Old media slays me. They still haven’t figured this intertubes thing out.
Years ago, people posting fan sites for Star Trek were threatened with legal action by Viacom. Same with Simpsons fans and Fox. For some reason, these megacorps were really really wringing their hands that some fan someplace might actually be promoting their shows! Mind you, in most cases the biggest infraction these fan sites were guilty of was posting pictures from the show. But otherwise, what they were doing was basically free advertising. In fact, it was even better; ads are annoying, but fan sites actually can build communities of thousands of people, all of whom will watch the show and spread the word.
The latest dumdum in this case is the BBC, and of all things they threatened a website that was posting knitting patterns of Doctor Who aliens! How counterproductive is that? (Answer: supercounterproductive).
Why on Earth (or off) would someone do this? How brain-dead do they have to be to actually stop enthusiastic fans from saying good things about their show?
I get a lot of traffic from Doctor Who, as well I should: I love the show, and talk it up quite a bit here. I wonder if the BBC will try to take me down, or at least the pages where I promote it?
In case some stuffed suit at the Beeb is reading this right now: I’m doing your job for you. For free. And I’m doing it better.
… oh. Maybe that’s why they worried.
Tip o’ the sonic screwdriver to Paul Hutchinson.
