Holy Blood. . .Bloody Hell

[stellanoir]

Welp here comes the inevitable. The authors of "Holy Blood Holy Grail" are now serving Dan Brown with complaints of plagerism.

Okay I read the former's book in the early 80's. I could see obviously the same themes in the "Da Vinci Code" years later.

But the bottom line is that this conflict is regarding an issue millennia old and what of the onerous copyrights and statutes of limitations.

This stuff is Biblical and preceeds all copyright infringement regulations. So go figure.

Should be interesting to see how this pans out. I am torn between feeling that Brown brought the issues to the masses which was great and the other guys did all the less sensational but more revealing grunt work.

Discuss. . . at liberty

[Ready4Change]

1. So... God should sue both parties?

?

[AnnieBW]

2. Sounds Like

Someone wants a piece of the action.

Heck, the whole "Jesus and MM were married and had a child" idea has been around for at least 1000 years. HBHG stipulates that. I've read another fictional account, called "The Moon Under Her Feet" that has the same hypothesis. Nobody sued the author of that book!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000CC49KI/ref=pd_ecc_rvi_3/102-2630260-3309767?%5Fencoding=UTF8

[misternormal]

4. Agreed...

Obviously Brown made a whole lot more money...

Probably a better read.

[stellanoir]

11. that's truly part of it

the appeal of fiction over non fiction.

[salvorhardin]

3. They might as well sue Jane Jensen too

For writing the script for the computer game Gabriel Knight III: Blood of the Sacred, Blood of the Damned.
http://www.janejensen.com/gk3frame.html

And since you've brought up a topic that is only tangentially related I'll use this as another opportunity to say: Best adventure games ever!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Knight

[Junkdrawer]

5. I'm told Dan Brown cites the earlier book in his...

If I write a non-fiction book and then someone else writes a novel based on that book, and clearly cites my work, I don't think that I have a leg to stand on.

Sounds like someone is looking to make a quick buck for a settlement.

[domlaw]

6. Grunt Work / Hoax Work

Both books are works of fiction:

http://www.cesnur.org/2004/davinci_nyt.htm

For a much better and hilarious read go for:

http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/reference/foucaults_pendulum_book

[NashVegas]

7. I'll Repeat What I Wrote in the LBN Thread

Brown has no one to thank for this publicity but himself.

If he'd written his dialog to show his characters as characters rather than as tools for moving the plot along w/exposition, he'd not be in this boat. He violated the law of "show, don't tell." All he did, really, was re-tell what was in HBHG. And that's why he's in court. Whether it was outright plagiarism remains to be seen. But the HBHG authors have Brown's wife's copy of HBHG that was used for research as their evidence, complete with notes and highlighted passages.

Good historical fiction authors go straight to the original source documents, they don't rely on other modern works for their research.

[Laelth]

10. Interesting.

I wonder how the plaintiffs got Brown's wife's copy of HBHG. If it's stolen, it may not be admissible. Curious.

-Laelth

[A-Possum]

8. "Plagiarism" isn't illegal, copyright infringement is

This is the first I've heard of this, but copyright does not cover concepts or ideas; it covers copying of the work itself.

That said, sometimes copyright holders make a claim that the overall work is so similar that it constitutes copyright infringement. The standards of Fair Use are:

“(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; (2) the nature of the copyrighted work; (3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and (4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.”

So any copyright infringement case would take these into account. From what I know of both of these books, one being published as non-fiction and the other as fiction, and one not only not compromising the market for the other, but possibly increasing it, there is probably not much chance that an infringement claim will be successful. But as I said, I don't know the details of this particular suit and there's no link in the OP.

Keep in mind that writers make their living from copyright. Books do not create themselves; they are the result of hard work by the author. Under current laws, your work is copyrighted at creation. The internet has created new issues and pressures on the copyright law and also on authors, with new and competing demands. These will be pounded out as time goes along, as always.

Just because one particular suit may or may not have validity does not mean copyright law is "onerous." As to when a work becomes public domain, again, keep in mind that without the author creating it in the first place, it would not exist. The public didn't create it; though the public might benefit from it and after a certain number of years (related to either the lifetime of the author or the date of creation, depending on how it was copyrighted) it becomes public domain.

[pretzel4gore]

9. it's all bs anyway

the type of thing born agin 'xians' would suck right up....fyi, jesus of nazareth truly died on the cross as the religion says; and he was truly the son of 'god' in a way no one else in human history has been (imo)...casually mocking the founder of our civilization is one big reason why our civilization is so fukking evil today...gandhi knew of jesus, and admired/respected him, so did william blake and albert einstein, blais pascal and george orwell and martin luther king. Mocking Jesus, which is what all this 'davinci code' crap does (and holy blood, holy grail too) by saying he was a conman just edifies real conmen like bush and regan and hitler and so on, puts them in the same category as someone no one should mock (even less so then mohammed, for example) because maybe GOD really isn't amused by grasping little men using the ideas that Jesus gave to us to fillup their shabby little bank accounts (and meanwhile the rest of us sheeple arguing whether junior bush is a godly or a goddamned man!)

[gauguin57]

12. Those "Holy Blood...." guys have gotten so much p.r. since Brown's book

was published.

This really pisses me off. "Holy Blood..." was mouldering in the remainder bin, and was revived BECAUSE of the DaVinci Code ... the big bookstore chains put all the Mary Mag/Knights Templar/DaVinci code stuff in displays together (WITH "Holy Blood/Grail") ... that old book wouldn't have gotten the play it has without Dan Brown.

AND ... at least one of the "Holy Blood..." guys (the one with the heinous comb-over-mullet) has been on every one of those ABC, Discovery Channel, TLC, etc. etc. shows about "The Truth of the Da Vinci Code blah blah blah" --

And NOW they're suing. INGRATES. I wanna see that damned movie!