Sorka42's slice of weird

Auto Mechanics Pose Dramatically to Recreate Renaissance Paintings

Alan Dean Foster is an sf legend - a writer who produced a shelf of original novels but also made a reputation novelizing movies and TV from Star Wars to Aliens, turning out books that transcended quickie adaptations, becoming beloved bestsellers in their own right.

Disney now owns a bunch of these books, thanks to their acquisitions of Lucas and Fox, and these books continue to sell briskly. Disney not only isn’t paying Foster any royalties for these books - they’re refusing to even issue him royalty statements.

https://www.sfwa.org/2020/11/18/disney-must-pay/

Disney has blackholed Foster’s agents and lawyers, and also the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA); to the extent that they have communicated with him, they have espoused a radical (jaw dropping) copyright theory.

This is Disney’s theory: When they bought Lucas and Fox, they acquired the copyright licenses that enabled them to sell the Foster’s books - but not the liability, the legal obligation to pay him for his books.

As SFWA president Mary Robinette Kowal says, this theory could absolutely upend the nature of copyright itself. Any publisher that wanted to go on making money from an author without paying them could simply sell the rights to a sister company, which then denies any obligations.

Foster brought his case to SFWA’s grievance committee - a group that has worked on my behalf in the past, extracting a fee from a multinational publisher that commissioned and accepted a story from me but then offered an odious and unacceptable contract they refused to amend.

Usually griefcom work happens in the background: a SFWA member goes to griefcom, griefcom goes to the publisher, the publisher settles. This is the first time in more than a decade that SFWA has gone public with a complaint.

To be fair, Disney DID offer to meet with Foster, but demanded that he sign an NDA PRIOR to any negotiation. This is Not Normal. Sometimes the OUTCOME of a negotiation is confidential, but you don’t go into a negotiation under NDA.

Disney appears to be taking a page from the private equity fund that acquired Taylor Swift’s masters from the cartoonish villain Scooter Braun, who refused to meet with her without an NDA.

https://twitter.com/taylorswift13/status/1328471874318311425

Foster’s case is a gross injustice. He has cancer and his wife is ill. He wrote these books, Disney bought them. They’re making money from them. They owe him money. Period.

But beyond the individual injustice being visited upon Foster, Kowal and SFWA worry that this represents a suite of new, corporate anti-writer tactics: flipping assets without liabilities, refusing to talk about it without an NDA.

You can follow Foster’s case with the #DisneyMustPay hashtag. If you’re a writer facing similar tactics (even if you’re not a SFWA member), they’re seeking your story, via this form:

EXCEPT

If it’s milk. “You stand right there and watch over it, do NOT leave.”

What’s even better is if you’re forced to leave because you need something from the fridge or something. So you dash into the back and get it and if someone wants to ask you something you just go “MILK! ON THE STOVE!” and everyone jumps out of your way and goes “oh shit, run!!!”

Armenians are being attacked in the streets of my country!!Why is there not national outrage, or a movement rising up?? Where is anyone outside of the Armenian population screaming for equality? A genocide is literally taking place RIGHT NOW but you all would rather get upset and put your energy into candidates who are literally doing nothing of substance to help this situation while schools, hospitals and civilian homes are destroyed.

In 1915 no one cared about Armenia either, they watched as these same instigators marched women, children and elderly out into the desert with the sole intention of none of them making it back home, this is after murdering the men and those strong enough to fight back in front of their families. The term genocide was coined solely because of this tragedy! An entire culture almost wiped from the planet, and people still say we are overreacting!

Don’t allow this to happen again, don’t be someone who sits back as an entire country and culture are facing the threat of a SECOND GENOCIDE!!!! Please, wake up, do something, spread the news, because it could be me or my family being targeted tomorrow.

If you disagree with me, unfollow my blog, block me and never look at my blog again.

Out of 19000+ followers I have, only one of you actually reblogged about this issue, yet a lot of you have reblogged and liked a picture by playboy about catcalling and that how men should never do it.

Additionally, I have received abuse in my ask box (which I will be answering when I can) and threats. In particular death threats and rape threats.