Is CARLOS PEDRAZA a liar or just a lousy journalist? (editorial)

“Lie.”

It’s a strong word, and it’s one I don’t like to use on this blog if I can avoid it.  It implies both intent to mislead as well as the act itself.  It’s not a nice thing to do, nor is it a nice thing to accuse someone else of doing.

As far as ALEC PETERS is concerned, CARLOS PEDRAZA (the “journalist” who writes the obsessively hyper-critical Axamonitor blogs) is an outright liar when it comes to all things AXANAR.  Alec has often asked me why I don’t call Carlos out on his lies here in this blog…especially when they are so obvious.

Not so fast, Alec.

It’s not that cut and dried for me.  I draw a distinction between lying and simply bad journalism.  For example, when Carlos mistakenly reported the wrong location for the new Georgia studio for Axanar Productions, that wasn’t knowingly a lie.  Carlos had been fed bad information, rushed to publish it before confirming his facts, and was later called out on it.  To me, that was not lying; it was simply sloppy reporting.  And to his credit, Carlos was quick to correct the misinformation and apologize.

And as I commented here in a recent editorial, Carlos is renown for reporting only PART of the facts and leaving out almost anything that works against his primary goal of discrediting Axanar.  For example, take a look at this screen cap from a blog Carlos wrote on September 5, 2017…

Notice that Carlos says “…all of which was spent without a single frame of Axanar shot in the studio.”  Makes it sound like nothing was produced at all, right?  Of course, the 3-minute Vulcan scene—the thing that reportedly got Axanar Productions sued—was shot outside of the studio in the parking lot, NOT inside.  See what Carlos did there?  Clever!

But reporting only half the truth with the intent to mislead is still not technically lying…even though Carlos does it a lot.

CORRECTION – In the original version of this article, I wrote that while Carlos claimed to have worked for the Associated Press, I had only been able to find one, single fluff piece article from 29 years ago.  However, a more extensive online search revealed additional articles, and I would like to correct the record and state that Carlos Pedraza was employed with the AP from July of 1985 until June of 1987.

So by sharing some facts but leaving out certain others, Carlos can “color” the truth.  But now it seems to me that Carlos Pedraza may have finally crossed that line between bad journalism and outright lying.  Read on and decide for yourself…

When I checked out Carlos’ latest blog entry on Axamonitor, I noticed something that, at first, I simply found amusing.  Carlos reported the total amount that Axanar raised through crowd-funding…

“Nearly $2 million…” huh?  Last month (as shown above) it was $1.7 million—which I suppose is “nearly $2 million” if you round up to the nearest million!  But…really???

I’d already started noticing that Axamonitor’s crowd-funding total for Axanar had been steadily and consistently growing, ever-so-slowly, for the past year or so.

In September of 2016, Axanar’s crowd-funding total on Axamonitor’s blog site was initially reported at $1.1 million…

This $1.1 million number continued into early November of 2016…

But less than a week later, the total jumped to $1.4 million as Carlos decided without explanation to suddenly add in merchandise sales to the the crowd-funding total…

Nothing inherently wrong with deciding to combine the crowd-funding and merchandise totals, of course.  But a few days after doing that, the number increased again to “almost $1.5 million,” citing confidential redacted portions of the court filings that Carlos had somehow obtained…

Now, before we go any further, let me remind you of this blog post from last month that I showed you earlier:

So, “According to court records,” the total was $1.7 million.  And yet, the previous November, also according to court records, the total was $1.5 million.  Obviously, the court documents can’t have reported the number as both $1.5 million and $1.7 million.  Is one of those two blogs a lie?  Maybe one was just a typo?

Well, if it was just a typo, then Carlos sure seems to be making a LOT of them because the numbers kept right on fluctuating!  After the three blog posts in November 2016 when the Axanar total was reported as $1.1 million, $1.4 million, and $1.5 million in just three week’s time, the $1.4 million total returned in January of 2017 when the Axanar case finally settled…

Note that, once again, Carlos cites court documents for his $1.4 million number.  And yet, $1.5 million didn’t have to wait long for its return, which came in April of 2017…

The first appearance of the $200K “jump” to $1.7 million came on August 12, 2017 in a blog entry that—strangely enough—was not even about Axanar itself but rather about James Cawley’s new Star Trek Film Academy in upstate New York…

And then, as I mentioned, $1.7 million was reiterated a month ago, and as of yesterday, it’s now “almost $2 million.”  From $1.1 million a year ago to almost $2 million today—with no additional crowd-funding campaigns in all that time?  Must be that “new math” they’re teaching in schools…or magic!

Of course, the actual numbers released from Axanar are as follows (and this does, in fact, match what was in the court documents)…

So the correct answer to the lightning bonus round question was: $1.4 million (which is not “almost $2 million” even if you do round off to the nearest million).

And of course, a couple hundred thousand of that never reached Axanar Productions as it went instead to the Kickstarter and Indiegogo service fees and the fee for processing credit card transactions.  So the judges would have also accepted an answer of $1.2 million.  Thanks for playing along at home, everyone.

In the end, it really doesn’t matter if Axanar took in $1.1 million, $1.3 million, $1.4 million, $1.5 million, $1.7 million, or almost $2 million.  The money has been spent, the lawsuit has been settled, and the production is reportedly moving forward.

And had Carlos not reached that $2 million threshold, I doubt I would have even bothered writing this blog.  The crowd-funding “creep” was more of an amusing sideshow to watch happen than a reason to rant.

But then I realized something…

Many detractors believe that Alec Peters is not to be trusted.  And yet, from my vantage point, the person who really seems to lack integrity is, in fact, Carlos Pedraza.

Axamonitor is not journalism.  It’s not news you can trust.  At best, Carlos will sneakily tell you half the story and make it sound like the Axanar sky is falling while he does it…as he did in my earlier example when he said that no scenes from Axanar had been shot “in the studio.”  He also did it in his blog yesterday when he tried to turn lemonade back into lemons.  Axanar supporter Reece Watkins wanted to help save the TREKCETERA Star Trek Museum in Canada by setting up a grass-roots crowd-funding campaign to help the owners raise $10,000 for a crucial loan payment.  Axanar Productions wasn’t involved in any way other than Alec Peters helping to spread the word and Mike Bawden facilitating the transfer of donated funds from a U.S. bank account to a Canadian one.

And yet, if you read the Axamonitor blog entry from yesterday, Carlos makes it sound like this kindhearted gesture from concerned Star Trek fans was some huge scandal just waiting to be uncovered (and of course, Axamonitor would be all too happy do so!).

I found out that last night, Carlos emailed a series of probing questions about the museum campaign to Mike Bawden at 3am Mike’s time.  That by itself wouldn’t have been so bad had Carlos not published his blog less than an hour later at 4am!  (Mike was, of course, asleep.)  In the blog, Carlos included his questions with no explanation of why Mike’s answers weren’t anywhere to be seen.  Mike emailed Carlos his detailed answers at 9:30am, answering them at his first opportunity yesterday morning.  And yet, even though Carlos rushed to publish the blog that did NOT include Mike’s answers, there has no effort made in the last 24 hours by Carlos to either add Mike’s answers to the original post or else publish a follow-up blog.

So no, that’s not good journalism.  It’s trickery and manipulation of both the news sources and of the readers.  Personally, I don’t know how or why anyone would trust what Axamonitor has to say.  It’s obvious that Carlos Pedraza is not a good journalist.  That much goes almost without saying.

But as you look at the casual and unexplained deviation in the reported crowd-funding numbers, and how three different totals are all attributed to the same “official court documents,” it doesn’t take a genius to ask the most obvious question of all: is Carlos Pedraza also a liar?

I know my answer.  Feel free to decide yours…

93 thoughts on “Is CARLOS PEDRAZA a liar or just a lousy journalist? (editorial)”

    1. Well, that explains the $1.7 million…too bad Carlos didn’t bother to cite his sources. Bad journalism? Totally.

      Any response to the rest of the blog, or did you just want to explain that one little bitty part of it?

      1. I know Carlos gets under the skin of Alec Peters, but what does Alec expect when he raised over a million dollars and failed to deliver a film? If it wasn’t Carlos asking these questions, it would have been someone else doing it. Blog entries like this one annoy me as they just seem to serve as a distraction for Alec’s lack of progress on finishing Axanar. As for the Vulcan scene, that was shot as a way to raise more funds, and it was implied that the scene would not be part of the actual film.

        1. Nope, the Vulcan scene is in the full Axanar script, Majic.

          And while I expect a lot of attempts at deflection to turn this into “Hey, look over there at Alec Peters!” today’s focus is squarely on Carlos Pedraza.

          1. Only for you, buddy. Only for you. Everyone else thinks that Carlos is doing God’s work (or at least, a benevolent Q’s work).

            Seriously, are you in love with Alec Peters or something? I don’t get all of this fawning over a guy who ripped off fans for over a million dollars. Why do care if Carlos exposes him for the fraud he is?

          2. Simple: I know Alec isn’t a fraud.

            If someone were accusing your good friend of doing something that you know for a fact he didn’t do, wouldn’t you come to his defense? My moral compass says I should. Doing God’s work? I doubt either Carlos nor I are doing that. But I do believe that God doesn’t like folks who bear false witness…or something like that. 🙂

    2. Yeah too bad Terry is making sh*t up. You see, we actually had two accountants handle the financials, and the $ 1.4 number is correct and backed up by facts and IRS documents from Paypal.

      Carlos…liar.

      Terry…liar.

      Anything else?

      1. I have one Alec could someone please at Axanar stand up to Carlos Pedraza . As William Shatner said ” Get a Life “

        1. It’s not really worth Alec’s time or effort to “stand up” to Carlos. Alec tried multiple times, and the poodle kept yipping and yapping. Eventually, Alec moved onto bigger and better things, leaving the detractors to wallow in their own echo chamber. Almost no one is reading Axamonitor.com anymore (I might be one of the only ones).

          And to be honest, I don’t typically spend much time talking about Carlos here on FFF. Of the 500+ blog entries I’ve written, two have focused on him. Even for me, it’s not really worth it to spend much time monitoring the Axamonitor. 🙂

      1. And the “almost $2 million” came from…what exactly?

        Y’see, I didn’t say anything back in August or September when your reporting of the total jumped to $1.7 million (which, to be accurate, Alec said was made up of $1.4 million in donations and $300K in private funding, mainly from Alec himself). But then you nudged up the total past the point where I felt I could sit back and say nothing any longer. You’re kind like Alec and Axanar in that way, Carlos. When Alec crossed the $1 million threshold in donations, that got CBS’s attention. Things went downhill from there. In your case, the number was $2 million. Same concept, though. 🙂

      2. So wait, first it came from “the court documents” and now somehow, suddenly, it’s from “Alec Peters’ own Donor memo”? This is why people have issues regarding your credibility.

    4. Here is where the link goes wrong, adding up all the disclosed figures on the “overview” section totals $1,510,370.76 with a “FIVE FIGURES” for convention appearance tables. Since a five figure some of money is in the tens of thousands…even if that number was $99,999 that still would not add up to $1.7 Million. Finally it would be disingenuous to make a statement that even $1.5 Million was raised without any Axanar film being made, when $163,746.50 (according to the aforementioned website) was raised for Prelude to Axanar (a completed work).

  4. I hate that kind of journalism primarily because it’s currently killing our democracy. In my opinion he’s a liar by omission or manipulation but still bottom line-a liar. He has an axe to grind. You can’t trust reporting by someone who has that ole ax. Who knows, perhaps like the recent Science Guy going over to the dark side by getting in bed with Monsanto scandal, he getting under the table pay d for his bias

  5. If not a Liar then a great fabricator of half truths seasoned with lots of total fabrications. And imaginative descriptions of non realities.

  6. You may as well add that Pedraza tried to implicate me in his newly-imagined harebrained conspiracy without even bothering to ask me any questions directly. He didn’t even ask permission to use my copyrighted photograph on his site first. (What a surprise…) But someone writing a different story on what really happened took the time to reach out before he published. The name eludes me at the moment, but it was something like “Lonathan Jane”…

    At any rate, any writer who fears the truth so much as to avoid seeking it before all else is by no means a journalist.

    1. There are millions of Trek fans out there. Was it really wise for someone like you, who is part of a the Axanar project that ripped fans off for over a million dollars, to be doing a “fundraiser” for a Canadian Trek museum? Take a few minutes to really give that one some thought. Or hours. Whatever you need, Mr. Fleece … er… Reece

      1. Why are you insulting Reece and making fun of his name for stepping up to help? Doesn’t that say some awful stuff about the kind of person YOU are, Brian, that you would criticize someone for coming forward and actually doing something to save a struggling Star Trek licensee? I’d say you’re giving Trek fans a bad name, but that isn’t true. 150 Trek fans stepped up to help while all you do is criticize us for doing so. I’d say you just aren’t a true Star Trek fan if you’d rather see a Star Trek museum disappear forever.

  7. “Notice that Carlos says “…all of which was spent without a single frame of Axanar shot in the studio.” Makes it sound like nothing was produced at all, right? Of course, the 3-minute Vulcan scene—the thing that reportedly got Axanar Productions sued—was shot outside of the studio in the parking lot, NOT inside. See what Carlos did there? Clever!”

    The word “Axanar” in this context meaning “The 90 minute Axanar Feature Film”. And if you look back to What The Plan Was At The Time, and confirm it with Robert Meyer Burnett, that scene, taken from the feature script, was intended to be two things: a test of what the movie would look like, and a teaser to launch what was going to be another round of crowd funding, and the scene would have likely been re-shot during the Feature Shoot to match the rest of the production, or any possible script/casting changes that might have occurred between the Test Run and the Feature Shoot.

    I’ve had this conversation with those involved. Feel free to verify.

    Which makes Carlos’ statement true: Not one frame of the Axanar feature film was shot. And the test scene was shot outside in the parking lot of that facility, which could have been any parking lot, at any building. It did not however make any use of what was promised to be a viable operational soundstage paid for with donor funds.

      1. It was also a tap dance. If you have to go through that much trouble to defend Carlos, you’re not getting it. Carlos was manipulating the reader by making it sound like nothing was ever produced…period. The Vulcan scene took a lot of work and a decent amount of money to hire a crew, equipment, pay the actors, feed everyone on set, pay Tobias for the VFX, and pay for music. Plus there was Rob’s time to edit it all (I don’t know if he got paid for that–you probably do).

        Anyway, the point is that Carlos, like me, is a very clever wordsmith. Note that, at no point in my blog did I actually call Carlos a liar. Read it again if you don’t believe me. I know how to write carefully and with certain goals in mind. It’s a useful talent to have in life, and it can be used for many purposes. In Carlos’ case, that purpose is all too often to manipulate and mislead his readers with half-truths and distortion. That’s not true journalism, and in no reality that I know of would it ever be considered good journalism, either.

  8. Jonathan, I’m the first to admit the differing numbers are confusing but none is inaccurate given the different revenue streams Axanar had, some of which have never been documented by Alec Peters.

    The $1.4 million you describe, which comes from the financial expert hired by Axanar to testify in the copyright infringement case, describes the total donations as coming from crowdfunding and donor store sales.

    In some articles I use the figure directly attributable to crowdfunding. In others I have used the Tregillis figure; both are correct as far as they go.

    As for the $1.7 million, I didn’t make that up. It’s what Axanar’s total expenses came to, and it comes directly from Alec Peters himself in the Donor Memo he released earlier this year. He himself states the $300,000 difference came from additional donations (including his own undocumented contribution) NOT included in the $1.4m figure. Here’s a link to the relevant page in the Donor Memo since I can’t post images here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/13l9k5bcimry9y4/Axanar-Donor-Memo-p7%20%28page%205%20of%207%29.jpg?dl=0

    As for my employment with The Associated Press, your scurrilous accusation that I’ve lied to employers (including the Federal government, which actually vets these things) for three decades about working there, and that I only ever wrote one article and it was as a freelance writer is patently false. You base this allegation on a Google search that turned up only one article? You realize, don’t you, that in the years I spent working at the AP there was no public internet? The AP itself offers no public archive of news stories from that era.

    If you want to spend the money, trying using the Lexis-Nexis database and you’ll find lots more to demonstrate that you’re the one perpetrating falsehoods.

    1. One point to Carlos. Its too bad some people don’t know how to do actual factual research when it comes to people they would love to put on their wall to ridicule. To be honest – I thought FFF would provide some good quality articles and then it slid down to being a hatemongering bitch fest with its cast of idiots who agree to this dribble piece of fan blog we are reading here.. Sloppy work – FFF, tsk tsk tsk

      1. Well, I guess I can’t please everyone. By the way, 1,309 reads yesterday. I made $2.59 in online ads. Or if Carlos wants to report it, I made “almost $10.” 🙂

        (Sorry, couldn’t resist.)

        1. Carlos has answered all questions perfectly well here. Gabriel Koener has explained the Vulcan scene to you. Your article is bunk.

          1. Many have said the same about Alec and Mike answering Carlos’ questions and that Axamonitor is bunk.

            I guess we all have to decide for ourselves. I know what I think. 🙂

    2. With all due respect you seem far more intent on attacking Alec Peters than in reporting actual facts.

  9. I’m also going to call you out on doing the same thing you accuse Carlos of doing: Selectively leaving things out that make the narrative look more squeaky clean for Alec.

    Remember how I mentioned the Vulcan Scene was intended to kick off another round of crowd funding? I believe the plan at the time was to use it as a sizzle piece to grab another I think 2mil or so in crowd funding to cover what they were short on for acts 2 and 3 (they had enough in the bank at that point to shoot act 1).

    And the “quality” of “how good” the Vulcan scene was (as the narrative is oft repeated) broke the camel’s back and launched a lawsuit.

    From my chats with people in that camp, there was some annoyance that Alec was so eager to go fishing for crowd funding YET AGAIN, seeking ANOTHER seven figures, and they were annoyed that the High Production Value by Fan Film Standards coupled with a Known Trek Actor as His Franchise Character was of (yes, Alec) Good Enough Quality that it may have actually been a successful enough commercial to get Alec & co another couple mil on the crowd fund sites.

    And that’s about when it was decided that their brand isn’t some overzealous fan’s multimillion dollar generating funbox.

    Why is THAT part always left out…?

    1. I’m just sourcing testimony from the actual discovery phase, as reported by Alec on the Axanar podcast. Is that any different than sourcing Terry McIntosh (something Carlos did to get his $1.7 million figure)?

      1. I don’t understand the question. None of what I asserted in the comment you are replying to had anything to do with information from Terry. Did you mean to reply to a different comment?

        1. You said in your blog “according to court records”—not “according to Alec’s donor memo.”

          And nowhere did any source ever say “almost $2 million.” That’s just a ridiculous exaggeration and—say it with me—lousy journalism.

  10. Carlos seems much more interested in attacking someone who is building something in the form of a fan film and studio than telling the truth. He is blinded by his own agenda to see the truth that is obvious to most anyone else. Without the Axanar windmill to tilt at he has nothing to say and no platform to pontificate from, unlike a real journalist who remains objective and able to see the truth. He has convinced himself that there are boogymen where none exist. Inconsistencies are the first things that real investigators look for when determining the validity of claims, Carlos’ claims of course reek of inconsistencies. Hopefully, at some point, he will move on and find something else to fixate on and leave Axanar and it’s fans alone.

    1. Each of the “inconsistent” figures in articles covering many months is sourced:

      • One comes from just Kickstarter and Indiegogo crowdfunding figures.
      • Another is based on the financial report prepared by Christian Tregillis, the expert witness hired by Axanar to testify on its behalf. It adds money from Donor Store sales.
      • The third comes from Alec Peters’ own Donor Memo, which was released last spring. It adds money from additional donations (including Peters’ own unsubstantiated contribution).

      They do not contradict one another. Each is correct but based on differing data.

      1. As usual, Carlos leaves out the most inconvenient truth: none of that explains escalating the reported amount to “almost $2 million.” A good journalist doesn’t round up a number in the one-millions to the nearest million. That’s just straight manipulation of the reader.

        As I said, had Carlos not touched the $2 million “threshold” (even with an “almost” added), I probably wouldn’t have bothered to write this blog. But enough is enough. Either learn to be a decent journalist or stop calling yourself one, dude.

  11. * Another possible omission on your part: The near certainty (based on verifiable information) Carlos was fed the false studio location by Alec via an email from his axanarproductions email address to a donor he suspected as having Lost Faith and soured on the operation.

    Nobody but Alec can send mail from his axanarproductions address… and the email was not bogus. It was a trap.

    1. That part is unconfirmed and irrelevant. I mentioned that Carlos was sent bad information. He never bothered contacting Mike or Alec to confirm or deny before going to press. Bad journalism. Something like that can get a reporter fired, but a blogger only works for himself.

        1. Jonathan, just thought I’d clarify, just in case somebody got the wrong impression.

          1. You do impressions? I can do a mean impression of Saru from ST: Discovery. Wanna hear?

            “Moo.”

            (‘Cause his people are, like, cattle? So he moo’s. Get it? Aw, I knew it was a bad joke before I told it…)

  13. Also, I posted this comment on the museum thread but I meant to put it here to consolodate, so…

    First, I’m glad the canadian Trek museum pulled through.

    Secondly, as for CBS yet again “picking on the group of fans just trying to save a little museum”…

    I think if it was indeed a random sample group coming to the rescue aid of this museum, it wouldn’t have raised any eyebrows at CBS.

    It wasn’t a random sample group of “just fans”. Let’s look at who it was…

    The campaign was spearheaded and operated by Mike Bawden, Alec’s Official PR Rep, and Reece Watkins, one of Alec’s main devoted Lieutenants/General Purpose Use guys. The promotion of the campaign was done by Jonathan Lane, Alec’s Minister of Information, and Alec Peters, the Legend Himself.

    All four of those individuals were deposed on the defendant’s side in their recent copyright infringement suit against Alec Peters, the Actual Defendant. A suit that concluded with a ban of Mr. Peters from using crowd funding as a medium to generate revenue on the back of the Star Trek brand name. This is not an honor just any four random fans can claim. And suddenly, they’re ALL Gung Ho On Board with a *SUDDEN IMMEDIATE 24 HOUR DEADLINE NO TIME TO ASK QUESTIONS NEED IT RIGHT NOW* Crowd Fund, that is involved with the Star Trek Brand?

    Which is why I don’t blame CBS for smelling a little possible Stank going on. I’d be scratching my head like, “This Peters guy we just sued has his main people crowd funding a Star Trek Thing and he’s pimping it from the sidelines? What’s his possible angle?”

    I’ll bet Real Money if it WAS a random group of Fan Friends not connected to this matter, they probably wouldn’t have gotten a Nastygram about taking their campaign down.

    Thoughts?

    1. Same answer as I posted on the other blog page…

      Just to be clear: neither Reece, Mike, nor I were ever deposed. (What are you, like, Carlos Predraza? You can’t just make stuff up, dude!)

      Speaking of which, when did I ever get the title of “Minister of Information”? If anything, that’s more Mike’s job…although still not a title. What exactly does a Minister of Information actually do, by the way? I used to serve as Chief of Communications for STARFLEET, The International Star Trek Fan Association. That meant I did their bi-monthly newsletter. I don’t do Alec’s newsletter. He kinda handles all the Axanar informational blogs himself.

      Hey, maybe ALEC is Alec’s Minister of Information!

      Anyway, had CBS bothered to ask anyone, Alec knew these guys because they’re prop and costume collectors just like he is. When he and Reece heard about their dire straights and the immediacy, Reece offered to help set up a GoFundMe campaign and Alec offered to spread the word to Axanar donors (who are known to be a proactive bunch when it comes to helping their fellow fans). Alec and Reece contacted me to see if I’d put a call-to-action on Fan Film Factor, as well…since that reaches a few hundred to a thousand people on a typical day. We three told our friends to tell their friends…and so on…and so on. And it worked! Mike came in at the end to handle the transfer of funds to a Canadian bank and floated the $5.2K loan for a few days until the money clears GoFundMe.

      If CBS were suspicious, there were so many people they could have contacted to figure out what was going on: Alec, Mike, or maybe even the guy who was running it: Reece! Wouldn’t that have been a novel idea? Alec isn’t about to pull a fast one on CBS. He has a legal settlement and very explicit do’s and don’ts that he has to follow. CBS knows this. Alec has been playing fairly with them since January (one might argue all along since even before the lawsuit).

      Anyway, just more bad optics for CBS.

  14. My problem with Carlos in this latest post on Aximonitor is pretty straight forward. His headline makes it seem like foul play is a foot, as opposed to saying “thanks to ST fans generosity spearheaded by Axanar fan Reece Watkins, Trekcetera museum saved”

    Instead he did his usual hit piece, because that is all he seems to be able to produce at this moment.

    1. Remember the joke about Carlos Pedraza sitting on the beach, watching Alec Peters rowing a boat? No? Let me remind you…

      About 500 yards out, Alec’s rowboat begins to sink. Carlos watches eagerly as Alec quickly submerges under the water. Suddenly, though, Alec lifts himself back onto the surface, stands up, and proceeds to walk across the water back to shore. He’s greeted by a crowd of cheering onlookers who have just witnessed a miracle.

      Carlos, having watched everything from start to finish, quickly flips open his laptop and writes the headline for his latest blog:

      “Hundreds of People Learn That Alec Peters Can’t Swim!”

  15. Wow, the lies and deflections from Carlos continue.

    And his lapdog Gabe. The same Gabe who yesterday LIED in a Tweet claiming I made joked about gun violence, which I never did.

    The same Gabe Koerner who threatened gun violence against Robert Meyer Burnett and who has stalked me and my girlfriend online and in real life.

    The same Gabe Korener whose friend suggested I get a restraining order against him because he is mentally unstable.

    Yeah, no credibility with any of these people.

    1. I should note three things:

      1) “Lapdog” pretty much counts as name-calling, and I am asking Alec to please refrain from that. (Gabe, however, recently called me Alec’s “Minister of Information” in another comment–which I’d also consider name-calling…albeit more erudite. So I’m giving Alec a freebee this time.)

      2) Alec asked me to please include the two screen caps to back up his accusations.

      3) For the third statement about Gabe’s friend, Alec did not feel at liberty to back that up with anything that could identify the person in question. That said, I thought about whether or not it counts as an accusation. Technically, it’s simply reporting what a friend of Gabe’s said. But it includes an accusation in the suggestion. I’m going to let it pass this time with a warning as I reiterate that unsubstantiated accusations are not allowed here.

    2. Oh yeah that. That’s when I threatened to call the cops on one of Alec’s guys when he released the home address of an Axanar detractor with young kids in Twitter.

      “Armed men” means Cops.

      Kinda hilarious of you, Alec, on a thread about manipulation of words to sell a narrative.

      Don’t engage in that low level wordsmithery with me, Alec, or I’ll intellectually snap you back so far you’ll feel like a first year cadet again.

    3. P.S. I’ll put my 17 years of employment (at age 35) in film, television, commercials, video games, love events, and licensed Star Trek product art (doing a new book cover for CBS this month!) with multiple award nominations (including being one of the principal 9 artists nominated for Emmy statues for BSG IN 2005 while the non leads only get certificates if it wins), and the youngest admitted member of the Visual Effects Society (which is populated by legends like Muren, Trumbell, Dykstra, Edlund…) who works hard every day on a show you’re a fan of against a “creative content creator” who hasn’t actually been involved in the creation of any finished released content in what is now MULTIPLE YEARS, whose first time out the gate got him Massively Sued.

      Maybe I should feel like my life is empty compared to you because my short from years ago doesn’t have 47 regional Midwest local con printed at Kinkos can film awards and some dusty regional business accolade from an irrelevant time many years ago.

      Clearly, our credibility is on different spectrums, yes.

      ::mic drop::

      1. ::picks up the mic::

        Gabe, I love a good schlong comparison as much as the next guy, but I’m going to point out (before Alec does it using many more four-letter words) that you and he BOTH have your achievements and failures, your highs and lows. Remember, I knew you during your dark, unemployed days living in…Bakersfield, was it? You were trying to get your life back together after having pretty much sabotaged your job, your relationship, and your living situation all in just a few days. You bounced back from all of that to find work on The Orville, and I’m happy for you. But the purpose of you hitting that low point probably was more likely to teach you humility rather than come out the other side arrogantly bragging and tempting to jinx fate or karma or whatever you might believe in.

        As for Alec, he’s had his highs and lows, too. He’s sold companies for more money than you or I will ever make…likely in our entire lifetimes. And yet, to keep Alec humble, he’s also been sued on multiple occasions and had to declare bankruptcy for one of his companies. And of course, he’s been constantly berated by a group of rabid detractors for the past two years.

        No, Alec’s never gonna win an Emmy, and I doubt he really cares. I’m not going to win an Emmy either. If you judge Alec’s success only by your standards of success, you’ll never understand why he’s such a happy and satisfied person. Likewise, when you used to hurl PM insults at me through your drug-crazed stupors, you never really understood why I was so happy and satisfied with my life, either. No, I’m not famous. I don’t work in Hollywood. I never got invited to one of Brannon Braga’s outrageous sex parties. But I really don’t feel like I’ve missed out on anything important…at least in my mind.

        So when comparing schlong sizes with Alec, just remember that the true measure of manhood isn’t necessarily the measure of the manhood itself but how happy and satisfied with life the man himself (or woman herself) is.

        For a complete set of daily affirmations, please call our special 800-number. Operators are standing by to take your order. 🙂

        1. Yknow that’s a reasonable reply so I don’t have any piss and vinegar for you this morning. Gotta work all weekend. There is a long way to go , but I am happt with the current shape and trajectory of my life.

        2. Well, a tiny bit of piss and vinegar.

          Yes, at one time Alec was dealing with the income and outgo of a company that dealt in seven figure volumes of money.

          Around that same time, 2005-2006, I had six pack abs.

          That was a long time ago. And Los Angeles is a town that perpetually asks, “What have you done RECENTLY?”

          When I “Came Back” that was a hurdle I had to face. Because other than indie film stuff I hadn’t “done anything lately” in terms of a big high profile thing.

          I love The Orville, so do the people I work with, and I think our Love is on the screen.

          1. “and I think our Love is on the screen.”

            If that comment had happened on “Family Guy,” someone would have gone “EWWWWWW!”

            But yes, I’m loving the VFX on “The Orville.” And I am loving nearly everything else about it other than the bottom-feeding jokes that come out of nowhere and act like speed bumps on the freeway. I realize the first 13 episodes are in the can, so there’s no fixing of that for season one. But I’m just curious how much of the potential audience those penis jokes are costing them. I’d love to show “The Orville” to Jayden, by I don’t know how to explain Yaphet’s “slime schlong” to my 7-year-old son.

            But hey, aside from that, the show IS awesome, and I love watching each episode.

  16. Its pretty black and white and does not need a full article to deduce. One is either honest or not. If you are not honest, you are dishonest. Dishonest people are known as liars. Its like arguing that a person who steals a penny is not a thief but a person who steals $100 is.

        1. Yeah, I was planning to cook Thai that night and forgot to buy cilantro at the supermarket. The lines were ridiculous, and I didn’t really need that much. So on my way back to the car, I walked into Baja Fresh (where I eat at least once a week), walked up to the salsa bar, took one of those tiny plastic containers they use for pico de gallo, filled it with cilantro, and walked out.

          I’m not proud of that.

  17. Axanar was held up by the lawsuit. Period. (Of course there was no production during that time. Duh.)

    It will be made. Period.

    This whole kvetching session reminds me of what my grandfather used to say all the time: “99% of the constipated people couldn’t give a shat.”

    Alec, go make your movie. There’s no time to klapotshe over Carlos.

  18. My experience with Carlos is that he’s a guy interested in pursuing his own agenda. That agenda I am sad to say seems at this point more like a vendetta. Which is really to bad for everyone.

    Especially Carlos, because these sorts of things just make him look like a sore loser.

    1. Carlos didn’t lose…and he didn’t win. He wasn’t even really playing. He’s like a fan in the stands who believes he’s helping his team by yelling really nasty things at the other team’s palyers at the top of his lungs.

      As a long-suffering fan of the New York Jets who just inherited the Chargers as his new town’s AFC sports franchise, let me assure you that yelling really nasty things at the other players doesn’t actually work. 🙂

  19. I’m feeling generous tonight… Why can’t he be a bad journalist and a liar? As always, the articles on this site are reasoned, well thought out and expressed.

  20. Hello Jonathan Lane, I agree with you that Carlos Pedraza appears to want create a puddle of water into that of an ocean. You can correct me if I’m wrong, but it feels like Mr. Predraza could be jealous in some way. This might be the reason for his faulty calculator. It’s just the way I read it.

    1. I can’t say why someone would do the things Carlos does regarding Axanar. I suppose there’s also the possibility that he’s afraid of being proven wrong, so he tries so hard (like REALLY, REALLY, REEEEEEALLLLY hard) to tell people again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again that he’s right. 🙂

  21. I don’t care about carlos but I am looking so forward to getting my copy of Axanar Origins next month. It is going to be amazing I’m sure because it is by the same team that made Prelude to Axnar. Wish it was the Axanar 2 part 3o minute movie but can’t wait more axanar material coming soon.

    1. I’m most excited about today’s news that Marvel Comics writer Paul Jenkins is coming on board to help finish up the 30-minute Axanar script. The version I read was good, but even I had a few suggestions for improving things here and there. With Paul coming on board, the final Axanar fan film(s) are going to be amazing!

  22. I debated even posting anything because I don’t want to lend energy to the nonsense but there is one point. Those who demand “where is the movie” are either lying deliberately, completely ignorant about what went down with the lawsuit or just arrived from another planet. It does not matter whether it’s firm or liquid, brown or black, it stinks.

    And to keep going after the lawsuit has been settled and people are picking up the pieces and trying to salvage what they can of the Axanar story crosses another line.

    If you hate Alec and Axanar, so be it. Go watch Discovery, Trek reruns or The Orville. Stop obsessing about Axanar until such time as we have something to review.

    But also Jonathan, I will ding you as well for the “how much did Carlos work for AP anyway”. At least I could care less about his work history. His postings speak for themselves and should be evaluated for what they are and what he claims them to be.

    1. The AP thing was simply me pointing out an instance of Carlos providing a partial truth and letting the reader “fill in the rest.”

      As one of Carlos’ editors at the AP used to tell him (according to Carlos in a recent e-mail to Mike Bawden and me), “If in doubt, get more specific.” Well, Carlos pretty much does the opposite of that when he describes himself on his blog as, “…a former educator, Associated Press writer and fan filmmaker.”

      I could do that, too. I can, with all honesty, list myself as “Former NASA contractor, CLIO Award winner (the CLIOs are the advertising industry’s equivalent of the Emmys), educator, small business owner, Antarctic explorer, professionally published author, Star Trek technical writer, and award-winning fan filmmaker.” I could say that I “directed such notable actors as Majel Barrett Roddenberry, worked closely with Levar Burton, and coached John de Lancie.” I can also claim to have been Willy Wonka professionally and to have been the business partner of the son of the Prime Minister of Malaysia from 1997-1999.

      All of the above is true. But without specifics, it’s pretty meaningless. I directed Majel for four hours doing voice-over in her living room after her stroke. I had no idea what the hell I was doing. I was on a photo shoot with Levar Burton for maybe three hours total. I coached de Lancie in a sound booth by helping him pronounce the names of Star Trek people, places, and things in questions I had written for the CD-ROM game “Star Trek: The Game Show.” (I wanted them to call the game “Star Trek: Q & A”.) My CLIO Award came in 1995 as the first of its kind ever given for an interactive multimedia marketing product, and at the time, there was little competition in the category (much less than today). As for Willy Wonka, I was creative director on Wonka.com for Nestle for 6 years. During that time, we needed the voice of Willy on some animated games. The guy doing the voice on the Wonka commercials was SAG. I wasn’t. So I did the voice to avoid having to pay royalties (this was back in 1997). Later on, when we added the “Ask Willy” feature to the website, I answered Willy’s fan fail from the kids for three years. It was lots of fun.

      Anyway, the point is that I’ve done a lot of interesting stuff in my life, as well. I just don’t typically talk about it, and I certainly don’t make it sound like it’s something bigger than it actually is. And even if it is big, I don’t try to brag about it every chance I get. Did I sell my second book for a $300,000 advance? Yes. DO I typically mention it? Nope. I’m not that insecure. And when I do talk about what I’ve done in my life, I try to provide specifics.

      Carlos doesn’t see to do that whaen the specifics don’t match the narrative cleanly enough. I often wondered how much work he did for the AP. So I looked. He worked at the AP, according to his LinkedIn page, from 1985-1987. I found one article on the internet with Carlos’ byline, and it was from 29 years ago. If there’s others, he’s not providing them…something I find very ironic considering how often he ragged on Alec for not providing proof of Axanar’s financial claims. Pot, meet kettle. 🙂

      So the point is that Carlos doesn’t mention that it’s been three decades since he worked for the AP. To me, leaving out that detail is misleading. I spent a year and a half as a contractor for NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory…back in 1993-94. That doesn’t make me a rocket scientist. 🙂

  23. One can lie by omission as well as telling untruths. Actually, quite often, telling only part of the truth (that won’t hurt your story) makes it harder for others to figure out what’s going on. Given what you’ve pointed out, I’d say the guy is a bald-faced liar.

      1. Heh! Jonathan, “Bald-faced liar” is an expression dating all the way back to the mid-20th Century. We old dinosaurs still talk like that once in a while.

  24. I know this is an unpopular opinion, but there are some people associated with the anti-Axanar side that have gone waaaaaay too far and just look sad and obsessed. They say they are just interested in exposing Peters. It’s nonsense. Some of them are obsessed. Pedraza is one of them. It is clear he has a grudge against Peters from his grab film days. Every article I see about about Axanar online and the usual suspects are there in the comments section running him down. They’re on the various Facebook groups constantly every day. There are entire, lengthy blogs dedicated to painting Peters in a bad light beyond just Axamoniter. The time and effort these people are putting in is ridiculous and they don’t seem to realise that they have gone from being people critical of Peters to looking like people hellbent on seeing him fall on his sword and will not stop until they get what they want – and I think this is evidenced perfectly by the fact that they are happy to prop up questionable individuals like Terry McIntosh and have been going full steam ahead well after the litigation settled. What these people have done, in my opinion, is giving Peters and his sycophants fuel to reinforce the “haters” narrative. It’s one thing to criticise Peters, criticisms which are perfectly valid and well earned in my opinion, and it is another thing entirely to devote hours and hours a week, or even a day, to Peters and his destruction. Of course, they deny that they are doing so and pass it off as caring about artists rights, fan exploitation and so on. I’m sure they do care about these things, but it is clear they are also obsessed and have no intention of stopping until Peters is either in jail or begging on the streets. The whole thing has become sad, toxic and petty on both sides and I cringe at some of what I read on things like the comment sections of this very site – and Mr. Lane, when you are so far up Peters’ backside and you write equally petty and childish articles like this, you really are no better.

    Since the Axanar litigation settled it has been the same small group people flinging mud at each other on a regular basis. I mean seriously, I amazed that some of yuou don’t have better things to do. It’s childish and from a neutral’s perspective it just makes you all look like children in a playground.

    1. In fairness, though, I’d kike to point out that I’ve written 420 blogs on this site in the past almost-two years, and only two have been about Carlos and Axamonitor.

  25. Axamonitor IMHO has nothing to do with justice and more about ego and relevance and the dark side of fanboy obsession. IMHO Carlos doesnt care about ‘the fans’ one bit. His behavior is obsessive and this gives his life meaning. No more and no less. The worse thing that could happen to these guys is for Axanar to go away because it would leave many involved there without purpose. Again, Axanar can exist without Axamonitor but Axamonitor cannot exist without Axanar and thats what it boils down. Pretty pathetic if you ask me not to mention the harassment and stalker like behavior. The Ebay thing was yet another low. Petty, pathetic and childish not to mention reprehensible.

  26. Axamonitor= Axa-Enquirer.
    Next week’s headline:
    Alex Peters; Alien Hybrid.
    Jonathan Lane, MIB Conspire To Suppress Peters Birth Records

  27. I agree with everything in the article. But if you put the issues of Carlos’ employment credentials aside you only have to look at the questions Carols asked of the museum owners to know that his site is nothing but a National Enquirer(is it enquirer or inquirer? I always get it wrong) knock off. If I had been the museum owners I wouldn’t have provided an answer at all.

    OFFICIAL ASSOCIATION Given Axanar’s record of raising nearly USD $2 million yet not producing its promised film nor crowdfunding perks, I was wondering if you have officially associated your museum — a CBS licensee — with this fundraising effort.
    ACCOUNTABILITY Do you have an arrangement with Mr. Peters or Mr. Watkins regarding how money they raise will be disbursed by them to you, how accountability for funds raised and disbursed on your behalf will be assured to donors and to your licensor, CBS?
    AXANAR BACKING Are you comfortable officially associating yourself as a CBS licensee with a group that was sued by your licensor for copyright infringement?
    PERKS The GoFundMe also includes an offer to “help [you] with the fulfillment of perks” — even though none are mentioned on the GoFundMe page, and Axanar’s public record on perk fulfillment is less than exemplary.
    Wow…”So when did you stop beating your wife?” keeps coming to mind. Questions crafted like those are the bread and butter of tabloid journalism which isn’t journalism at all.

    The more interesting question is why Carlos feels the need to hound Axanar like he does? The lawsuit ended with a settlement so there are no further legal threats outstanding. The crowd sourcing funds wither they are gone, being held in an account for finishing the fan film, or stuffed in a sock buried in the back yard,there was never a legal requirement for the recipient to provide any type of accounting to the donors. Once you give your money to any crowd sourced project you don’t have any legal recourse to get any type of project status or any guarantee the project you are funding will ever see completion and you can’t sue for any type of refund. Once you take that into consideration it makes Carlos’s website a waste of time and resources. So why do it?

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