Katrina
Good Karma
Joined: 11 Oct 2003
Posts: 215
Location: Uranus
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 Posted: Mon Aug 22, 2005 7:52 am Post subject: Ratings Subject to Copyright |
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Ref: [url=http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/18/business/media/18ratings.html?ex=1271476800&en=fff4a420930c890c&ei=5090"ner=techdirt}]New York Times[/url]
I wasn't sure if NY Times takes down their articles after a while, so here's the text of it:
| Quote: | The Motion Picture Association of America's ratings code - G, PG, PG-13, R and NC-17 - is so familiar that the initials are used in everyday conversation about subjects that have nothing to do with movies. But that doesn't mean that the association wants just anybody to use them.
Recently the association sent e-mail messages and letters to people who write online fan fiction, demanding that they stop tagging stories with the ratings. Fan fiction, which uses characters from popular TV shows, movies and novels in original stories, has used movie ratings for years as a way to help adults find stories with mature content and to steer children away from it. Too many children looking for Harry Potter stories were stumbling onto new and unexpected uses for wands.
"We have a right to go after people who use our trademarks without permission, big or small, whenever we find out about them," said John Feehery, executive vice president for the association. "Our ratings are not supposed to be ripped off."
Wendy Seltzer, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, argues that the association would have a point only if the fiction sites had claimed that association reviewers had rated the works. Using the ratings as a rough comparison is not a trademark infringement, she said: "It's like saying a beverage tastes like Coke."
Heidi Tandy, a lawyer who is also president of fictionalley.org, an archive of Harry Potter fiction, added that ratings such as PG and R are not exclusive to the association, since they are used by some foreign film boards. Movie ratings are also used online to tag jokes and photos, so the association may have a difficult time stripping its ratings from the cultural vocabulary.
Nevertheless, the association's cease-and-desist letters have had a ripple effect, with many fan fiction sites switching to new ratings schemes. One fan fiction writer archly suggested a simple visual code: one bunny picture means no smut, two bunnies means smut ahead.
PAMELA LICALZI O'CONNELL |
Well, with this news, I can say I'll probably be switching the rating system on my site as well. Granted I think if this were to actually go to any court a fiction site that uses the ratings as a comparrison might well have a good case. I just don't want to be the one to take it to court. ^_^;;
As far as my personal opinion in all this, I think it's sad and pathetic that MPAA sees fit to crack down on writers like this. (Both fanfic writers and people who are self-publishing their original writing online.) Selling bootleg movies I can understand, but no one is making a profit off their rating system. It's not even a terribly original idea.
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Check it out! I finally remembered my login for this account. I can do crazy things like put text in my signature and change my avatar so it doesn't say NaNoWriMo 2005. |
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