@ice1517
Please don’t interpret what I said as some sort of “When this happens you can …”
I know I’ve said this several times so I’m repeating myself, but the movie is much more like the art books or the comics [edit]
which also are treated as Rule #1 unless they are a preview or, in the case of the comic, under other special circumstances such as only partial scans (I just realized some people might not understand why I keep making this comparison).[/edit]
Hasbro treats the episodes like expenses to advertise the toys, and they have been SUPER nice about fan art and people sharing things from the broadcast episodes (up to a point, which appears to be when you try to share content that includes the voice actors or music).
But with things like the art books or comics or the movie - that’s not an advertisement - that’s product. And it’s often managed and monitored by OTHER companies, and those other companies have their own ways of dealing with things that they have a fiduciary responsibility for.
Speaking for myself - and JUST for myself - even when the movie does premier on Netflix or Discovery Family, I would not be in the least surprised if AllSpark’s or Hasbro’s
ENORMOUS stable of freelance lawyers starts sending nasty letters to sites hosting images from the movie. It’s what they’re paid to do, and at the end of the day they need to show a certain number of “C&D letters sent in exchange for more sweet, sweet monies”. They basically exist in a bounty hunter kind of world. And if they don’t do it, then maybe Paramount sees that Hasbro isn’t protecting it’s intellectual property, and starts acting like they OWN the Transformers, instead of just licensing them.
Right now AllSpark is the new kid on the block, and they need to show everyone that they can fight with the big kids. So this is a very important time for them to “get it right”. They have to prove for all their investors and competitors that they’re grown up and can be trusted with properties, and can DEFEND those properties - because Hasbro is denying OTHER companies licenses that they’re giving to AllSpark. So AllSpark has to show that they are up to it.
And it might be that this movie forever remains like the Art Books - 100% completely no. Even though it’s pony, the movie is a completely different kind of thing than the TV show is, from the companies involved to the legal structure it exists in. And the way the companies involved in it deal with fans is also completely different. There’s some history for some of the companies - like LionsGate - but for AllSpark we’re still making this up as we go along.
On the other hand, once the movie actually airs on broadcast or cable - I personally don’t think they’re going to care any more. Either companies like LionsGate and AllSpark will no longer be involved because they’ve sold it to someone else, or it will be so far down the food chain that fansites spreading the love is good for them, not bad. And if they do care, I don’t know if WE will care that they care. So maybe we’ll just do what we want to do anyway, because a that point … fuck it.
But, that’s just me. I’m a guest here like everyone else - my name isn’t on ANY dotted lines as far as the lawyers are concerned.
So please don’t take what I say as some sort of “Ready, set, GO!” marker for when it will be ok, because it might be that AllSpark makes some sort of public broadcast after Christmas and tells everyone that they love the fans like Hasbro does, and everything is fine. Or it might be that they go the LionsGate route and it will never be ok.
For right now, all I can say is please wait, and enjoy the ponies that we have.
Gosh this ended up being a wall of text.
>inb4
