HW: Hawkwind domain

[K Henderson]

Andy (Knot) Gill-cup vents the following (which immediately made me uneasy
given that posting presumed 'internal' correspendence in a public forum is
not always kosher, but given the peculiar claim of hawkwind.com pirating
itself in some unperceivable manner that made absolutely no sense to me, I
believe Andy's actions were warranted here - "let the truth be known" I
think trumps the knee-jerk reaction that a major faux pas had just been
committed)...

>Yeah, Dave was really keen to work with me and Doug.  "Fit of pique" my
>arse.

>To Andy Gilham
>Webmaster www.hawkwind.com
>
>CC. Doug Smith

>It is further argued that to avoid misuse, profiteering and deliberate
>misrepresentation, any and all usage of such a trademark should be strictly
>controlled by, and expressly limited to, 'Hawkwind' as the recognised
>'owners' of the mark, unless express written permissions are granted by the
>band, or their officially authorised agents.
<remainder of rhetoric deleted for brevity>

This is entirely true!  Misuse and deliberate misrepresentation of the name
should indeed by limited to the recognized members of Hawkwind!

Well, that was sort of a joke, but really I believe that whoever is truly
the author of this statement signed by the "Hawkwind Five" has an apology to
make....this is pure rubbish.  I'm presuming that this message was sent as a
'first contact' on the matter to Mr. Gilham, and if true I think it's way
out of line.

I mean, from the beginning, I had thought that www.hawkwind.com was an
EBS-thing, championed by D.S./EBS and the band by association, and that Dale
(StarRats I believe, though whose surname has never been known to me) was,
as the original webmaster, generally an official outlet of info/news on the
doings of the band as it was then.  But of course, the site went inactive
for quite a long time and even disappeared from view for a spell.  (The fact
that EBS then went into remission didn't mean to me that hawkwind.com
suddenly became un-affiliated with the band...why would it?)  The Mission
Control site (which I think has always been a more personal connection for
the fan to the West Country (Devon), but less of an 'official news' outlet)
I think began around a similar time, and went equally silent for long
periods of time.  Again, until rebirth as hawkwind.org.uk, what, just about
a year ago?

So, truly for many of us, ourselves (i.e., each other) has been the main
source of up-to-date info on the activities and output of the band and all
its friends, enemies, and relations.  And perhaps a visit to Age's site now
and again.

But in the two years or so, www.hawkwind.com under Andy's guidance, had
indeed been an actively-updated informative site that I think all of us were
glad to have in addition to our own daily correspondence.  To blame him for
'advertising' shows/releases that have an obvious connection to the Hawkwind
history (as recently as last October) is remarkably petty and unconstructive.

I am sorry to see www.hawkwind.com go (if that's to be the case), but I can
imagine that I would have done exactly the same thing if presented with this
'kind and gentle' request from the band that I'd thought I was working *for*.

This is hardly the point, but I, like others have already stated, prefer an
easily-navigable site without fancy-schmancy "Flashy" sh*t that plays tricks
on my browser (though it didn't usually crash completely on me).  It only
takes one or two episodes of browser-freeze before that URL goes on my black
list.  www.hawkwind.com had certainly never posed a problem in that regard.
And I wonder how long www.hawkwind.org.uk will remain a 'current' entity?
Does anyone know who is charged with being the webmaster there?  Will
whoever quickly tire of keeping it up-to-date with the most recent strong
statements of denial of any involvement in <insert next Nik event here>?  At
that point, we're again just stuck with sussing it out between ourselves on
boc-l then.

C'mon, Dave...legal threats against one of your own supporters?  Go to any
CD store in the entire bloody world and take a look at the absolute rubbish
residing there in the Hawkwind section (none of which you'd earn a dime from
BTW) that nobody wants, and then take a peek at what CD copies of 'Quark',
'Warrior', and '25 Years On' are earning on Ebay, and then come back to me
and tell me what you think the main marketing problem with Hawkwind is in
2001.  (Well, same was true in 1991, so not expecting any changes soon.)

Let me spell it out for you in capital letters....

THE ALBUMS EVERYBODY WANTS, NOBODY CAN GET.  THE ALBUMS THAT ARE ILLEGAL AND
CRAPPY, ARE EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK.*

If that *anybody's* fault, it ain't Andy Gilham.  Maybe, Steve Swann's
responsible, but that's another matter.

Geez.

Grakkl (FAA)
Keith Henderson, if you didn't know

*OK, the Voiceprint remasters reissue series was a big step in the right
direction.  I'll give ya' that!

P.S.  Oh, I didn't read much of the IRC transcript (or whatever)...was there
anything important in there?  Can anybody make any sense out of whatever
that 'chat' thing is?  I couldn't.  I prefer my dialogue actually in some
sense of order.