The Copyright Act & "Fair Use" Doctrine

[Fozzie Bear]

Well, guess what I've had to do, gang? Police my mule and some artwork I did for a local hockey team!

The website trying to sell my MuleySuit finally took him down from their site.

I still have to get on the hockey team's case, though.

 

[Fozzie Bear]

The folks who made him for me. No bother now. I have to just stop the hockey team from doing the same thing--unless they're going to pay me.

 

[cooked sashimi]

I'm sorry to skip through, but has anyone thought about eBaums world's flagrant abuse of any form of copyright laws?

 

[Fozzie Bear]

Well, the website took the Muley Suit down from their sales pages. I still have to write a letter to the local hockey team and to a local t-shirt company who lifted my art to sell their shirts.

 

[jacobsnchz]

...

 

[beaker]

It's this giant fear of the RIAA or whatever, as well as this notion of keeping things "rare" that the Muppet community has no real sense of shared media community like every other community out there.

When a Muppet has a tv appearence or commercial, there is no blog or forum
or person that puts it online on youtube/video google or has a space to host an avi/mpg. Only exception is when the company puts it up.

Wouldnt JHC want fans to FINALLY see all these great wonderful lost/rare/obscure/international only clips that will never be officially released on dvd?
Muppet fans the world over deserve to see these clips than just a few tape traders.

Wanna see The Hoobs, Fraggle Rock cast wrap special,
Fox 2002 Muppet pitch, Mopatop, UK "We Love the Muppets" special,
etc? Forget about it...people are either too afraid to "omg break copyright laws"
or want to make it so only a select few can see it.

It's funny...go to any comic book based movie blog, any Farscape or Firefly blog, or really any other franchise fandom...heck, even political blog and they are always posting video links or torrents to when people they care about are on tv, or when someone finds an obscure clip or lost episode.

But nooooo...you dont see that with the Henson/Muppet/Sesame/JHC/related
community.

You'd THINK someone would start a sweet blog/index/guide site where one could easily say, find all the Gorch sketches online, Great Santa Claus switch, or any non released rare stuff...from tv appearences/commercials in the last few years to Tales of the Tinkerdee.

We have this great great advent with youtube and video google, as well as
with bigger hosting capabilities...but people just arent into making whats rare available.

So I have a big middle finger to copyright laws in these cases, as I believe once its been shown on television, its fair game within non profit fan communities to post it...be it a special, clip, whatever.