Star Trek

[Valka]

Niven was unhappy about that adaption being in print, competing with the original...

He shouldn't have been. He probably got a lot of sales out of it, from people who otherwise wouldn't have looked twice at his books, if they even noticed them at all.

I get rather annoyed at SF writers who sneer at Star Trek, since if I'd never been a Star Trek fan, I wouldn't ever have started reading science fiction novels. I started out with the best stuff, btw - Heinlein, Clarke, Bradbury, and went on from there. I'd include Asimov, but I was more into his science essays than his fiction.

[Buster's Uncle]

That wasn't the problem with Niven - he's totally a fan.  He just wasn't thrilled to have Foster's adaption out there.  Business is business, after all, and Niven takes the business he's in seriously.  I think he felt a little screwed over by a rights loophole, and I may have given the impression he's more put out than he seems to be; but he's a somewhat low-affect fellow, and it's hard to tell.

[Valka]

Yeah, I get that authors have to look out for themselves first. But some of them do it the wrong way, if they want fans to have any sympathy for them. I've read some of Niven's books, exactly because I first read Alan Dean Foster's adaptation. There was no competition. I bought both authors' books.

[Buster's Uncle]

Google is my friend...

Urban Myth: Legal Issues Behind the "The Slaver Weapon"
by Greg Tyler
November 22, 2006

One popular myth among Star Trek fans is that there was a legal entanglement between Larry Niven and the producers of the animated Star Trek television series over the episode "The Slaver Weapon." This episode, written by Niven, features the Kzinti, a felinoid species reminiscent of the Kzinti from Niven's Known Space series of novels and short stories.

In December 2002, to learn the truth behind the myth, I contacted Larry Niven through his web site and asked him directly. Here was his reply (email addresses removed):


From : email address removed
 Sent : Friday, December 20, 2002 2:04 PM
 To : email address removed
 Subject : Thank You for using my FAQ

Here is my answer to your question:
 You asked me: I'm a Star Trek fan, and I wanted to ask about what could possibly be nothing more than an urban myth.

Is there some kind of legal controversy surrounding "The Slaver Weapon," an episode of the animated Star Trek television series?

Thanks!

My response:
 "The Slaver Weapon" was adapted, with permission, from Niven's story "The Soft Weapon." Then "The Slaver Weapon was novelized in Star Trek Log Ten into a short Story by Foster. Niven has gotten all the credit he deserves for having written the original story. He may not have been thrilled about the re-adaptation, but AFAIK, there isn't any legal battle looming.

Larry has this to say:

The sequence went like this:
 I published "The Soft Weapon", a novelet.
 Gene Rodenberry suggested I turn it into a Star Trek animation. Hence "The Slaver Weapon".
 The company sold novelization rights to Ballantine Books.
 Alan Dean Foster did the novelization.
 So I wound up competing with myself, and I find that annoying, but no legal action was ever threatened nor taken.

Larry Niven

Thanks to Larry Niven and the webmaster of Larry Niven's web site for sharing this information.

http://trekplace.com/article19.html

...

I do believe, reading between the lines, that Niven may be too much of a gentleman to publically comment on what he thinks of the quality of Foster's work.  This is a low-confidence guess, however.

[Valjiir1]

To coin a phrase - fascinating! Sounds like Susan Oliver was one of the first "liberated" women in Hollywood.

[Buster's Uncle]

I think I WOULD like to see that.

[Unorthodox]

Just randomly noticed the trek cartoon is on netflix...

[Buster's Uncle]

Ooh!   

Mylochka has them all on disk, but still.

[Rusty Edge]

I'm still really enjoying your sigline every time I visit. I just like to watch.

[Valka]

My Spud is faster!

[Buster's Uncle]

You want Spud shooting a Klingon?

[Valka]

No, thank you. Spud may be a biker, but he's a pacifist biker.

[Buster's Uncle]

I'm still really enjoying your sigline every time I visit. I just like to watch.

 

[Unorthodox]

So, I decided to kill some time looking at star trek online...

They ran with the new movies' storyline with the romulans world blowing up...and used the opportunity to totally rewrite anything I had learned about the romulans. 

The Klingon storyline is similarly...odd.  They absorbed the Gorn and Naussican (spelling, don't really know them off hand) and...um, someone else.   Orions? 

Anyway, these are all playable, and regular crewmen on Klingon vessels now...I just don't really see that happening.  Since I'm playing a Gorn captain, the storyline makes no sense in spots that deal with Klingon religion crap.  I scrapped all my Klingon officers and am running with a full Gorn crew.  Unfortunately the Gorn ships are 'premium' which I'd consider if they weren't EXPENSIVE. 

The game itself...the ground missions are cliche, but the space battles are entertaining. 

[Mylochka]

I've only played the game a little.  Have barely got though the training mission...  Friends asked me to create replicas of the uniforms, so I had to do a little research.

http://fav.me/d3aau69