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Post by bombadil1963 on Nov 6, 2006 17:05:06 GMT
Pure horror!
Yesterday, 5th of November, I stumbled over some pieces of a rudimental sentence in the net:".... Games Workshop . . . licenses . . . . Silmarillion"!!!
My first reaction was simple: "Aaaaarrrggghh!!!!!" When I found back to myself and the doctor´s left again, I got back to the PC and began to investigate. Unhappily I wasn´t that successful.
So later on I mailed to Games Workshop Germany and asked about their plans. They answered today. It seems as if they try to get the licenses. But they said that the customers should be patient and that nothing is for sure.
How horrible! Please hurry up! Be quicker than GW!
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Post by barliman on Nov 7, 2006 8:11:54 GMT
I wouldn't panic. While Christopher Tolkien is alive there's no way GW (or anyone else, including Mithril, alas) will get a Silmarillion merchandising licence of any kind whatsoever...
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Post by Gildor on Nov 7, 2006 9:48:48 GMT
Until Christopher Tolkien is dead (which, alas... should not be so far from today, he is not very young) such licences cannot be purchased. Not trying to be morbid, but the only person blocking tolkien estates from selling "licensing possibilities" for derivated products is Christopher Tolkien... and mainly because his father delegated him as litterary executor before his death. His brothers are not so much into their father works and thus, the licence may be bought...Still, tolkien estates is not only composed by Christopher Tolkien, and thus buying rights from them would mean discussions with great libraries (of which I don't remember the names) in England and in New York as well as Bailie Klass-Tolkien (Christopher wife) and Michael Tolkien (Chris' nephew who lives in France) When GW talks about aquiring licences and to be patient... they "may" mean : "wait until the old annoying guy is dead, which should not take tooo long".... IF that is the case, then this is very mean, not to say evil...
Until that time, GW will have to wait, because no matter the price, no matter the pression, nobody can overule a dead man's will, the one of JRR Tolkien, who regretted the last days of his life, to have sold his two first books to some guys (allen & unwin, if I remember well) who then were bought back by Saul Zentz.
Oh and by the way, GW can only by licences from a licensing authority, which is Saul Zentz 'Tolkien Enterprises', so I think that this is rather Saul Zentz more than GW , who is trying to get licences from the Tolkien Estate
I may ask my mother who has been in contact with Michael Tolkien (who lives in Aix-en Provence as a linguistic professor if I remember well, Christopher himself lives in "Auvergne" and is very fond of mushrooms lol) if all those rumors are serious. As a member of the estate, and Christopher nephew, I suppose he may have informations. He is a very sympathetic person, from what I heard from my mother (who's a casual fantasy poetry writer)
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Post by bombadil1963 on Nov 7, 2006 18:51:38 GMT
Well,
so far, so good! ... as we say in Germany (is there a similar saying in English?). I´ll sleep calm and good tonight . . .
Thank you for your words and thoughts!
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Post by aelfwine on Nov 14, 2006 20:01:16 GMT
Also, GW hasn't been doing terribly well as late. OK, its d**n amazing for a hobby company, but compared to a few years ago, its having serious issues. It's entirely possible that GW could not afford a new license.
They also closed down their forums, interestingly.
Anyway, this all says to me that GW is cutting back, not expanding. So sure, officially they would like a Silmarillion license, but unofficially...what could they do with it? The Silmarillion is a huge work, and not especially commercially exploitable.
The best possible outcome from all this licensing crap would be to allow third party licensors to use everything in MERP second ed, with oversight. So that would technically include some elements of the Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales, but it wouldn't mess around with the book.
Gavin
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Post by Gildor on Nov 15, 2006 10:00:54 GMT
From what I heard, when MERP disappeared and ICE did not get licence anymore from tolkien enterprise... All the materials created by ICE on the tolkien universe became the property of Saul Zentz Tolkien Enterprise as "extended non-canonical tolkien material". And that's the reason why Mithril has been able to produce MERP figurines after MERP has ceased to exist. But correct me if I am wrong
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Post by aelfwine on Nov 18, 2006 2:43:37 GMT
Well, correct.
The story regarding ICE and the license is long, involved, irksome and, in the end, boring.
BUT...
GW, Decipher, and indeed Mithril, are licensing Tolkien's work via Tolkien Enterprises, AKA Saul Zaentz and Company. (Saul was one of the producers on the old LOTR cartoon movie who somehow managed to hold onto the licensing rights to LOTR).
The entire content of the MERP range was a "work for hire" by ICE to Tolkien Enterprises. All content belonged to TE, even if originated by ICE.
So MERP belongs to Tolkien Enterprises. Sneakily, TE allowed GW to use some imagery from old MERP books in their Strategy Game. I told ICE. ICE told Pete Fenlon. Pete Fenlon decided "ah f**k it." (Even in work for hire environments, creators have some rights to their product, including a right to be identified as such. Depending on juristiction. Also: the phase of the moon.)
By the end of the Second Ed era of MERP, we had information, stats and write ups on every major character and culture from Tolkien, most of the minor ones and even some rather good additions. Not perfect, but rather good. All this belongs to Tolkien Enterprises. All this could form the basis of a Licensor Canon.
Want to make a computer game? Use this lot. Want to make an RPG? Use this lot. Want to make a TV series spin off? Use this lot.
However, historically there's been a lot of tension between the Tolkien Estate and Tolkien Enterpises/Saul Zaentz. Saul Zaentz is a Hollywood IP farm. The Tolkien Estate is the heir to a literary legacy. Even in a perfect world, there'd be tension, and this is not the perfect world.
Still, I would hope that in the event of some change, the Estate and the Saul Zaentz company could come to some agreement and create such a licensor canon.
Gavin
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