Tolkien Estate Says Just Mentioning Tolkien Infringes; Tolkien Censorwear Appears In Response
from the that's-not-how-this-works dept
We've been mentioning a bit about how the estate of JRR Tolkien has been overaggressive in trying to enforce (sometimes non-existent) intellectual property rights related to Tolkien. The estate has been like that for a while, but in the last few weeks it's seemed like the number of such stories have been ramping up. The latest one is particularly ridiculous. Boing Boing points us to the news that the Tolkien Estate has threatened a guy for having a button that merely mentions Tolkien:
If you can't see the image, the button reads: "While you were reading Tolkien, I was watching Evangelion." That's not infringing in any way, shape or form. Yet, the Tolkien Estate sent Zazzle (where the button was being sold) a cease and desist. Ridiculously, Zazzle simply complied. That's disappointing as well. In cases of obvious overreach, Zazzle should stand up for the rights of its users.
Of course, where Zazzle fails to stand up for its users, its users seem to be more than willing to stand up for themselves. A bunch of protest merchandise has suddenly been showing up on Zazzle, such as the following two shirts, which joke about Christopher Tolkien's desire to censor any mention of his father that he hasn't approved or been paid for:

Of course, where Zazzle fails to stand up for its users, its users seem to be more than willing to stand up for themselves. A bunch of protest merchandise has suddenly been showing up on Zazzle, such as the following two shirts, which joke about Christopher Tolkien's desire to censor any mention of his father that he hasn't approved or been paid for:







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And puppies....
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"Oh look, a childish response in a comment."
Dammit! Soooooo close. More willpower needed.
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1- Open python console
2- Write " print "Tolkien "*(10**6) "
3- Enter
4- Jail
5- ???
And then they wonder why programmers have 0 respect for I.P. laws.
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But it was the Tolkien estate the "invaded Poland"
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Tolkein
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Supposed some random dude named Tolkien decides to sell, I dunno, Tolkien brand helicopters. Is he going to be sued for trademark/copyright/whatever infringement? If yes, can someone please stop this world? I want to get out!
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Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
Programmers... Hmpf...
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The first law of Toklien Club is
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There's a similar case a year or so ago involving a Japanese doctor who had the same name (and website) as a large manufacturer. Wish I could recall his name at the moment...
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Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
for x in xrange(10**6):
print "Tolkien"
Now, please, don't make me implement a fast exponentiation algorithm :)
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Just sayin'
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Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
Let's try that again:
for x in xrange(10**6):
....print "Tolkien"
where . is supposed to be a space.
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I wonder if a reprinting of "Bored of the Rings" is in the offing?
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Use it or lose it?
I suggest that the same applies to human rights, only far more so.
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Re: Use it or lose it?
I think you mean trademark.
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Copyright
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Re: Re: Use it or lose it?
while you are technically correct I think the comment about copyright lawyers saying they need to vigorously defend copyright to avoid losing it is also a true statement. Sad thing is it seems most of the copyright lawyers think that way copyright works.
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Re: Re: Re: Use it or lose it?
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Re: Re: Re: Use it or lose it?
I doubt that they think that way - but I don't expect that to stop them from talking that way.
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Good way to disappear
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Re: Use it or lose it?
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Re: Re: Re: Use it or lose it?
I really don't think that's true. Most copyright lawyers know that you don't need to protect copyright. There are some *copyright holders* who think you do, but I've never run across a copyright lawyer who thinks that's how it works.
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http://www.nissan.com/Lawsuit/The_Story.php
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I'm just naughty...
"Sorry, sir. All we have are 09-f9-11-02-9d-74-e3-5b-d8-41-56-c5-63-56-88-c0. Will that do?"
"It will"
Tolkien moved down the bar, and set next to Holden Caulfield, who promptly said "I am a former employee of Cash 4 Gold. I did not know much about the company before being hired. On my first day of being hired, I was taught the "Cash 4 Gold Scam" from beginning to end."
"Indeed?" said Tolkien, "and who told you about this?"
"It was Xuxa Meneghel, when she was working on the set of 'Amor, Estranho Amor'"
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Re: Use it or lose it?
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Tolkien
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I wonder...
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I always thought...
this parody image was missing something,
http://img638.imageshack.us/img638/1962/poohwalken.jpgand now I've finally figured out what it was:
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He basically remixed various tales from Norse Mythology, Fin Mythology and others to make that.
Is just impressive how the stealing have been going on for so long.
Anybody saw the new film called Thor? Who has the rights for the Norse God?
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Re: Copyright
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Tolkien
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Use it or lose it?
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Re: Tolkien
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It was really cool, when I was about 14 I had to buy a new copy 'cos the old one was falling apart.
I also got the computer game of it and I had a poster of it. I'd like to tell you who it was by, but unfortunately no one is allowed to write the name.
Sorry.
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a quote
I guess the apple fell too far from the tree, and the son isn't like the father at all......
Oh well, maybe true talent and genius just skips a generation?
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OH MY GOD! can you imagine if they all stopped procreating and we had to live in a lawyer-free world?
/shudder at the thought of everyone dancing happily and creating stuff without having to worry about someone destroying their life!
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Wouldn't that be better expressed as null respect?
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Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
test
pre
tags
If that came out cascading then pre tags work =)
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Re: Just sayin'
Is it Tigger?
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Tall, But Not So Keen
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i think greenland got those rights as part of the treaty of kiel...
/sarc
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In fact, the percentage of professional programmers/engineers I know that are self-confessed pirates and/or free-culture advocates is way higher than the percentage of non-technology people.
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20 goto 10
LOL. Damn I used to love BASIC
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“Dragons steal gold and jewels, you know … and they guard the plunder as long as they live (which is practically forever, unless they are killed), and never enjoy a brass ring of it. Indeed, they hardly know a good bit of work from a bad, though they usually have a good notion of current market value; and they can’t make a thing for themselves …” The Hobbit", J.R.R. Tolkien [emphasis added]
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I've never used the term "imaginary property" before, but when you consider that, it sure is hard to consider IP (as defined by current law) as anything but imaginary.
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Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
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Re: Re: Tolkien
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
<blockquote>LoL<blockquote>LoL<blockquote>LoL<blockquote><blockquo te><blockquote>
Result:
Or using like this:
LoL
LoL
LoL
Result:
&nb sp;LoL
LoL
LoL
Source:
HTML Entities
Other entities:
  en space
  em space
  thin space
‌ zero width non-joiner
‍ zero width joiner
ps: Please note that the Techdirt filter mangles the result sometimes, so you can be left we part of the entities dangling out or a space where there should be none.
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Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
<blockquote>LoL<blockquote>LoL<blockquote>LoL<blockquote><blockquo te><blockquote>
Result:
Or using like this:
LoL
LoL
LoL
Result:
&nb sp;LoL
LoL
LoL
Source:
HTML Entities
Other entities:
  en space
  em space
  thin space
‌ zero width non-joiner
‍ zero width joiner
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Use it or lose it?
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Re: Re: Re: Tolkien
Yeah, lol, so true. Luckily, my kids' mother nixed all the suggestions I had for their names....but, on the other hand, the cats have VERY interesting names....
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
I just use Gedit to replace all spaces, noting that if you have only one space it will get mangled so you just need to be careful and put two spaces whenever you want something to appear indented.
No need to be fancy LoL
It ain't pretty but it does work.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Response to: Anonymous Coward on Feb 28th, 2011 @ 9:25am
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?
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