Hobbit Actors Stephen Fry & Ian McKellen Pay License For Hobbit Pub
from the nice-of-them dept
Remember the Hobbit pub in the UK that was threatened with legal action from the Saul Zaentz Company (SZC) for infringing on the supposed rights SZC held in the Hobbit movie? The bad publicity resulted in SZC offering up a cheapo license, and now two of the actors appearing in The Hobbit movie -- the hugely popular Stephen Fry and Ian McKellen -- have said that they'll pay the license fee for the pub. Both actors had spoken out pretty early on about their disgust over the moviemakers bullying the pub this way, with Fry going so far as to apologize for his industry's actions. Taking it even further by agreeing to pay the license is certainly a nice gesture and shows (yet again) the value of actually connecting (and being human and awesome). It still amazes me that so many companies don't recognize how badly these kinds of things will backfire.Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
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Filed Under: hobbit, ian mckellen, license, stephen fry
Companies: saul zaentz company
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It also shows a true lack of marketing acumen.
Like holding a new trailer screening there or a meet the actors party.
It would have gotten them a ton of free publicity. There would have been stories all over the world talking about the movie, the actors, about how cool it was that the trailer was being first shown at The Hobbit pub. All kinds of things. Then in the back ground they could have said to the pub we will give you a license to use the name in perpetuity but only you.
My thoughts are that there are too many times when the lawyers are creating fear in the higher-ups so that they can get billable hours.
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Re: It also shows a true lack of marketing acumen.
You'd have to have a Human Being's common sense... Not work in the legal and/or management department of a MPAA(this case)/RIAA company.
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My best guess is that they wanted to crush some easy prey and get some favorable court decisions to make their battle with New Line easier.
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Defending trademark Re: It also shows a true lack of marketing acumen.
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On the bright side it gives the pub the chance to get rid of all infringing material and keep the name.
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There have been plenty of images of both The Hobbit and LOTR over the years which this pub may have that have nothing at all to do with this movie.
For example calendars by The Brothers Hildebrandt and some with art by Tolkien himself. If these have been there for years and no one has complained of infringement why should they get rid of them? They predate the upcoming movie and have nothing at all to do with it. I don't see any infringement on the movie with any of that.
The strange thing is you'd think that if there was ACTUAL infringement either the producers of the LOTR movies or Tolkien's estate would have chased it down long before now.
The whole thing is a crock of smelly cat litter.
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This is their official website. It's clearly blatant infringement.
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"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.
They have said to us they will offer us a licence to trade, but we don't know whether it means trading as The Hobbit, whether we still have to get rid of all our artwork, cocktail names, everything. We just don't know what's entailed."
The problem isn't really the price (although she's right to say that they could just milk them every year if she doesn't fight it) - it's that having the license means accepting the terms, and the terms are likely to be quite strict.
If it was just a case of "Give us £65 and you can carry on as before forever" I'd have paid the damn fee, but things never work out like that.
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Stick your license in your arse, please mr Z.
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It's still all crap. a serious and silly overreach by the producers of a film I WAS looking forward to seeing in an actual movie theatre. WAS.
Now I'm not to sure.
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Which means the name "The Hobbit", the visuals from original books, the characters et.al are all fair game and since the actual publicans have been trading on this for over 20yrs which is more than the films can say, they could have a counter claim on trademark having to do with sale of beverages and/or licensed entertainment premises within the UK/EU.
No license should of been payed for, no matter how much it was, unless that licence is nominally ONLY for unique images in the actual IP SZC actually control and nothing else.
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Author's life+95 years, and going with the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension act...if Disney keeps it going.
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The Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998 extended these terms to life of the author plus 70 years and for works of corporate authorship to 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication, whichever endpoint is earlier.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act
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I stand corrected. However, I am not a lawyer, and the sad point is that I really shouldn't need to be to understand copyright. There are way too many variables. It is interesting, however, that if I write a book today, and get it published a couple years from now, and then die, I have less time to capitalize on copyright than a company who hires me to write a book (and then die.) Not that dying is something I plan to do...
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And this is where copyright shows its magic, isn't it.
In England, copyright (since 1955) was author's life+70 years. Tolkien died in 1973, which means the work is unavailable until 2043.
Just be thankful he didn't live in the US, where, if he played his cards right and Disney keeps at it, copyright will likely never expire.
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Part of the criticism is that the name "The Hobbit" and the accompanying story has been licensed to SZC by Tolkien's estate and isn't really theirs at all except as it relates to the movie. If it's trade mark just how in heaven does even a moron in a hurry mistake a pub for a movie?
Yes, they do deserve credit for backing off and muzzling their lawyers. But the point is that they don't have all the IP surrounding LoTR or The Hobbit just for their movie. Everything else is Tolkien's estate and it doesn't look like they've ever complained.
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MONOPOLY DOESN'T HAVE A MONOPOLY ON MONOPOLY?
OMG.... WHAT IS THE WORLD COMING TO WHEN THOSE WHO DEFINE THEMSELVES AS A MONOPOLY CAN'T EVEN HAVE A MONOPOLY ON BEING A MONOPOLY.
but...but...but... we called it MONOPOLY because we wanted a MONOPOLY...
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It's nothing more than self-marketing, stepping up and finding a positive line in a difficult situation. It's not unusual for performers to seek the camera.
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This place had used the name 'Hobbit' for over 25 years. If enough time goes by without a copyright holder taking any action then they should not be able to stop it.
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History of Saul Zaentz Company
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It still amazes me that so many people think that such behaviour will actually backfire (in a significant way).
It won't. How many cases are there where such behaviour actually made a difference? The truth is: Even though there may be an outrage among some groups, there are still more then enough who will buy the product, see the movie etc. People are fast with condemning companies, but when it comes to their real life behaviour, most of that is usually forgotten.
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Look at the governments overthrown with the help of technology.
Look at SOPA being bashed into the ground thanks to the internet.
Look at Mass Effect 3's ending being 'clarified' (rewritten) after fan backlash (which has supposedly caused a huge drop in sales after the first weekend, though that's hearsay on my part).
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This still really doesn't explain the ridiculous suggestion that any confusion between the movie and the pub would result.
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And damn nice of the actors to agree to foot the bill.
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Backfired?
BTW, serious question, not rhetoric. Has there actually been any repercussions to their actions?
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I wasn't going to watch the movie anyway, because I'm just not interestet, no matter how many Stephen Frys (whom I admire even though he's 'beginning' to take himself a bit too serious) they throw into the bargain. But NOW I'm not going to watch it because of their actions.
Makes all the difference in the world.
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the above.
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Good... and bad... and... ugly...
Sadly, this means that the outrage from this type of extortion bullying will diminish and die away.
As a previous poster pointed out, this Pub has been in existence for over 20 years and somehow, I think they'd be hard pressed to prove that there was ANY affect on book or movie sales.
In fact, quite the opposite.
Plus... copyright is on a single expression of an idea. Somehow... I don't remember there being a BAR in any of Tolkein's books called "The Hobbit". Nor do I remember any drinks called Gandalf, Frodo or Gollum in any Tolkein literature.
As far as using likenesses... last I checked, there were no "publicity" rights in Britian... so if they bought a photo... what exactly would be the law against displaying it? Or, if the licensed a photo of the actors from something like BigStock... the violation is... where?
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Stephen Fry & Sir Ian McKellen with a late entry showing once again that rightsholders are a bunch of dense idiots, but some people in "Hollywood" actually get that fans are important!
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A Victory for Hobbits Everywhere
Long live The Hobbit!
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Hobbit
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Simply... disgusting!
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