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Black Mirror; Bandersnatch

Started by Dex Sawash, December 26, 2018, 02:44:02 AM

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BlodwynPig

Quote from: olliebean on January 09, 2019, 05:23:54 PM
No, that was Jeff Minter, founder of Llamasoft and gaming legend.

stealing my thunder

Quote from: WikipediaSince 2015, Minter has used the name "Yak" relatively rarely, usually signing as "Stinky Ox" or "Jeff Minotaur".

In 2019, Minter was the subject of a lawsuit filed by Academy nominated Film Director, Blodwyn T. Pig over the use of the "Minotaur" moniker.

Head Gardener


Small Man Big Horse

The folks behind the Choose Your Own Adventure books are now suing Netflix for $25 million, and might have a case as one character said the words "Choose Your Own Adventure" at one point, though I'm hoping they'll lose because this sort of thing always seems twatty to me.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Small Man Big Horse on January 14, 2019, 07:25:33 PM
The folks behind the Choose Your Own Adventure books are now suing Netflix for $25 million, and might have a case as one character said the words "Choose Your Own Adventure" at one point, though I'm hoping they'll lose because this sort of thing always seems twatty to me.

Yeah but then again, $25 million is a relative drop in the hat to Netflix.  The Choose Your Own Adventure folks are probably in far greater need of that $25 million than Netflix, in part because a lot of kids won't be reading their book range because of services such as Netflix competing for their attention.

I'd be pretty pissed too, if an (albeit, indirect) competitor of mine muscled in on my territory and then had the gall to use a copyrighted phrase of mine whilst doing so.  This is why companies such as Netflix have a legal team; to avoid infringing upon other companies copyright.  It was a careless oversight on their part.  You can't really blame the Choose Your Own Adventure company for trying to get some money from them.  Twatty as they may or may not be for doing so, it's their legal prerogative and you can be certain that Netflix would do the same, if someone encroached upon their copyright.

It's a dog eat dog business, not a friendly egg and spoon race.

Mister Six

It's not "their territory", though. They don't own the concept of a multi-path digital adventure otherwise they'd be able to sue god knows how many video game companies. And there's no trademark infringement as it was just used in the story, not in the marketing (as far as I'm aware).

Pretty sure Netflix's lawyers will already have considered this and will shut the whole thing down fairly swiftly.

MojoJojo

Quote from: Mister Six on January 14, 2019, 08:38:31 PMAnd there's no trademark infringement as it was just used in the story, not in the marketing (as far as I'm aware).

Pretty sure you don't have to use it in marketing for it to count as infringement. I would have have thought Netflix's best defence would be that it isn't a book, but turns out the CYOA people did some DVD thing at some point.

I don't think they have any chance of winning, but a good enough chance that they can draw it out and make it expensive enough that Netflix will pay them off.

Quote from: St_Eddie on January 14, 2019, 08:02:49 PM
Yeah but then again, $25 million is a relative drop in the hat to Netflix.  The Choose Your Own Adventure folks are probably in far greater need of that $25 million than Netflix, in part because a lot of kids won't be reading their book range because of services such as Netflix competing for their attention.

How do you figure? CYOA make more profit than Netflix.
Quote
I'd be pretty pissed too, if an (albeit, indirect) competitor of mine muscled in on my territory and then had the gall to use a copyrighted phrase of mine whilst doing so.  This is why companies such as Netflix have a legal team; to avoid infringing upon other companies copyright.  It was a careless oversight on their part.  You can't really blame the Choose Your Own Adventure company for trying to get some money from them.  Twatty as they may or may not be for doing so, it's their legal prerogative and you can be certain that Netflix would do the same, if someone encroached upon their copyright.

It's a dog eat dog business, not a friendly egg and spoon race.
There is a difference between trademarks and copyright.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Mister Six on January 14, 2019, 08:38:31 PM
It's not "their territory", though. They don't own the concept of a multi-path digital adventure otherwise they'd be able to sue god knows how many video game companies.

I never said that they owned the concept of multi-path digital adventures.  By "their territory", I was referring to their bread and butter.  Of course other companies are free to make their own multi-path adventures but from the perspective of the Choose Your Own Adventure company, it's unwanted competition.  That doesn't mean that they have a right to do anything about it, of course.  I was simply saying that the moment that their competition fucks up by using a trademarked phrase of theirs, then it's only natural that they're gonna pounce.  From a business perspective, it would be rather silly not to.

Quote from: MojoJojo on January 14, 2019, 08:55:53 PM
Pretty sure you don't have to use it in marketing for it to count as infringement.

Exactly.

Quote from: MojoJojo on January 14, 2019, 08:55:53 PMI don't think they have any chance of winning, but a good enough chance that they can draw it out and make it expensive enough that Netflix will pay them off.

I'd imagine that's their plan, yes.  Good for them, I say.

Quote from: MojoJojo on January 14, 2019, 08:55:53 PMHow do you figure? CYOA make more profit than Netflix.

Do you have anything to back this statement up?

Quote from: MojoJojo on January 14, 2019, 08:55:53 PM
There is a difference between trademarks and copyright.

Okay but that's semantics.  It doesn't change the core point which I was making.

Mister Six

It's not semantics - it's two different areas of law with different rules as to what constitutes infringement.

Quote from: MojoJojo on January 14, 2019, 08:55:53 PM
Pretty sure you don't have to use it in marketing for it to count as infringement.

Infringement of what? You can't sue because your brand name was used in a story unless it implies endorsement or denigrates the brand, IIRC. I don't think that's the case in either instance and they would struggle to prove that was Netflix's intention, I'm pretty sure.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Mister Six on January 14, 2019, 09:12:27 PM
It's not semantics - it's two different areas of law with different rules as to what constitutes infringement.

Look, I used the wrong terminology.  I get it but you both knew what I meant.

BlodwynPig


St_Eddie

#130
Quote from: Mister Six on January 14, 2019, 09:12:27 PM
Infringement of what? You can't sue because your brand name was used in a story unless it implies endorsement or denigrates the brand, IIRC. I don't think that's the case in either instance and they would struggle to prove that was Netflix's intention, I'm pretty sure.

It doesn't matter whether it was their intention or not, at least not in terms of filing a law suit.  The relevance of intent is a matter for the courts to decide.  The phrase 'Choose Your Own Adventure' is trademarked.  Other companies can't legally use it without prior consent from the holder of the trademark (in this case, Chooseco).  It would be like a chicken product manufacturer, who isn't KFC, releasing a chicken bucket with the phrase "finger lickin' good" printed on it.  You can't do that.

Mister Six

Quote from: St_Eddie on January 14, 2019, 09:17:56 PM
It doesn't matter whether it was their intention or not, at least not in terms of filing a law suit.  The relevance of intent is a matter for the courts to decide.  The phrase 'Choose Your Own Adventure' is trademarked.  Other companies can't legally use it without prior consent from the holder of the trademark (in this case, Chooseco).  It would be like a chicken product manufacturer, who isn't KFC, releasing an advert with the phrase "finger lickin' good" in it.  You can't do that.

No, it's not like that. It's like a TV character saying "Let's get some KFC," which you can do.

They might want to argue trademark infringement or dilution, but since it's a single line in a single episode, that's going to be a stretch. If it had been promoted as "Black Mirror's choose your own adventure episode" then that might be different. I don't recall that being used in the trailers though.

St_Eddie

Quote from: Mister Six on January 14, 2019, 09:43:11 PM
They might want to argue trademark infringement or dilution, but since it's a single line in a single episode, that's going to be a stretch.

Hardly matters, considering Netflix is likely to settle out of court.

BlodwynPig


ZoyzaSorris

What the absolute fuck? Of course you can't sue a tv programme for having a character mentioning a phrase within it, real product or not. Absolute nonsense.

Mister Six

Quote from: ZoyzaSorris on January 14, 2019, 10:25:49 PM
What the absolute fuck? Of course you can't sue a tv programme for having a character mentioning a phrase within it, real product or not. Absolute nonsense.

You can if the character denigrates the product. But not the case here, obviously.

olliebean

Although I suppose the argument could be that being associated with a product that drove its creator to murder (albeit fictitiously) might damage the reputation of the trademark.

Dex Sawash

I think in america to infringe copyright, it just has to confuse the consumer about if it is a genuine product. My sister's the IP attorney, don't make me ask her or I get a lot more data* than I want.


*As in info, not the cybernetic character from a sci-fi tv and film franchise

Cloud

Absolutely batshit!

I've just watched this for the I dunno, 4th or 5th time? Over the past couple of weeks, after finishing the excellent Black Mirror main series

Everything about it is amazing, 5 stars out of 5, perfect.  (Hey, I tried to emulate the kid)
Thought after all the talk of free will, I'd try just letting all the options time out. I thought it'd give me a "you won, Stefan made his own decisions" kind of ending but rather, it seemed to just show me most/all of the paths.

But it's FUCKING CREEPY,
1) After I'd finished watching it last night, I clicked onto a Telegram group I frequent and the last post, a few moments ago, was of a derailed train
2) Stefan is the absolute spitting image of a longstanding friend of mine (we go back to school days) who also had mental health issues and made the exact same stares
3) Now I find that my suspicions of "this guy looks a bit like Jeff Minter" were true (I'm a regular on the Llamasoft forums, and the kicker, I only found them by accident and had never played their games) and reality was indeed mixed with fiction in the already massive headfuck of reality and fiction depicted in the movie..game..thing

I've never felt so gaslighted. Holy shit

As always with Black Mirror, I need to sit down