Dear god, Trekkies are worse than Doctor Hueys or whatever they're called. Children's TV is really getting out of hand
Your mother has a smooth forehead, Klingon language lovers roar at Paramount
The Language Creation Society is very unhappy about an effort by movie studio Paramount to copyright the language of bumpy-headed Star Trek aliens, the Klingons. In an amicus curiae brief filed with an LA court, the society claims that Klingon is a "living language" and cannot be owned. "The greater whole is a living …
COMMENTS
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Saturday 30th April 2016 03:26 GMT Geoffrey W
Re: Reality check
If nothing really matters then piddling on someones fireworks doesn't matter either so why piddle on his fun if that's what makes him happy? Be happy that he's happy, and I'll be happy that we're all happy because this is all on line nonsense and there is no actual piddling going on and no extinguished fireworks and we can all be happy knowing that everyone else is happy and unicorns can nibble stardust and we can all love one another and no one need ever feel sad ever again.
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Friday 29th April 2016 08:51 GMT Tom Melly
Normally I'd agree, but CBS have generally been pretty good with regard to fan-stuff, and the Axanar crew were really taking the piss.
On the bright side, when Axanar challenged CBS to detail the exact copywrite infringements, one of the lawyers did just that, delving deep into Trek lore (history, not Data's brother).
https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2757228-Axanar-Klingon.html (page 11 onwards is the fun bit)
As someone else remarked "Depending on where they fell on the nerdiness spectrum, this could've been one of the greatest weeks or one of the worst weeks in some paralegal's life."
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Friday 29th April 2016 11:45 GMT Chris King
"Normally I'd agree, but CBS have generally been pretty good with regard to fan-stuff, and the Axanar crew were really taking the piss"
After I pledged to Adam Nimoy's "For the Love of Spock", the Axanar mob spammed me asking for a pledge too. They got nothing from me, other than an e-mail along the lines of "sharing mailing lists like this is NOT cool".
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Friday 29th April 2016 06:30 GMT Michael H.F. Wilkinson
Initially?
"In fact, at least one child was initially raised as a native speaker of Klingon."
Does the "initially" mean that some child-care agency stepped in, or did the parents come to their senses? I am quite a Lord of the Rings (the books), and Discworld fan, but I didn't name my kids Frodo, Galadriel, Havelock, Carrot, or Glod, nor did I teach them Quenya, Sindarin or Adunaic. I certainly wouldn't dream of teaching those as their first language.
I prefer to just stick a fish in their ear. Works for me and my friend Ford Prefect
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Friday 29th April 2016 18:23 GMT MattPi
Re: Initially?
"Does the "initially" mean that some child-care agency stepped in, or did the parents come to their senses? I am quite a Lord of the Rings (the books), and Discworld fan, but I didn't name my kids Frodo, Galadriel, Havelock, Carrot, or Glod, nor did I teach them Quenya, Sindarin or Adunaic. I certainly wouldn't dream of teaching those as their first language."
I just read an article about it today, strangely enough. The guy was a linguist (and not actually that much of a Trek fan) and thought it would be interesting to start a child in a constructed language. His wife spoke English to the child, so he's bilingual. Read on if you want to know how it turned out.
http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2012/08/a-man-once-tried-to-raise-his-son-as-a-native-speaker-in-klingon/
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Friday 29th April 2016 07:41 GMT find users who cut cat tail
Yes, and the bigger claim and copyright on characters, settings, and plot points is pretty fucked up too if you ask me. You created a concrete work of art and you get copyright on that. If someone else creates some other work of art related to the same (virtual) universe, it is their work of art.
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Friday 29th April 2016 08:06 GMT dan1980
@Bloodbeastterror
"Some people just have too much time on their hands . . ."
Oh, I agree. I just don't necessarily put a group of devoted fans enjoying their hobby and creating something (however niche) for other like-minded folk to enjoy in that bucket.
Though I must confess to only a casual enjoyment of Star Trek (I often work at night and TNG/DS9 are often on) and have no ability - or desire - to say anything in Klingon, I understand that the people in question have enriched their part of the collective human culture.
Having 'too much time' is the beginning of many interesting creations.
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Friday 29th April 2016 07:12 GMT Gordon 10
ST:WTF!
Whilst I have some sympathy with the Trekkies/ers language claims, it seems to be a part of a bigger element of Paramount stopping Fan films being made.
Since it appears the fans are pissing up $50k on funding this stuff, I would respectfully suggest they get a life and film and write something original. Who knows they might actually have a winner on their hands.
The top quality fan films seem genuinely good and the makers are obviously hugely talented - its just a shame they have wasted all that effort on
stealingrecycling what is clearly someoneelses IP.The last thing the film industry needs is another set of sequels, especially for ST which has had more than its fair share of film outings.
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Sunday 1st May 2016 20:56 GMT John Brown (no body)
Re: ST:WTF!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqA9dhQfwPs" was a fun little interlude that brought a smile to my face. It's nice that some kids still have the patience to help in creating something like that instead of wanting and getting the instant gratification that most kids seem to expect these days.
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Friday 29th April 2016 10:30 GMT MacroRodent
Re: ST:WTF!
Very, very stupid of Paramount: The trekkies are the only reason Start Trek films or TV series make any money at all, and annoying them is not going to make the franchise any more profitable. Maybe their lawyers are concerned the fan fiction would dilute their trademarks or something, but the solution would have been to negotiate a deal where the fan films prominently acknowledge the trademarks are used by the gracious permission of Paramount, but do not pay for them.
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Friday 29th April 2016 10:57 GMT Danny 14
Re: ST:WTF!
Oh I doubt it. The new ST films were not really "trek" enough; here were plenty of booing and hissing in the cinemas. Paramount probably want to bury trekkies so that they can sell the new action films to a newer generation.
Ironically without the trekkies the franchise would have sunk a long time ago.
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Sunday 1st May 2016 20:47 GMT John Brown (no body)
Re: ST:WTF!
"The top quality fan films seem genuinely good"
I find that to be quite rare. Most fan productions, whether film or audio drama, tend to have a "boss" who does all the top jobs, including the starring role and then it's their best mates or clique who do the rest of the top jobs. Acting ability seems to play second fiddle to who you are and who you know in so many of these things. It's a shame really because sometimes the stories are actually quite good. If only the author would stick to the writing and stop pretending to be the "star" actor, Director and Producer too!
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Friday 29th April 2016 07:42 GMT Anonymous Coward
What!?
I always thought Star Trek was a documentary. Now I find out it's entirely made up even including the language.
What other major parts of my world is The Register going to collapse today? Is Trump, in fact, a real person? Did the Grinch not steal Christmas? Is Windows 10 voluntarily installed by people? Is this actually the year of Linux on the desktop? Are ads a good thing?
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Friday 29th April 2016 08:08 GMT Anonymous Coward
Spite ?
Anyone who knows the Star Trek story (my Mum was a *massive* fan, so aged 8-16, our house had every single thing ever written - including the David Gerrold book) will know:
1) Paramount/NBC never bought into ST, and it as never considered "serious" by them
2) It was cancelled after the 3rd season despite having excellent ratings
3) The cancellation led to one of the biggest (it may still be the biggest, since snail mails decline) letter campaigns in US TV history
4) After the cancellation, NBC/Paramount got very protective and were flinging sueballs at any form of "fan fiction" (it's a fair view that ST *invented* fan fiction)
The overall story of ST is of it's being made in spite of, rather than because of US network TV.
Spock Messiah !
The Price of the Phoenix.
Visit to a Strange World Revisited
and of course the first fan-fiction book:
"Spock Must Die !" by the late James Blish
Raising a glass to Bjo Trimble - yes, *that's* how much of a Trekkie my Mum was.
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Friday 29th April 2016 08:51 GMT DrStrangeLug
Axanar looked awesome
I saw the "Prelude to Axanar" video on youtube last year and thought it was awesome, and I was so looking forward to the final version.
Several other fan produced not-for-profit productions have been made and paramount seems to be OK with them so long as nobody profits from it. I dont really know why Axanar is different. However having seen the the other productions I suspect Axanar is actually being sued for being too good.
IDK why Paramount didnt just buy them out .
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Friday 29th April 2016 11:52 GMT Chris King
Re: Axanar looked awesome
"Several other fan produced not-for-profit productions have been made and paramount seems to be OK with them so long as nobody profits from it".
The "Star Wreck" series was a good example. Paramount were pretty cool about the whole thing, even the commercially-distributed "Imperial Edition" (the P-Fleet ships were redesigned in that one to give them a more "Soviet" look).
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Friday 29th April 2016 10:05 GMT BlackDuke07
I do not see the correlation between the story and your example. All you have done is attach something great we (mankind) have done to this story to mock it. It makes you sound really clever, I'll do the same and see if it works for me.
Joe Bloggs can't even tie his shoelaces. How did we devise theories of the beginning of the fucking universe?
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Friday 29th April 2016 10:11 GMT Chas
Although Marc Okrand developed the proper grammar and syntax for Klingon, the first words and phrases were actually created by Jimmy (Scotty) Doohan for the first ST film.
This perhaps explains the similarity between the sound of Klingon and the dulcet tones of a Glaswegian who, on reeling back from the pub after a marathon session, discovers 'er indoors has locked the front door thus requiring him to inform the entire neighbourhood—at full volume and in detail— as to his woeful circumstances.
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Friday 29th April 2016 10:48 GMT Anonymous Coward
Thought experiment
The British Sign Language symbol for "Prototype" was explicitly invented, on the BBC's payroll, for an episode of Doctor Who. It has since entered common usage among the Deaf population to mean Prototype. Previously, a Deaf, or hearing, signer who wanted to sign Prototype had to sign P-R-O-T-O-T-Y-P-E.
Do the BBC or Doctor Who have any claim to the copyright of this sign? I know they wouldn't try, but imagine they were Paramount. What then?
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Friday 29th April 2016 11:42 GMT allthecoolshortnamesweretaken
Paramount is acting short-sighted and, well, just plain dumb. Yes, they have a point about copyright(s), but this would have been an excellent opportunity for massive positive and cost free PR. It adds to my already strong belief that the only companies that should be run by accountants are accountancy firms.
Anyway: There are also Klingonz. Have a nice weekend, everybody.
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Friday 29th April 2016 21:27 GMT Red Bren
Paramount v Disney
If Paramount can set a legal precedent that ancillary items in a story are covered by copyright, will Disney have to pay a metric fuck-tonne of cash to Great Ormond Street Hospital for using Captain Hook and Tinkerbell in various spin-offs from Peter Pan?
Pirate icon, coz it's only bad thing when the little guy does it...
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Monday 2nd May 2016 14:11 GMT sisk
I once heard of a man who met his then-future wife at a Star Trek convention. He was American and she was studying abroad from France. The only common language they had was Klingon. Apparently that stayed true for several months before they picked up enough of each others native tongues to use them to communicate. They literally enjoyed a romantic relationship while speaking to each other exclusively in Klingon for the first several months that they were dating and it led to marriage.
If that's not proof that the language shouldn't be owned by anyone I don't know what is.
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Tuesday 3rd May 2016 11:29 GMT Dr Patrick J R Harkin
Essential late night listening
Drving through the night once, I pulled into services and wanted something NEW to listen to. I rummaged through their sale bin and got a Buffy audiobook narrated by Charisma Carpenter (worth the 99p just to hear her attempt at Gile's accent) and "Teach Yourself Klingon". The wrapper said it was aimed "at the tourist planning a holiday or trip to the Klingon empire" but cautioned that if you wanted to trade with the Klingons, you needed the companion tape "Business Klingon for Beginners"...