So I read that some of the people in that $50 billion fraud have actually profited. They've looked at what they put in versus what they drew back out over the years in 'profits' and realised that actually, they've come out ahead. However, they still technically had money invested. These people actually have the gall to be calling lawyers and asking if they should file claims for their missing money.

People, you will be damn lucky if someone doesn't decide to take those profits from you and redistribute them among those who have actually lost something. Yes, I'm sure you'll all cry foul, you had no idea etc etc...but it's stolen money. That's how the scheme works, you take the new investors money and use it to pay 'profits' to people who want to cash in their gains. You then skim a little something for yourself and ta da, it looks like you're an investment genius.

Well ok, there's probably a little more to it than that, but I believe that that is the essence of it.

Your profits are stolen money. If I bought a stolen car, and it was then tracked to me by the police, I'd have to give the car back to its owner, and tough luck to me for buying it in the first place, even though I had no idea it was stolen.

I'm not actually advocating stripping people of all their wealth, as I'm sure in some cases they simply can't afford it. On the other hand, it's quite possible that if you can afford to invest $5 million in the first place, you can afford to give back the $1 million you fraudulently obtained from that investment, knowingly or otherwise.

So. The Watchmen saga. I'm going to go ahead and assume that most of you who read this went to see The Dark Knight, and that therefore you also saw a trailer for Watchmen. One of the most celebrated comic book/graphic novels of all time has finally made it to the big screen, and from everything we've heard, has survived the transition. Lots of people are quite excited about this.

Sadly for them, Fox does not share their enthusiasm. You see, while WB are actually the ones who have produced Watchmen, it seems their lawyers were a little lax on checking to make sure that they actually owned the rights to it. They don't. Fox do. Fox, unsurprisingly, wants a cut. WB, even less surprisingly, don't want to give them one.

Here's the issue here. Fox bought the rights to Watchmen some 20+ years ago. They've sat on it ever since and done nothing with it. WB believed they had bought the rights a little while ago, and instantly got to work, but their lawyers were a little slack in checking what they were actually buying (or they were simply conned, although that seems slightly unlikely right now).

I read one blog that seemed to suggest that Fox were totally in the wrong on this issue, while still being legally in the right. Fox were, the author said, simply being opportunistic. In an attempt to put this in real world terms, food metaphors were resorted to. WB were like a man trying to make a bacon sandwich. He goes out, gets the bacon, the bread etc and then comes home and starts to prepare his sandwich. Cooks the bacon up all nice and crispy, butters the bread, lays it all out and gets ready for a really nice breakfast and...that bastard Fox from next door comes and steals his sandwich, claiming that it's his bacon!

Good metaphor, right? On the front of it, it does look a little bad for Mr Fox from next door! Only...well, it seems that Mr WB did in fact simply take the bacon from his neighbours fridge. After all, he was obviously not using it. He'd been in that fridge many times over the past few weeks, and the bacon was just there.

Also, and this is getting away from bacon so I'll try and keep it short in case anyone loses interest, but it appears that Fox were not quite as opportunistic as it is being made out to be. They sent WB a C&D (Cease & Desist) letter sometime around april 2007, telling them to stop producing Watchmen because they owned the rights. WB ignored it.

Let me tell you folks, I know several people in the prop making game who have received C&D's. I've received one myself (from Lucasfilm). You do NOT ignore them. You put on your very best humble irish gardner accent, and say "Yes sor, thank you sor, no sor, it won't happen again sor." and hurry off to where they won't spot you. I'm actually kinda glad to see that big corporations get slapped down just as hard as the little guys.

Anyway, I'm sure no one read this far, or maybe you did just for the conclusion. Here it is. WB = in the wrong, Fox = in the right. No matter how you slice that bacon sandwich, it still belongs to Fox.

Watchmen fans everywhere may now flame away.