Be Careful Writing About Tintin; The Lawyer For The Tintin Estate Might Sue

from the tintin-tintin-tintin dept

I've never quite understood how various brands decide to go about attacking their biggest fans, but sometimes common sense isn't so common. Robert Ring sends in a story from a few weeks ago, about how the lawyer who represents the estate of the guy who created the cartoon character Tintin has been suing fans who have written about Tintin, including a guy named Bob Garcia who had written five essays about Tintin. According to the original report:
"One pamphlet drew links between his twin passions -- Tintin and Sherlock Holmes. Another looked at the cinematographic references in Herge's works. Two of the five, printed on average 500 times, used 'graphical citations' of Tintin drawings."
In the US, this would clearly be fair use. In the UK, where this is happening? Garcia "has been ordered by British courts to hand over £35,000 or face the possibility of having his house and belongings seized." In response, many people are organizing a boycott of the new Tintin movie. Nice work. In overstepping common sense bounds to try to squeeze a tiny bit more money out of a fan who was just writing about a character, this lawyer has succeeded in getting people to proactively shun the movie.

Of course, the link above also points out that the lawyer, Nick Rodwell, has a bit of a history making somewhat questionable decisions in dealing with how others perceive Tintin. Apparently, last year, his own blog on Tintin.com had to be shut down after he accused some journalist critics of not liking him or Tintin because "the children of those critics had autism and couldn’t appreciate Tintin." Oh, and did we mention that the reason Rodwell is representing the estate of Tintin creator Herge is because he married Herge's widow?
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Filed Under: copyright, fans, tintin


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  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2010 @ 12:32pm

    Super article

    Slow news day or are you out of stamps and/or envelopes?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      Hephaestus (profile), 27 Jan 2010 @ 1:29pm

      Re: Super article

      Mikes at the Midem music industry conference this week in Cannes, in the south of France. Having WiFi Problems.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2010 @ 1:53pm

        Re: Re: Super article

        Back in my day, we had things called "marital problems", not wifi problems. But, if he had an iPhone, he could at least get a lifeline connection. Along with the dictation app from Dragon Software, (available for a limited time for free in the App Store), he could also dictate his responses. A co-worker tells me that Palm Pre from Sprint has spotty coverage in the south of France.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        Mike Masnick (profile), 27 Jan 2010 @ 3:45pm

        Re: Re: Super article

        Mikes at the Midem music industry conference this week in Cannes, in the south of France. Having WiFi Problems.


        WiFi isn't that bad. It just cuts out pretty frequently. Havent' had any real problems posting.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      transmaster (profile), 27 Jan 2010 @ 1:37pm

      Re: Super article

      No Mike just wanted to hear you the Ayatollah-ass-hola speak.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2010 @ 12:34pm

    Nick Rodwell is a skank.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 27 Jan 2010 @ 1:01pm

    Or

    From the see-you-in-court dept.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    The Groove Tiger (profile), 27 Jan 2010 @ 1:49pm

    Just found and joined this:
    http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=info&gid=91196878131

    I can't read much french but it seems the page to back Bob García vs the Tintin estate thingy.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anony1, 27 Jan 2010 @ 4:24pm

    Super article
    by Anonymous Coward
    Slow news day or are you out of stamps and/or envelopes?


    You showed up here didn't you?! You and Anti-mike need to start sharing your brains. Then you'll probably have, well at least an 1/8th of a brain between you....

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Rin Tin Tin, 27 Jan 2010 @ 4:42pm

    RRRrrr - Woof

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Chris Tregenza, 29 Jan 2010 @ 2:13am

    France Not England

    Bob Garcia's case took place in France, not the UK.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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