"The Hobbit" vs "The Hobbit" Pub

[Jazoni89]

I live in Southampton and have been following this story for the last week since the news came out. I'm surprised to see just how high profile this case has gone in such a short amount of time. Of course it is obvious to anyone that the pub, which has been around for over two decades, isn't 'cashing in' on the films but is instead a fun themed pub made by and for fans of Tolkien's work.
It isn't harming anyone and is in fact one of the most famous and popular landmarks in the Portswood area and is the drinking spot of choice for everyone in ECS and the Engineering departments.
This is just a film studio trying to throw their weight around, shame it's just harming the films and not helping anyone.

We should have a Southampton Escapist meet-up at the Hobbit. That would be cool.

I live in the Southampton area too, so this would be a great idea for a nerdy get together.

Someone should really make this happen.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

As of writing the most recent facebook update from the campaign about 15 mins ago

"To our army of loyal Hobbits,

I can confirm that the SZC have contacted the press.

The SZC have stated that they would like to resolve the matter of our possible copy right infringement amicably.

The SZC wishes to avoid a lengthy court battle with Punch Taverns as it feels that there would be a role reversal in that the SZC would be David and Punch Taverns Goliath. (Snigger snigger!)

They have asked that we arrange to operate by way of License and that they would grant this License for a nominal fee of $100 per annum.

It does not, however, tell us what this License would entitle us to.

However, there is one thing we are 100% certain of and that is that the support of 48,000 people plus the support of Stephen Fry, Neil Gaiman and Sir Ian McKellen has got them a little FREAKED OUT.

I am sure they thought we would just roll over and bow down to their bullying tactics.

Picked the wrong bunch of Hobbits didn't they ?

As soon as we hear back from the Solicitors as to the terms and conditions of this license we will update you.

Thank you all so very much and keep spreading the word."

That's what the pub said? the Owner of the IP let them keep their pub name and their response is to gloat and taunt them? Man that pub owner is a real dick. Perhaps they should have dropped the legal nuke on the pub after all.

or maybe even do away with the notion of owning an idea entirely.

Reminded me of this comic:

Its always the people who just haven't spent millions of dollars developing an idea that thinks ideas should be free. Its always the people who want them without having to pay for them.

And an idea is equivalent to the rent on an apartment how? IP laws get in the way of cultural progress. The fact that Disney, the company that got started by utilizing the public domain, is in turn preventing what they created from slipping back into the public domain is one of life's saddest ironies.

Edit: Hell, that comic /supports/ my statement. It's saying that ideas have no inherent value. Note that the guy getting ridiculed is getting ridiculed for seeing ideas as property -- intellectual property, in other words.

Edit Edit: And yes, I get that my interpretation is not what the guys at Penny Arcade were going for with that. But you have to understand something: they stopped being the voice of gamers and became a voice for the industry ages ago. When it comes to things like EULAs and IP laws, they're a pair of corporate tools. A pair of corporate tools who, in the case of that comic, set up a strawman of their own argument by mistake.

 

[Dejawesp]

They just understand the business.

When it costs tens of millions of dollars to make a game then it can't just be public domain for anyone to grab. That destroys incentive to create further ideas.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

They just understand the business.

When it costs tens of millions of dollars to make a game then it can't just be public domain for anyone to grab. That destroys incentive to create further ideas.

Further ideas like this Hobbit Pub, which are costing the copyright owners nothing, and will not be capitalized on by them even if they do shut it down? And I notice that you completely skipped my note about 25 years of copyright from the date of initial publication. You've created a strawman even bigger than the one in that comic.

P.S.: There's a quote button next to every post. Someone with a join date as early as yours should know by now that clicking on it before responding to someone gives them a notification, so they can see that you responded. These forums are too big to assume people will find responses without a quote.

 

[Dejawesp]

Further ideas like this Hobbit Pub, which are costing the copyright owners nothing, and will not be capitalized on by them even if they do shut it down? And I notice that you completely skipped my note about 25 years of copyright from the date of initial publication. You've created a strawman even bigger than the one in that comic.

The law can't dictate what is fair use of any IP. Its up to the owner of the IP to decide who can and cannot use it. Its 75 years after the authors death for simplicity. Otherwise who decides when the Star Wars IP has expired? Based on the first movies? Based on the latest games? will it be rewed by republishing?

If you want ideas to be free then make some good IP and *you* can hand it out for free. Don't demand to have other people's work for free.

P.S.: There's a quote button next to every post. Someone with a join date as early as yours should know by now that clicking on it before responding to someone gives them a notification, so they can see that you responded. These forums are too big to assume people will find responses without a quote.

I like to work in the quick reply tab. If you can't be arsed to watch threads you participate in then you probably didn't care that much about it in the first place.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Further ideas like this Hobbit Pub, which are costing the copyright owners nothing, and will not be capitalized on by them even if they do shut it down? And I notice that you completely skipped my note about 25 years of copyright from the date of initial publication. You've created a strawman even bigger than the one in that comic.

The law can't dictate what is fair use of any IP. Its up to the owner of the IP to decide who can and cannot use it. Its 75 years after the authors death for simplicity. Otherwise who decides when the Star Wars IP has expired? Based on the first movies? Based on the latest games? will it be rewed by republishing?

If you want ideas to be free then make some good IP and *you* can hand it out for free. Don't demand to have other people's work for free.

P.S.: There's a quote button next to every post. Someone with a join date as early as yours should know by now that clicking on it before responding to someone gives them a notification, so they can see that you responded. These forums are too big to assume people will find responses without a quote.

I like to work in the quick reply tab. If you can't be arsed to watch threads you participate in then you probably didn't care that much about it in the first place.

Actually, the law literally does dictate what fair use is. Fair use is a legal term; Wikipedia lives and dies by it. And the way copyright is supposed to work, the way it originally worked, is that 25 years after a work is published, it goes into the public domain. Now, its sequels did not go into the public domain until after they had been around for 25 years. So, for example, right now if the original law were still in place, anyone could make their own Star Wars sequel, but they could only base it on the original trilogy, material from the prequels would be off limits. The 75 years after the author's death thing was literally to keep Mickey Mouse from entering the public domain, not to make a system simpler than that.

As for the quick reply tab: dude, how often do you post around here, seriously? For one thing, the quote button is the same as the quick reply tab, the only thing different is the quote button inserts a quote. These forums don't have a graphical editor; it's all that box at the bottom of the page and BBcode. Neither I nor anyone else can be expected to check every single thread we post in constantly; I've posted in three or four threads aside from this one since making that other post, and what's more, that's in one session on the forum. If I had logged off for a couple of days after posting that, chances are I never would have seen your reply, because the thread would have slipped way down. These forums move pretty fast, too fast to just assume people will be able to check a thread manually.

 

[Dejawesp]

Actually, the law literally does dictate what fair use is. Fair use is a legal term; Wikipedia lives and dies by it.

Yeah and opening a profiting bar on the theme is not fair use.

And the way copyright is supposed to work, the way it originally worked, is that 25 years after a work is published, it goes into the public domain. Now, its sequels did not go into the public domain until after they had been around for 25 years. So, for example, right now if the original law were still in place, anyone could make their own Star Wars sequel, but they could only base it on the original trilogy, material from the prequels would be off limits.

All right great. So we can make a movie with adult darth vader but not young darth vader and any references made to Anakin Skywalker would have to be about the last scenes in the last movie of the first set of movies.

And of course it could also not feature any Obiwan without a beard I suppose, Boba fet would be okay but Jango or his mention would be totally against the rules.

I doubt anyone is going to be crying over not being able to use jar jar.

The emperor is in both the sequels and prequels so I'm not sure what we would do there. So is Jabba the hut and Darth vader in his black suit is in the prequels briefly so is he off limits or what?



I'm sure this wouldn't tie up the court systems or anything.... And for what? So EA can make old republic without George Lucas? Where is the greater good in here? The socialist free idea stuff?

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Actually, the law literally does dictate what fair use is. Fair use is a legal term; Wikipedia lives and dies by it.

Yeah and opening a profiting bar on the theme is not fair use.

And the way copyright is supposed to work, the way it originally worked, is that 25 years after a work is published, it goes into the public domain. Now, its sequels did not go into the public domain until after they had been around for 25 years. So, for example, right now if the original law were still in place, anyone could make their own Star Wars sequel, but they could only base it on the original trilogy, material from the prequels would be off limits.

All right great. So we can make a movie with adult darth vader but not young darth vader and any references made to Anakin Skywalker would have to be about the last scenes in the last movie of the first set of movies.

And of course it could also not feature any Obiwan without a beard I suppose, Boba fet would be okay but Jango or his mention would be totally against the rules.

I doubt anyone is going to be crying over not being able to use jar jar.

The emperor is in both the sequels and prequels so I'm not sure what we would do there. So is Jabba the hut and Darth vader in his black suit is in the prequels briefly so is he off limits or what?



I'm sure this wouldn't tie up the court systems or anything.... And for what? So EA can make old republic without George Lucas? Where is the greater good in here? The socialist free idea stuff?

Actually, no. Young Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine, and beardless Obi-Wan would be fine, because they're all derived from the original trilogy. Watto, Padme Amidala, and Jar Jar Binks would not, because they were originally created for the prequel trilogy. And no, it wouldn't tie up the court systems. Look up some of what happened with Sherlock Holmes and Conan the Barbarian. Both of those had portions of the series go into the public domain before the DMCA extended it, and there were portions that were covered after, yet the courts weren't tied up by legal battles. Far from it in Sherlock Holme's case; ever hear of Sherlock on the BBC?

 

[Dejawesp]

Actually, the law literally does dictate what fair use is. Fair use is a legal term; Wikipedia lives and dies by it.

Yeah and opening a profiting bar on the theme is not fair use.

And the way copyright is supposed to work, the way it originally worked, is that 25 years after a work is published, it goes into the public domain. Now, its sequels did not go into the public domain until after they had been around for 25 years. So, for example, right now if the original law were still in place, anyone could make their own Star Wars sequel, but they could only base it on the original trilogy, material from the prequels would be off limits.

All right great. So we can make a movie with adult darth vader but not young darth vader and any references made to Anakin Skywalker would have to be about the last scenes in the last movie of the first set of movies.

And of course it could also not feature any Obiwan without a beard I suppose, Boba fet would be okay but Jango or his mention would be totally against the rules.

I doubt anyone is going to be crying over not being able to use jar jar.

The emperor is in both the sequels and prequels so I'm not sure what we would do there. So is Jabba the hut and Darth vader in his black suit is in the prequels briefly so is he off limits or what?



I'm sure this wouldn't tie up the court systems or anything.... And for what? So EA can make old republic without George Lucas? Where is the greater good in here? The socialist free idea stuff?

Actually, no. Young Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine, and beardless Obi-Wan would be fine, because they're all derived from the original trilogy. Watto, Padme Amidala, and Jar Jar Binks would not, because they were originally created for the prequel trilogy. And no, it wouldn't tie up the court systems. Look up some of what happened with Sherlock Holmes and Conan the Barbarian. Both of those had portions of the series go into the public domain before the DMCA extended it, and there were portions that were covered after, yet the courts weren't tied up by legal battles. Far from it in Sherlock Holme's case; ever hear of Sherlock on the BBC?

Yeah because Arthur Conan Doyle has been dead for near a century so there's no newer works to muck it all up. And people could easily argue that Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader are two different characters

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

Actually, the law literally does dictate what fair use is. Fair use is a legal term; Wikipedia lives and dies by it.

Yeah and opening a profiting bar on the theme is not fair use.

And the way copyright is supposed to work, the way it originally worked, is that 25 years after a work is published, it goes into the public domain. Now, its sequels did not go into the public domain until after they had been around for 25 years. So, for example, right now if the original law were still in place, anyone could make their own Star Wars sequel, but they could only base it on the original trilogy, material from the prequels would be off limits.

All right great. So we can make a movie with adult darth vader but not young darth vader and any references made to Anakin Skywalker would have to be about the last scenes in the last movie of the first set of movies.

And of course it could also not feature any Obiwan without a beard I suppose, Boba fet would be okay but Jango or his mention would be totally against the rules.

I doubt anyone is going to be crying over not being able to use jar jar.

The emperor is in both the sequels and prequels so I'm not sure what we would do there. So is Jabba the hut and Darth vader in his black suit is in the prequels briefly so is he off limits or what?



I'm sure this wouldn't tie up the court systems or anything.... And for what? So EA can make old republic without George Lucas? Where is the greater good in here? The socialist free idea stuff?

Actually, no. Young Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine, and beardless Obi-Wan would be fine, because they're all derived from the original trilogy. Watto, Padme Amidala, and Jar Jar Binks would not, because they were originally created for the prequel trilogy. And no, it wouldn't tie up the court systems. Look up some of what happened with Sherlock Holmes and Conan the Barbarian. Both of those had portions of the series go into the public domain before the DMCA extended it, and there were portions that were covered after, yet the courts weren't tied up by legal battles. Far from it in Sherlock Holme's case; ever hear of Sherlock on the BBC?

Yeah because Arthur Conan Doyle has been dead for near a century so there's no newer works to muck it all up. And people could easily argue that Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader are two different characters

1.) Arthur Conan Doyle's books have been partially in copyright as recently as the 90's. Robert E. Howard, whose books I also mentioned, /still/ has part of his library in copyright. 2.) They might make such an argument, but Anakin Skywalker was also named in the original trilogy, so even if they did make that argument, it would be pointless, because he was still a character from the original trilogy. Even if he wasn't mentioned by name in the OT, call him Bob Skywalker. It's now derivative of the original trilogy, and not the prequels. The courts are tied up by the current system because of the way copyright has been unnaturally extended. Shortening it would free up the courts, not fill them. It's like how prisons are full of convicted drug users who wouldn't be there if drugs were legal.

 

[mickey]

Awkward.

On the one hand, it doesn't sound like a good thing, but on the other, if they make their place of business based after someone else's IP...that's something they should have seen coming.

It's been around for 20 years, so the books were long since out at the time, and this was long before the LoTR films were even a glimmer in Peter Jackson's eye. The fact that the pub has existed unopposed for a decade since the LoTR films came out just further serves to show the utter absurdity of this lawsuit. This is an affectionate support of Tolkien's work, not a cynical move to make money out of the IP.

Besides, this is overlooking a very important point; this is probably one of the only places in the world where you can walk in, say "I'll have a Gandalf," and not only be understood, but be given alcohol to boot!

I think we need to crush this pub as punishment for waving facebook "likes" in our faces as if they had some sort of significance. Stuff those Zuckerberg coins up the owners butt and kick him out on the street.


And yeah the Saul Zaentz Company is in the right legally here too. They own the right to the name. He used the name with a reference to The Hobbit IP owned by Saul Zaentz Company.


If the bar was allowed to get away with this then I would open "the Apple iphone bar" in the middle of town and make a fortune on all of Steve Jobs zombies and cultists as they gobble up the IP connection.

I direct you to my above post, and ask you to take your head out of your ass and do some basic research before making such a brash comment. You honestly think a pub that is themed after Tolkien's work in appreciation should be crushed under a corporation simply because they dared to show they had supporters via a Facebook campaign? What a horrible, vindictive person you are. The pub was named the Hobbit before the Saul Zantez Company got the IP rights, and it has existed happily for a decade, whilst the LoTR films came out, hobbits and all. Was any harm done in said decade to the revenues of the Saul Zantez Company? Hardly. I would rather support a pub that might be breaking copyright law than a company that got too greedy and decided only now to chase after something so insignificant.

Melon Hunter,
I am dating myself a bit here, but I remember seeing an animated movie of the Lord of The rings back in the early 80s that was made by this Saul Zaentz guy... so gotta disagree with you here when you say "The pub was named the Hobbit before the Saul Zantez Company got the IP rights"

Looked it up on IMDB, Zaentz made his movie in 1978, so it looks like he had the rights way before 1992 when they say the pub opened. Wonder when they found out about the pub?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077869/fullcredits#cast

 

[mickey]

40,000 people signed a petition asking for the lawsuit against the pub to be dropped. Regardless of where that petition is hosted, that's a pretty damn significant number. Anyone arguing otherwise should, to paraphrase yourself, 'be parried by common sense and then annihilated.' Allowing your own personal prejudices against social networking sites into your argument will endear you to no-one.

People do not pay taxes do the zantez company. Its a private company and not a public institution and as such are not entitled to any voice on their business matters.

Why should paying taxes have anything to do with it? As I have constantly reiterated, this pub has done no harm to the company. It is an affectionate theming. It is certainly not a nationwide chain, or any other large-scale company that would affect the revenues of Saul Zaentz. The petition is a an attempt to show the company that the negative PR generated by pursuing this lawsuit will far outweigh any monetary gain.

Besides, if they're defending their IP, why didn't they do this way back in 2001 when the Fellowship of the Ring was released? Y'know, that film with hobbits in? In the 11 years since, I have roundly failed to see any significant abuse of the IP. The motives behind this are not rooted in defending their IP; it is simple greed.

If they had done so back in 2001 then we would have had this debate in 2001 with you asking why they didn't do it in 1991 and so on.

They had the right to do it since the pub was started. When they decide to take action is at their own leisure. When you violate someone's IP you play with fire.

Except no LoTR film was released in 1991. The question remains; why choose to do it now, rather than when the first film they released featuring hobbits came out? Apparently they were quite happy to leave it alone then. They've had the right to do it since the pub was formulated, as his company (or at least the man himself) has owned the rights since 1976. The fact that they only begin a lawsuit now, when the Hobbit film comes out in a few months, speaks volumes about their motives here.

You seem to assume the founders of this pub were attempting to steal something from Tolkien's legacy simply by paying homage to it. This is profoundly not the case, and until you realise that, I have nothing more to say to you on the issue.

Ok I see in this post MH had figured out that Zaentz did have the rights going back to the 70s... (sorry)

But the real question you are asking is - WHY IS ZAENTZ PUSHING THE PUB NOW? Well based on my impression of IP law the answer is probably because Zaentz just found out about the pub recently. Thats the way this legal stuff works, if you own IP, once you find out about someone using your property, its your obligation to protect it. Otherwise you can loose your right to defend against other people who try to use it in the future. (unfortunate for the pub but true.)

So if Zaentz have decent lawyers, the reason they are pushing now is probably because they just found out. Because if they knew about the pub in 1992, then they wouldn't have a case to push on it now. Does anybody know when Zaentz found out about the pub?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laches_(equity)

 

[marianrogers]

According to the report, Tolkien Estate and HarperCollins filed their complaint in federal court in Los Angeles. They also requested a jury trial for their claims. Now, the lawsuit [http://mbblegal.net/] seeks an injunction against the defendants to prevent infringement and over $80 million in damages.

 

[AgentLampshade]

New goal found. Drink at this place before it becomes another boring lifeless pub.

Unless it changes it's name to "The Three Broomsticks" or "The Leaky Cauldren."

 

[Queen Michael]

Honestly, I think the company has a good point. If you start a pub called Mickey Mouse's, you'd expect to get sued by Disney. "No copyright infringement was intended," the petition says. Yes. Yes, it was. They knew fully well that The Hobbit was someone else's IP (Intellectual Property) when they created the pub, and now they're mad that they're not allowed to use it anymore? They're mad that they're not allowed to do something that they knew fully well was criminal? It would be more appropriate to be grateful that they've been allowed to have this name for two decades even though they never even tried to get permission.

Look, I'm not saying this is some Heinous Crime Against Humanity, and I actually think it'd be nice if the pub got to keep its name; I'm just annoyed that the owners are pretending this wasn't intended to break copyright laws.

 

[Hoplon]

Look, I'm not saying this is some Heinous Crime Against Humanity, and I actually think it'd be nice if the pub got to keep its name; I'm just annoyed that the owners are pretending this wasn't intended to break copyright laws.

But it's a pub, not another book.

 

[MrCollins]

The exact same thing happened all over the UK during the Summer, with the Olympic lawyers reportedly asking all "non-officially partner businesses" to stop all use of anything that could be associated with the games, It became ludicrous, with places being asked to rename their Olympic breakfasts and more than one Cafe Olympic received letters from Lawyers.
I don't think that it ever went to court.

I is also important to note that in order to make a genuine claim of copyright infringement, you have to show that you are using the copyright and attacking all people who breach it and not just defendants that are rich. So, in theory if they make a claim for something as trivial as this, imagine what they'll do to actual malicious infringement.

 

[Queen Michael]

Look, I'm not saying this is some Heinous Crime Against Humanity, and I actually think it'd be nice if the pub got to keep its name; I'm just annoyed that the owners are pretending this wasn't intended to break copyright laws.

But it's a pub, not another book.

That's true. And that does matter. It's true that Campbell's Soup owning the rights to all soup with the name "Campbell's" doesn't legally stop anyone from starting, say, Campbell's law firm. However, in this case the name is intended to make you think of the book, and there's the rub.