»Sofia Stewart, Investigation, Results and talking to her«

I've been reading a bit about the entire Sophia fiasco, and in my nature, decided to research the crap out of it. These are the results of my findings.

First, when searching Google for '"Sophia Stewart" Matrix', there are only 3 references on the Internet. One of them is from this "Spitboxers" web site, which doesn't exactly look like any official source of information, but we'll be getting into that later. The second result is just a minor forum posting. The third result is a dead link, however Google's good ol' cache allows us to look at the page as it was. The page says:

Quote:

=> VANDOR REP SUES WACHOWSKIS, SILVER, WARNER BROS. OVER "MATRIX" - $200 MILLION DOLLARS, INFRINGEMENT AND RACKETEERING CHARGED; Vandor Affiliate Sophia Stewart, Filed A Federal Lawsuit In The United States District Court Of California Against Hollywood Defendants Andy And Larry Wachowski, Joel Silver And Warner Brothers mi2n.com...

Following the link to the left we get the following article posted 10-17-2003 (which is posted here for archiving purposes):

Quote:

VANDOR REP SUES WACHOWSKIS, SILVER, WARNER BROS. OVER “MATRIX” - $200 MILLION DOLLARS, INFRINGEMENT AND RACKETEERING CHARGED Hollywood, CA. News releases concerning Vandor Music Group’s signing of two new production agencies and labels to their current 400-plus roster have ignited a media firestorm over a dispute of ownership of the original script of the film “Matrix” and it’s subsequent releases. On April 24, 2003, Vandor affiliate Sophia Stewart, Salt Lake City, UT, filed a federal lawsuit in the United States District Court of California against Hollywood defendants Andy and Larry Wachowski, Joel Silver and Warner Brothers alleging copyright infringement of the movie "Matrix", all subsequent releases, and racketeering. During an FBI investigation, key pieces of evidence were found establishing Sophia Stewart as writer/author of “Matrix”. Credible witnesses employed at Warner Brothers have come forward claiming company executives and lawyers had full knowledge the work in question did not belong to the Wachowski brothers. Witnesses also stated the original work of Stewart had been seen, and often used, during preparation of the motion picture. Stewart submitted her original script through so-called ‘recommended’ channels several years prior to the Wachowski brother’s claim to authorship. Revenues from the motion pictures and merchandising are in the hundreds of millions of dollars and growing. Stewart’s entertainment company “All Eyez on Me, Inc.” and Pop Silk Records have been contracted with Vandor Motion Pictures, Phonorecords and Music Publishing Group (vmgworldwide.com) as a production facility offering world wide promotion, licensing and distribution for the label since January 1st, 2003. Vandor Motion Pictures, Phonorecords and Music Publishing Group, founded in 1958, has built a 45-Year reputation on independent product, artists, labels, publishers and producers. The company site - vmgworldwide.com - has been on-line for seven years and logged well over 10,000,000 hits and site downloads making it the number one source of accurate recorded music industry information in the world.

The article states "Stewart’s entertainment company “All Eyez on Me, Inc.” and Pop Silk Records...", so doing a search for "All Eyez on Me" turns up a staggering about of 2Pac info and Monica. Excluding all that we get a whole lot of nothing. (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22All+Eyez+on+Me%22+-2pac+-Tupac+-Monica+-Pac). Seems to me that this company simply does exist.

Additionally, her other apparent company, "Pop Silk Records", returns nothing as far as results go whatsoever. (http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22Pop+Silk+Records%22). There are no records of this company on the internet either. You'd think a record company, something which has to be ahead of the curve as far as trends, would have at least some form of presence on the web.

Additionally, conducting a search for this Sophia Stewart and her book turns up nothing. They are not on amazon, and a search on google (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=%22Sophia+Stewart%22+%22third+eye%22) turns nothing as well.

Going back to the forum posts which display first on the "Sophia Stewart" Matrix search on Google, there are numerous documents, some relevant, others not so much. Some of the more relevant documents are the supposed letters to Warner Brothers. They are signed:

Sofia Stewart
PO Box 165153
Salt Lake City, UT 84116
(801) 575-8387

Now there is one big thing we notice with this document and the rest. Sophia's name is spelt differently throughout all of them. Is this evidence of just idiots working on the paperwork or some bad attempt at making this entire thing up? Sophia herself seems to spell her name "Sofia", however all other references are to "Sophia". Anyhow, conducting searchs on Google with the name "Sofia Stewart" turn up even fewer references.

Anyhow, I tried calling the number listed above to my great displeasure of having that traditional American (I'm Canadian) "beep beep, the number you are trying to reach has been disconnected". Too bad, I have a long distance plan for all of North America, so I would have loved to have the chance to talk to her.

The second result is a forum post which just has a casual mention of the fact of Sophia. Here's the post:

Quote:

Just a FYI for the team! The rackerter and copyright infringement case between sophia stewart and the wachowski brothers has been recently covered by a abc news team. ABC channel 4 in Salt Lake City Utah. The story is covered by Jill Young.801-975-4444/ abc4.tv...

Now unfortunately abv4.tv's site search is down, so I resorted to our good friend Google once more, using a site search for the term matrix. The search query is here again:

Wow, I'm actually quite shocked that no one here has been interested in the developments with Sofia. If you're looking to get answers what really happens in the matrix, what this lady has to say is it. I see many people blindingly throwing ideas at the movies or empasising their distaste for the movies, so why not look at the source of the movies themselves for answers? I believe many fans who are regulars here believe there are fundamental flaws regarding consistancy from M2 and M3 compared to M1, and that flaw would be the absense of the creative writing of Sofia.

Nice research and results. I have gone through the documents provided in the web page that you have given, and they are awfully interesting, as it is for the two page manuscript of Sofia's work. I for sure will be watching this story. (By the way "Sofia" is the spelling for Sophia in Greek with Latin-Roman characters of course).

Excellent job. And thank you for writing so coherently.

Can you send me whatever parts of "The Third Eye" you have? And are you aware that Ms. Stewart seems to be posting on the Spitboxers site?

Excellent research job.

I read through here page excerpts on the site you refer to and I laughed when I read this one

Strife, such a nice contrubution!

I read the two pages from the "The Third Eye" script but I cannot see anything that really really relates to the actual matix movies.

However I consider this Matrix Theft thing to be important and therefore I created
1) A new forum dealing about the stolen matrix

This seems to be a very interesting development, thanks for putting it into a separate catagory - I never noticed it while it was elsewhere - and I relly think it does deserve some serious scrutiny.
Let's see where this goes!

Why are pages from the Matrix comics included in the gallery?

It's interesting, I'm just not buying it. I read through the scanned sheets, and I don't think it's enough to say they ripped it off. If anything, they both ripped off the collected authors of the Bible. I mean come on, her story sounds like half the stories I've got written on my hard drive. I've got an infatuation with Messiah stories, and I've made several half hearted plots around that idea, and hers doesn't sound any different to me. In fact, I'm not really impressed with hers. It sounds kind of like cheesy fantasy. To say it's the same story because it's about a messiah is ludicrous. The character similarities are bound to happen with people educated in great literature. Both tried to evoke some of the greatest stories ever told, and things like an all-knowing-aging-woman-figure are part of that, just like the "judas" character always is, as is the "satan" character. They're elements of a messiah story, and more broadly, they are elements of any great epic tale worth telling. I've got several stories about men in distopian societies(and sometimes women) who come into extraordinary powers by one means or another, and must wield those powers against a tyrant of sorts(read: "the devil") to save mankind. I wrote them for me cause I like those stories. But maybe now that the Wachowski's have made some dough off theirs, I should sue them for copying my ideas. Then again, maybe John the Baptist could sue Sofia for ripping off his Revelation. Or at least the companies that own the copyrights to the bible(and yes, someone does).

I'm sorry, I just don't buy it. Similar story elements in a similar genre is grounds for nothing. It's merely status quo for the genre.

Lysander wrote:

Why are pages from the Matrix comics included in the gallery?

We don't know yet why theye are included in Sofia's presentation of the evidence.

Laodecea wrote:

Similar story elements in a similar genre is grounds for nothing. It's merely status quo for the genre.

Yeah, this is a general copyright issue: How far does the copyright go.
How far can one have copyrights on IDEAS?

Laodecea wrote:

Or at least the companies that own the copyrights to the bible(and yes, someone does).

Anything published before 1923 is in the public domain.

Lysander wrote:

Anything published before 1923 is in the public domain.

That's the impression I've always been under, but I've seen bible's with copyrights in them. Anyway, I was proving a point. It's all derivative of the ONE major messiah story. That's like one fantasy writer suing another because he also had a hero who got a magical sword/staff that glowed, and had to use it to defeat a dragon/monster to save his kind from an evil that threatened the world. It's a genre issue.

Laodecea wrote:

That's the impression I've always been under, but I've seen bible's with copyrights in them.

They were probably new translations published after 1923.

Laodecea wrote:

It's all derivative of the ONE major messiah story. That's like one fantasy writer suing another because he also had a hero who got a magical sword/staff that glowed, and had to use it to defeat a dragon/monster to save his kind from an evil that threatened the world. It's a genre issue.

Actually many religions, including those pre-dating christianity, incorporate messiahs that return from the dead.

I do agree otherwise.

In the pages released so far, I see only passing similarity. The writing quality seems to be on par with average fan-fiction.

The Wachowskis certainly owe a debt to a lot of people (eg Grant Morrison, William Gibson), but that doesn't mean they can claim to have written the movie, as Ms. Stewart is doing.

where can the Sofia essay be found? At the spitboxer site? I'm very interested in this story due to the fact that Revolutions lacked continuity with the rest of the series. I have been saying this on other forums but never heard of the possibility that ideas may have been stolen.
Who knows? I'm gonna take a look at it. I certainly don't think it's outside the realm of possibility.
And I think I'm gonna continue and build on this research effort into this.
Good job, dude!

Peace

ATLien

ummm..
this all makes really intersting reading,

it does go some way to explain why the last two matrix movies seems to have a different plot line that the others.

the first was about the one, and im freeing mankind. at the end, he says he is going to wake everyone up. The System crashes....

i catn really explain it, but the first movie always seemed totally different to the last two...

but then again, im not a good writer, not should pass judgment, but the part of the essay i saw was, in my opinion only, written poorly.

all in my opinion of course...

there IS a story line mind you... it all links up together as long as you use your ficking brains

OriginalATLien wrote:

where can the Sofia essay be found?

It seems like only 2 pages have been released so far, and one of them has like 4 lines. This makes me suspicious.

In reference to knnknn's message about copyrighting thoughts: I'm no lawyer but I've heard a term 'intellectual properties' which seems to imply that if you have written or graphic proof of some idea you have and when it came into being you would have a case for copyright infringement. I don't know; just a thought.

Also is "matrix_explained_sucks" the handle for Joel Silver? I've seen some interviews with Mr Silver and he is quite arrogant about the Matrix and the "boys". He said in one interview for Starlog essentially that if people don't get the Matrix as a trilogy then they are just not very bright. "matrix_sucks" seems to have that same hostile attitude to people who question the quality of the films. If so many people don't get 2 or 3 maybe it's because they just don't make sense compared to the first film? Maybe the reclusive brothers should crawl out from under a rock and justify or explain what they created.

zombie42 wrote:

Also is "matrix_explained_sucks" the handle for Joel Silver? I've seen some interviews with Mr Silver and he is quite arrogant about the Matrix and the "boys".

Surely, he can't be the only one.

Mind you, I noticed one dig by Stewart in one of the documents I read. It ran something like "they're not creative writers -- they're comic book writers"! Excuse me? Since when have comic book writers not also been creative writers?

LauraS wrote:

Mind you, I noticed one dig by Stewart in one of the documents I read. It ran something like "they're not creative writers -- they're comic book writers"! Excuse me? Since when have comic book writers not also been creative writers?

I noticed that too. Judging by her comments and the quality of her writing, I don't think the WBs have anything to worry about.

Now if Grant Morrison and William Gibson got together...

Lysander wrote:

Now if Grant Morrison and William Gibson got together...

Absolutely!

I've read "The Miller's Tale" at the official site and was impressed with it. Followed Grant Morrison since his "2000 AD" days, were he was mostly known for his "Rogue Trooper" work.

Incidently, does anyone know if the comics online at that site are available in a paper collection?

I'm a Wachowskiphile. matrix_explained_sucks, however, makes me feel ashamed to be one. People like that annoy the hell outta me. Cornel West said it best in the behind the scenes stuff for part 2's DVD: The Matrix trilogy has about 400 levels to it. Some people get 2, some people get all 400. I like to consider myself somewhere in the middle, finding more every day. However, just because someone only gets 2 or 3, or 15 levels, that doesn't mean they're stupid. It just means that this story didn't hit any notes with them. I'm a big believer in the power of belief, so a lot of the subtleties in the movie hit close to home with me(like the subtle, yet noticable difference between morpheus riding shotgun with trinity in the freeway chase, and the morpheus that rode shotgun with Niobe after losing his faith). For others that's not the case. For me the story did not "change" from part 1, to parts 2&3. It seemed obvious to me from the beginning where this was heading to. I didn't think it would get quite as spiritual as it did, but I was happy when they made that bold step to not just be another sci-fi beat-em-up not-quite-a-real-messiah-story cop-out. Like End of Days. Anyway, if someone doesn't get as much from Matrix as you, don't call them stupid. That movie had so much to say about perception and viewing things you're familiar with from different angles, how can you possibly say that you "get" it and then turn around and have that attitude towards other people. Doesn't make sense to me.

I cannot condone the suductive, deceptively manipulative, sadistice promotion of sacrifical crufixion as depicted in the bait and switch trilogy known as the Matrix. As such my posts are being deleted and replaced with this.