In the course of a clearing out the archives of the German TV station RTL at Luxemburg, the tapes containing the German dubbing of Santa Barbara are going to be destroyed. The reason: licensing for Germany has expired, New World Television (the original producer) no longer exists, which is why the rights now belong to 20th Century Fox. Fox does not consider the show eligible for renewed broadcasting, nor DVD release, because there are several owners of the original rights, and rights for every piece of music ever played on the show would have to be negotiated from scratch.

So RTL has no use of the tapes with the German version any more, they would not be allowed to broadcast the episodes again even if they wanted to.

These are the only copies of episodes 1-1650 of the show in the German language version (later episodes are stored digitally in Cologne, safe at least for now).

A fan, who is writing a book about our favourite soap, found this out while doing research and has asked the station for permission to get a copy. Of course this is a very expensive project, so he has allowed other fans to join in as sponsors, which means they will receive copies.

If any of you, particularly the German fans, are interested in joining, see
http://www.serienjunkies.de/news/california-clan-deutsche-baender-vernichtung-34...
and http://www.facebook.com/pages/Rettet-den-California-Clan/260252137337655

Current calculations are that 100 fans are required for the copies to be made at all, and that each fan has to pay 280 Euros for the first season, comprising 255 episodes. The copying will continue as long as there are 100 fans for each season willing to sponsor.

Attention: Copies purchased this way may not be uploaded and will have an invisible watermark, so it can be traced who gave his recordings away.

Thanks for the hint, but the person who is organizing this is already on Facebook. I just thought it couldn't hurt to spread the word through every medium I know, although most people here won't be interested in dubbed versions. If there are only two or three who read it and sign up, it will be a help already.

I'm not the only person in the world who has reservations about Facebook. As much as the cause here matters to me, personally, I wouldn't use it even for this. Firstly, I am not sure my data is safe there because of the many occasions on which Facebook has been in the press for violating users' privacy (facial recognition feature, storing profiles that have been deactivated by their owners, the Beacon programme sending info on users' activities on the internet to Facebook).
Secondly, I do not like the content policy. Of course I am all for the freedom of opinion, but I strongly disapprove of Facebook hosting groups promoting anorexia and bulimia. There are enough girls starving themselves in order to look like a photoshopped supermodel, they don't need a social network group to share tips about how to starve to death. In a moderated forum like this, I know our admins would never allow such a thread, and it's very reassuring to know that.

With every medium, there comes a responsibility, and I just can't see Facebook taking that responsibility. Facebook has pro-anorexia groups, Holocaust denial groups, cyber-bullying groups, and pro-Mafia groups.
Of course there are more users who use Facebook responsibly than for such questionable purposes, and of course it's up to every individual how they behave on the web. But the fact that Facebook fails to ban those groups even when users complain about them is one of the reasons why I don't want to be associated with Facebook. I don't mean to convert anyone, but I hope people get informed before they sign up.

Hi Titania & Olga, I wish I could at this time, I love supporting Lane/SB in anyway I can, but right now it just not affordable. Good luck and much love!!!

A short update: the TV station has changed its mind about SB. Meaning: We won't get any recordings.
BUT: the whole campaign has brought to their attention that there might still be more SB fans out there than they had anticipated. So the tapes will not be destroyed, but kept in the archives for a possible rerun in the future if legal matters can be resolved.
So despite the disappointment of not getting any recordings, there has been some success. Thanks to everyone who supported this!