This week the Trek corporate frontline cracked comparably to a core breach. Activision, licensed to develop game software, has sued production company Paramount's parent Viacom. The lawsuit seeks protection from lost revenue resulting from Viacom-inflicted damage to the franchise. They broadcast their broadside in no uncertain terms, claiming that Viacom did not "continue exploiting the Star Trek franchise consistent with its practice at the time the agreement was signed in 1998." I won't try and dispute that "exploit" is the operative word here; in fact, that naked claim is so honest it's hard not to smirk at the irony.

By exploiting the franchise, in appeal to the lowest common denominator - think T'Pol in heat - Viacom has, in essence, failed to "exploit the franchise." (The "fan-chise" expecting gourmet meals instead being served rubber bones.) Viacom has already returned fire, alleging that Activision seeks only to renegotiate its contract halfway through its ten-year term. (As to the franchise, "All is well, all is well.") Two issues must be distinguished - first that such an actual decline has taken place and second, that this decline represents a violation of contract. As to the first element, it would be hard (but not impossible) to deny such a decline. The second may not lay at the feet of Viacom.

Yet even if their case loses in Superior Court that doesn't mean Activision won't win in the court of public opinion (if they already haven't). It's one thing to tamper with the temper of the fans; I mean, it's only our precious time over which they barter their quatloos. But a corporate collision? Neither side may easily win this sort of public relations battle, so Activision's sense of injury must be felt intensely. And yet they clearly pay an objectively measured amount for official license to a subjectively estimated franchise. Does their contract insist in certain terms that this estimation would not decline? (Can one sell Trek short?)

So now the goose is still dropping eggs, they're just no longer golden - the gold deliberately scraped off to apply a stinking patina of stupid war in some silly "Delphic Expanse." It was not good - no, it was inexcusably foolish - to neglect the goose. So will a clamor descend from the heights to concuss those responsible, inflicting the reality of their inept handling of a once mighty treasure? That small crew liable for mishandling Star Trek - and who if not the producers are blameworthy, the fans? - deserve every bit of the opprobrium history will attach to their names.