B5 commercials?

[shakiroz]

Hey, maybe someone can help...

TNT produced some really cool ads to promote the series and I cannot find them anywhere...

Anybody know if there is a website where these and others can be viewed?

I remember one with G'kar, another with Ivanova and a third 1 minute long commercial with an amazing voiceover...

[bakana]

There would be some serious copyright issues with any website that tried to post those commercials.

Warner would NOT allow even a fan site to use them. Lawyers would happen.

[grumbler]

Originally posted by bakana
There would be some serious copyright issues with any website that tried to post those commercials.

Warner would NOT allow even a fan site to use them. Lawyers would happen.

Where did you come across this info? That must really be a well-connected website, if it can state with certainty what would happen if someone used promo material to promote the show.

You Do have a source for these statements of fact, don't you?

[Jan]

Originally posted by grumbler
Where did you come across this info? That must really be a well-connected website, if it can state with certainty what would happen if someone used promo material to promote the show.

What well-connected website stated what? And umm...promote WHAT show? It's over. Off the air. Has been for quite a while now. Any promotion for future projects might use previously shot footage but almost certainly wouldn't recycle old commercials.

Jan

[Dr Maturin]

<<What well-connected website stated what? And umm...promote WHAT show? It's over. Off the air. Has been for quite a while now. Any promotion for future projects might use previously shot footage but almost certainly wouldn't recycle old commercials.>>

I think grumbler was responding to bakana's past tense "would not allow" as in he heard this info when the show was still on TNT.

[grumbler]

Originally posted by Z'ha'dumDweller
[BI think grumbler was responding to bakana's past tense "would not allow" as in he heard this info when the show was still on TNT. [/B]

No, actually, I was responding to the dead-certainty in bakana's post about what would happen to "any website that tried to post those commercials." The commercials in question beiing the old ones for B5. It may well be true that WB doesn't want any of their old promo material published (for reasons I don't know). I just wanted to know bakana's source for these statements of fact, because they imply connections I haven't seen on any unofficial or official web site as yet.

The material was distributed fairly widely, i would imagine, in the hope that it would in fact be republished. For WB to now take offense at actions they themselves wanted to stimulate in the past would be an interesting development, and the source of the info that this was indeed true could tell us other things, perhaps.

[bakana]

Uh, I was responding based on the Absolute Certainty that, if WB's lawyers heard of Any website posting commercials for B5, no matter When it had aired, that website's owners would receive a Cease and Desist letter Immediately!

It's how people who own Copyrights do business. Legally, They have to if they want to Keep the copyright. Copyrights and Trademarks which are not defended can be Lost simply because the copyright holder didn't bother to "defend" them.

IOW, if WB knew that a website was posting B5 commercials and did Nothing, that website could later claim that WB had granted permission by Neglecting to complain.

The other part of it is that the Actors own their Images. If you post a commercial showing Delen talking to G'Kar, you owe Money to Mira Furlan & Andreas Katsulas for using their images.

WB is the entity that is expected to Pay them. For Every Single Viewing of the commercial.

So, again, WB would object.

Fan sites are granted a Tiny bit of leeway. Very Tiny. The commercials would be stepping over the line.

The money owed to the Actors for public showings, BTW, is why JMS has several times said that Warner is reluctant to sell the Blooper Reels: Figuring out Who is owed and How Much is a real PITA.


I'm sorta familiar with the concept of the "Cease & Desist" letter. A club I was in a few years ago did a T-Shirt with a Mickey Mouse vs Godzilla parody on it. We referred to it as the "Crispy Mickey" shirt. (In fact I've still got my two.) We got the C&D Letter just a couple weeks later. Along with the info that the Moustappo had confiscated the shirt from the guy who was foolish enough to wear it to Disney World.

This was in spite of the fact that Disney's lawyers know quite well that Parody is always legal. They still send the letter threatening to sue you for your First Born Child.

[Capt.Montoya]

Back when B5 aired on TNT I did download those ads... and several months had passed from the TNT premier when I did, they were available for a long time.

As with any B5 fan site that has ever read JMS opinion on the matter they were all on sites that displayed a copyright notice for PTEN and WB (and back then for TNT too)...

I don't have them anymore, I deleted them in a hard disk cleaning spell.

[grumbler]

Originally posted by bakana
Uh, I was responding based on the Absolute Certainty that, if WB's lawyers heard of Any website posting commercials for B5, no matter When it had aired, that website's owners would receive a Cease and Desist letter Immediately!

That's kinda what i thought. You are arguing your opinion disguised as Absolute Certainty. I kinda suspect that anything that is posted with due copyright notice, and for legitimate reasons, would be legally okay.

If you post a commercial showing Delen talking to G'Kar, you owe Money to Mira Furlan & Andreas Katsulas for using their images.

So you are arguing that the Lurker's Guide (which uses many images of Mira and Andreas in costume) in fact owes them money? I don't think so. I think this falls under "fair Use" especially as it contains the due copyright notices.

There are actual (well, claimed, but I believe them) copyright lawyers on this board. Let's leave it to them to state what is known, even if you "know" it with "Absolute Certainty."

[Andrew_Swallow]

Originally posted by bakana
{snip}I'm sorta familiar with the concept of the "Cease & Desist" letter. A club I was in a few years ago did a T-Shirt with a Mickey Mouse vs Godzilla parody on it. We referred to it as the "Crispy Mickey" shirt. (In fact I've still got my two.) We got the C&D Letter just a couple weeks later. Along with the info that the Moustappo had confiscated the shirt from the guy who was foolish enough to wear it to Disney World.

This was in spite of the fact that Disney's lawyers know quite well that Parody is always legal. They still send the letter threatening to sue you for your First Born Child.

It is not an offence to wear a tee shirt and copyright is basically a civil matter. So it sounds like the Disney Corporation committed theft of a tee shirt and possibly assault (depending on how they got him to remove it).

[Joseph DeMartino]

1) Trademarks have to be defended or be subject to forfeit. Copyrights do not - but the rights holder certainly can put a stop to any unauthorized use of its material except in the very narrow confines of copyright law. (Brief excerpts in reviews, academic work, etc.) This applies as much in cases where the proper copyright notices are displayed as in cases where they aren't.

The Lurker's Guide is left alone not simply because it displays the copyright and trademark notices but because WB allows it to use the images.

TNT owns the copyright to the promos that it created for its broadcast of the reruns and the new fifth season episodes, because they "created" the original content used in them, even though WB owns the rights to the underlying material. So even WB could not use them without TNT's approval, and no one else could use them without the permission of both.

The downloads TNT permitted for private use would not include the right of "public performance" - which posting to the internet could arguably be considered.

2) Copyright violations can be criminal violations as well as civil torts, which is why there is an FBI warning at the beginning of every DVD sold in the U.S. and why people are serving prison time for video and music piracy.

Either way material that violates copyright is subject to siezure. So Disney would have been within its rights to demand that the person wearing the t-shirt surrender it if it used a clearly-identifiable image of one of its copyrighted and/or trademarked characters. No "theft" involved. Parody or satire is not a 100% defense against copyright or trademark actions - which is precisely why the targets of such things are often disguised, renamed or otherwise altered. A T-shirt reading "Mickey vs. Godzilla" might pass muster even at Disney World if the "Mickey" character didn't too closely resemble the clalssic image of the "real" Mickey.

3) I think it is a reasonable assumption that Warner Bros. and/or TNT would take action against any site that offered the promos that they became aware of, at least any that did so without getting their prior consent, so the "'absolute statement" is hardly some kind of cosmic offense. WB
has certainly shut sites down that went too far in its eyes once such sites were called to their attention.

Regards,

Joe

[Andrew_Swallow]

Originally posted by Joseph DeMartino
Either way material that violates copyright is subject to siezure. So Disney would have been within its rights to demand that the person wearing the t-shirt surrender it if it used a clearly-identifiable image of one of its copyrighted and/or trademarked characters. No "theft" involved.

Siezure without a Court Order!!! Risky.

[colonyearth]

Originally posted by Andrew_Swallow
Siezure without a Court Order!!! Risky.

OK...just so the masses in the know can speak. Bakana was right and JDM is right. Anyone using those spots on their sight would most likely be stopped ASAP, unless they had a written contract to allow their use.

CE

[shakiroz]

I'm sorry I strated all of this Anyways, I hope they will be included on future DVd releases...

The ads I was speaking of were not for episodes but to promote the 5th season on TNT.

The ones with GÆkar and Ivanova had them speak directly to the cameraà

In GÆkarÆs ad, his lines were: "For freedom, for freedom! For peace! And to guard against those who would see such liberties stolen from my people. That my purpose on Babylon 5."

And IvanovaÆs lines were: "Babylon 5 was supposed to save our future, but it starts trouble than it stops. It's a time bomb. Private little wars break out everyday. It's my job to start them. it I don't those wars won't be little for long."

The best Babylon 5 commercial ever is a one minute ad which described the show perfectly with a motion picture quality voiceover...

" 2 million tons of spinning metal, all alone in the night. A world where empires rise and fall, where dreams are born and die, where war and hatred are challenged by love and faith.

In the third age of manking, an age plagued by an evil empire that seaks to destroy humanity, it is our last best hope for peace, for victory, for freedom. It is Babylon 5."

[grumbler]

Originally posted by shakiroz
I'm sorry I strated all of this

Don't be. It is the kind of question I find interesting. I note that the lawyers have remained silent, while the amateurs have delivered decisive opinions on the law.

I am in another forum with some pretty smart lawyers, and have put it to them. I don't have a stance of my own, because this isn't an area of the law I know much about, but I find it an interesting question. Around here, barn ads are used as decoration, and I am pretty sure that some of them have been repainted since the original ads expired. I'd be curious to know if this was violation of copyright.