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 Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 5:19 pm
The BBC's ordered a knitter to remove her Who inspired knitting patterns.
http://www.openrightsgroup.org/2008/05/08/bbc-removes-doctor-who-fans-knitting-patterns-from-the-web/
Yet, people have been making 4th doctor scarves and selling them for years.
There's also an article on the BBC main page.
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Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 5:36 pm
Mostly screamingly furious about this here.
I bet the guys over in Cardiff aren't too happy either. Since Davies quite rightly understands that Doctor Who is "an imagination that goes way beyond the screen, and all the way into your head, where it's yours, forever" I expect them to be as dispirted by BBC Legal's actions here as Joss Whedon was when Fox went after Buffy fans.
Unless we're to understand Doctor Who as "an imagination that goes way beyond the screen, and all the way into your head, where it's yours...unless it involves wool. Wool is FORBIDDEN!!!"
On the other hand...it's worth remembering that BBC Legal never seemed to have a problem with her offering the knitting patterns on her website, just with her selling the products pre-knitted on eBay. That would seem to be the line between fan creativity and offering unlicensed Doctor Who merchandise.
Although even then, before getting in a huff the BBC would do very well to look up phrase 'Audio Visuals' on Wikipedia and then have a glance down the list of names of those currently working on thier flagship drama.
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Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 6:04 pm
GAH! I think it's genius that someone came up with these do-it-yourself knitting patterns!
I can sort of understand the fact that they would get upset over selling the stuff, but still...
Ah yes. Must remember to stay away from my knitting baskets of doom. ninja
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Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 6:39 pm
Oh no.
Oh no oh no oh no oh no.
I just started on a Tom Baker scarf, and I only copied down about 1/4 of the pattern...
Don't tell me I bought all that yarn for nothing...
-digs furiously on internet-
What's happened to the page??
-dies-
This is all I could find: http://www.doctorwhoscarf.com/
It's changed...
-digs more-
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Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 6:58 pm
Richard_Swift On the other hand...it's worth remembering that BBC Legal never seemed to have a problem with her offering the knitting patterns on her website, just with her selling the products pre-knitted on eBay. That would seem to be the line between fan creativity and offering unlicensed Doctor Who merchandise. I know the knitter in question from another online community, and I have to clarify something here. She never sold either the finished product or the pattern. She found out someone was ebaying printed-off copies of her adipose baby pattern, and contacted that seller asking that the auctions be removed. Enough complaints poured in from knitters who didn't appreciate seeing Mazzmataz's work stolen, and the auctions were removed. The ebayer sent Mazz abusive emails and relisted the pattern repeatedly, until she was kicked off Ebay. It's believed that this same seller contacted the BBC lawyers in retaliation. As far as I know, Mazz was the only designer targeted directly. Other designers with Dr. Who patterns have removed theirs from the net in solidarity.
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Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 8:06 pm
This was response #34 on the website mentioned in the original post. Not sure if it's legit or not.
Philip Fleming, Head of Communications, Home Entertainment, BBC Worldwide Says:
May 14th, 2008 at 12:35 pm
We are not heavy-handed when it comes to fans creating their own products out of a love for the show, providing it’s on a small scale and not for profit. In the instance of the knitting patterns created by Mazzmatazz, they were posted on a website and ended up being exploited for profit by people who did not have permission to use the Doctor Who trademark. This ‘profit’ would not have been returned to the BBC whereas BBC Worldwide’s profits are. We did not threaten Mazzmatazz with legal action or prosecution as has been suggested in some media reports today. We sent an email informing the webmaster that they did not have permission to use the Doctor Who trademark and asked them to remove the patterns from their site - which they did. We also told Mazzmataz that we would pass on her ideas/designs to our Licensing team where there is always the possibility that we might work together with her in the future.
Although this is a rather stupid PR fiasco for the BBC, it sounds more like an isolated incident more than anything else. I hope they'll eventually back off, since Mazzmataz clearly wasn't doing anything for profit here.
Of course the person everyone should be pissed off at is the punk that stole her patterns and was selling 'em on eBay.
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Hairy Priest Vice Captain
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Posted: Wed May 14, 2008 11:11 pm
Horntastic Oh no.
Oh no oh no oh no oh no.
I just started on a Tom Baker scarf, and I only copied down about 1/4 of the pattern...
Don't tell me I bought all that yarn for nothing...
-digs furiously on internet-
What's happened to the page??
-dies-
This is all I could find: http://www.doctorwhoscarf.com/
It's changed...
-digs more- Google caching is your friend.
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Posted: Thu May 15, 2008 12:12 am
Megzie-Woodles Google caching is your friend.
That was mostly an overreaction... I spent a lot on yarn so I had a panic attack for a min... ^^;;
Anyway, I found a pic with the row numbers and colors I needed, so...
I still hope they find some way to resolve all this so we can still have patterns and stuff.
Talk about a couple people ruining it for everyone...
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Posted: Thu May 15, 2008 2:28 am
Horntastic Megzie-Woodles Google caching is your friend.
That was mostly an overreaction... I spent a lot on yarn so I had a panic attack for a min... ^^;;
Anyway, I found a pic with the row numbers and colors I needed, so...
I still hope they find some way to resolve all this so we can still have patterns and stuff.
Talk about a couple people ruining it for everyone...I knoes. It sucks. If Doctor Who was here he'd defeat the evil aliens controlling the bbc from space.
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Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 2:30 am
Radetzky March I know the knitter in question from another online community, and I have to clarify something here. She never sold either the finished product or the pattern. She found out someone was ebaying printed-off copies of her adipose baby pattern, and contacted that seller asking that the auctions be removed. Enough complaints poured in from knitters who didn't appreciate seeing Mazzmataz's work stolen, and the auctions were removed. The ebayer sent Mazz abusive emails and relisted the pattern repeatedly, until she was kicked off Ebay. It's believed that this same seller contacted the BBC lawyers in retaliation. Whoops! That makes a big difference! Thanks for putting me right. Sounds like we've found the real villain of this story.
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Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 5:23 am
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Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 1:23 pm
DoctorWhoScarf is back up...
It was apparently down for completely unrelated issues.
...I feel a bit silly now...
ninja
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Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 4:39 pm
This story makes the BBC legal department look terribly evil and petty, which I'm sure they don't like. As with most of these things its a mixture of knit-picking over rules and stuff being blown out of proportion.
OMG that wasn't a bad 'knit'ting pun by the way!!
It's not that the BBC were WRONG exactly, it's just one of those rules that if you want friends then you don't enforce, especially not over knitting patterns. I mean creative, die-hard fans have kept Doctor Who alive! They should be given some leeway.
Add to that this whole argument between the actual lady in question and those making money off her stuff... it just makes me mad. And sad. Can't people be selfless and nice from time to time? confused
P.S. The only reason I actually heard about this was cos it was on the News Quiz... I need to keep more up-to-date!
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Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 5:17 pm
Roobarb P.S. The only reason I actually heard about this was cos it was on the News Quiz... I need to keep more up-to-date! On the contrary, you gain points just for listening to the News Quiz. Whole weeks have been known to pass by in which all news I've absorbed has been either from that source or The Now Show. On the subject of you and awesomeness...is there anywhere you'd recomend where I could get a really big frog... and a damn fine peach?
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Posted: Mon May 19, 2008 8:48 pm
One damn fine Peach coming up....
Yummy!
mrgreen Edit: It isn't allowing me to link to the exact page. mad
Enter "Donna Barr" in the search bar.
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