Meh – Those copyrights expired hundreds of years ago anyway, and people with military grade combat robots rarely get sued to begin with, so they’re all good.
You have a good point – particularly if Disney ever gets hold of one of those copyrights, it will become eternal, and you know Disney will have its own army of terminator-style cyborgs to enforce that copyright with extreme prejudice. They probably already are developing them as we speak in the the vast network of tunnels beneath the Tragic Kingdom.
It’s parody, so fully allowed under Fair Use (at least in the U.S.; I don’t know about other places).
It’s arguably thanks to Disney that copyrights kept getting extended – Mickey Mouse can never be allowed to go out of copyright. Both Dr. Who and Short Circuit are much newer than Steamboat Willie.
Technically, in theory, “Fair Use” protects parody/satire. In practice, however, if Megabucks, Inc. decides to sue Joe Webcomicartist, even if they don’t have a legal leg to stand on, Joe W. still has to hire an expensive lawyer, which he cannot afford, to defend himself from the baseless suit. If he does not have the small fortune it would take to hold off Megabucks’s army of lawyers, then Joe W. ends up having to cave in or get shut down, despite the fact that he would have won the suit had it gone to trial. I’ve noticed that WotC seems to be particularly aggressive in their pursuit of webcomics that satirize D&D properties – they’ve cracked down on several of the webcomics I’ve read over the years, and invariably the Webcomic had to cave in, notwithstanding the supposed protection of “Fair Use” laws. As usual, there’s a difference between the Law in theory and the Law in practice. Such is life.
Meh – Those copyrights expired hundreds of years ago anyway, and people with military grade combat robots rarely get sued to begin with, so they’re all good.
The way things are going copyrights are moving more and more toward lasting forever.
You have a good point – particularly if Disney ever gets hold of one of those copyrights, it will become eternal, and you know Disney will have its own army of terminator-style cyborgs to enforce that copyright with extreme prejudice. They probably already are developing them as we speak in the the vast network of tunnels beneath the Tragic Kingdom.
It’s parody, so fully allowed under Fair Use (at least in the U.S.; I don’t know about other places).
It’s arguably thanks to Disney that copyrights kept getting extended – Mickey Mouse can never be allowed to go out of copyright. Both Dr. Who and Short Circuit are much newer than Steamboat Willie.
Totally true. Disney is the force that keeps pushing copyright out longer and longer.
Technically, in theory, “Fair Use” protects parody/satire. In practice, however, if Megabucks, Inc. decides to sue Joe Webcomicartist, even if they don’t have a legal leg to stand on, Joe W. still has to hire an expensive lawyer, which he cannot afford, to defend himself from the baseless suit. If he does not have the small fortune it would take to hold off Megabucks’s army of lawyers, then Joe W. ends up having to cave in or get shut down, despite the fact that he would have won the suit had it gone to trial. I’ve noticed that WotC seems to be particularly aggressive in their pursuit of webcomics that satirize D&D properties – they’ve cracked down on several of the webcomics I’ve read over the years, and invariably the Webcomic had to cave in, notwithstanding the supposed protection of “Fair Use” laws. As usual, there’s a difference between the Law in theory and the Law in practice. Such is life.
Ed8 is not a lawyer, but he plays one on the internet.