I'm guessing he's the first writer or director to address the issue pertaining to their own work?
It probably helps he's no longer working inside the Hollywood system!
This is his response after a "copyright complaint" was issued against Sheridan Cleland and his site --
Full story at https://torrentfreak.com/repo-man%E2...laints-120424/
It probably helps he's no longer working inside the Hollywood system!
This is his response after a "copyright complaint" was issued against Sheridan Cleland and his site --
From its roots three years earlier, in 2009 Cleland created myPDFscripts, a platform which enabled him to share his passion with others. In recent months, however, things have not been easy. To cut a long story short, Cleland has been plagued with DMCA takedown requests from movie studios, one in particular.
November last year Cleland was forced to take down the site after Universal issued complaints against more than a hundred scripts. One of them, at position #69 on the list, was was from the classic movie 'Repo Man'. Interestingly, its creator Alex Cox contacted Cleland about the takedown directly.
"I believe you have received a 'takedown' notice from Universal to remove the script. I do not agree with this. I'm very pleased you have my script on your site and would like to see it remain. If you would like to add any other of my scripts, get in touch. You are welcome to post them,- Cox wrote.
But given the direct interest of a powerful company such as Universal, Cleland was concerned of the consequences should he simply repost the script. So he contacted the studio for clarification.
"Mr. Cox is the author of the Repo Man screenplay; however, his rights to and interests in the screenplay for the film were granted to Universal Pictures, which is the exclusive owner of Repo Man throughout the world in perpetuity, including, without limitation, all copyrights in the film and in the underlying screenplay,- the studio responded. "Accordingly, Universal stands by its request that you take-down the Repo Man screenplay from your website.-
So, if posting the actual script was off limits, maybe it would be OK for Cleland to post a link to the copy of the script that Alex Cox hosts on his own website? Apparently not.
"Please don't post the links,- advised Universal. "I don't believe Mr. Cox is authorized to post the script on his personal website either.-
Cox disagrees...
November last year Cleland was forced to take down the site after Universal issued complaints against more than a hundred scripts. One of them, at position #69 on the list, was was from the classic movie 'Repo Man'. Interestingly, its creator Alex Cox contacted Cleland about the takedown directly.
"I believe you have received a 'takedown' notice from Universal to remove the script. I do not agree with this. I'm very pleased you have my script on your site and would like to see it remain. If you would like to add any other of my scripts, get in touch. You are welcome to post them,- Cox wrote.
But given the direct interest of a powerful company such as Universal, Cleland was concerned of the consequences should he simply repost the script. So he contacted the studio for clarification.
"Mr. Cox is the author of the Repo Man screenplay; however, his rights to and interests in the screenplay for the film were granted to Universal Pictures, which is the exclusive owner of Repo Man throughout the world in perpetuity, including, without limitation, all copyrights in the film and in the underlying screenplay,- the studio responded. "Accordingly, Universal stands by its request that you take-down the Repo Man screenplay from your website.-
So, if posting the actual script was off limits, maybe it would be OK for Cleland to post a link to the copy of the script that Alex Cox hosts on his own website? Apparently not.
"Please don't post the links,- advised Universal. "I don't believe Mr. Cox is authorized to post the script on his personal website either.-
Cox disagrees...
"The studios, including Universal, are pretty clearly a criminal enterprise, operating an illegal blacklist and functioning as a price-fixing cartel. They actually have legislation which permits them to operate as a cartel abroad (the law is called Webb-Pomerene) but absolutely no right to operate as a cartel domestically. They do so because they're powerful and have politicians in their pockets,- Cox notes.
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