Talk:Legacies (short story)

Licensing
Here's an important question -- does this story hold the proper rights to illustrate characters like The Doctor's TARDIS and Jamie McCrimmon? Does it literally use the words TARDIS and Jamie? If not, we must follow the precedent of stories like AiaPU. OS25 (Talk) 12:18, April 29, 2017 (UTC)


 * Not at all! With regard to the TARDIS, it mentions a blue police box which transforms into a woman with the ability to manipulate time. Jamie isn't actually in it - a "Scottish boy" is merely mentioned. Victoria is in it very briefly, where she's referred to simply as a young girl with a surname to do with "water" and the first name of a famous English queen. All above board as far as I can see. Mythicia77  ☎  16:01, August 13, 2017 (UTC)


 * Yeah the story doesn't mention any character by name, but through very clever description you can clearly tell who each character is in the story. Licensing doesn't really come into it as the words "the Doctor" and "TARDIS" are simply not present in the story. It's identical to PROSE: Toy Story, in that regard. --Revan\Talk 16:27, August 13, 2017 (UTC)


 * Thank you for explaining. This looks like the case of Schrödinger Victoria. When a BBC lawyer looks at the book, she's not there, but when a reader pops their head she appears in all her glory. This frankly cannot stand. As correctly pointed out by OttselSpy25 (whom I sincerely thank for being the first to note the problem), the wiki has long ago developed a way of dealing with these wink-wink characters, which is nicely summarised at Adventures in a Pocket Universe (audio series) We have separate pages for
 * The Mistress (The Choice) who is not Romana II
 * War King who is not the Master
 * The Imperator who is not Morbius
 * Clockworks who are not Time Lords
 * Ecto-Space which is not E-Space
 * Very Fabric of Time and Space which is not Time Vortex
 * etc. etc. etc. As tempting as it might be to take the Faction Paradox (series) situation and apply it here, we cannot for several reasons.
 * Faction Paradox was debated on Panopticon at least 4 times. And the amount of effort NateBumber put into the a) justification of established connections and b) delineation of cases that are less clear is both commendable and mind-boggling. The eventual argument that won the day was not that we accept every license-bending description if the authors said they would like us to. It was nowhere near that simple. The reality of the FP is that authors zig and zag in and out of Doctor Who licensed properties carrying their characters with them. NateBumber has developed an elaborate web of connections that reach some of the descriptions but not all (as the list above shows).
 * And this is a second reason we can't apply the FP treatment to this series. There is no treatment. It's tedious case-by-case analysis, aiming to trace a character or element through licensed properties to the place it was only described.
 * When we have a properly licensed appearance of Victoria, Jamie, etc. referring to the events of this story, then Victoria may be brought back onto this page. For now, the connection should be mentioned on the story notes and the legal situation explained, as is done on many pages provided for comparison above. The page of Girl (Legacies) or whatever you might wanna call her based on the text of the story should mention the intention of her being Victoria Waterfield in the BTS section and explain the reasons. But Victoria Waterfield be she cannot, as Rule 2 of T:VS it violate will. Amorkuz ☎  12:59, August 15, 2017 (UTC)

Over the past few weeks I have read the first six novels in the Lethbridge-Stewart series, in addition to several of the short stories. As you note, the series does not hold the license to use "the Doctor" and "TARDIS" as concepts, like a number of similar spin off series that have popped up over the last few years. The unique situtaion about the Lethbridge-Stewart series is that it has made the effort of obtaining the license to other characters and concepts from the Doctor Who universe in order to truly establish itself as taking place within the same universe.

In regard to the question of "is the Cosmic Hobo the Doctor?". The short answer: of course he is. The Beast of Fang Rock contains several scenes where characters mention "the Do-" or similar, before the "Cosmic Hobo" alias is used, which is explained in-universe as a government alias for the Doctor, who they have noticed popping up several times over the course of the 20th century. While Amorkuz, you may stipulate that this is cannot be the Doctor due to rights reasons, the story (and others) specifically state that the "Cosmic Hobo" was the man whom Travers and Lethbridge-Stewart encountered in the London Underground, and who also appeared at Fang Rock in relation to the Horror of Fang Rock TV story. The series does hold the rights to the concepts and characters from these stories, and leave no shadow of a doubt that the Doctor is the character to whom they are referring.

The sad truth is that while we can go along the argument that "no rights = no appearance", we are doing the factual accuracy of this wiki a sad disservice by doing so. The people at Candy Jar are doing nothing wrong by including references to the Doctor in their stories, by all rights they should, considering that their stories take place within the DWU. The references to the Doctor are all what they should be, merely references, and leave no room for doubt that they are meaning the Doctor, with very clever use of the English language to emphasise this without violating copyright law.

If you were to read the stories for yourself, you would certainly see the way these references are put across. In the past I have been skeptical about how the series can hold its own without a full license to Doctor Who, yet after reading them, their validity is very much there. --Revan\Talk 19:41, August 15, 2017 (UTC)


 * Once again, the validity of these stories is not in question until Cosmic Hobo become The Doctor. At that moment, the stories start violating Rule 2 of T:VS. Let me quote it in full: "A story that isn't commercially licensed by all of the relevant copyright holders doesn't count." Note the emphasis on "commercially" (whether the story is marketed as free or not) and "all". Indeed, there are many spin-offs, and each of them should stay within their legal boundaries. If they want to include explicit references to the Doctor, they should pay for them. Their approach at the moment seems slightly different: as in take a promotional photo from the BBC website and use it to cash in on the general hype of the moment by referencing a character they will never have the rights to and that has yet to appear even in BBC stories. It is certainly up to BBC to pursue or not the legal side of the matter. But "holding its own" this series isn't, sorry.
 * Let me be very clear about the consequences of being lax here: if we allow references to the Doctor from CJB, then the first mention of this BBC character would be by CJB. This shall not happen.
 * I also disagree that we are doing a disservice by upholding the current legal situation and our own validity rules. There are plenty of ways to provide complete information without violating either. Plenty of connections remain behind the validity line: Petronella Osgood and Tom Osgood, The Woman (The End of Time) and the Doctor, all the non-equivalent equivalences above. At the minimum, copious BTS notes would do the trick. At a maximum, the Legacy (video game) approach can be used with a separate wiki focused on the LS series and representing everything as the authors/editors dream in a copyright-free world with extensive linking between the two wikis.
 * But pretending that this is a fully licensed Doctor Who range is false advertisement. The publisher can engage in it at their own risk. But the wiki should not be party to it. They are not the first ones not to have complete license. They should be treated as everyone else. And the quality of their righting (or lack thereof) has absolutely nothing to do with it. Amorkuz ☎  20:07, August 15, 2017 (UTC)

Another perspective, coming purely from a place of Devil's Advocacy: the authors intended the Cosmic Hobo to be the Doctor, and everyone who reads the story understands the Cosmic Hobo to be the Doctor. What good are we as a wiki if we refuse to acknowledge such a basic and obvious element of the story? NateBumber ☎  20:14, August 15, 2017 (UTC)

My point exactly. This story literally is a complete and confusing mess if you remove the Doctor Who elements from it. The story is completely propped up by having knowledge of The Web of Fear. The wiki receives increasingly negative press on forums and social media for our strange rejection of stories based on strange conceptions of validity. The fact that the Cosmic Hobo is clearly intended to be the Doctor is a simple truth of this series, yet we have once again over-examined such a basic notion of storytelling, and made things complicated for our readers as a result. --Revan\Talk 20:56, August 15, 2017 (UTC)


 * With all due respect, I would ask to adhere to T:BOUND. When I saw potential ways of improving our validity rules to improve coverage on this wiki, I went to discuss this on Panopticon. The thread is still open and everyone is welcome to contribute. Any issue with "negative press on forums and social media" can be discussed there, preferably with exact quotes and links rather than in this unsubstantiated and irresponsible manner.


 * Secondly, why is it believed that moving unlicensed elements to story notes and BTS sections equates to their "removal"? This thought keeps reappearing and has absolutely no basis under it. Why is it that the readers of the books are supposed to understand that "Cosmic Hobo" is the Doctor, but those same readers bumping into a faithful description of the story about the Cosmic Hobo would suddenly be horribly confused despite hyperlinks and helpful explanations in the story notes?


 * Thirdly, if there is "a complete and confusing mess" in understanding the stories, it was the choice of the publisher to engage in it. In fact, this is the best confirmation from you that this project does not "hold its own", primarily because they do not own what they need. Let me quote the praise from Revanvolatrelundar: "The unique situtaion about the Lethbridge-Stewart series is that it has made the effort of obtaining the license to other characters and concepts from the Doctor Who universe in order to truly establish itself as taking place within the same universe". So this is considered a good thing. However, by allowing them to get away with not obtaining the license to the most important character, we would encourage them to drop all pretence and use whichever characters they want. That is what you are proposing. This position is absolutely legally indefensible. It will make the wiki accomplices in potential copyright infringement cases. It would be sufficient to prove that wiki coverage improved sales to open up the parent company, Wikia, Inc., to legal damages.


 * But let us look at this situation from the point of view of policy. I can see that allowing BBC to introduce their characters the way they intend strangely did not meet much sympathy (not yet at any rate). Well, in that case imagine that Zygon: When Being You Just Isn't Enough (home video) features a character of the Cosmic Hobo, or the Matchstick Man, or the Grumpy Granddad. Indeed, why not all of them? The more the merrier, for this kind of production. I'll let your imaginations do the rest: human brain is the best CGI. If having a license to one DWU concept entitles you to provide valid facts about the Doctor of your choice via a clever description, then the creators of that movie qualify. And there you go, it's valid, it's in the lead, it's in the infobox. There are categories. Or slightly closer to the source material here. Imagine CJB decides to explore a chapter in the life of the Cosmic Dandy when he agreed with the Brigadier that blowing up things is a potential answer (he did shoot some Ogrons after all). So CJB publishes a whole series of books where the Cosmic Dandy hunts aliens across Earth. People did not like the Sixth Doctor strangling his companion, but that was done by BBC. CJB can do much worse. Unlike BF and Titan, they do not have to run their scripts by BBC for approval. They can take their Cosmic dudes anywhere they like. They are not answerable to anyone and have already showed that they are ready to bend some rules for a quick buck.


 * And that is another reason why we cannot create a precedent. Just because some readers currently like what current writers do with the properties they do not own under the current management, does not mean that other writers in the future working for new management will not take this production to lengths and depths that would make (most of) us weep.


 * We do not need to invent a bicycle. Our validity rules are based on a solid legal and moral ground. It has to be a narrative by the right-ful owner(s), we recognise the author's prerogative to release things the way they want without second-guessing them (or letting third parties share the spotlight), and we respect the author's/publisher's wishes if they want to stay out of DWU. We do not grant validity because we like somebody, or because they're struggling, or because they are in a difficult legal situation.


 * Let me remind you that this whole series of publications was born out of a dispute. This is not my claim: it is literally the first thing that Andy Frankham-Allen replies to the question about the genesis of the series: "Doctor Who has a long history of not crediting the character of Lethbridge-Stewart to his creators (indeed, they’ve only received on screen credit once in forty-seven years, not counting the script in which they introduced him), and it’s a well-documented bone of contention." He then goes on to count the number of times Great Intelligence was credited to its creators and comes out unhappy. Leaving aside how reasonable this complaint is in the first place (I don't believe the creators of the Doctor are normally credited either), it is not the place of the wiki to take sides in this dispute. We should not be helping CJB get back at BBC any more than helping BBC to squash an inconvenient publisher.


 * BBC does not have the license to the Brigadier, CJB obtained this license. We do not take the side of BBC by ignoring CJB production. I don't even believe there was an inclusion debate. No barriers: welcome to the family.


 * By the same token, CJB do not have the license to the Doctor. We do not take their side by letting them play with the Doctor anyways.


 * The policies of the wiki must treat all rights holders equally. If someone likes an underdog, feel free to buy their books. But as an admin, I cannot take sides and I must respect the current legal position of all parties involved. Amorkuz ☎  23:02, August 15, 2017 (UTC)


 * I have to say, the argument that the Wikia might be complicit in a copyright infringement case is pretty funny to me. Unless I'm grievously mistaken, copyright infringement is a civil wrong rather than a criminal wrong, which means there can be no "accomplices"; here is a specific list of criminal wrongs that could come from copyright infringement, and you can see that Wikia would be complicit in none of these claims by covering questionably copyrighted material. (If they were, an interlinked Lethbridge-Stewart Wiki would be just as bad!) As far as legal issues go, Wikia should be far more concerned about super-detailed plot summaries and high quality screenshots than anything having to do with T:VS. NateBumber ☎  23:48, August 15, 2017 (UTC)


 * Thank you, NateBumber for doing research and reminding us that we do not live in a legal vacuum and there are simple and efficient tools against us at the disposal of copyright holders. They do not need a court order to have a deep impact on us here at Tardis. There is a simple procedure for removing our content described here. The matter will not be handled by the local admins: "Upon receipt of a valid takedown notice with all the required elements, Wikia, Inc. will remove the allegedly infringing content. The community where the content was deleted will be notified, via edit and/or deletion summaries (when available), why the content has been deleted."

- Ibid Note that Wikia, Inc. will not make an attempt to determine whether the content is indeed infringing. They will remove the allegedly infringing content and wash their hands. And, just in case you were wondering, copyright holders can even target particular users, due to the following policy: "If a particular user account uploads content that accrues three (3) separate DMCA takedown notices, Wikia, Inc. reserves the right to disable the account, at our discretion, under our repeat infringer policy."

- Ibid


 * So far we've been respecting intellectual property of others and have been left to our own devices in return. Let's keep it that way. Amorkuz ☎  23:25, August 17, 2017 (UTC)


 * That's a super interesting point; thank you for letting me know about that Wikia policy. Though I'm not quite sure why the BBC would file a takedown request at us for ... covering stories about the Cosmic Hobo on the same page as stories about the Doctor? That's outside the scope of the DMCA, as far as my lawyers tell me; or at least, if the Beebs tried that approach, it would be ... a precedent-setting case, to say the least. I mean, if Tardis made the decision that all fanfic is valid (which we obviously wouldn't want to do, but could), as long as we're not copy-pasting books or uploading whole comics, wouldn't we still be in the clear? If not, please let me know, cuz I'd rather the Faction Paradox Wiki not get nuked from orbit for saying the Master is the War King. NateBumber ☎  00:36, August 18, 2017 (UTC)

Anyway, back to the topic at hand, I think it'd be pretty funny if we had pages that said things like, "According to one account, Victoria Waterfield wasn't present at this incident, and instead a woman named after a Queen was present." NateBumber ☎  00:36, August 18, 2017 (UTC)


 * According to one account the Rutan scout that attacked the Fang Rock lighthouse in the 1900s was defeated by the Fourth Doctor. (TV: Horror of Fang Rock) Another account indicated that the Rutan was defeated by the time traveller with a time machine shaped like a police box that the British government knew by the codename "Cosmic Hobo" and that Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart encountered during the London Event. (PROSE: Beast of Fang Rock)


 * The Bellotron Incident [Track 13] - Bernice Summerfield and Bev Tarrant are in a bar contemplating their recent licensed encounter with Rutans
 * BT: ...And then I will tell you a tale of an escape filled with great daring, skill, and cunning. Hmm, the doc would have been proud of me.
 * BS: The doc? Oh my god, you don't know him?
 * BT: Know him? How do you think I got stranded in this godforsaken area of space and time?
 * BS: But how on Earth did you-
 * Ryan: Look, before you two ladies start catching up on old friends... what are you drinking?
 * [this is followed on by a joke relating to the events of the story and then the closing theme]
 * The point being: Lethbridge-Stewart is far from a stand-out case when it comes to the stories covered on this wiki. And as you said Amorkuz, "They should be treated as everyone else." I do not see any difference between Candy Jar alluding to characters they don't have the license to use in the story and Big Finish alluding to characters they don't have a license to use in the story.


 * And I'm not just talking about Bernice Summerfield. Let us not forget that The Kingmaker mentions a "Northern chap with big ears", a handful of BBC Eighth Doctor Adventures mention "Grace" (or in the case of Unnatural History, "Dr Holloway"), and loads of Virgin New Adventures use the word "Dalek".


 * I certainly think that the codename Cosmic Hobo deserves its own separate page, but there's an argument to be made that precedent allows for us to acknowledge that it's the Doctor. At the same time, this talk could set precedent. Do we want something like this:

Grace (disambiguation)
 * Grace (The Blue Angel), a woman the Eighth Doctor impulsively kissed in a San Francisco park on New Year's Eve
 * Grace (The Bodysnatchers), a woman that the Eighth Doctor grew close to during his post-regenerative trauma
 * Grace (Genocide), an individual who gave the Eighth Doctor a pair of shoes which he wore for much of his early life
 * Grace (Unnatural History), a friend of the Eighth Doctor who lived in early 2000s San Francisco
 * Because I sure don't want something like that. In my eyes, even if Grace Holloway is owned by Fox Broadcasting Company, having the Eighth Doctor (a character who appeared alongside Grace in a licensed story) mention someone named Grace who has characteristics that greatly correspond with Grace Holloway should be enough for the wiki to just link to Grace Holloway  and not make a new page.


 * Lethbridge-Stewart's allusions are (in general) much more of an "EDAs referencing Grace" situation than a "The Kingmaker referencing the Ninth Doctor" situation. Aside from Legacies showing an alternate timeline in which the Doctor was among those killed in the London Event and that one now infamous two-page bonus short story with the >spoiler<; Lethbridge-Stewart hasn't been saying anything about the "Cosmic Hobo" that isn't also true of the Doctor in Doctor Who, just as the EDAs said very little about Grace which wasn't already in the TV movie. Now that I think about it, both are novel series primarily spun-off of one Doctor Who story which contained characters the publishers did not have a license to use.


 * Now, a whole lot of this discussion seems to be based off of an incredibly short bonus short story written in two days to be released as an extra alongside the regular "free" subscription short story: When Times Change. The fact is that just isn't representative of the series as a whole. The initial 2015 run of LS novels did try their damnedest to tie-in to all corners of televised Dr Who, but it didn't use the words "the Doctor" once. And the whole "let's prove we're in the DWU by having vague references to things we don't own" has really died down since 2015; as far as I'm aware since 2015 the only non-Lincoln/Haisman elements which originate from Doctor Who to appear in the series have been Adrienne Kramer, Karfel, and Grigoriy Bugayev (one of the main characters of Emotional Chemistry). With mostly new original aliens and an established cast of recurring characters, there really isn't really a "need" to reference "Cosmic Hobo" very much anymore. Even in cases where 2015 LS would have alluded to the Doctor, recent LS has refrained; segments of Times Squared are set directly after the events of The Abominable Snowmen and the novel has the restraint to not even have Travers recall "a dark-haired stranger with a large fur coat, a Scottish boy, and a girl named after a queen".


 * Not sure where to go next with this... I'll just end it with two things which aren't really relevant to the wider discussion.


 * The idea that Candy Jar might publish a whole series about the "Cosmic Hobo" is about as sensical as the idea the BBC might give Candy Jar the license to use the Doctor and the TARDIS; they're too concerned about being consistent with televised Doctor Who and the Doctor is usually rather insistent on having people refer to him as "the Doctor".
 * Surprisingly, the one part of this discussion that legit makes me angry has literally nothing to do with Lethbridge-Stewart. The Very Fabric of Time and Space is not an unlicensed Time Vortex and members of the Clockworks are not unlicensed Time Lords! Surely the fact that our articles for both of these things mention the concepts that they are supposedly knocking-off outside of the BTS should be considered some sort of sign. For the record, Mad Dogs and Englishmen has a character that says the Very Fabric isn't the Time Vortex and The Elixir of Doom has Iris saying that she is not a Time Lord, but instead a member of the Clockworks.


 * - CoT    ?  05:35, August 18, 2017 (UTC)


 * I think CoT raised a very important distinction in how characters may appear in stories: some stories merely reference events from properly licensed stories without changing anything about those events or adding anything about those characters. Though in for-profit publishing using real names in such cases is still considered a violation of copyright, if I understand CoT correctly, he suggests that by a careful curation of material it would be ok to relax this rule as too cautious.


 * Whatever anyone thinks about the current implementation of copyright laws, they are based on a reasonable foundation: the creator should have creative control over his/her creations. The way I understand CoT's argument is that this fundamental right is not violated in the preceding references of Grace. As I said before we cannot advocate violating laws because they are inconvenient. But it can be argued that a simple reminder of snippets of a fully licensed story does not affect the author's rights in any way: nothing new is claimed about the characters and no profit is derived. This is a reasonable position I can sympathise with. This approach can be traced in how cultural references are treated in general. For instance, when Gabby Gonzalez asks not to compare her with a certain cartoon mice with the same name, the wiki currently mentions the actual cartoon character by name even though the story doesn't.


 * Of course, separating mere references to stories past from retconning those stories or hijacking those characters is harder than separating not using the name from using the name. This requires a lot of attention that has so far been lacking towards LS series here on Tardis, which is why we're having this conversation specifically on this story's page. Returning to NateBumber, I think his question happily provides a perfect litmus test, a way of telling if something new is said about the character. If one perceives a need to put some info about the character derived from his/her/its unlicensed appearance onto the original story's page and/or the character's page, that means the character was taken for a spin without permission. And in this case, morally and legally the connection to the original character should be disallowed. You can call it stealing, cheating, copyright violation. But it's wrong and I am strongly against condoning such behaviour. If, however, it is a mere reference to the original events, then there is nothing to be added about them on the original page. Then there is no "according to another account" because nothing is changed. And I can live with this being linked to the original character as in Cosmic Hobo . Obviously, the page of the story should still use the name the character goes by in the story, but I guess it is ok to link if this is really a harmless reference.


 * Such a distinction is something I can get behind. But it is completely and utterly inapplicable to this story, which happens in an alternate timeline even from the in-universe perspective. It is a "what if" narrative. If the girl and Cosmic Hobo and the Scottish boy were killed here but not in the original story, why can't the girl be called Elizabeth as heavily implied in the story, why can't this be a completely different Cosmic Hobo who might have chosen a different monicker? There is zero reason to equate the characters in-universe or out-of-universe, just like we do not equate Ricky Smith with Mickey Smith, nor Unbound Universe characters with their normal DWU counterparts. And on the very few pages that may reference this story, it is very easy to do: "In an alternate timeline the Brigadier did this and a girl did this and the Cosmic Hobo did that, and all died. The end." Thus, I agree with CoT that Cosmic Hobo should get a page if only to record his fate from this story. And Girl from this timeline should get a page, and the Scottish one. Amorkuz ☎  21:26, August 18, 2017 (UTC)