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CBS/Paramount sues to stop Axanar

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Here's the Time Line as reported by AxaMonitor
2012
September 24: 'Star Trek: Axanar' Announced
Alec Peters announces on TrekBBS his intent to produce Star Trek: Axanar, a “one-shot feature … about 75 minutes long. It will be shot both at the Phase II sets, and here in L.A. at my warehouse, which we are emptying out for use as a sound stage. It has a rather large budget for a fan film, all funded by me.”

2013
October 30: 'Star Trek: Axanar' Film Posted on IMDb
Producers list the film, then called Star Trek: Axanar, on the Internet Movie Database with a status of ‘pre-production,’ meaning it was close to filming, with a scheduled release date of 2014.

2014
March 31: 'Prelude to Axanar' Kickstarter Campaign
A month-long Kickstarter campaign concludes with 2,123 backers donating $101,171 to produce the short film, Prelude to Axanar. The fundraising goal was only $10,000.

May 4 & 8: 'Prelude to Axanar' Shooting Dates
Director Christian Gossett completes the shoot for Prelude to Axanar in two days in Los Angeles.

July 26: 'Prelude to Axanar' Premieres
The short film, Prelude to Axanar, premieres in San Diego during Comic-Con, to herald the beginning of the project’s second Kickstarter campaign.

August 24: 'Axanar' Kickstarter Campaign
The second Kickstarter campaign concludes with 8,548 backers donating $638,471 for production of the feature film, Star Trek: Axanar (later re-titled to simply Axanar.)

November 17: Name Change to 'Axanar'
Producer Alec Peters announces the name of the feature film is being shortened to simply Axanar. “In deference to CBS, we have removed the Star Trek branding from our website. and our Facebook page,” he wrote. “We are cognizant that we are using CBS’ intellectual property and we wish to minimize the use of that IP in our film and in our overall production.”


2015
January 8: Production Status Reverts to 'In Development'
Plans to proceed with filming are put on pause as the studio build-out progresses.

March 16: Production Status Back to 'Pre-Production'
Star Trek: Axanar‘s IMDb production status is upgraded to ‘pre-production,’ with the accompanying note, “We shoot in May/June.” Those plans were derailed by the news on May 12.

May 12: Director Christian Gossett Resigns
Producer Alec Peters says director Christian Gossett resigns to take a position on another feature film.

June 13: 'Vulcan Scene' Shot
Under new director Robert Meyer Burnett, filming takes place in California for this three-minute scene from Axanar featuring Ambassador Soval, reprised by actor Gary Graham.

July 10: 'Vulcan Scene' Released
A three-minute scene from the feature film, still titled Star Trek: Axanar at that point, featuring Vulcan Ambassador Soval (Gary Graham), is publicly released. The scene is removed from public view in 2016 after the lawsuit is filed.

July 15: Annual Report "of Sorts" Released
Producer Alec Peters publishes a blog titled “Axanar Annual Report” showing a $9,000+ deficit in producing Prelude to Axanar and outlining how money raised from its second Kickstarter campaign was to be spent. He calls Axanar a “fully professional production” in which full-time employees get salaries. Later, Axanar claims it never had employees. Alec Peters goes on to release a flawed "revised" version of the report five months later, on December 15, 2015.

July 31: 'Axanar' Indiegogo Campaign
The third crowdfunding campaign, now moved to to the Indiegogo platform reaches its initial $330,000 goal, just 20 days since the campaign launched.

August 6-9: 'Axanar' Producer Meets with CBS Officials
Axanar producer Alec Peters meets with CBS Officials during the Star Trek Las Vegas event to seek parameters within which he can continue to operate Axanar. His version: They refused to tell me anything. Their version: We’re not authorizing, sanctioning or licensing this project in any way. CBS goes on to issue a formal statement describing Axanar as a “professional commercial [venture] trading off our property rights.”

August 10: Indiegogo Campaign Formally Closes
The month-long Indiegogo campaign formally concludes, with more than $470,000 in donations.

August 11: 'Axanar' Indiegogo Campaign Extended
Indiegogo moves Axanar to its “In Demand” category, which allows ongoing fundraising beyond the initial campaign. Producers raise their goal to $1.32 million to fund four episodes of Axanar, comprising the feature-length film.

August 25: [......]
Following a fruitless meeting between producer Alec Peters and two CBS officials, the industry news site, The Wrap, asks of Axanar, “[Its] seven-figure bankroll raises questions about just how “fan” the project is and at what point it poses a threat to the authorized franchise.” CBS issues this statement:

“CBS has not authorized, sanctioned or licensed this project in any way, and this has been communicated to those involved. We continue to object to professional commercial ventures trading off our property rights and are considering further options to protect these rights.”

September 1: Tony Todd Leaves Cast
Actor Tony Todd announces he’s leaving Axanar. This is not acknowledged by the production until after the copyright lawsuit is filed in December.

October: 'Heroes' Shoot, 'Axanar' VFX Work Begins
"Heroes' Vignette Shot on 'New Voyages' Set
Director Robert Meyer Burnett and producer Alec Peters travel to upstate New York to shoot a short, Heroes, on the sets of the fan production, Star Trek: New Voyages. The vignette tells the story of Capt. Garth’s rehabilitation following the events of the Original Series episode Whom Gods Destroy (episode), 23 years after the events to be portrayed in Axanar.

'Axanar' Visual Effects Begins Shooting
In order to make a planned September 8, 2016, release date for Axanar, director Robert Burnett commissions work first on the script’s visual effects, collaborating with VFX wizard Tobias Richter.

December 15: Axanar Annual Report Released
Axanar Productions releases to donors only a revised 23-page annual report outlining spending through July 31, 2015, from its two Kickstarter campaigns.21) Paramount and CBS file a copyright lawsuit two weeks later.

December 29: Copyright Lawsuit Filed
Paramount Pictures and CBS file suit against Axanar Productions and Alec Peters, alleging knowing infringement of their Star Trek copyrights, seeking damages and an injunction to prevent production of Axanar.

December 30: Tony Todd Cites Accountability Problems
In a series of messages on Twitter, actor Tony Todd disputes Alec Peters’ account of why Todd left the project and raises questions about the accountability of the project.


December 30, 2015: @Richard Baker reads something about a lawsuit and starts 'a' TrekBBS topic thread about this. 21 thread pages later Day 2 arrives.

Well, there were a lot of questions.

Elsewhere information was being suppressed, dodged, censored, twisted, ignored, denied, obfuscated. Donors and fans having questions labeled as morons, haters, idiots, and the like. Donors being accused of not worth having a voice because their donations were too small. The Axanar Marines formed to follow us around the internet to see who was loyal, who was not. Donors being thrown out of the official places for asking questions. Doxing, lawsuit threats, DNR offers to keep donors and questioners quiet. Official rolls and threads were suddenly purged of irritants.

@jespah saw supplies were going to be needed because thiswholething might take some time.

@lurok began bringing them in.

@carlosp started keeping track of everything at AxaMonitor

@TREKZONE.org started doing interviews. Maybe the first one was with Christian Gossett?

@jespah (being an actual lawyer and all) began a blog holding the many many court papers (on her own dime) as they were filed, with decoding of all that lawyer-y talk. (@jespah, what's the link to the blog? I'll link it here when I get it. Thx)


And for the defendant the money kept rolling in --- And Out

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Where did that dadgum $1.5million dollars go exactly? Area 51?

TheThread kept discussing thiswholething.

The suit was settled.

The shenanigans kept right on going.

TheThread kept right on discussing them.


TheThread by @Richard Baker started December 30, 2015. As of this posting TheThread is 1,689 pages long.

There were a 'lot' of questions... and shenanigans.
There are 2 separate blogs as I started at G&T then moved to my own show (which really is on hiatus):

http://www.gandtshow.com/tag/axanar/
http://www.semanticshenanigans.com/tag/axanar/

That should be most if not all of it. Thanks for asking! <3
 
With that logic, CBS has over 5 million subscribers (between CBS All Access and Showtime OTT) so they must be offering something someone wanted to see. Paramount’s Star Trek Beyond made $343.5 million at the box office. They too must have been offering something someone wanted to see.

I get that Axanar has its passionate fans. And for what Prelude is (a 20 minute sizzle reel with a good cast, great SFX for its budget and a very fanboyish war storyline that other than the mockumentary format doesn’t break new ground), it does fine. But that Alec made poor decisions and treated fans with questions like garbage really tarnishes it for me. And a lot of the people here.
At an average cost of $10 per box office ticket, Beyond had approximately 34 million domestic viewers. That's before international views and DVD/Blue Ray sales.
 
At an average cost of $10 per box office ticket, Beyond had approximately 34 million domestic viewers. That's before international views and DVD/Blue Ray sales.

To be fair, 34 million domestic views. We can't be certain people didn't see Beyond more than once.

Regardless, far more than Prelude's 4 million views over 4 years.
 
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To be fair, 34 million domestic views. We can't be certain people didn't see Beyond more than once.

Regardless, far more than Prelude's 4 million views over 4 years.
Even assuming half the audience were repeats thats still an absolute minimum of 17 million individuals watching Beyond.
 
Even assuming half the audience were repeats thats still an absolute minimum of 17 million individuals watching Beyond.

34 million. 17 million. Its still a lot of people. (My wife and I only saw it once ourselves, so that's 2!)

And I get the argument that Paramount had a marketing budget that Axanar did not. But, neither did Tommy Kraft for Horizon (and if we're going with that 17 million viewers for Beyond, almost half of that audience).

AND it has double the views and has been out for half the time as Axanar.
AND cost less.
AND its creator didn't treat its donors like shit.

So, that says something.
 
Your right. I don't like Axanar either but I would rather watch it than what's currently at the bottom of their expensive barrels on tv and in the movies any day of the week.
It's a war story as well, so I'm not sure what Axanar did that somehow merits the Star Trek name that current productions do not :shrug:
 
It just feels more like TOS than what's on tv and in the movies. He has a genuine love for the source material. The war arc may be misguided and not in line with GR's thinking but the dialogue is very Trekky.
 
It just feels more like TOS than what's on tv and in the movies. He has a genuine love for the source material. The war arc may be misguided and not in line with GR's thinking but the dialogue is very Trekky.
Which dialog? the super-cheesy script for the Axanar film or Prelude?
 
Alec Peters loves big ships and pew-pew battles. His knowledge of Star Trek is limited to a very specific area
 
Alec Peters loves big ships and pew-pew battles. His knowledge of Star Trek is limited to a very specific area

Which is fine. As I've said before, Star Trek is and can be many things to many people. To suggest otherwise would be a lie. But still, the hypocrisy of whining about current Star Trek and suggesting that Axanar is the end-all, be-all answer to Star Trek is just ridiculous when the EXACT SAME THING IS GOING ON IN MODERN TREK. On top of that, the complaints of the dialogue is ridiculous, particularly when it comes to the Kelvin movies. The original 2009 movie, in particular, is sometimes verbatim from TOS. So I call BS on the "Axanar is the same as TOS" argument.
 
It just feels more like TOS than what's on tv and in the movies. He has a genuine love for the source material. The war arc may be misguided and not in line with GR's thinking but the dialogue is very Trekky.
Yeah, I don't get that feel.

But, that's ok. Everyone has their thing.
 
We'll just leave it at that.
Leave it at "you may or may not be right but you can't be bothered to make a proper logical argument"?
You do know Axanar took most of their ship designs from the JJ Abrams Star Trek movies, right? Because I don't think you liked the look of those.
While this is true, I don't think I've ever heard anyone go on about how the production design destroyed those movies for them. (Although, the Romulan ship in the first movie kinda looks like someone just taped a bunch of knives together.) They usually talk about how the scripts emphasize action over substance.
And I get the argument that Paramount had a marketing budget that Axanar did not. But, neither did Tommy Kraft for Horizon (and if we're going with that 17 million viewers for Beyond, almost half of that audience).

AND it has double the views and has been out for half the time as Axanar.
AND cost less.
AND its creator didn't treat its donors like shit.

So, that says something.
It also says there's an audience for feature-length fan films, if you ask me.
 
Mr. sci fi Marc Scott Ziecree wants CBS to license fan films so what's the problem?

Yeah, but it has to be a two-way street. Why would CBS want to license fan films? What possible good would that do except to dilute the Star Trek brand with what could be inferior works? I think the guidelines are going to be the closest fan films ever come to being legitimized. Which is a long way from where they were a few years ago.
 
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Which is fine. As I've said before, Star Trek is and can be many things to many people. To suggest otherwise would be a lie. But still, the hypocrisy of whining about current Star Trek and suggesting that Axanar is the end-all, be-all answer to Star Trek is just ridiculous when the EXACT SAME THING IS GOING ON IN MODERN TREK. On top of that, the complaints of the dialogue is ridiculous, particularly when it comes to the Kelvin movies. The original 2009 movie, in particular, is sometimes verbatim from TOS. So I call BS on the "Axanar is the same as TOS" argument.
Absolutely - people can enjoy different aspects of Trek however they wish - however, his self promotion as "the biggest fan ever" does not hold up to scrutiny IMO
 
It just feels more like TOS than what's on tv and in the movies. He has a genuine love for the source material. The war arc may be misguided and not in line with GR's thinking but the dialogue is very Trekky.

You have GOT to be kidding me! Lets be real, you are comparing 20 mins worth of Axanar to 79 episodes of TOS and you are able to determine that it is more like Trek and GR's vision than anything CBS is doing. It is nothing like TOS; what are you talking about?

I can't even begin to understand this comparison of Axanar to TOS. Axanar is ONE talking head piece with CG that looks exactly like JJ Trek. There is not enough of Axanar to compare it honestly to anything TOS unless you just want to believe the rhetoric. Any real comparison, investigation and analysis would make it difficult to compare the two as being similar at all.

If AP had any real love for the source material he would have done everything in his power to get the film done. Not continually make excuses and basically steal well over a million dollars from fans.
 
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Why would CBS want to license fan films? What possible good would that do except to dilute the Star Trek brand with what could be inferior works?
There are two points here. First is the presumption that fans won't be able to distinguish between fan films and films produced by CBS. That's easily addressed by proper disclaimers, trademark enforcement and labeling. Heck, CBS would even produce some special "fan film" branding assets for people to use. So I feel this concern is easily addressed, and fans won't really expect other fans to be able to produce films of the same quality as CBS/Paramount. All the films people usually point out as confusing (Star Trek: Renegades, Star Trek Continues, Star Trek Horizons) literally have "Star Trek" in the title.

I also think you're grossly underestimating the value of fan engagement. I think it's easier to maintain a fan base if your franchise allows some sort of cultural participation, and that's what fan films and other fan works provide. Without a sense of participation, people feel less connected to the franchise and less likely to continue with it in the future.
I think the guidelines are going to be the closest fan films ever come to being legitimized. Which is a long way from where they were a few years ago.
I think the Guidelines show how they could have created a real fan license if they wanted to. They're just afraid of being the first penguin in the industry to take the plunge. Think about it. If they created a license that basically embodied the guidelines, what's the worst that could happen? Someone creates a 15-minute fan film, with "fan production" in the title, and a fan disclaimer, using $50,000 or less with no profanity, nudity, drug use, et cetera, and somehow THAT film brings the Star Trek franchise to it's knees? Nonsense.
 
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