3 Responses to “Order in the Courtroom, Here Come the Stormtroppers”

1. torso_boy Posted: Apr 10th, 2008 at 11:54 am

   1 Lucas doesn’t go after much of the Star Wars prop community for three primary reasons (as I understand it, being IN that community myself): 1) The 501st Legion has sort of an unofficial monopoly on fan-made Star Wars props. They don’t control the flow, selling, or distribution of the props, but most sellers and buyers are understood to be contributing to the 501st experience. As such, Lucas has approved of the selling of fan-made Star Wars costumes and props within the 501st Legion so long as those props are put to use within the 501st Legion context, and no significant profits are made (since the 501st is a non-profit charity group). The charity group thing has played a primary factor in Lucas’ decision to do this: With 4,000+ members world wide contributing to charity in the name of Star Wars, it would look bad for Lucas to shut them down. Free publicity also plays a role. It’s not the fact that he NEEDS more publicity (who doesn’t know about Star Wars?), it’s more of a permanent billboard for his brand name. 2) Outside of the 501st Legion’s jurisdiction, most prop and costume sellers are VERY careful. They get around the legal issues by not selling “Stormtrooper armor.” Instead, they sell “Trooper armor” or “Space trooper costume” or some copyright-free variation of the name. Buyers understand what they are buying to be Stormtrooper armor, but according to the bills and records, no actual Stormtrooper armor was sold. It’s funny, the Stormtrooper is one of the most identifiable movie characters of all time, yet it’s legally “ok” to sell the costume and/or components if they just change the name on the pictures. 3) Lucas only goes after those people that a) turn a significant profit (which is EXTREMELY rare), and b) claim AUTHENTICITY. That’s perhaps the most important factor. The 501st sellers and the non-501st sellers get away with it on yet another legal sidestep by not claiming authenticity. If the seller says “This is Star Wars trooper armor,” he is claiming authenticity by the inclusion of a copyrighted brand name without the proper licensing. If the seller also says “this is my personal design, I claim copyrights to it,” he is claiming authenticity as well as doing a big copyright no-no. HOWEVER, if the seller is not claiming any sort of authenticity, it dodges the issue just barely. Also, if he gives proper credit, Lucas will allow him to sell the costume/props at a fair exchange (basically, materials + time + effort, but no extra profits). There was a website called Shepperton Studios or something along those lines that was LFL went after because of the authenticity issue. I don’t know if this is the same guy you’re talking about, but this one was a while back by a year or so. He apparently had original vacuum-forming bucks for the armor and was selling “authentic” Stormtrooper armor as part of his business. His business wasn’t shut down, but he was ordered a cease and desist on the Stormtrooper part. Fortunately for him, they were able to work out something where he paid a copyright fine and was able to continue selling the props after a short delay by carefully NOT claiming any sort of authenticity.

2. Kevin Bahrt Posted: Apr 10th, 2008 at 12:50 pm

   2 That actually sounds like a good set up. The free publicity sounds like something more companies should do. Companies spend billions of dollars on advertising that probably doesn’t work because we forget right after we see it, and here comes a small division of storm troopers down the street, not something you are likely to forget anytime soon. Just consider it free advertising. Same with AMV’s, there are dozens of shows and music artists I have tracked down because of a cool AMV and people are getting in a tizzy over whether or not copyrights have been paid. Hell, I’m surprised Lucas had to hire extras. He could have announced that there was going to be another StarWars movie and nerds would have flocked to him to get their name into the credits and do some cgi work on them.

3. Kindless Posted: Apr 11th, 2008 at 1:03 pm

   3 Lucas can go fuck himself o.O I’ve noticed over the years how much I hate this man.