Wyrd Sisters and Warner Bros
p2p news / p2pnet: Unless you`re from around Winnipeg, Manitoba, in Canada, you`ve probably never heard of the Wyrd Sisters folk group.
But if you have, it`s probably because they were suing Warner. And Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker. And Radiohead’s Johnny Greenwood. And Phil Selway.
There`s a scene in the new Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire featuring a band called [you guessed it] The Wyrd Sisters, but instead of seeing it as an opportunity a little dexterous legal work with Warner, perhaps? the band wants to have movie`s November 18 Canadian release blocked and on top of that, is demanding around $40 million in punitive damages from Warner.
We haven`t heard much about this, of late, but with the release nigh, the mainstream media have picked it up again.
However, the world press corpse hasn’t mentioned the interesting fact that Warner isn`t the first to have used the Wyrd Sisters name in a flic.
As we pointed out last month, in 1980 Britain’s Terry Pratchett wrote a book called theWyrd Sisters, featuring a world carried on four elephants standing on a huge turtle travelling in space. In 1996 it was made into a six-part animated video for Britain’s Channel 4, and you can buy it online for $12 US. It’s also on a DVD, these days.
That was probably before the band started up, though.
Nope. Canada’s Wyrd Sisters launched in 1990.
But everything is now cool, apparently.
The Wyrd Sisters have wrangled all kinds of free PR and the Canadian Press quotes Warner Brothers spokesman Scott Rowe as saying, “We have submitted sworn affidavits to the court, stating that the name Wyrd Sisters is not being used either in the film or on its soundtrack.”
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See:-
six-part animated video – Wyrd Sisters take on Warner, October 5, 2005
Canadian Press – ‘Wyrd’ lawsuit against new ‘Harry Potter’ movie, October 26, 2005
October 27th, 2005 at 12:07 am
Man, talk about your desperate move to try and get free publicity. Wyrd Sisters on the move to the US scene riding the backs of Warner Bros. soon to be released film, “Harry Potter: Goblet of Fire”. Be weary fans as there is a “Wyrd” attempt by the sisters of Canada. Now that we all know who the “Wyrd Sisters” are we can move on and ignore them even more as they disappoint more than their share of folk music fans in the US, well, if they had any at all. Some one get the stage hook and pull them away from the center stage, if you got your tomatos toss’em hard.
October 27th, 2005 at 12:11 am
…oh yeah well, I might add that if the film is banned in or interrupted in Canada the money flows in the US, sue away “Wyrd Sisters”
October 27th, 2005 at 12:33 am
GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR. THEY BLOCK THE MOVIE HERE IN CANADA, I`LL GO MORE INSANE, AND PROBABLY KILL MYSELF. I GOT WHAT IM WEARING FOR THE OPENING DAY ! GAAAAAAAAAAAR. THEY SHUD BE HAPPY. THIS IS PUBLICITY. STOOPID ATTENTION SEEKERS. YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED. YOUR GONNA HAVE A LOT OF CANADIANS KILLING THEIRSELF BECUZ THEY CAN`T SEE A MOVIE. WHY? CUZ A BAND DOESNT WANT THEM TO USE THEIR NAME. SZEEN?!
October 27th, 2005 at 6:49 am
Its just a movie with a name of a band. Dont most movies have disclaimers saying that any names used are dont o be confused with real people etc etc etc.
Thats like someone named harry Potter sueing, or any other name in books or movies. And 40 million for pain and suffering or what ever gee wiz.
October 27th, 2005 at 12:45 pm
get a life. it’s just a children’s film.
you should be able to download it the same day – or perhaps a day or two earlier – it opens in theatres.
people who would kill themselves for missing the film need help.
i hope the wyrd sisters get their 40mil. it’ll teach aoltimewarner a lesson. if they had only characters named “the wyrd sisters”, it would be different. but because the film has a band by that name, this is theft!
October 27th, 2005 at 4:30 pm
It isn’t theft
. And anyone who fights over a few letters in a name is lame. They need to get it through their skulls that they are just going down not up with this lawsuit. They could of at least worked something out behind the doors with AOLTimeWarner to advertise their name. They would get good publicity rather than this negative one. There are more kids in the world than us adults, who do you think will get upset?
October 27th, 2005 at 4:32 pm
Yeah, I totally agree. If they were famous they wouldn’t have to worry about their so called unique name (NOT) be ruined by a movie. I blame their publicist advisor, or whatever they call them nowadays.
November 11th, 2005 at 8:27 pm
It is theft. It’s called trademark infringement. And what has not been reported on this site was that WB offered a band that has spent 15 years building a name for themselves (and regardless of what biased sites like this one report, they ARE known in Canada) $5,000 and said they should accept it or WB was going to run their band out of business. What is also not reported is that WB has a habit of doing stuff like this, including threatening young teens with massive legal action if they don’t hand over the Harry Potter-relateddomain names these fans have legally registered to WB. WB could have gotten around the whole thing if they’d left the name of the band the way it was written in the book (Wierd Sisters).