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From: chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach)
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers,net.movies
Subject: Re: The Terminator vs. Harlan Ellison
Message-ID: <2818@nsc.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 7-Jun-85 23:20:11 EDT
Article-I.D.: nsc.2818
Posted: Fri Jun  7 23:20:11 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 8-Jun-85 06:36:44 EDT
References: <1027@peora.UUCP>
Reply-To: chuqui@nsc.UUCP (Chuq Von Rospach)
Distribution: net
Organization: The Blue Parrot
Lines: 34
Xref: watmath net.sf-lovers:7872 net.movies:6577
Summary: 

In article <1027@peora.UUCP> joel@peora.UUCP (Joel Upchurch) writes:
>> 	Ellison stated that the idea of 'The Terminator' came from
>> two episodes he wrote for 'Outer Limits'.  
>
>This seems a little thin.  The producers would have had  to  copied  a
>lot  more  than the IDEA from Ellison for him to win a copyright suit.
>Ideas are not copyrightable, only the particular expression  of  those
>ideas are.  If you could sue a writer for stealing an idea, they could
>sue every writer in existence.  When was the last time you  saw  a  TV
>show  or  a movie with an original plot?  A writer has to be very good
>just to come up with an interesting variation of an old idea.

I read somewhere that the settlement with Ellison cost them $70K. (locus?)
There is a strong difference between reusing and idea and rehashing a
story. What is and isn't plagiarism is a very nebulous point, but there is
a big difference between building a new story around an old idea (as
Gerrold did with Trouble With Tribbles) and what seems to have happened
here. This isn't the first time Hollywood has ripped off Harlan -- he and
Ben Bova got a settlement a number of years ago for a TV show that ripped
off their short story 'Brillo' about a robot cop. The reality is that SF
authors get ripped off a LOT, mainly because they seem to be afraid to
fight back, either independently or through their agents or SFWA. The
Mystery Writers group, on the other hand, has relatively little problem
because they DO tend to police their work. Harlan, who has been around that
industry for a long time and isn't known for his timidity, is also not
afraid to go for what he believes is his. If other authors or the SFWA took
a more active stance in hollywood, perhaps hollywood would take SF a bit
more seriously...
-- 
:From the misfiring synapses of:                  Chuq Von Rospach
{cbosgd,fortune,hplabs,ihnp4,seismo}!nsc!chuqui   nsc!chuqui@decwrl.ARPA

The offices were very nice, and the clients were only raping the land, and
then, of course, there was the money...