Editorials
The SCP Trademark is Under Attack
Disclaimer: Bloody-Disgusting.com operates two shows under the Creative Commons 3.0 license. I act as the Showrunner on our show, SCP Archives, which uses many of the articles and tales from the SCP Wiki.
SCP stands for Secure, Contain, Protect. It’s also a worldwide collaborative fiction project, where anyone is free to create their story within the universe and upload it to the SCP-Wiki. Think of it like Wikipedia, but for monsters. Everything is written in a government-like dossier, with blacked-out text, gruesome photos, and sometimes even audio logs from expeditions into other worlds! There’s one catch though, everything on the SCP wiki is under the Creative Commons Sharealike 3.0 (CC-BY-SA3.0) license. That means once you’ve published it to the site, anyone else can take your idea and expand upon it, sell merch of it, or even make a movie- But they must attribute the original author, and whatever work they make must also be released under the CC-BY-SA3.0 liscense.
Six months ago it came to light that a Russian man, Andrey Duksin, took advantage of the trademark standards of the Russian Federal Service for Intellectual Property and trademarked the SCP Foundation name and logo within the Russian Federation and Eurasian Customs Union. Duksin defended this action, stating “[He is] putting a lot of money into promoting the universe and creating media content (arts, books, tabletop games, etc), I had to make sure no one shifty enough jumps in and profits on the PR I’m making. ‘Cause in that case I’m losing the resource to get my own investments back.” Duksin goes on to claim that “This doesn’t matter for the community at all, because I’ve always supported the community’s decisions…”
Duksin revealed he was the trademark owner after a fan run merch store was kicked off of the Russian social media website, VK. Fans had posted onto a VK group about a link to the shop being blocked, Duksin writes “As far as I can see, 20+ people sent their money, at least 30000 rubles [~$500] as preliminary payment for their merch boxes,” and pushes for customers to file a police report for fraud. Later, Duksin reveals that a year ago he paid 100,000 rubles (~$1400) to register the SCP Foundation trademark, and had “… contacted those guys and offered to coordinate our actions. They told me to fuck off. In turn, I contacted vk.com admins and kicked that group outta vk.”
Later, Duksin would openly admit to the SCPRU (Russian division of the SCP fandom) admins that he secured the trademark to pursue big-budget films and video games. Around the same time, other fans who managed SCP based VK groups shared their interactions with Duksin, you can read their transcripts (or view screenshots from VK) here.
This brings us to today.
Duksin is now threatening to shut down the SCP-RU website. For the last six months US and Russian SCP admins have tried to negotiate and work with Rospatent to dissolve the illegitimate trademark to no avail. This has to lead the US admin team to seek legal action, and they require help.
You can support the SCP fandom by spreading the message with #StandWithSCPRU or by donating to the legal fund.
The trailer for Ti West’s upcoming adaptation of A Christmas Carol raised a lot of eyebrows when it dropped earlier this week. While plenty of folks initially dismissed Ebenezer as a derivative project meant to cash in on the recent wave of unnecessary prequels that expand the backstory of beloved characters (such as 2023’s Wonka), Charles Dickens’ original novel already made a point of exploring Ebenezer Scrooge’s origins in detail – meaning that this new film is likely just a particularly faithful adaptation of the source material under a different name.
Couple that with the fact that the movie is being helmed by a genuine horror auteur and I think it’s safe to say that the latest iteration of the first modern ghost story is in good hands.
That being said, one detail that immediately jumped out at me during the brief teaser (other than a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it nod to Johnny Depp’s iconic bedroom death scene from the original A Nightmare on Elm Street) is the fact that many of Ebenezer’s ghosts appear to have been directly lifted from the iconic John Leech illustrations that accompanied the first edition of Dickens’ novel.
Here are a couple of stills from the trailer compared to the original artwork:
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
The Phantoms in ‘A Christmas Carol’ and ‘Ebenezer’
Marley’s Ghost in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
Mainly working with old-school wood and steel engravings that would later be transferred to print, Leech was instrumental in crafting the iconic look of history’s most influential phantoms – especially since Dickens is said to have been deeply involved with the creation of these so-called “comic illustrations.”
And since the novel is commonly said to have popularized spiritualism in Victorian England, much of the ghostly iconography that we still see in genre media to this very day (including some of Ti West’s previous films) can be traced back to the author’s partnership with Leech.
Ebenezer won’t be the first A Christmas Carol adaptation to borrow heavily from these designs, but I can appreciate how Ti West is incorporating an important part of horror history into his latest film.
Ebenezer will be available in theaters starting November 13.
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