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Hobbit Pub Saved By Actors Stephen Fry and Sir Ian McKellen
Fluffeh writes "Recently the Hobbit Pub in England was sued for rights infringement, but it seems Stephen Fry and Sir Ian McKellen are going to re-pony-up the cash to keep the pub alive. Landlady Stella Roberts said she had been shocked by the actors' offer. She said: 'I had a telephone call on Saturday evening, while we were trading, from Stephen Fry's business partner and manager. That's when he told me. I was very shocked. They've said as soon as they finish filming they would like to come down and visit the pub.' However Ms Roberts said she was not celebrating just yet. She added: 'Until everything is in black and white, on paper, we're going to be a bit reserved because it could be $100 this year and $20,000 next year.'"
Because Hobbits are always relevant. Always.
It's not just the use of the name "The Hobbit" it's the use of Still Images from the LOTR movies in their promotional material. Essentially, these people are lifting copyrighted imagery and using it to promote themselves -- most definitely NOT cool and if I was one of the parties that ponied up hundreds of millions to make these films, I'd be a bit peeved by someone taking that work and using it without permission to make a profit.
I can only imagine that Stephen Fry and Sir Ian McKellen do not know the full story here and possibly think that this is a matter of a harmless pub merely using the word "Hobbit" in their name and have not seen the website or promotional material produced by this pub.
And for the record, the web site and promo material is completely amateur and quite tacky. Hopefully any money given to the pub to support them would mandate that they cease using imagery from the movies and perhaps use hand drawn illustrations by fans and artists who wish to contribute artwork for them to use.
The difference here is, from TFA:
The pub in Bevois Valley, which is popular with students, has traded with the name for more than 20 years.
That pub existed wayyy before the movies made the franchise famous. It's not like they decided to name the business to ride on the films' fame.
Perhaps not, but they certainly started selling stuff with the images of the characters from the movie including putting Elijah Woods face on things. That's what prompted the legal action.
1. I agree this is petty bullshit.
That said...
2. The pub has likenesses FROM THE MOVIE. "It features characters from Tolkien's stories on its signs, has "Frodo" and "Gandalf" cocktails on the menu, and the face of Lord of the Rings film star Elijah Wood on its loyalty card."
The name "hobbit" is only about 1% of the issue.
I'll mince no words: Saul Zaentz is and always has been an ahole. He only owns the rights to the film version of the book, he does not own the book. He ripped off Credence Clearwater's John Fogerty long ago, and then had the audacity to sue Fogerty for hundreds of millions, claiming John did not have the right to use his own riffs. He lost the suit but remained a complete dick. This man is the epitomy of wrong.
The sad part is that you actually believe your childish little rant has any bearing on the issue. You don't You're absolutely clueless.
That word "Hobbit" predates JRR is irrelevant. That words starting with "hob" have existed in even less relevant. (Words don't even exist in any human language to express how irrelevant the latter is.)
They aren't being sued because they used the word "Hobbit". They're being sued because they used the word Hobbit in association with The Lord of The Rings - Something JRR did claim exclusive right over by the very act of copyrighting his works. And by establishing a literary estate, he willingly and knowingly granted his descendents the right to enforce that claim.
They're also being sued because they used imagery from the movie on their website.
Website of the pub: http://www.hobbitpub.co.uk/"
Most of the "infringing material" is mere fan art like this graffiti in the beer garden: http://www.hobbitpub.co.uk/gallery/hobbitgraffiti/67/
Even thought it is just a drawing they were asked to over-paint it.
Here is a still from the movie used as background for a card: http://www.hobbitpub.co.uk/hobbit-cocktails/
That's pretty much it.
I think Steven Fry and Sir Ian McKellen are right when they call the claims "petty". How many pubs are there with images of e.g. Elvis Presley? I am sure someone has a copyright to them as well. So all auxiliary lawyers here should calm the f*** down.
So if I'm going to a pub, and it has Coca-Cola posters, than Coca-Cola can sue them ?
Probably. However, usually Coca-Cola pays people to display their posters. It's called ad-ver-tise-ment.
However, in this case : they are just being fined into oblivion, after 20 years.
If by "fined into oblivion" you mean
Producer Paul Zaentz told the BBC trademark law dictated it had to act against infringements of its brands, but were open to licensing the pub to use them.
He said: "When it's an established business, we like to get the company to acknowledge they are using our trademarks, stop selling infringing articles and then we will grant them a licence for a nominal fee - approximately $100 a year.
Please, go away and take your stupid with you before it rubs off on others.
No, definitely not. However, the image of a character from the movie is definitely copyrightable, and the names can be trademarked in the context of the movie. So if you just happened to be named Frodo, you could use your name all you want, unless you attempted to present some connection with the movie (or possibly the book).
dom
Maybe so, but the people suing don't have the rights to the images of the characters from the movies.
I feel I should address some of the issues raised in these comments. Firstly, the lawsuit was threatened because of their name. Second, the letter Mr Zaentz sent us was certainly NOT amicable, but we're not allowed to share it for legal reasons. Regarding use of images from the movie, perhaps that wasn't very well thought through, but anyone who has been to the pub could tell you that the places these images are used don't really have a bearing on sales at all - people don't buy loyalty cards because they've got Elijah Wood's face on, and nor do they buy an Aragorn drink simply because the poster has Viggo Mortensen's face on it. The pub has never tried to piggy-back on the movies' success. It's just a slightly geeky pub run by Tolkien fans for students who wouldn't see it changed for the world. Perhaps there have been some foolish but well-meaning errors committed. There are bigger things to deal with in the world of IP than small British pubs.
I gather you have never heard of fair use.
I gather you're not from the UK, or at least are not familiar with our copyright laws. There is no "fair use" provision. There is a "fair dealing" provision, but by my reading of the details this does not fall under it.
It's official. Most of you are morons.