June 21 2018
In our introduction we stated that neither the Anaxar supporters or Axanar detractors have the moral high ground.
It is true that nobody really does because one side or the other thinks that if they get hit with a pebble they need to throw a boulder.
AxaMonitor seems to pride itself on chasing justice over what they think Axanar has done and/or is still doing wrong, yet one of its admins makes large amounts comments including changing a copy of the AxaCon poster to SphincterCon.
It is interesting that one of the admins of the Star Trek group that voted to police any discussion on Axanar also posts lots of content on AxaMonitor as well which can be a case that the voting was unfair.
Is all the nasty posters etc really needed when all AxaMonitor needs to do is keep reporting what they believe is the facts? a lot of effort goes into the stories and usually that is all that is needed for somebody to form an opinion.
Now don’t think the censoring is only happening on one side of the street, yes there are instances that people are blocked and comments deleted on Axanar and Fan Film Factor when people ask questions on the Axanar page etc and some supporters have made distasteful images mocking those not happy with Axanar.
If somebody asks a question politely then it should be allowed to stay up and be answered truthfully, if the comment maker can be proven wrong, it is a win but of course if you can’t make a counter case then you’re screwed.
Somebody made a comment that ‘haters’ of Axanar would go and disrupt Axacon (and SphinxCon) and Alec made a big mistake.
How? he replied that his head of security is ex special forces and an ex sheriff deputy and a good friend was one of the top bodyguards in Hollywood and finished with ‘I say “Bring It On”.
You just don’t say something like that! you just got to say something like ‘Thanks for telling us but we think everything will be alright’ and get on with your day instead of hand delivering another clump of text for those who don’t like you.
Another foot in mouth moment is that Axanar conducted a poll asking if people would pay for membership into a Facebook group in order to help raise money to finish Axanar.
Facebook is apparently investigating having monthly subscription fees for people to join certain FB groups and it appears that the poll maker misread it and thought that people pay Axanar when it is pay Facebook and well it was payday for those who don’t like Axanar.
It cannot be said enough that Axanar cannot make mistakes, they got to play ball according to every word in the Fan Film Guidelines, it has to conduct itself properly and not drop the ball on any matter.
To start finishing these thoughts, let us tell you all a sports story and hopefully people will understand the message.
In the 1958 Victorian Football League Grand Final (think Super Bowl), the Melbourne Demons were going for four Grand Final wins in a row (an equal record) and they beaten their opponents Collingwood just two weeks earlier by a big margin.
Collingwood knew they couldn’t stop Melbourne on skill alone and it occurred to one of their strongest players that he would have to start up some fights to try balance things out.
So he started small fights with Melbourne’s best players and they were suckered into fighting and forgetting about the game and allowed Collingwood to build up a lead.
Melbourne’s coach said to his players at Half Time to cut it out but his players kept responding to the pushing, shoving and punching by doing the same thing back and eventually they lost the Grand Final and lost their chance of equaling history.
The lesson is simple that if you try to match exactly what the opposition is doing, chances are that you will get distracted from what you’re trying to do, they will stay focused on their task and they will beat you.
Axanar gets suckered in too easily and they lose their cool with responses and when they lose their cool, they will say something they will regret later and they cannot afford to, it is as simple as that.
Axanar has to play the game which is make the two 15 minute videos, follow the guidelines to the letter and don’t worry about anything else and who knows they may get that moral high ground that nobody seems to reach.
Mentioning Trekkie Mentions 
Actually all axanar has to do is follow the rules laid out in the confidential settlement. They do not need to follow the fan film guidelines as they are now due to that settlement in a completely separate category from what other fan films need to do.
As for Alec’s response about the detractors showing up at sphinxcon, you should cut him a bit of slack as he has been on the relieving end of close to 3 years of “bad behavior” from the “other side” and frankly he is allowed to be fed up about it.
The settlement should have ended everything on both sides, with Alec having the space to rework the script, and make the movie in the allowable form. Instead everything he says and does is still scrutinized to the ninth degree. The detractors don’t care if axanar gets made or not, the want their pound of flesh, which they did not get when the case settled.
Heck, just yesterday in “the big Star trek group” the detractors peddled the lie that Alec or his legal team agreed with the CBS press release on the settlement that he was “guilty” of copyright infringement. When I pressed them for proof, I was told “it was misworded”, nope it was a lie, and when you were called out on it, instead of owning up to it, you gave a bs response.
Trust me apart from Alec’s digs here and there(which have become fewer in number), the supporters comport themselves with as much respect as they can, however dealing with lie after lie, leads to anger at times.
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It will be interesting to see if the emails that were sent to SphinxCon will do anything or not.
They may have no impact like Treklanta but you never know SphinxCon may get nervous of the attention the conflict brings.
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I appreciate hearing your perspective with regard to what indeed seems like an ongoing war between Axanar’s supporters and critics, and the meaning of your sports story is apt. I’d offer a few points, however:
• There aren’t really two “sides.” Neither supporters nor critics are monolithic, and I believe it’s unfair to characterize individuals’ actions on either side of the Axanar question as indicative of the beliefs or actions of any other member of an entire group.
• The opinions of individuals in the AxaMonitor group on Facebook are just that: individual opinions. The group was created as a place to discuss issues arising out of stories covered on AxaMonitor itself at axamonitor.com. You appear to have equated the Facebook group with what actually is published on the AxaMonitor website. That’s like judging the coverage in a newspaper solely on the basis of readers’ missives that appear in the Letters to the Editor, or the point of view in a YouTube video judged by the comments that appear below it.
• Finally, as to the issue raised by the previous (unnamed) commenter regarding Alec Peters’ admission he overstepped with regard to CBS/Paramount’s Star Trek copyright, the notion that someone is peddling a lie is at odds with several facts.
First, what was released in the wake of the settlement was not a “press release.” It was titled a *joint* statement by all the parties involved in the lawsuit. That joint statement specified, “Axanar and Mr. Peters acknowledge that both [Axanar] films were not approved by Paramount or CBS, and that both works crossed boundaries acceptable to CBS and Paramount relating to copyright law.”
The statement names all the parties — including Alec Peters and Axanar Productions at the top as the sources of the statement. That’s either true or it’s not. If Peters didn’t subscribe to what that statement says then why allow it to go out with his name on it? If that statement does not accurately reflect what all the parties agreed to publicly disclose then why allow it to mislead the public? Peters has never directly condemned CBS/Paramount for allegedly publishing a “joint” statement including language to which he did not sign off. Instead, he has allowed his surrogates to make the allegation. You understand what they’re saying is that CBS/Paramount — the day they publicly settled this lawsuit — lied about what Peters agreed to in the settlement.
The separate statement released by Axanar cleverly sidesteps this issue simply by not mentioning it. The Axanar statement simply omits any reference to the infringement question, meaning both statements are technically accurate — Axanar’s only so far as it goes. When directly asked about it, Axanar’s spokesman simply refused to answer any question on the issue. Why would he allow a public statement in which Peters admitted to having “crossed boundaries acceptable to CBS and Paramount relating to copyright law” if that weren’t true? Axanar Supporter would have you believe that a document in which Peters is named as one of the sources is a fabrication by CBS/Paramount. If that is so, why hasn’t Peters disavowed it?
In any case, thank you for publishing your blog. The more people speaking civilly about the ramifications of the Axanar case the better.
Regards,
Carlos Pedraza
AxaMonitor editor
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OBTW, the “poll” was scrapped at the request of other Axanar supporters
It had nothing to do with the Axamonitor crowd “chiming in”.
Just to clarify.
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why did the other Axanar supporters want the poll scrapped?
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