table. I really don't blame him for being upset, sounds like he tried to go through friendly channels for awhile.
"I Don't Have Enough Faith to be an Atheist"
Watch that cunt get modded 'insightful'!
He got Judge Snyder, so I can't imagine he'll lose.
(seriously, the judge's name is Snyder.)
Sad is that if you enforce/support copyright it doesn't go to the artists, but rather to major corporations and PHB's.
And sadder is that if don't enforce/support copyright, then the major corporations and PHB's simply rob artists blind, corporations being "more powerful than you can possibly imagine."
Copyright basically does jack shit, like everything in our society. Heads the corporations win, tails you lose to the corporations.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Ellison is one of my favorite sci fi writers but the version of the screenplay he wrote only vagely resembles the one that was used in the film, it was rewritten several times himself and by 4 others including D.C. Fontana and Roddenberry himself before it was finally filmed. As is the original script was unfilmable, it was written from a writers skew not a screenwriters one and also dismissed alot of the established character traits of the crew. He was originally upset enough by the rewrites that he threated to pull his name from the script.
Fast forward 42 years and a Hugo and now he wants all the credit? I take it his books arent selling like they used to? Seriously Harlan maybe you need the cash or something but get over it.
Stop regurgitating Roddenberry lies.
http://www.amazon.com/City-Edge-Forever-Original-Teleplay/dp/1565049640
The original screenplay did need some revisions to fit in with the startrek story line, but only fairly minor ones.
Regardless of what any contract says, regardless of who actually owes what, screenplay writers are the major breadwinners yet get paid virtually nothing for their efforts. Nobody got rich writing scripts, but many many rich actors and movie moguls got rich from bloody good stories.
Now, onto the crux of what he says. It is well-known that money brought in through lawsuits, etc, via the MPAA and RIAA have not been forwarded to artists. It is also well-known that artists repeatedly sue managers, producers and studios for payment of royalties. Is it too hard to imagine the studios rip off those who are respected and heard even less?
The totals are probably exaggerated a little. A Star Trek FAQ from the 1990s suggested the annual turnover of Star Trek merchandise was around 60 million dollars. Recent FAQs don't show any estimate and deny it's possible to calculate one, so this is the only figure I can really go on. It simply isn't possible for a single episode (minus residuals owed to everyone else involved) to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars, even if we assume the FAQ figure to be about right. Tens of millions, divided amongst everyone, for the entire time since original screening - that sounds more likely.
Given the number of people involved wasn't many, I could see that he should have made somewhere in the low single-digit millions or upper three-digit thousands off a single script at this point. If he has made less than this, he has every right to feel like the studio is ripping him off.
Of course, legally, all that matters is what the contract says. If the contract says he should be paid X amount and he has been paid less than that (a common enough experience with artists, so why not writers?), then he has not just a moral argument but a legal argument.
Those who accuse him of kicking up a fuss over nothing should remember that the studios ARE rip-off merchants, and ARE making a great deal of money off Star Trek. There isn't the slightest possibility all of the money Paramount is making is legal. Maybe most of it is, but don't expect me to believe they're being honest for the first time in their lives over one of their biggest money-spinners. Their lawyers are bigger and their accountants are sharper. If there's a way for them to have hidden income, you can be certain they have.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Look them up. Though I admit it can be murky at times, inspired by and written by are NOT the same thing.
Seriously, when you get down to it how many things are inspired by Biblical stories and old fairy tales?
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
Nice try Harlan, we aren't going to buy your books just to refute your point.
Arrrr, matie. City on the Edge of Tomorrow, ay? Copyright long ago exipred fer ya, matie! Go suck a squid befores I make you walks the plank, ya scurrvy pox ridden land lubber.
Interesting that Ellison waited until Roddenberry died to publish his side of the story. Presumably so people like you could brand Roddenberry, unable to defend himself, a liar.
I live ze unknown. I love ze unknown. I am ze unknown.
OK, I think that I think rationally about copyright, though that may not be a completely objective opinion. Here's my way of thinking about it, and ya'll can decide if it's rational or not:
I'll start with a prosaic non-copyright example to establish my conceptual framework. Suppose you go to a builder to build a house. The builder would be willing to build it for $50000. However, the law requires that he charge you $100000. Would that be rational?
Now, suppose George Gershwin was willing to write "An American In Paris" as long as he had a copyright for 17 years, but the law required that he have the copyright for the rest of his life plus 100 years. Would that be rational?
People might say "It's his property!" But if somebody copies it, have they stolen it from him? Doesn't he still 'have' it. What he doesn't have (after the copyright expires) is the right to deny somebody else copying it.
I thought the original idea of copyright was to give a creator enough incentive to do creative work. Just like $50K might be enough incentive for that builder to build the house.
Copyrights do inhibit other people's rights. Nobody else was likely to independently compose "An American In Paris", but perhaps George Harrison indepedently composed the melody of "He's So Fine" for his song "My Sweet Lord".
If George Gershwin thought to himself, "I ain't gonna bother to write no "American In Paris' if all I get is a measly 17 years copyright'. Then maybe 17 years wouldn't be enough. How often do you suppose that comes up in the minds of creators?
Copyright is now associated with the concept of "intellectual property", and my self-described rational way of thinking of "intellectual property" is that it's a expression coined to trip up people into thinking of copyrights/patents as being the same thing as real property, which is stolen not when somebody copies it, but when somebody actually like, you know, goes out and steals it.
In theory, theory and practice are the same; in practice they're different. (Yogi Berra & A. Einstein)
They should have the rights to "bare-fangs-of-Adamantium"
I don't consider Ellison as creative a writer as the accountants/troglodytes who toil in the stinking darkened pits of Hollywood.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
IANAL but isn't there a statute of limitations here? Isn't an issue dating back to the original Trek a little beyond it? In all likelihood this is a publicity stunt that he knows full well will be laughed out of court... that's beside the point.
It gets wrappered and wrappered and the underlying machine gets emulated before they change the software because the program has been written for, and blessed by, a bunch of lawyers. .NET is a potential gold mine not because its good but because it allows some code to be reused.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
If well i respect a lot what he wrote, i think that is a bit late for that... Of course, unless he is doing practical science fiction over the law system.
I think I'll sue Satan and then Maybe God..
I never considered the option of suing someone for $1. That's brilliant. For threat of a suit they'll capitulate simply to avoid legal fees but it will bolster his position being able to say he successfully sued the guild in regards to their complicity.
Lawyers are tricky!
Agreed. I don't understand why Hollywood lets so many movies tank because while they are willing to pay millions for big name actors but can't be bothered to buy a decent script. Obviously cost isn't the issue, as lots of less expensive films and TV shows (the old Doctor Who comes to mind) do get decent scripts.
Copyright is one of the things that makes it possible for them to do this. Instead of paying actors, scriptwriters, and so on for new material, the studios can coast on their back catalog (as with Gilligan's Island, which someone mentioned upthread). The system may be great for a few superstars, but for the ordinary Joe who pays the bills with steady work, long strong copyright is a bad thing.
Not that Harlan would let that stand in the way of a good rant about ordinary folk people "stealing" his stuff. Still, whatever the legal facts of this case, I'm more inclined to side with him than the MAFIAA.
The lawsuit is based on the master Writer's Guild contract in effect in 1967.
The contract defined who was entitled to be credited as a writer. It defined the writer's share in derivative works and merchandising.
It doesn't matter who owns the copyright on the script as broadcast.
The geek is abysmally naive about copyrights.
He forgets who owns the master prints. The trademarks that protect logos, character designs and props.
He forgets that Disney or Paramount has a corporate line of credit. Production facilities. Talent. Marketing and Distribution.
The screenwriter - the pro - never - forgets that without a strong union - without out a strong contract - the studios will find ways to profit from his work for all eternity.
The Last Dangerous Visions, the third volume of the anthology series, has become something of a legend in science fiction as the genre's most famous unpublished book. It was originally announced for publication in 1973, but other work demanded Ellison's attention and the anthology has not seen print to date. He has come under criticism for his treatment of some writers who submitted their stories to him, of which some estimate to be nearly 150 (many of the authors have died in the subsequent three-and-a-half decades since the anthology was first announced). Harlan Ellison
Is there anything even remotely bearing on the facts of the case? Or even the allegations? Because the summary, while inflammatory, didn't have them. The article was even worse. The link to Harlan's actual press release was similarly lacking. Aside from the (admittedly well-articulated) frothing-at-the-mouth, I honestly can't tell what he alleges in his suit.
Harlan, if you want to convince geeks, say something concrete. The rhetoric is a waste of my time.
--Somebody infect me with a
Greedy, arrogant writer sues greedy, arrogant corporation.
and i'm sure he flips a few cents to the hard workers at andersen everytime he gazes out his windows.
Seriously, I'm finding it hard to think of a more overrated Star Trek episode than this one. Utterly lame. Definite third season material.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
If he wants credit for shit, then how about we all give him credit for starting the Trek trend of bullshit time travel plot devices that have been pulled out whenever they need a ratings boost or plot holes need filled.
He can also take the credit if the new Star Trek movie sucks because of its time travel plot device. Its not about the art with him, its about the credit, so take it Harlan, its all yours! The shitty Voyager two part episode where they went back in time - Its yours!
The terrible DS9 holodeck episodes set during WW2 - yours too! You were the first to do a WW2 theme in Trek.
After all, its all about the money, your words. Let that be your epitaph, while after your death we continue to celebrate real sci fi authors like Phillip K. Dick who died penniless, but left amazing art.
Just chiming in to say that it's a wonderful time that we live in.
I had never heard of this episode, so I looked it up on Wikipedia. Read the plot, and saw that the next Star Trek episode that won a Hugo was "Inner Light" and the one after that was the series finale of TNG, which I had never seen. Searched the series finale on YouTube and the whole damn thing is there. Watched it while I sat here and am thoroughly impressed with the ending to the series. So impressed that I might have to geek out and pick up the whole series on Amazon.
Cliff Notes: everything's amazing and nobody's happy (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoGYx35ypus Take a moment and think how sweet life is today, :)
Get it used. And trust me (i bought it used eons ago) it WAY more than 'minor changes' needed.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/1565049640/ref=dp_olp_used?ie=UTF8&condition=used
Harlan Ellison accusing someone ELSE of being arrogant is hilarious.
I guess this guy was too afraid to take on Majel Barrett, and so waited until after her death to file this lawsuit.
Well, it's not like he's *written* a book with a plot recently. Heck, five years of pleading from JMS wasn't enough to get him to turn in a script for Babylon 5.
His script may have been a Science Fiction Epic, the problem is, it wasn't Star Trek.
love him or hate him, he has a record of sticking his neck out on behalf of "the little people", at the same time the studios have a justly-earned reputation for screwing said "little people". Ellison should be given due credit for that.
Rock on, Harlan.
Does this guy actually write anymore? Every time I see his name somewhere, he's litigating someone.
"Oh look, they arrested Harlan Ellison".
"Good!"
Just shrivel up and die, Harlan. We're all tired of you.
Advice: on VPS providers
Jeez, Harlan's getting so mellow in his old age . . .
If you contract somebody to build an apartment complex for you, and they do so... let's say they design it, taking it all the way from blueprint to finished building, and you pay them for that job and then proceed to rent out the units in that complex, eventually starting to profit quite heavily, the people you contracted can't exactly come back later and start demanding a percentage from your profits just because it was their work that helped make you rich, can they?
He wrote something, he was paid, and that was it. Unless his contract specifically says that he was supposed to get royalties all along, he may need reminding that *HE* agreed to those terms. If he didn't like them, he shouldn't have agreed to them in the first place.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
we expect to face if we consider a career writing Sci Fi stories for TV Shows and Movies?
Be the next Harlan Ellison, write an unfilmable script for a Sci Fi series.
Work with the producers and director to rewrite most of the script and demand credits as the original writer.
Let it boil for 40 years and become a grumpy old man about it when some young punk writes a book based on the TV show that was based on your original script of which 90% of it was rewritten. Demand to be paid royalties for your ideas, ignore that you signed a contract 40 years ago and were not saying anything for 40 years about not getting paid enough until some young punk wrote a book on your ideas.
"Mine mine mine, I want my money hammerheads! I'll sue you, sue you, sue my writer's guild too, sue sue sue! You will rue the day you fucked with Harlan Ellison, assholes! I'll get my money one way or another. I'm going to bare my Adamtium-Fangs over this."
"Wait, what is this? A letter from Marvel Comics?"
"Dear, Harlan Ellison, please cease and desist from using the word Adamtium in your threats to the 'Star Trek' and Writer's Guild groups. Marvel Comics owns the right to Adamtium, and our new movie 'Wolverine: Origins' is marketing that phrase 'Adamtium' for the new movie."
"No no no, dammit dammit dammit, why did they have to remove the Pirate Ship, that was the best scene in the show, it was a shocker that the United Federation of Planets was replaced with a band of Pirates! Imbeciles! I'll sue, I'm no Richard Donner, you can't just edit or rewrite my script and then make a ton of money on it and then just think that I'll go away. I am going to use computer special effects to change 'The City on the Edge of Forever' to my original version and then let the fans decide!"
Then Harlan Ellison original version bombs and ends up on Youtube and gets a total of three hits, with fans claiming that he ruined the whole 'Star Trek' experience.
It would be better to write an entire movie on Harlan Ellison, just to show how messed up things are in Hollywood and the Writer's Guild and how Writers act and behave when their ideas get rewritten and recycled.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
That's because "The Great Space F--k" was a better story than "A Boy and His Dog", and Ellison knows it. Vonnegut's contribution to the Dangerous Visions anthologies was the work of a writer playing the whims of his audience to make an actual point; Ellison's was a hack job tickling the whims of his audience but offering no insights you didn't expect after reading the first page. Ellison's ego far exceeds his talent, and he doesn't hesitate to prove it again, and again, and again.
Cool story, bro.
Isn't the important question how much the script he wrote resembles the novels based on the episode? It's the novels he's trying to collect on as derivative works.
He sound a little angry.
This is just research for his new book "Paycheck on the Edge of Whenever"
Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
Did anyone else notice the sets of nested quotation marks in the summary?
Miracle Jones writes "The ever-quotable speculative fiction writer [...] had this to say: 'The arrogance, the pompous dismissive imperial manner of those who "have more important things to worry about,"
Those are scare quotes within a quotation within a quotation. Which I just quoted above. ("Ever-quotable" is right, I guess.) It reminds me of nested parentheses in Lisp, in a good way.
A few years ago at Worldcon, a famous SF author told a story about Harlan Ellison. It seems that Ellison once asked a friend and fellow SF author what he thought about his (Ellison's) latest book, and the friend told him, in polite terms, that he didn't feel it was Ellison's best work. Ellison never spoke to the man again.
But that's not the end of it. Years later, Ellison had a heart attack, and the former friend sent him a note to express that he was sad to hear it had happened and wish him a swift recovery.
Ellison wrote him a nine page letter to reject his get-well note.
I'm fascinated to see what's in Ellison's books, what comes from the mind of such an angry man that could fascinate people for generations, but I'm waiting for him to die before I buy any of them, I don't want to give him any of my money.
Now THAT's a writer! Rejoice ye who thought the English language was dead!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
"Let me help." A hundred years or so from now, I believe, a famous novelist will write a classic using that theme. He'll recommend those three words even over "I love you."
--Capt. Kirk to Edith Keeler
Nitewing '98
Everything works...in theory.
Gabe's recounting has an obvious problem. Why would a dude who got thrown out of college himself (a story he retells proudly) snootily inquire if someone else "even attended college"?
I think most independant accounts, like one by the guy who organized the convention basically made it sound like Gabe was a disrespectful asshole, about like you'd expect, and Harlan responded about like you'd expect. Anyway much like the whole little fuck story that's been told for years about Sinatra before Ellison, it may be a funny story that way, but it simply isn't true.
http://www.snopes.com/risque/celebrities/ellison.asp
Like Harlan or hate him, he's got a point. Think about the position the movie studios, the record labels, the Author's Guild, all of them take when it comes to their stuff. All of them argue vehemently that you shouldn't be able to create anything containing their stuff, no matter how minor the use, without getting their permission and paying them for it. Well, like it or not, Harlan wrote the original script for that episode. He's in the credits. He's one of the copyright owners. By the studio's own argument, why shouldn't they have to get his permission and pay him exactly as they demand everybody else do for them?
The main problem with the gist of your post is that you are saying that writers are the primary reason a movie is financially successful. This simply is not the case. Good writing is necessary for critical success. These two are not the same thing. If you're going to look at the entertainment industry as an industry, you have to measure it on financial performance.
Jurassic Park was spun around a great story (with some caveats), but do you think it would have ever been such a financial success without the groundbreaking CGI dinosaurs?
Jaws had an interesting story, but what would have happened to it without a studio to food the bill for what could have been a huge flop?
Would The Exorcist have succeeded without Friedkin being such a bastard on set, getting some very amazing performances from the cast?
Do you think anyone other than Tom Hanks could likely have pulled off Forrest Gump?
Would Shrek the Third be on the top 100 grossing films list of all time if not for the advertising muscle put behind it?
All of these are highly financially successful movies. These are the kind of films that make Hollywood the big bucks. Not well received, fantastically written pictures that do a modest amount of business. There is just far too much that goes on after the movie is written to support giving the "breadwinner" role to the writers.
And though I left it for last, I'd say that these days the advertising is actually the number 1 breadwinner for Hollywood films. They can serve up some utterly poor shit as long as they aim it at the right demographic and advertise the hell out of it.
do you expect ot be paid for ever for one thing
that is not what the spirit of copyright was about
SO here is hte golden idiot of the year award
for STUFF-U-DUMMY-ITS-40+YEARSOLD
The thing about software is, it's easier to replace than stories. I mean, Star Trek is Star Trek. You can certainly write other stories which *are not Star Trek*, but which are similar (space adventures). But then it's not Star Trek, and people will know it's not Star Trek.
On the other hand, you can often rip out code, completely replace it with something which is functionally equivalent (perhaps even improved) and completely compatible, without end users even even knowing it has happened.
I mean, look at GNU/Linux - it's *not* Unix, but for most purposes, it is functionally equivalent (and in many places improved), without violating the copyrights of the original Unix codebase.
I think this, to some degree, puts software developers in a less powerful position than other types of authors, because if Microsoft (or any other company) has sufficient incentive, they can simply replace your software with software that someone else ((probably them) owns the copyright to.
Given that, I don't know that software developers could ever get *quite* as powerful as other types of Authors' Guilds.
...it's come to this.
In your dotage, it's easier for you to sue someone, than it is to create and write something of quality.
Have you no sense of shame, you foul-mouthed, angry little man? You've been playing the L'enfant terrible for decades, and now, here you are, 75 years old, still throwing tantrums, still playing the poor victim, still blaming those damned kids and their Internets and everyone else under the Sun for all your woes. Still cursing and swearing and tossing obscenities and vulgarities around like a little child, wanting to shock the grownups.
Well, guess what. The grownups think you're a rude, vulgar, egotistical little shitmonkey. Every time you open your yap to cry that you have been victimized yet again, most of humanity in the immediate vicinity wishes you would just shut the hell up, already.
Mr. Ellison, your time has passed. You are as irrelevant as the ancient typewriters you worship. You are as irrelevant as Spiro Agnew. You are as irrelevant as suing AOL, thinking that would stop ebooks of your works being on the Internet. Mr. Ellison, I hate to break this to you, but AOL does not equal the Internet, despite all those TV commercials from the 1980s you remember.
Mr. Ellison, you are a joke. You have become nothing more than a punchline: "Why do you call an 8 ounce can of Budweiser a 'Harlan'? Because it's a short, bitter half-pint!"
Mr. Ellison, feel free to continue to disgrace yourself in public as much as you like. Just be aware that, like seeing the derelict who has urinated and defecated in his trousers, the vast majority of people just turn away from such a scene of pitiful self degradation with expressions, not of sympathy for that poor man, but of disgust for what has become of that poor man.
Show some dignity. For once in your life, show some dignity!
Guaranteed! This comment 100% Anthrax free!
If anything, good writers are even more rare than good actors. I have yet to meet the fiction writer who can fall back on their looks.
The problem is a fundamental disconnect. Good dialogue makes the actor look good. Good structure makes the director look brilliant. A script that stinks just makes the movie overall look bad, but generally no one blames the actors. In the end -- and yeah, this is oversimplification -- writers get none of their due and all of the blame.
Studio executives -- who famously refer to screenwriters as the "highest paid secretaries on Earth" -- honestly believe successful movies are the result of their business acumen. They take arrogant cluelessness to a level Marie Antoinette would have boggled at. Witness the latest SciFi/Syfy debacle.
Everyone wants to sleep with the actors, and the studio execs understand lust. Directors are the boss, and studio execs understand the boss needs to get paid. But frat boys turned studio nepotists almost intentionally refuse to understand the value of the script. They honestly believe Tricia Helfer's breasts do more for "Battlestar Galactica" than Ron Moore's scripts.
Even worse, every single one of those MBAs have delusions of Hammett -- or Snoopy at least -- and they all believe they could write the next Great American novel, if they just weren't so darn busy all the time, or could condescend to the menial labor of typing. Every Armani-clad jackass walking down Wilshire fancies himself a warrior-poet, strong yet sensitive, tortured and misunderstood.
Hell, even Saddam Hussein self-published a novel in which he saved the maiden of Iraq from the ravages of America, and his prose was even worse than this line. I guess it's easy to find success when you can have the critics tortured and beheaded.
It's hard to charge premium prices if your small, dedicated market doesn't perceive the value of your product, and even worse, are all convinced they could do better than Twain and Shakespeare's bastard love child if they just took the time.
He put his boots up on the table and made a face. "The sig," he smirked. "You can waste your life in search of the sig."
...are invariably ripped off when their work is used, particularly after their death. Philip K Dick died in poverty. The catering budget for Minority Report would have made him a rich man. Many great painters lived their lives in poverty, and their works made money for collectors after their death. Many modern SF movies contain elements ripped from books without payment. Trinity from The Matrix is Molly from Neuromancer.
So yeah, Harlan Ellison is a PITA (I have a copy of The Starcrossed here, HE is kind of a character in that book). But I think he is right to stick it to movie producers.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Star Trek sues for "Harlan Ellison" episode.
Mr. Ellison's attorney, John H. Carmichael, points out that the 1960 collective bargaining agreement between the WGA and the Producers, as amended in 1966, assures to the writers of individual teleplays âoea piece of the pie.â Specifically, Mr. Carmichael states, âoeWriters under that WGA agreement are supposed to get 25% of the revenue from the licensing of publication rights.
If these are indeed the terms that were agreed to by both parties, he has every right to be pissed.
Oblig. Penny Arcade reference.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/2005/09/26/
This should tell you a little bit about what it is like to work with or even near Mr. Ellison.
$1 is a minimum dollar amount required to trigger "consideration" aspects of law, and is not considered a "trifle". There are many suits calling for $1, and no I'm not going to get flyswatted by a lazy "Citation Please". It's because the elements of contract law of Offer, Acceptance, *Consideration*, Capacity, Legality usually require Consideration>0.
What Harlan is suing for is to establish precendent for future cases that if the Guild does not assist authors in certain ways, Bad Things will happen.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
He could do just fine.
He doesn't WANT "$1", and if you thought so (I didn't see aa ~ tag), then you got Whooshed. He's setting up future cases and the impact of public opinion.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
You sue for justice to remedy a bad situation. It's not about "he who sueth for the largest $ amount wins" , though that theory seems to have been tried by the RIAA.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Mote, Beam, Eye, NotPournelle.
If I buttress my note to you enough the DropDown crew won't trash your K.
There is no such thing as an external "fair price" for anything. Staff writing works on the theory that someone would rather be guarantee to make a mortgage than hope to get lucky enough to have $1.15 accrued per day in royalties off a minor hit.
If you think you've got the killer vision to make the next big hit, then go to it. Then shop it around, get turned down while the insider politics stomp on you for a while, and in 4 years you might land the contract you are looking for, so you too can buy a new car. Don't care to be broke for 4 years trying? Then don't disparage. It's that industry's risk-reward ratio. It's the IP lottery.
Larry Niven wrote he mainly got started because he could live off a family inheritance for some 3 years until he learned the trade.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Comment removed based on user account deletion
If this is a combined suit, wouldn't including the Guild as a defendent make it possible for the court to award legal fees to Ellison, which would (assuming he is correct) be "poetic" justice, since the Guild, who was supposed to be suing for him in the first place so he wouldn't need to pay legal fees, would end up paying (at least in part) his legal fees?
Suing the Guild for $1 could be justified as advancing the cause of justice in this case, in the case that the court awards legal fees to Ellison.
Harlan would have gotten paid for his work. The contract would have said so. And if he didn't want to lose his idea to the public domain for that amount, he could refuse to write. After all, 50 years after he's dead, he's STILL lost his idea to any "shark" who wants a slice. So he's obviously not THAT worried about it.
But Paramount have a monopoly on the books and so the price of the books are what the MONOPOLY will allow them to ask for. Not what the FREE MARKET will bear.
And one reason why Paramount have that monopoly is because Harlan has copyright. A right that Paramount are making money off without payment which is not allowed either by contract law or copyright law.
Now if Paramount believe in copyrights they should pay Harlan for the monopoly rights he has.
If Paramount don't believe they have to pay Harlan, they don't believe in copyrights.
Since this is one single legal entity, THERE is your hypocrisy. Slashdot is not a single entity. No hypocrisy.
I only read about halfway through the thread before realizing that apparently no one has actually read Ellison's short story upon which he is basing the lawsuit. Other than mention of the word "time," his story and the Star Trek episode have virtually no resemblance. He will loose his case big time!
Synchronizing stop lights across the US = one less nuclear power plant
Let's be fair here: it is common knowledge that Roddenberry did everything to get as much credit for Star Trek as possible, including shenanigans like minor rewrites to get a writer's credit. Harlan is not the only one to complain about this.
Despite all Roddenberry's good points, he was no Saint Gene. Funnily enough, all his many and deep faults make his good points shine even more, which is why I don't understand why the fanbois want to keep them out of sight.
Mart
"I know I will be modded down for this": where's the option '-1, Asking for it'?
I liked Ellison's writing in the 70s but I think his "angry young man" days are long gone. Now he mainly comes off as a "grumpy old man". He's had a reputation as someone who'll sue anyone for anything. Maybe he needs a new hobby. The Star Trek episode in question was filmed decades ago. Nothing more to see here. Move on. Move on.
And if the remedy is $1, the judge is going to say, "Must not be a very bad situation. Why are you bothering me with this? Get out of my courtroom."
"I don't know what is contract said, but if he's like most of us it's called "work for hire" and he's already been paid. Unless he has a contract that promises a percentage of the future royalties and licensing he's just upset that he didn't negotiate said type of contract back in the day."
Um...you should have done your research. According to Ellison's press release ( http://harlanellison.com/heboard/visitors/startrekpressrelease.html ), that IS what happened. Ellison's contract specified that he would receive royalties on material based on City on the Edge of Forever, Paramount and Pocket Books put out a trilogy based on it, and refused to honour the contract.
Robert B. Marks
Author, Demonsbane in Diablo Archive
The problem with a balanced objective is that it cannot be achieved by negotiation again unreasonnable demands.
xxAA want infinity.
You want 25 or 50 years.
If you say you want that, the "management", hearing 50 and infinity, will go toward extension, trying to attain a balanced compromise.
If you really wants reasonable terms, given your opponents, you are best saying you want NO ip.
Then, when the statusquo is maintained, or the recent international delirium begin to fade, you can "accept a compromise", keep the moral high ground, and be ready for the next round of fight against extensions of IP.
Maybe I got whooshed then. I thought that he wanted $X amount from the main defendant, and a buck from the Guild, instead of asking for $X from the Defendants and letting them sort it out. Frankly, it still doesn't make a lot of sense to me, asking $1 just to "set up future cases" strikes me as incredibly wasteful of the system's resources. He should let someone with real damages sue, if that's the case.
Rule of Slashdot #0: You and people like you are not representative of the larger population. - A.C.
And for those who are critical of Harlan's lawsuit, how do you feel about the RIAA, and all the money the actual *artists* DON'T get, while the record companies make out like bandits? Hell, I've heard Arlo Guthrie say it took 30 *years* before he got one penny of royalties from his record company for Alice's Restaurant.
You think there's a difference between Harlan, and other writers, and musicians?
mark
Awe, you not still getting paid for shit you did 40 years ago, cry me a fucking river you whiney little bitch.
I'm really rather sick of 'artists' who think they should get paid till the end of time because of something they did long ago that wasn't that good in the first place.
I love StarTrek, but anyone who thinks they deserved to get paid at all for anything written for TOS is just dumb. They should be shot for writing such horrible shows in the first place.
This is just another typical artist 'I deserve and I'm entitled to make money for ever even though I've already been paid for the work I did'.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Harlan, you worthless fuck. You've been bitching and moaning about how Paramount ruined your screenplay for that episode for decades. You admit they found your version so unacceptable that they had to have Dorothy Fontana rewrite it for them. You should be glad they paid you anything at all, and they probably just did that to get rid of you. Quit trying to live off past glories which aren't even yours and try writing something new for a change. If you still can, which you probably can't, you dried-up old piece of shit.
I remeber him whining about how Star Trek screwed him in a talk he gave in the 1980s.
"OK, I think that I think rationally about copyright, though that may not be a completely objective opinion. Here's my way of thinking about it, and ya'll can decide if it's rational or not:"
Forget rational - you need to get it right first. You've got a lot wrong here.
"Now, suppose George Gershwin was willing to write "An American In Paris" as long as he had a copyright for 17 years, but the law required that he have the copyright for the rest of his life plus 100 years. Would that be rational?"
No, it would not be rational, but the law doesn't work that way. Under copyright law, your hypothetical Gershwin is completely free to release his "An American In Paris" into the public domain whenever he wishes. So, the only thing keeping it in copyright for the term you specified (which is off by 30 years in the United States, and 50 years in Canada), is your hypothetical Gershwin.
"People might say "It's his property!" But if somebody copies it, have they stolen it from him? Doesn't he still 'have' it."
In fact, they have stolen something from him. They've stolen his ability to determine how his work is distributed - when you're living off royalties while you work on your next piece, that can make a big difference.
Let me pose something to you - let's say your hypothetical Gershwin decides that he's going to write "An American in Paris," and he decides that he's going to release it as Creative Commons, which is a decision that copyright law allows him to make. But, somebody comes along, we'll call it "Evil Corporation X," and starts distributing it for money, against your hypothetical Gershwin's wishes. Would you not say that something has been stolen from him? He wanted to give this to the world, but somebody took that decision away.
Now, I'm going to point something out here, and you may not like it - I'm going to point out that you don't really understand copyright all that well to begin with. Don't feel too badly - most of the people on here wouldn't recognize modern copyright if it came up and bit them.
"I thought the original idea of copyright was to give a creator enough incentive to do creative work. Just like $50K might be enough incentive for that builder to build the house."
Now, that is certainly the wording in the U.S. Constitution. But let me pose you two questions - first, is that the wording from the original copyright legislation, which predates the U.S. Constitution by around 70-80 years? Second, is that what copyright is doing right now?
To answer question one, the answer is "no." The original copyright legislation, the Statute of Anne of 1709, begins with:
"Whereas printers, booksellers, and other persons have of late frequently taken the liberty of printing, reprinting, and publishing, or causing to be printed, reprinted, and published, books and other writings, without the consent of the authors or proprietors of such books and writings, to their very great detriment, and too often to the ruin of them and their families: for preventing therefore such practices for the future, and for the encouragement of learned men to compose and write useful books..."
So, in fact, protecting creative artists from exploitation is mentioned first, and encouragement comes in as number 3. Times change, and the purpose of copyright in the United Kingdom in 1710 is not the purpose in the United States in 1810, and it will not necessarily correspond to the purpose in 2010.
So, let's look at the purpose of copyright in 2009. Most of it the reader, viewer, or listener will never see. That's because most of it is a legal framework used to govern the relationship between creative artist and the means of distribution. As a writer, editor, author, and the owner of a publishing company, I have to deal with this on a regular basis. People complaining about copyright frequently have tunnel vision about it - they look at the length of the term alone, declare it unreasonable, read propaganda about why the term is there that is usually dead
Robert B. Marks
Author, Demonsbane in Diablo Archive
Penultimate != "the ultimate ultimate"
Penultimate
The whole concept of residuals just irritates me. Who the hell decided that people should be rewarded indefinitely for their work? I don't care how good it is. Hell, I'd dearly love to get paid for every time somebody runs one of my commercial programs. Of course, that clearly explains why companies want to shift running apps like an office suite over the net.
A thick, creamy core of pure unadulterated ego encased in a thin shell of human skin.
But he's right.
Serving your airship needs since 1995.
Couple things going on here.
A. "Remedy" does not have to be a dollar amount. To be facetios for emphasis, suppose he sues for a dollar and a required notice when any work involving his original story gets published in derivative form anywhere. Failure to do so would trigger the Bad Things. And Harlan is VERY good at Bad Things. He once mailed someone a dead gopher 4th class, with a recipe for Dead Gopher Stew.
B. "Setting Up Precedent" is HELPS the court system. What wouldn't we have given for about 5 good precedents in the RIAA mess? But no, we had to put up with that circus of settlements ... because there was no good precedent to shut down the RIAA! I'd happily pay a lawyer $500 to write a letter referring to ___ vs. ducharme than settle for $12,000 because I didn't have the unholy amount of fees I Jamie Thomas (I think) risked on the legal system. It's much more fun for the court to file 12,500 copies of "___ vs. ducharme letters" than process 12,500 cases!
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Wasn't Ellison the one who sued AOL a few years back because his stuff was being posted to usenet groups (over which AOL had no control)?
If Marvel sued Harlan for his unlicensed use of "adamantium"?
Dude, don't get pissed off about people referencing your work if you are gonna go around referencing other people's.
Yeah, I know you didn't make any money off of that reference, but neither did the actual writer (Len Wein? Help me out, here someone...) who created "adamantium". That was part of the deal when they published his work using their characters. It was probably part of your deal too, pretty standard on "shared universe" writing contributions. Ask Jim Starlin or Rob Liefeld about it sometime...
"People are stupid; given proper motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything."
Okay, so as to A), do you really think he can ask for a non-monetary remedy from the Author's Guild? Who as far as I know, doesn't actually publish works, but instead is supposed to represent authors' interests? He could move or sue to have the Guild assume his claim (if they ever actually agreed to sue on his behalf for this kind of violation), but in that case, why sue them for a buck at all?
B) Generally, precedent applies to damage awards as well as legal questions (at least here in Ontario where I am), so if he wins his dollar, that sets a precedent too. The next claimant has to go before the judge and explain why she deserves more than a dollar, instead of being able to rely on the precedent. So what good then is that precedent to anyone? Sure it gets you a decision on the law, but then it saddles you with a crappy damage award that you have to distinguish. Better to let a claimant with real damages go ahead and make that case law, and get a reasonable decision on the liability and reasonable damages.
I don't buy it. Bringing in the Guild for a dollar is mean-spirited and vexatious, as it won't give Ellison anything substantial, but will cause the Guild to have to go to the expense of defending against the claim, and moving for the claim to be struck, etc. In fact, it's just like sending a dead gopher through the mail, but I'd bet the courts would be much less tolerant of such an act.
Rule of Slashdot #0: You and people like you are not representative of the larger population. - A.C.
Miracle Jones, whoever the hell he/she is, says this in her report: "Ellison tossed aside a difficult life as a short-story writer and novelist in New York to move to California and write bad television shows and bad movies. He once even worked for Disney for one famous day, a day he didn't spend honing his craft as creator or "pit-bull" for literature."
Wikipedia gives Ellison a long list of awards. They don't mention Miracle Jones at all.
I don't like much of what Ellison writes, but clearly he's impressing a lot of authors who are voting the awards for him.
...the pompous dismissive imperial manner...
Oh Harlan, Harlan, you short ironic bastard.
You were paid then, you shouldn't keep sponging of work you did then.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
"We're talking about a person that a couple total assholes find rude."
Everything you know is wrong, Just forget the words and sing along.
Seriously, what a tool. He was work for hire on contract. He was paid to the terms of that contract. To hell with him and anyone else that wants more money after the fact... you signed it, you got paid, end of story bub.
Pathetic fool... and honestly, his writing is meh too.
Dear Harlan,
You didn't like the final script. You threatened to take your name off of it. That was 45 years ago. In short, bite me.
Signed, everyone.
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
'Cause NOBODY fucks with The Mouse.
Kick ass, Harlan.
Oh, yeah--I know McCoy didn't shoot up by accident.
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
Larry Niven could have lived off the family inheritance for 300 years...
~REZ~ #43301. Who'd fake being me anyway?
...needs a hug.
Before you design for reuse, make sure to design it for use.
All of them rip off the writers. It's part of the culture. That's why many writers now wear "producer" labels. They get to write and the new label gets them more respect.
What's so special about now? Besides, contractually, I think writers are only eligible for residuals for the first 17 years after the series was on. I could be wrong, "Always in motion, Hollywood writing contracts are."
on writers' shares of secondary rights in contracts before the 1990s. I'd love to look at the 1960 and 1966 contracts to see, but I sincerely doubt they are anywhere to be found outside the WGA-W archives or the LA public library. So I don't have the faintest clue as to whether Ellison has a leg to stand on. If he does, go for it, though he'll only get just enough to pay half his lawyer's bill. Unless the writer of this spin-off trilogy is a big name, he'll be getting around $40,000 per book (maybe a little more, maybe MUCH LESS). The books themselves have limited earning potential, hard to tell for a TOS novel, could be high six or low seven figure sales. Remember, the ST franchise is fractured and competes against itself. Lots of TNG ppl don't like TOS, lots of Voyager ppl don't like TNG, etc. Most of the earnings for the trilogy go to the outlets and the publisher. The license to publish it might have brought only $100,000. Hey, maybe Ellison's lucky and its $250,000 (I doubt it, but I'm always wrong about these things). If he doesn't have a leg to stand on, this is about his anger at his work being spun off without his permission. But all Hollywood writing is work-for-hire, so you're boned if you think you'll ever have a say in how your work is used.
I'm probably late, but
Just Tell The Story
$1 is a minimum dollar amount required to trigger "consideration" aspects of law
Yes, minimum legal remuneration. I had Westinghouse's lead patent attorney offer to buy the rights to a patent for some work I did for them. He offered one dollar, the reason being that the manager of the division for whom I did the work was supposed to have had me sign a blanket assignment of all patent rights to Westinghouse ... but didn't. Needless to say, this upset the legal beagles, who tried to schmooze me into signing away my rights for a dollar. It was pretty funny, actually. He tried to sell me on the idea that Westinghouse preferred all the rights to "be under one roof." I said that was a great idea, but that I preferred my roof, and told him that I would happily assign the rights to Westinghouse for a reasonable fee. I never heard back from him, so I guess he didn't consider it that important.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Yes but lawsuits are all about damages. Perhaps I should have said "only principle".
The remedy that you receive is based on the damage done. It's not black and white, like "they wronged me so I want them to suffer the embarrassment of losing a lawsuit." You have to put a number on it, and if that number is too low for small claims, then you settle your differences by tossing a glass of scotch on the guy. It's how these things are done.
When you enter the court your are taking up the time of the judge, the clerks, the lawyers, and everyone who has to wait in line behind you to have their case heard. I'm sure Ellison is just doing this unofficially in order to create a little chaos.
I read what you said earlier about him suing to create a precedent. I still think he should have just included them in whatever he's suing Paramount for, but if what he's doing is SOP then I guess I was incorrect. I had a more practical impression of how lawsuits work but I guess with a suit against a large organization it would make sense to get a judge involved as early as possible.
Writer's Guild, not Author's Guild. The Writer's Guild is a union representing (among others) Hollywood screenwriters, and yes, part of what it's supposed to do is to secure the interests of its dues-paying members.
No one said the WGA was supposed to "sue" anyone for him, but they were supposed to "act" on his behalf and he alleges they haven't been doing that. What he wants it to do is nothing more than its job.
And the brethren went away edified.
I'm sorry, it's the Writer's Guild, not the Author's guild, and they're a union, but I fail to see what that has to do with bringing what looks to me, (admittedly from well outside the specifics) like a frivolous suit. If they're supposed to "act on his behalf", (and if that doesn't mean "sue the fuckers who cheat him" then what does it mean?), then why, why oh why, sue them for a lousy buck? Either they're responsible for a big chunk of the damages, or for going after damages themselves. Either way, $1 is not going to cover the damages. If he wants performance instead of money, he should sue for that.
It's not strategically smart to sue them for a token amount, whatever people here on /. might think, and could get him in a lot of trouble with a judge, if she doesn't think it's as funny as he does (which she won't).
Seriously, I can't believe that would even get past the registrar.
Rule of Slashdot #0: You and people like you are not representative of the larger population. - A.C.
Actually he waited until the studio broke the contract they had signed with him. They made derivative works (a fiction trilogy) based on that episode, which is in turn based on what he wrote.
Contract broken, he is entitled to compensation - whether he is an ass or not doesn't (or shouldn't) come into this.
Moved to http://soylentnews.org/. You are invited to join us too!
You really think the only way a union accomplishes anything is by lawsuits? Wow.
And the brethren went away edified.
First, you wrote this:
So, James Cameron admitted he got some ideas from Harlan Ellison's writing (for a couple Outer Limits episodes). But then you jump to the (unfounded, and unsupported) conclusion that the verdict was "inevitable" once this happened. Not so; I'll get to my reasoning why in a moment.
Then you wrote:
Except for one glaring problem with your entire line of reasoning: Copyright laws actually don't work that way! You can copyright the expression of an idea. You can not copyright an idea. James Cameron merely admitting that he got a couple ideas from a particular source in no way means that he owes money to Harlan Ellison. There are no new ideas for plots or plot devices under the sun, and the stories you cite by Ellison themselves can be shown to be derivative in some way of even older literature, some of it very ancient.
The settlement was nothing more or less than a means to get rid of a nuisance lawsuit.
I am not a lawyer, but I would encourage you to actually read up on U.S. Copyright law -- the U.S. Copyright Office has a great web site which has FAQs, legal resources, and more. In particular, I'd like to turn your attention to section 102 of Chapter 1 of the law, which states in part:
You later wrote:
Erm, just to point out, I, Robot was a collection of loosely-related stories featuring Dr. Susan Calvin. The movie was written using the character of Dr. Calvin, and was intended to be a story complementary to and similar to the ones that appear in the book, dealing with the same kinds of issues without being derivative of the ideas presented in those other stories. Whether you consider the movie a true heir to that intellectual pedigree or not, the fact remains that calling I, Robot a novel is a stretch.