Animation Source Forums

In case you haven't read the news post or the thread about it, I suggest you do so first:
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=18741

Alright, now down to business.
We know Phil Weinstein was in control of Universal's animation department during production of Wolf Quest and Wings of Change.
Also we know that Glenn Ross took over the animation department just before Wings of Change's release. Well, some of you may not have known that, but now you do.

It's come to light that the staff under Glenn Ross deliberately tried to kill off the Land Before Time series. Quote interview with Aria Curzon (the voice of Ducky in LBT)'s representative:



[My kudos to Steet for getting this valuable tidbit of what is probably a major issue.]

Basically, the series was being shifted around constantly so people had to look for it, the DTVs were being released at different times etc etc.

However, the quote "so they could say they were not selling well" is of interest. Why?
As I mentioned earlier, Glenn Ross took over before WoC's release, and in the interview Aria's representative says "The new people that take over in this kind of case just want to dump all the old shows and put on edgier stuff, so it has their signature...".

What this means is the new staff most likely have deliberately not advertised Wings of Change as it wasn't something they made. They wanted to get something they made out instead of paying their respects to the previous staff and trying to advertise it. This way, they could say that "it didn't sell well", and have that as an excuse not to make another.
There is proof that this happened - several sites have reported Wolf Quest selling more than Wings of Change, including Amazon.

More proof on how they don't want to have anything to do with Balto, is the answer we first got back from our Balto Petition Poll.



Of course, he obviously didn't read through the letter sent with it, which was that it was about a Special Edition DVD, not a sequel. Yet more evidence...

But I didn't make this to rant about how Universal dumped Balto. It's the rights to the franchise I'm talking about. Seeing as the new regime only wants stuff out that they created, could it be possible that we could get the rights to it?
Of course there would be many many difficulties in doing this.

First is how much they'll ask for it. They may not even want to give us it anyway, or they might want thousands of dollars. It's not like they'd be willing to give us the rights for hundreds - their only interest is to make money, so they might ask very large figures.

If they don't, we'd have to think of a way to get the money. We'd probably need a fund raiser of some sort, or if anyone has some links to companies and the sort we'd need donations. Probably a PayPal donations account.

Second would be who manages it, of course, or who it belongs to. There'd have to be some sensible way of doing so. The problem here is that rights can only be held by a person or company, not a community. The primary option is Ruskie Huskie (the Series project) or Steet, of course, but we'd have a problem with new members often demanding for some sort of association with them.

Overall it would be hard work, we don't even know if Universal would even be willing to give us the rights as several companies I know of are quite similar to them but are stubborn and refuse to lend out rights, although they're in different industries. I think it would be very troublesome, but it'd be worth it. Who knows, Universal might release another sequel in a few years time just for the sake of entirely trashing the series.

What are your opinions? Should we try and ask? Too expensive? Too hard to work out? Worth it? Post away!

Wow this is a really huge thing your talking about here. Getting rights from a company like this even though it's over something they are not so keen on would most likely be expensive and difficult to manage, thats even if they consider wanting to give over the rights. Although you've already explained everything thoroughly so I won't repeat what you've already voiced. However if there was a chance talks could be made into gaining rights to Balto I cant really begin to imagine the complications and legal rights that could appear.
Firstly Universal would have to know we would be interested in Balto, although this itself is unfortunate as I'm sure they're experts at milking the most profit out of someone and knowing we'd be keen on purchase even if they aren't keen on ownership would put the ball in their park. Although I'm getting way ahead of myself here, it seems if this is something to be worth taking beyond consideration then it would be best for site runners or Steet himself (as you mentioned) to have a main task in handling the rights and organisation, thats if he would want to.

About your ways to raise the money, yes PayPal would definetly seem the best way but how many of us would/could pay into the online account? What would happen if everything falls through if Universal suddenly don't want to sell the Balto franchise rights and all the money collected would be for nothing. Firstly to sell the rights wouldn't we already have to have the money ready so Universal know's we mean it and if so wouldn't it be risky to have everyone donate money when we might not even get it in the first place. Look at the Balto petition, thats been up for ages and still hasn't reached it's goal of 2000 signatures but here we're talking about money and I'm sorry to say that most people on this site (including me) don't own a credit card to pay into PayPal... unless you don't need a credit card just a bank account, I cant remember.

Overall though I do back up this idea and if money is needed for the slim chance that we could buy the rights for the Balto franchise then this is one member who promises to make worthwhile donations (the benefit of finally getting a job )

Yup, this would be rather big XD You raise some good points. Already there's been interest, actually.

Indeed Universal might try and milk all the money they could out of us, that was another concern of mine. For the money... if Universal just suddenly pulled out when we had the money ready, that would be completely unprofessional. Distributing the money back would give us plenty of trouble. We'd have to make it clear that there would be absolutely no pulling out once the money started coming in.

Already having to have the money... that's a big problem. I think we'd have to inquire about it first and then discuss with everyone if we could raise it. If it's a thousand, we might have some difficulty with it, but if they ask for a sum much more than that, we'd be screwed.

PayPal works with just a bank account, I think... I'm not too sure about that. If we get enough interest about paying with bank accounts in this, I'll take a look.

Another problem we'd face is a lot of people wouldn't be able to work. I'd be willing to when I can (which is just a matter of months away, at the end of May), but those not able to work might have to hold fund raisers, things like a chocolate drive in their local neighborhood. You could figure out a way of raising money however you want, just don't steal k? Ignore that last bit, I kid. However if anyone under the age of 18 wanted to donate (job money-wise this is) they might have to discuss it with their family... which could be another issue.

EDIT- Just saw about legal rights... we'd need someone that has a good understanding in this field too, because I sure don't XD That would get quite complicated, I could imagine

Indeed it's an incredibly slim possibility. I don't see how they could ask millions for it, but if they asked in the hundreds of thousands, we'd be running into quite a bit of trouble. It'd be pretty unfair to ask a mere fan community to come up in the hundreds of thousands for it, but that's what we face.

They won't ask for something low unless there's a miracle. I don't even know if they'd be willing to give it to us in the first place with their attitude, but they seem to want to get rid of things that they didn't make, so maybe...

As fate would have it, I happen to have a company to connection, long story short, I know a guy who's friends with the presadent of Nickalodian. Also we might be able to get in contect with an intrested buyer with a patition that we are intrested in a Balto 4, such as someone has suggested, Dreamworks would be a senseable choice. Ether way it wouldn't hurt to ask Universal for the price.

Another point to add to us not knowing stuff legal wise, my Dad's a barrester. It's a long shot to ask him and only last resort if it was something that would help, but if we really did need somone who know's stuff legal wise and cannot get anyone else then I'll ask him. I'm only saying this to cover the point of who can talk "legal" stuff, heck he might not even want to do it, he's busy a lot of the time and would more then likely view this as a waste of time and tell me not to obsess.

Again I'm saying it's very likely nothing will happen so I'm not even going to get my hopes up but I'd like to try, however if someone else know's how to get into talks then that would be great. The best we have seems to be with Kendell knowing someone who actually know's the president of Nickolodeon, thats pretty decent. I doubt Balto would be given away for millions but if its millions or even 10,000 quid (Which is low to them) we still wouldn't be able to purchase the rights. The only way we could get the Balto franchise is if they knew about us and in some weird way allowed us to buy it for the most that we could offer, or gave us a set price that we had to make. Thats pretty much the only way, ever. Anyway back to my point if this is taken further then I'd be more then happy to ask my dad to help in with legal stuff, he probably wouldn't help because he couldn't but he might, so I'm just throwing that in there

Oh and also nice idea about the charity thing, auctions and selling items that someone else could want would help loads, if everyone on the site pitched in then that would be a great help to raising more money Even if it's only a small amount like a tenner that would still be good. Again I get ahead of myself, I'm only saying this if there was a chance so I'm more then ready to accept the very high probability that we wouldn't be able to buy the rights.

Good point, glad we have someone who knows legal stuff. I'll try to get through to him but he's a busy guy being president of a major network and all. I think we'd have a better chance if we have the price when I ask, who knows, Nick might be very intrested if they see how hard we're working to save Balto. Another possiblity is that maybe Universal will have a change of heart after this whole thing. I honestly think we can make this work if we try. Power to the Fans!

Err...No. Phil Weinstein was the director of the Balto sequels, he was not in charge of the animation department. I'm not sure who was, maybe it was Feola but they say he was in charge of the whole Universal Studio Home Entertainment department (which does not only include animation!)

http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA613255.html

But its departure may also confirm the staff change... (just look at the date : 8/13/2004)


No again...Read it for yourself :

http://www.petitiononline.com/balto001/petition.html

As for the Balto franchise rights, I think you're dreaming...They would probably ask millions for it. Even if they don't exploit it currently, it's still a franchise known worldwide (even if there are still lots of people who don't know it...) If they hadn't make the sequels, they would probably ask for much less, but now...

Of course, I dream about something like this happening, but I honestly don't have any hope into this.

I think I've done everything I could, but I think I didn't get much help on this. I'm tired of having to do EVERYTHING myself.
Staying on the topic, does anyone know if anything like that has ever happened? I'm not talking about the rights of a movie that didn't come out yet like The hobbit as this isn't a rare thing.
This is a different situation. I just can't remember any film or series franchise getting sold to another company (I'm not even talking of them getting sold to the fans...) To me the only way something like this happens is when an entire company merges or is getting sold to another one.

All Good Points

Head, meet desk. Agh, mah apulugies, couldn't remember exactly about the last poll, although note there's special edition DVD on there... moving right along however, yes, it is a distant possibility. We'd need to generate a lot of attention for something to happen.

Them asking a small fan community for millions, however, is rather ridiculous. However, they might.



Truth is, we've seen enough, been dealt too many blows. The current staff will absolutely not release anything that they didn't create, and I don't know how often it is that we get a changeover. We've tried to circulate the poll for a year, and only gotten halfway. We could try Google listing it, though, but from experience sites with bigger activity come first... or something like that, at least.


Please don't post unless you have something to add ._. otherwise it's spam

True Steet it is a remote possiblity but it is still a possiblty and Jerseycaptian also has a good point, if we can't get the rights, we might show Universal how much Balto means to us fans and maybe get them to reconsider. I could go to some other sites I'm a member on a drum up support. Like I said before, I could get Nickalodian in on this abd they may want to get the rights but before I ask, I'd like to have the price to raise our chances of it working, if someone could find that out I'll ask, if we can't find that out, I'll still ask. So even if we can't do this directly, what we try might ripple out and work in another way. If we just try I think we can somehow get this to work.

We buy the rights to Balto?

Before I repeat what everyone else has said, why would we ever want to do that anyway? Balto would be even less likely to have anything done with it IF fans owned the rights.
There are so many different versions of a B4 that if we wanted to do that it'd never go anywhere.
How many animators are on this site? I'd like to bet hardly any and even less willing to work on something as huge as a full movie.
How would we ever release a special edition DVD? We have no way of advertising or promoting nevermind producing.
Not to mention the huge price tag it'd have, movie companies are used to dealing in very large amounts of money and they would make no exception for a group of fans, I doubt they'd ever even agree to selling it to fans anyway.