Posts tagged: copyright
EXPELLED Thievery Continues
Expelled filmmaker’s illegally use John Lennon’s song “Imagine” for their creationist propaganda film.
These guys are on an absolute roll for the worst planned and executed film release ever. Just when you thought they couldn’t stoop any lower they go and steal good music in an attempt to gain some credibility for their piss-poor excuse for a documentary.
The blogosphere rippled with anger over the film’s use of the song “Imagine,” by the late John Lennon. Many accusing Lennon’s wife, Yoko Ono of selling out to creationists by licensing the song to these filmmakers. Ms. Ono’s lawyers were quick to respond that the filmmaker’s had not licensed the music and had no permission to use the song.
… according to a lawyer for Ms. Ono, the filmmakers did not have permission to use the song, for any amount of money.
Ms. Ono’s lawyer, Jonas Herbsman, of Shukat, Arrow, Hafer, Weber & Herbsman, said in an interview Wednesday: “It was not licensed.” With respect to the filmmakers, he says: “We are exploring all options.” It is not clear what remedies if any may be available to Ms. Ono.
I’m beginning to wonder if they genuinely made any part of this documentary themselves or if they just stole it all and spliced it together.
Via: Richard Dawkins
EXPELLED: Plagiarism Allowed
There’s just not enough controversy (r)evolving around the creationist propaganda film Expelled is there? Well, here’s yet another example of the dishonest tactics being employed by the filmmakers.
A while back there was a bit of a stir over the Discovery (no linkage for you) Institute’s illegitimate use of a magnificent video created by XVIVO on behalf of Harvard University’s Biovisions called The Inner Life of the Cell (watch here).
After realizing they can’t take copyrighted material, strip it of its credits, and narration and stick in their own creationism-filled nonsense, I guess these morons decided the next best thing was to have some crap video team remake the Harvard video, scene-by-scene, and then put their creationism-filled narration on top of it. And that’s exactly what they did. Here’s an image of the offending scene side-by-side with the original Harvard scene.
The film Expelled contains this scene-by-scene duplication of the Biovisions masterpiece and as usual for the creadesign proponentists, they left a few transitional fossils in their wake. ERV points out in her recent presentation at the Oklahoma Americans United for the Separation of Church and State conference there are at least a dozen different ways a paramecium can move across a microtubule and how odd it is that the Expelled video uses the exact same visualization of motion as the Harvard video. It’s even been pointed out by some bloggers within the science community that the motion depicted in the original video isn’t even a good example of actual molecule movement and cellular activity. So, just like in High School, the proof that they copied is in the copying of errors as well as the facts.
It’s pretty clear to myself and many others that the filmmakers behind Expelled have not a shred of honesty running in their veins. I’m unsure as to how much legal action was pursued after the original copyright infringement, but ERV is moving against this blatant example of video plagiarism with a little letter. I’m sure they’ll backpedal and divert attention like always but it will still be fun to watch them scatter for answers. Probably more fun that watching Expelled itself.
Via: ERV
