Amazon and Tolkein Estate force author to destroy all copies of his work. Only pirated copies will survive.
‘Lord of the Rings’: Amazon and Tolkien Estate Win Copyright Lawsuit Over TV Show, Copycat Book
In my opinion LotR should've already entered the public domain but thanks to Disney well have to wait until 2044 for that.
Embracer is gonna be the next one to beg for an extension.
It may as well be, they’re endorsing all sorts of shit content lately (like the Golem game, or the ring of power)
The books go into public domain in 20 years. Now that Christopher Tolkien is out of the way (who tended to block a lot of stuff, for better or worse) , the current heirs want as much out of it as they can.
20 years might sound like a lot, but that's about as much time as between the Peter Jackson movies and now.
Tbh they seem to be a lot more "hands off" with non-canon stuff, which I think includes all of the LOTR/middle earth licensed games, and that's not a bad thing imo.
I haven't played the gollum game, but rings of power was actually good tho
Don't worry, they'll manage to get it extended again before 2044.
Such optimism that it wont be extended again.
Steamboat Willie, the first Mickey Mouse cartoon, will become public domain in literally 13 days.
You can't just extend copyright indefinitely. It's not like a patent, where you can make minute changes and claim it's a new product. The original works have a copyright limit of 95 years after the first date of publish (thanks Disney and other corporate lobbyists).
If we go by The Return of the King, it was published in 1955. That means the words, the story, the settings, and the characters will be public domain in 2050. Steamboat Willie, on the other hand, was published in 1928. That means it expires at the end of this year. Unless Disney can convince Congress to change copyright law again, these copyrights all have hard expiration dates.
ETA: Disney might have a case where they can claim copyright on the information they added or changed from the original works, just like how they can still claim copyright over Mickey after losing Steamboat Willie.
And I'm sure they will, because fuck society, amirite? /s
Demand reform.
30 years from publication, no exceptions.
And for commercial purposes only. If you're not making money off of it, you should be able to use it however you want.
I think an argument could be made to set it to the date of death of the author. I agree with the other guy that it should only apply to commercial works though.
I also don't think that the copyright should be transferable. The trading of ideas is an absurd concept to me. But then us humans do a lot of absurd things so I guess it's just par for the course.
Apparently it did for a short while in the US, but not anymore.
Well public domain or not this changes nothing for the sailors of the high seas.
not exactly. You can of course still get existing works by pirating them.
But if the Tolkien works entered the public domain, anyone could use them for any creative purposes freely. And yes, a lot of the new material would be trash. But some excellent works would appear to.
A good example of this is Lovecraft's works and the Cthulhu Mythos, that although not public domain until recent years, Lovecraft encouraged others to use his own creations on their own stories, thus expanding the literary universe of his own creation. Some stories are awful, but there has also been a ton of great works based on Lovecraft's creations that couldn't have existed otherwise.
LotR should've already entered the public domain
Where is the petition to sign up for?
Should copyright for works that old be expired? Yes!
In the actual world we live in, was this guy ever going to avoid being sued so hard that his grandchildren will be embarrassed for him? No!
You've got to admire the lemming-like devotion to the legal cliff he threw himself off though. Writing a sequel to not only a copyright work, but one that is still in the cultural zeitgeist thanks to a 20-year old wildly successful series of films? Ballsy. Subsequently suing one of the largest companies in the world and the estate that produced the original works as infringing his copyright?
Chutzpa, I believe the term is.
Yeah, this guy didn’t have a leg to stand on. There’s an independently owned cafe opposite sarhole mill (inspiration for “the shire”) on the street JRR Tolkien grew up on called “the hungry hobbit”. It’s been called that since 2005 - before the release of the hobbit film. A production company sued this tiny sandwich shop, sitting on a roundabout 3 miles south of Birmingham for the unauthorised use of the word “hobbit”. That was completely egregious imo. It’s now called “the hungry hobb” - they just took down the last two letters on the sign. I really should grab a sandwich from them one day.
Ballsy? He's an outright copyright troll and anyone celebrating him here in the comments should read the article...
He wrote a knockoff book and then tried to claim Tolkien's characters as his own and sue his estate? Does nobody remember the days of BS software patent trolls trying to claim they invented "the app" or "method for clicking on things with the mouse cursor?" Do we remember how mad we were at those shysters?
This guy deserves whatever he gets.
I read through the article but it doesn't seem to specify the nature of the book. How do we know it's a "knock off"? It might very well be fanfiction. Copyright law aside, fanfiction can be original and is a valid artistic expression.
This is quite a nuanced issue. The author is claiming that the Rings of Power copied his ideas. Even if the author didn't have the legal right to publish this book, he might have put original ideas into his work, and the Tolkien Estate should not automatically own these. The copyright owner "should" (within the current legal framework) be able to make you take down your derivative work, but they don't own it. The article doesn't specify why the original lawsuit was dismissed.
Speaking of Chutzpah...
"The Fellowship of the King" title is a combination of the titles of the first book in the LOTR trilogy "The Fellowship of the Ring" and the third book "The Return of the King".
"The Two Trees" title is similar to the second book in the LOTR trilogy "The Two Towers"
Honestly, I'm surprised he wasn't embarrassed to claim that any part of that tedious shitheap of storytelling that Amazon produced had been lifted from his work.
The few episodes of that ridiculous black-hole of entertainment are the only things I have ever watched where I truly wanted those hours of my life back.
Look, I agree his works shouldn't be destroyed, just not monetizable.
But the dude poked a bear with a sharp stick... Suing the creators of the story/characters you've built your content on for copyright infringement? Brilliant move....
Right? Like I’d go write Harry Potter 8 and then sue WB lol that guy is nuts.
This is more like smacking a warhead with a hammer until it blows like in Loony Tunes. It is a shockingly suicidal decision with predictable results. He'll be in debt for the rest of his life and should be thankful the Tolkien estate didn't have him flayed for his impudence. Learning about how out of touch with reality the author is does make me curious how unhinged his book might be, though. If it turns out to be "The Room" of lotr fanficfiction I'd like to see it fan canonized just to spite the most litigious family in literature.
Copyright's explicit purpose is to encourage new works.
Any form of "unpublishing" is theft from the public. You wanna say a guy can't make money on a thing? Great, fine, go nuts. But nothing any human being put effort into deserves to be lost forever.
Yeah nothing says "write a book" like all revenue going to whichever corporation bootlegs it on the fanciest paper.
The explicit, stated purpose of copyright was to encourage sharing of ideas. When it lasted originally 14 years, it worked. Before that, you might have had a great idea and kept it to yourself because why take years of your life researching a subject and writing a book when a publisher's going to immediately copy it and pay you nothing? 14 years is plenty of time to get a return on your investment and most importantly, after that, it didn't belong to you anymore. It belonged to everyone.
For example, that would mean District 9 and Hunger Games would be in the public domain right now.
Yes, copyright exists to encourage new works - which the author ignored by creating content violating copyright law. Never mind the public, this dude stole from the copyright holders. He's a pirate and he got caught.
LOTR should be public domain right now. Only because copyright was extended to draconian levels would it be a question.
Copyright has long been perverted to disregard the interests of the public. You are defending rent-seekers.
It's crazy that people believe ideas can be owned.
Fuck off.
Maybe read the fucking room, Mal.
Going after the copyright holder for infringing on your work, which by merely existing commercially infringes on their copyright, is one hell of a way to get sued out the arse...
Having said that, it is a crime that LOTR still hasn't entered the public domain yet.
Yeah, I'm not sure what this idiot thought would happen...
The author then filed suit against both Amazon and the Tolkien estate, claiming the streaming series “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” had borrowed from his sequel and infringed his copyright.
The gall.
I honestly wouldn't even be surprised. What was it, that thing with Star Trek Discovery taking plot points from some adventure game with space-faring tardigrades?
Tolkien Estate? What's that? People profiting off of the work of an author who has been dead for 50 years?
Copyright law is fucked up.
I dunno, if I build a house, I can leave it to my family for generations. Indeed, barring something interfering with that ownership, it will be passed along. Maybe they'll sell it, or take out a loan against it and default, or a disaster could strike, or whatever.
Why would any other creation be less portable to my heirs?
Mind you, I'm definitely of the belief that artistic creations like books should eventually go public domain. I'm fine with any number of possible restrictions on that duration. But it is strange that one of the only things that automatically gets removed from a family are things like writing. Ideas, if you want to break it down. We treat them different than other things we create.
Again, I'm fine with there's being limits on holding ideas restricted. That's necessary to prevent loss of such things, that are harder to preserve than something like a piece of jewelry, or a statue, or a house. That's why patents and copyrights need to expire, but I can't agree that the limits as they exist are fucked up/bad/wrong.
Seriously, I'm a published author, I've spent a lot of time thinking about such things.
Now, I would love to see the laws change so that any copyright held by a publicly traded company, or that has been sold/abandoned by the actual heirs of the author is shorter than when held by the heirs of the author.
And, any popular work is going to have the issue of who gets to decide what is and isn't done to the works before or after public domain. You can end up with something wonderful being shat on by asshats. So it isn't like copyrights expiring is without drawbacks. When what's at stake is only keeping the works published and available, that's a clear cut thing that benefits everyone.
But adaptations, expansions, "fanfic"? I would definitely prefer someone that at least has some chance of the author's intent being known than some shitty company looking to milk the work for every possible dime.
Why shouldn't authors be able to build generational wealth the way a business can? You're talking about people profiting off a dead man, but that's what investments and properties and such are. It's future generations profiting off a dead person's work. There's billionaires out there that are sitting on wealth that was amassed not just decades ago, but sometimes centuries. Why do authors not have that possibility?
A house exists, in order to remove ownership of that hous you would need to physically expell the family living there. A story is fictional, it does not exist and removing the copy protection from it does not require actively harming the inheritors of the person who wrote it.
A house is also not so much generational wealth as it is generational ownership. You don't get active revenue from a single house if ypu are living in it. And generational wealth is pretty fucked up and should not happen.
Besides if an author really wants to make sure their children are taken care of, teach them to continue the story, the family name will ensure they get more sales than anyone else writing stories in the same universe as the original.
Shouldn't you be paying the people who built your house royalties then?
I understand that at a personal level you would want to share wealth with your children and their children, but that is not what copyright is about. The intention is that the creator gets to make their earnings out of their original product for a limited time only. So that they can continue to make original products and make a living. It is not intended to provide for your family for generations. While this may be what it has become with the help of corporations, in my opinion this is not it's intended use.
Aside from that I think your works should become public domain after a limited time, prefferedly during your lifetime. So that as much as possible people get to enjoy your original works of art.
You make a good point about generational wealth in business and I think there should be limits to that as well. It doesn't help the world at all if wealth just stagnates like that and in my opinion it should be shared with those doing the actual work, instead of a select few who were born in it, were extremely lucky, or gained money in immoral ways.
I'll leave it at that since I am not the right person to go into a discussion with you about all of these things. I do want to thank you for your work and for gifting us with your books entertaining us and giving us an escape of daily problems, expanding our knowledge with educational content or whatever else. Know that you are valued and there are people out there being touched by your work.
This guy was just deluded to think he was in the right or could win.
I was going to write a Star Wars sequel and then sue Disney for copyright infringement, until I heard this story.
Don't let your dreams be dreams! What were you going to spend all that money on anyway, retirement?
The only sane thing to do in response to this is the same thing that SHOULD have been done when Paramount went all sue happy on folks making unofficial Star Trek stuff.
Creators should stop making things related to their works and consumers should stop consuming and giving Paramount money for the official works.
The lesson being if the rights holder for something wants to keep it all to themselves, let them, forget it exists and starve it out of profitable existence. Spend the time and money with content, creators, and consumers that don't believe sucking up ever dime that's not nailed down is, or should be, the ultimate goal.
Did you even read the article? This dumbass wrote a book based on LotR characters and then HE tried to sue the Tolkien estate and Amazon. This person actually probably needs mental help if they think this could have worked, it was such an incredibly bad idea that there has to be some kind of mental health crises involved.
Worth also mentioning the Tolkien estate is notoriously letigous. There are piracy sites that specifically ban Tolkiens works from being uploaded for that very reason.
They plagiarized his fanfiction. Theoretically you would have rights to your stories even if they involve characters that you don't have rights to.
That's a lose lose scenario. I'd rather guillotine the copyright holder so the IP "fall in the public domain" if you ask me.
Your true enemy is capitalism, tho. Don't shoot the messenger.
Can’t have copyright in capitalistic systems
The person who can produce the work the cheapest is the one who gets money
What was this guy thinking? He was clearly violating copyright.
Is he just soft in the head, or is he up to something us not crazy people can't see?
Demetrious Polychron
holy shit what an incredible name, don't even care what's this about, I'm with him. President Polychron 2024.
I'm Demetrious Polychron --
Could only be made better with some Mountain Dew.
IDK what Demetrious means, but polychronic means multiple fatal diagnoses, like when you have multiple stage 4 cancers.
He tried to take them to court?!
They were...not smart lol.
Well if they did plagiarize some independent's fanfiction, and they can get away with that, it really limits the remedies for independent writers when their unpaid for script drafts end up being used for storylines.
Abolish copyright law, it does nothing but stymie creativity
At least restrict it. A carpenter who made me a chair doesn't get paid every time I rest my derriere on it.
Naaah, that's not true.
I promise you that if the stuff I've written and published could be used by anyone, however they wanted, it would not have been published. I would have kept that shit to myself.
If anything, copyright laws encourage creativity because the person knows they can take their time to build things up. You don't have to worry about fifteen sequels to your book being spammed by hacks trying to profit from your work
While this is piracy adjacent, good on Amazon and Tolkien's estate for shutting down that trash lol
lol, Amazon's LOTR was trash.
I quite liked it, personally.
I imagine saying that is going to be treated as an admission of heresy here though.
I don't even like Tolkien (find his writing to be just excessive, I don't need to know the color of the buttons on the shirt of the dead character with no name), and even I have to agree, lol.
Too many re-interpretations of authors' works. Tolkien is highly detailed - not reflecting that (or worse, substituting your own details) in a movie or show is just hubris. If you're so damn good why don't you write your own shit. Oh, your name doesn't sell instantly is why.
So much money, just absolutely wasted.
The story lines they fabricated were (mostly) formulaic, the effects were (mostly) poor, and the characters were (mostly) unlikable. Apart from that I liked it! :P
It had a few moments that I enjoyed but overall it fell flat because the characters where flat.
It was but I can’t imagine how trashy this would have been if it came to light. We don’t need fan fiction to be confused with cannon.
More to the point, who's got a link so we can judge this fanfic for ourselves?
Its still on Google Play for now
I don't trust that will stick around, need a downloadable copy
I've heard it is utter fucking trash
Well in that case I do believe Rings of Power plagiarised it, because ROP is trash too
Amazon should be sued for the Rings of Power
I can’t really weigh in, as I couldn’t get more than 30 minutes into it.
Exactly
I watched the first episode, but stopped paying attention around the second scene with the proto-hobbits
I think it's okay to let this one go doesn't seem like there is any value in his work.
I do think it's time to open up the rights to older IPs and let the community make their own stories within universes though. I loved all the star wars EU stuff as a kid.
How can you decide that? Have you read his work? Why should only works with "value" matter?
The idea of someone destroying their own work to satisfy a copyright holder is abhorrent. Worse the copyright holders who counter sued contributed absolutely nothing to the original work they hold the copyright over - they're just inheritors and businesses.
It just shows what a mess the copyright laws are. The writer shouldn't have sued but he'd probably have been sued anyway because the copyright laws are a tool for right holders to exert control over other people, and go way beyond what is needed due to the influences of corporate greed and lobbying over decades.
I read his summary it was filled with sentences like "Thus begins the War of the Rings to End All Wars of the Rings." It reeks of shitty fan fiction that should have lived out it's life in a lost corner of the internet with all the other shitty fan fiction out there. It could easily have stayed there until humanity wipes itself out and the last servers lose power. This troll had to go a poke the bear and sue the rights holders for plagiarizing him in a prequel show loosely based off of existing Tolkien works when his novels are sequels.
As for what has value and why only things that have value matter. I think value is provided if a work of art or piece of media make you feel something, think about something new, or maybe just let you escape for a bit. What does that is going to vary based on the individual. I'm pretty sure this book only provided value to the author.
Yeah, the article itself makes me a lot less sympathetic towards the author than the headline would suggest, given he instigated this whole legal dispute on frankly idiotic premises.
Purchased paper books will survive too.
Not if the author finds and destroys it.
Fanfiction illegalized in USA!
Amazon LoR just sucks, is nothing of what Tolkien wrote
JRR wrote four LotR stories.
Everything else is a fanfiction. Even the Silmarillion. By far the most obnoxious reaction to the show is from "Tolkien purists" who got their entire Tolkien knowledge base from Peter Jackson.
The show is a perfectly Tolkienish story, despite the gratuitous lack of random singing, it's just not a good one. Like, okay, you need to compress the timeline for the show, fair enough, just do a good job of that.
Wrong Durins to fight both the War of the Rings and the Balrog?
Then don't tease the fucking Moria Balrog. If you want to use a Balrog, because Balrogs are fucking sweet, there was more than one...
Honestly, the weirdest part of the show is that they'll follow a lore deep cut with something that could only possibly fool someone that missed the deep cut, but also doesn't know or care who Gandalf or Isildur is, so what's the payoff for the reveal?
"Perfectly" except for all the descriptions Tolkien does on his books vs what Amazon did.
Descriving elves as one thing and having elves as oposite for the Amazon stories. So no, not a tolkienish stories.
I understand he didnt write anything that Amazon is doing, but what Amazon did is nothing like what he descrived on the books.
No wonder the rating is so low and none of the LoR fans liked it.
Wow that guy died first. How deluded
When your plan to get some sweet settlement money doesn’t quite work out.
All in all, not the best get-rich-quick scheme I’ve seen.
I think his lawsuit is valid and that Amazon really did steal his work, because those titles are derivative mulch and The Rings Of Power is a snoozefest.
meh. Fan fiction. Not a real book. not a real author.
Ah, because you, the god of "real" art say so? Quit gagging on your own bullshit.
Can yall go back to reddit lmao
Heh, more of this shit.
Remember, the only reason we can still watch the highly influential 1922 vampire movie Nosferatu today is because some people didn't destroy all their copies despite a court saying they had to.
DISOBEY DESTRUCTION ORDERS.
COPY ALL THE THINGS.
The author in question here was pretty shitty. He wrote his own sequel to called "Fellowship of the King", and then sued Amazon and the Tolkien estate saying they stole elements from his book. He lost, and the Tolkien estate countersued.
The guy played stupid games and won stupid prizes.
Yeah, I read. I don't have much sympathy for him. He sounds like a jerk.
IMO preserving the content is more important than honoring him (or, for that matter, humiliating him).
I can't help being curious, who are these "Tolkien Estate" people? I want NAMES!
Hey this is a pretty interesting story, got a link?
Here a pretty good version of it
https://www.npr.org/2022/03/15/1086605684/try-as-she-might-bram-stokers-widow-couldnt-kill-nosferatu
I didn't see anything on Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nosferatu?wprov=sfla1
Some older dutch movies were released as rentals to the theaters that had to be returned after they stopped playing the movie. These copies were all destroyed and re-releases on DVD now look worse than what it looked like in movie theatres.
The good news is that some theatres hung on to some movies.
Thank goodness. Have those copies resurfaced and gone into the possession of proper archivists and/or research collections?