No Summary Judgment Granted in Archie v. Penders Case
Anything that wasn’t a summary judgment in Archie’s favor would have been good news for Ken Penders and his legal team Monday, as US District Judge Richard Berman heard both sides argue their case in the ongoing civil dispute over the validity of Penders’s copyrights.
That is exactly what the Penders defense got. Moreover, a court order obtained by TSSZ shows both parties’ motions for summary judgment were tossed by Berman, as well as both parties’ motions in limine, which attempted to limit evidence on both sides in the case.
First, here is why Penders and his defense team have reason to celebrate. Archie’s attempts to invalidate signed affidavits by Scott Shaw, Karl Bollers, Scott Fulop, and Mike Kanterovich for the case were for naught. You may remember us telling you about what they said a few months back. Judge Berman rules those affidavits are valid, as the trial, originally scheduled for January, was delayed:
Archie’s timeliness arguments are unpersuasive. Even assuming, [….] that Penders disclosed any witnesses late, no prejudice to Archie has resulted because the Court vacated the January 30, 2012 trial date [….] leaving Archie ample time to prepare any rebuttal.
[….]
The affidavits of Karl Bollers, Scott Shaw, Joshua Ray, Scott D. Fulop, Elliot S. Maggin, and Mike Kanterovich are relevant and admissible, even though they do not have personal knowledge of whether Penders signed the Agreements, because those affiants are freelance artists who previously worked for Archie and claim that Archie never required them to sign any work-for-hire contracts. [….] The affidavits of Fred Mausser and Justin Gabrie are relevant and admissible because those
affiants are former Archie employees who claim that “[f]reelance creators, including Ken Penders, were not required to sign contracts . . . before they could do work for [Archie].”
That said, the judge did conclude portions of affidavits, including some areas of Penders’s own affidavit, are inadmissible due to several reasons, including extrinsic evidence and hearsay. Some of that concerns small details regarding Ed Spallone, his departure from Archie Comics, and what he allegedly knew or did not know regarding Penders’s contract. The latter was to be a centerpiece of Penders’s defense, and it appears most of that portion will survive.
The judge also found that Archie’s argument of an E-Mail exchange between Penders and Archie’s Victor Gorelick was not enough to merit summary judgment:
Archie’s contention that “a series of emails written by Penders to Victor Gorelick . . . admit that Penders did, in fact, sign [the] [A]greements” is unpersuasive on summary judgment. (Pl. Mem. at 16.) The emails, dated December 4, 2008, December 15, 2008, and January 5, 2009, reference a “work-for-hire form”
from “back in late ‘95” and do not resolve the genuine issues of material fact regarding the authenticity of the Agreements which are dated December 12, 1996. [….] Because the existence or nonexistence of authentic Agreements is a question of fact for the jury, Archie’s motion for summary judgment is denied.
However, Penders also had his motions denied, and several pieces of evidence his team sought to toss, including duplicate copies of the work-for-hire agreement he allegedly signed, were allowed to stay in the case. A jury will ultimately determine their authenticity. In addition, the defense’s cross-motion for summary judgment was denied. An argument that the contract was unenforceable, even if authentic, did not convince the judge:
[….] The record appears to show that Penders submitted invoices to Archie for payment without expressing “any issue or concern with receiving payment from [Archie] in this method or form.” [….] And, Penders’ argument that, “even if [the] Agreements are found to be authentic, valid and enforceable[,] all Works submitted before December 12, 1996 cannot qualify as work for hire” is unpersuasive. (Def. Opp’n at 15.) The Agreements provide that if any Works “do not qualify as a work for hire, [Penders] will and hereby does assign to Archie any right, title and interest that he/she has or may obtain therein, including all copyrights.”
In a nutshell, it means both parties are back to square one facing a possible jury trial, albeit with most of their ammunition intact. Judge Berman has ordered both parties to submit pre-trial orders, jury instructions, and verdict sheets jointly by August 10th, as well as any motion in limine. One last pre-trial conference is scheduled for September 10th to try and hammer out a settlement.
“The parties are directed to engage in good faith settlement discussions prior to the conference,” Berman advised.
If those attempts fail, we should see a trial, and if gets that far, make no mistake; advantage: Penders.
Why should you care if it gets that far? Any thought of Archie losing this case or a settlement may give the company reason to put the brakes on future releases that include Penders’s work, including but not limited to the long-awaited Sonic Comic Encyclopedia. There is, of course, no indication that will happen at this point, but should we see a trial and a jury render a verdict, anything in Penders’s favor would make a release like that quite difficult.
We will continue to offer developments in this case as they come in.
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Hmm, this may explain why, barring stuff in Sonic Universe, a lot of the comic is focusing more on SatAM/SEGA heroes at the moment.
Sheesh, this is so ridiculous
Well… damn. That is worrisome. Looks like the ball is in Penders’s court at the moment, but I honestly feel like he shouldn’t have a case in the first place. Granted, he did the work and created quite a few characters, but since they’re all derivative of an existing franchise, his claim over those stories and characters is fairly shaky begin with. At least, that’s the way I’m looking at it right now. I admit I don’t know a ton about copyright law.
Guess all we can do is see how this is going to play out in the next couple of months.
I never really delve deep into this matter and I dont know much about law, so someone clear this up for me…
What’s the worst case scenario here if Penders wins? Do we lose some characters from the comics? Or what?
“Why should you care if it gets that far? Any thought of Archie losing this case or a settlement may give the company reason to put the brakes on future releases that include Penders’s work, including but not limited to the long-awaited Sonic Comic Encyclopedia. ”
Seriously Penders?
(EDIT – Inflammatory – T)
AMT: It also can mean that any asshole on deviantART smart enough to do the same thing Penders is doing right now can bring it to court to copyright their character when it is so obviously based off of an existing property.
Why the hell Sonic’s franchise has to deal with this shit is beyond me.
Just imagine…an entire world filled with ORIGINAL CHARACTER DO NOT STEAL creations everywhere. The bit from that one Sonic Shortz says it all really.
@MM2
Yeah the fact that this case could open the floodgates and allow fans to copyright their recolors scares me.
Jeez, I was hoping for some good news with all the Penders’ garbage.
I mean I can sort of understand why he thinks deserves royals for some of Sonic Archives, but to say his characters are NOT based on Sonic the Hedgehog is a complete and total lie. It’s ridiculous and that’s why I don’t think he deserves a penny.
*worry* I just don’t want Archie to lose the ability to use Julie-Su. She’s a longtime favorite of mine and she’s simply too much a part of the story to be written out! O_O I know that Patrick Spaziante created her visual design, so hopefully, as long as they don’t make frequent mention of her back story, they might be okay.
A part of me almost wants Penders to win.
I mean, think about it.
SEGA is pushing the Archie and SatAM characters out of the comic bit by bit anyway. We’re seeing mandates that prevent non-SEGA Sonic characters from taking spotlight or having significant roles, and it probably won’t be long before most of them are shelved and forgotten in order to focus on SEGA’s latest in-house recolor as opposed to one of Penders’.
Virtually everything Penders had created for the comic in the past has either been put to rest already, and what’s left is unlikely to be used in a fulfilling manner under Ian Flynn (see: The Dark Egg Legion, and Lien-Da being turned into Snively), so, hypothetically speaking, what would it matter if none of these elements ever appeared in the comic again thanks to the lawsuit?
A lot of Archie fanatics hated Ken’s work, anyway, and so I doubt they’d be sad to see it go, and for those that like it, Ken apparently had plans for some sort follow-up storyline once he’s gotten the right to use them in his “original” (ha ha ha ha) work. What’s the big deal?
This is ridiculous. It’s what happens when someone can’t let go of greed and selfishness.
Something that I was pondering. The only way I see Penders winning is if Archie doesn’t have something that states whatever character created belongs to us no matter what. What I’m getting at is the example of Rare and Nintendo’s relationship. Rare, despite creating Diddy Kong, Cranky Kong, the Kremlings, most of the other kongs that aren’t DK, have no rights to those characters because they were created in a franchise that belongs to Nintendo. If Archie has something like this then their really shouldn’t be any case. Work for hire agreement or not there has to have been a document stating the ownership of new characters created.
I still don’t see how Penders can win simply for the sole sake that Sega owns Archie’s Sonic the Hedgehog, regardless of whether Penders “technically” had a work-for-hire agreement or not. It doesn’t matter if he had a work-for-hire agreement; Archie is only licensed to use the characters and the contract pretty much states that Sega owns all characters and comics, so ultimately, everything should go right back to Sega anyway.
I really really don’t like this guy. His scripting sucked (“Fuh-fuh-friend?”) too much fucking stuttering and stupidity.
If you noticed, Ian’s slowly getting rid of ‘Ken’s OH-MY-GOSH-SO-ORIGNAL! Characters’: He’s killed off Hershey, Geoffery St. John’s now “evil” and will likely either get booted or killed, none of the echidnas are ever mentioned other than Knux, Julie-Su (Lara-Su in the future arcs/stories), Lien-Da, Dimitri, and whatever’s in the D.E.L. The Brotherhood of Guardians is non-existent at the moment (not sure what happened with them, I missed that story), Locke’s dead, Finvitius (I know it’s spelled wrong, shush) is Chaos-knows-where, and I think that’s all of them covered. The only ones important to the stories as of right now are Knux, Julie-Su, Geoff, and Lien-Da with the D.E.L., and even then Knux and Julie-Su haven’t been in a lot of comic recently.
Stupid Penders, you and your stupidity. Ian’s a much better writer than you’ll ever be.
~Jennie
Jennie:
Finitevus doesn’t belong to Ken Penders. Finitevus was created by Karl Bollers and Jon Gray, and is one of Ian Flynn’s self-admitted favorites.
It’s not Ian that’s getting rid of the characters, it’s SEGA. Ian’s killed off a few of the useless ones over the years he’s been on, but he’s hardly the only one responsible, and in some cases SEGA won’t let him use Archie original characters he actually WANTS to use.
@Blazer: You are correct, sir! Also, a certain archive near release has had its cover changed, removing one character (in dispute) and replacing it with another.
@Amt: That’s entirely up to Archie Comics Publications. Ken has always been willing to work with Archie towards a settlement. Need I point out it was Archie that sued Ken, as a lot of people seem to think it was the other way around.
@MM2: Characters by themselves can not be copyrighted (only trademarked or service marked in certain instances.) So an artist on DeviantArt or any other location can not copyright a character. They can copyright the artwork they drew of that character, and indeed copyright is automatically extended in the U.S. The character vs. artwork of the character are two different animals in the eyes of the copyright office. What Ken’s copyright covers is the story the character appeared in, which extends control over the use of that character to the copyright holder.
@Robot521: What the characters are based on, i.e., the inspiration for the character, is immaterial. It is how the character is used that’s the controlling factor.
@Trellia: Sorry, but Julie-Su is one of the contended characters. Of course, ACP can always work out a deal to continue to use her.
@IronFrenzy82: You mean like ACP? I’d put the greed and selfishness on their side. They were the ones who sued Ken, not the other way around.
@Timothy: That’s what Work-for-Hire agreements do. They don’t apply to the Rare/Nintendo gig, though. Nintendo owned 49% of Rare at the time. Thus they also owned the characters Rare developed and could control how those characters were used. The same problem affected Sonic and DiC. At the time Sonic was created as a cartoon series (TAoStH and SatAM), Disney was a co-owner of DiC. When it was first announced that the complete set was going to be released, Disney stepped in and said “Not without our approval!” Approval was finally obtained and the complete series was released, but that’s why it didn’t get out after that first announcement.
@UltimaHedgie: No, SEGA owns Sonic the Hedgehog. ACP owns the comic called Sonic the Hedgehog (although there is some question about that, too, as they’ve never filed copyright on any of the comics and in the comic itself they reference SEGA as copyright holder…so do they own the comic copyright or not? Interesting question.) In either case, though, the fact that SEGA owns Sonic the Hedgehog is immaterial to this case. Sonic the Hedgehog is not one of the contended characters.
@Jennie: Let’s just say our taste in writing styles differ. 🙂
@Anonymous: You are correct. However, guess who also doesn’t have a contract with ACP concerning his works?
Bob–which Archives cover had been changed? I didn’t catch that, and that would be something of note.
-T
omg penders…cut your damn losses and move on…i doubt you’d have a very big fanbase after this trial anyway…even less if you cost archie losses to the sonic series
@ Tristen
BobR is taking about the new Sonic Select 7(?) with the Sally mini-series and assorted stories. They replaced St John with Espio on the cover. At first I just thought it was because of the obvious ( Espio being more recognizable)but it could be because of the case.
Gee whiz, and just when I thought this day couldn’t get any worse.
I wonder who is in the right in all this, penders, or Archie? I mean, while it’s true that Penders made the characters, if he didn’t file a copyright claim(please correct me if I’m wrong) on the characters, or signed a contract, then this trial is pretty much useless.
Although, I wonder why Archie can’t counterclaim Penders, I also though this was going to be an open and shut case.
BobR-Wait, Archie sued Penders? I so thought it was the other way around. So, I’m kind of behind in this case, care to explain why Archie sued Penders please?
I still think it’s too soon to worry about what might happen if Penders wins.
Right now we have a draw. Neither Archie or Penders were able to prove their case enough to get summary judgement. This doesn’t mean that Penders will have an advantage when this goes to trial.
You know I seriously doubt that even if Ken wins that graphic novel he keeps going on about is not coming out, it’s just a scam to win more people over to his side. I mean is he not in the middle of making two films amidst all this legal chaos (The Republic and The Lost Ones) both have been in development for over three years and have little to show for it. Plus both of there Facebook pages have been silent for the past year, so that should say something about when the novels will coming out.
(Was not the original date going to be this summer?)
It’s probably not a ‘scam’, as such, but like you, I too have serious doubts that even if Penders wins the lawsuit that this “Guardian graphic novel” will ever materialize.
Why? Because the guy is all talk and virtually nothing to show for it. It’s hot air. Ken Penders is an ad copy spouting robot who unfortunately seems to have come to believe his own hype (anyone remember when he was calling his “Lost Ones” comic, a random, single-issue flop of a story that absolutely no one knows anything about, was published in 2001 and promptly abandoned–a “best-selling hit comic book series”? That is example of exactly what I mean), and I sincerely do not believe for one minute that Ken is going to have the resources, motivation, or frankly even the paying readership to pull off any sort of viable “Guardian graphic novel series” project, especially not with the mountains of electronic bells-and-whistles he’s promising to go along with it (specialized apps!!1 voice acting!11 animoooootion!!11!!!)
Something that’s interesting is if you look at Penders’ forum, you’ll notice that there are exactly four people who care ANYTHING about the supposed “Lara-Su Chronicles”; two of them are Penders’ close friends, one doesn’t seem to care much for what Ken’s done to the characters in terms of redesign but is still tentatively supporting the lawsuit, and the fourth and final one is a notorious Penders fanboy that would accept and like anything Ken does, no matter how awful it is. The response everywhere else has been overwhelmingly negative, and yet Ken still prattles on about how many people are “waiting for this” — when you realize how transparent his self-hype actually is, it’s apparent that he’s probably intentionally misconstruing what amounts to a stray inquiry email here and there as “tons of fan response and interest”. In his attempts to delude others into thinking he’s got something special in store, one has to wonder if he hasn’t deluded himself…
Another thing to note is that, a while back, I saw Ken claim that once he had full control over his characters that he was planning on cutting Sega a “deal” that was “better” than what “Archie has to offer them”. It seemed, back then, like he was doing all of this in order to worm his way back into his old job, even if it meant carrying on without Archie. So, his motives may be layered yet.
In truth, He’s actually said a lot of things that about this whole thing that are completely contradictory to things he’s said before, and if anyone’s curious all you have to do is just glance over his posts on his forum over the last few months and you’ll see what I mean. It gives the impression that he actually has no idea what he’s doing or what he’s planning to do once all of this is over, and yet there he is talking about all of these grandiose plans he has in store…
Which, really, seems about par the course for Ken. Even as a writer, he’s always been the kind of guy that comes up with a general idea and steamrolls on ahead without worrying about the details — which was also one of his major drawbacks as a writer, because it always resulted in plot holes big enough for one to trip into. And I won’t be surprised if, by the end of all of this, Ken himself has fallen into a hole of his own designing, whether he wins or loses.
@N@mby
Damn… you have said a mouthful there n@mby but I agree Ken likes blowing a lot of hot air and making himself seem bigger then he really is. You know when you look at it from a certain angle Ken would probably be worst off if he does win the case, cause that means he would actually be under pressure to release the book. Once again this is someone who does not have a good track record of publishing stuff he has made himself. (Lost Ones only lasted one issue and he promised his “fans” years ago that a graphic novel of that was “coming soon”.) And even if he gets ONE novel out it won’t have all the bells and whistles, which would probably be a good thing since in all likely hood the app will not work probably, the animation would be terrible (who is suppose to be making the animation and app anyway, himself?) and the voice acting would distract from peoples enjoyment of it. Unless he got some name voice talent for it (i.e. Bradley Pierce, Tim Curry, Jim Cummings, and Kath Soucie). And one final thing that I have notice that no has brought up concerning this, How much is this going to cost and how many pages is it going to be?
@TLSonic: It wouldn’t matter what it cost or how many pages will it be. Cuz I for one won’t buy it
Am I the only one thinking Archie V Penders would be a terrible name for a fighting game?
Actually, I almost hope Penders wins out of sheer morbid curiosity.
Namely, to find out how he expects to use characters like Julie-Su and Lien-Da without clear reference to Knuckles or the Floating Island, both of which are clear and obvious property of SEGA/Sonic Team. And let’s not forget that Penders’s echidna characters are all SEGA-style echidnas, which are extremely stylized and don’t look much like real echidnas at all.
If his old work for Archie is any indication, he’ll screw up hilariously. I’d almost even consider it worth paying for, just for the schadenfreude.
@The_L
Considering how “his” character redesigns blatantly rip-off Sega’s traditional echidna design, I fully expect them to sue his pants off if he does get so far as to get the book published.
@Kiondrick: “I mean, while it’s true that Penders made the characters, if he didn’t file a copyright claim(please correct me if I’m wrong) on the characters, or signed a contract, then this trial is pretty much useless.”
Copyright is automatic in the US, but actually Ken DID go on to file copyrights for the issues he wrote and drew. But that was years after the fact.
The real question is whether he DID sign a contract. Archie says he did; Ken seems to be implying that his signature was forged (though AFAIK he’s never actually made that accusation in so many words).
If he DIDN’T sign a contract, then he retains the rights to his scripts and art and all Archie got in return for what it paid him was first-publication rights. Ken is absolutely right on how (modern, post-1976) copyright law works on this: if there was no work-for-hire agreement in advance, then it wasn’t work-for-hire, and if there was no contract stating either work-for-hire or transfer of rights, then he retained all the rights to his stories.
Now, that doesn’t mean he can re-publish those stories himself, because they contain characters owned by Sega. But likewise, if his claim is accurate then Archie’s reprints of those stories are illegal, because Ken still owns the words and pictures themselves.
While I am a little skeptical that Archie would be so careless as to neglect to make Penders sign a contract in advance, multiple other creators and editors have come forward to corroborate the claim, and that leads me to consider that there may be something to it.
@TLSonic, Jennie, The_L, et al: Whether or not you like Penders, his characters, his work, etc. is completely irrelevant to the legal merits of his case.
@The_L: “Namely, to find out how he expects to use characters like Julie-Su and Lien-Da without clear reference to Knuckles or the Floating Island, both of which are clear and obvious property of SEGA/Sonic Team.”
Knuckles is. Angel Island is. Mushroom Hill, Hydro City, Sandopolis, Carnival Night, and the rest of the Zones seen in the games are. But “the Floating Island” in and of itself is not. Floating islands are pretty common in fantasy fiction; if Penders steers clear of established locations from the games and associated trappings like Chaos Emeralds, then he’s all right.
Knuckles himself gets a little trickier, but if he’s significantly redesigned and referred to by a different name, then Ken COULD avoid infringement.
I’ve used this example elsewhere, but it bears repeating: Red Sonja is a character who first appeared in licensed comic books but is now a distinct property owned neither by the comics publisher nor the licensor of the original property. And what’s more, a character who was pretty obviously Conan (and who was even played by Arnold Schwarzenegger!) appeared in the Red Sonja movie — but they gave him a different name and thus avoided infringement.
“And let’s not forget that Penders’s echidna characters are all SEGA-style echidnas, which are extremely stylized and don’t look much like real echidnas at all.”
I think that in and of itself could be a major stumbling block, though I think it’s more likely to run afoul of trademark law than copyright law. (Knuckles’s likeness is trademarked, and brand confusion is a hallmark of trademark law.)
I’ve seen Bob draw comparisons to Disney’s legal threats against Howard the Duck for his resemblance to Donald, and Marvel getting around that by putting pants on him. Sometimes a silly, small change can make enough difference to defeat a trademark claim. That said, there are a lot more cartoon ducks than cartoon echidnas, so the mere existence of anthropomorphic echidnas may invite closer scrutiny than ducks would. THAT said, I’d say Donald, Daffy, Baby Huey, et al all share certain stylistic similarities that don’t really resemble actual ducks, so by that standard Ken may be able to get away with a lot of similar features to the Sega echidnas without reaching a point where his designs are infringing.
If a court DOES determine that Ken’s latest character redesigns are still too close to Knuckles’s look, then I suspect he can get around that problem by getting rid of the dreadlocks and using colors other than red and pink.
“I’ve seen Bob draw comparisons to Disney’s legal threats against Howard the Duck for his resemblance to Donald, and Marvel getting around that by putting pants on him.”
I’ve seen Bob make this claim as well, and I think it’s ridiculous. A cartoon duck is a caricature of an actual animal, and so nobody is going to be able to sue someone for making a cartoon duck unless it strongly or directly resembles an already-established character.
Knuckles, on the other hand, is an echidna in name only. He looks nothing like an echidna, and his design is wholly original to SEGA. No one in the history of anything has ever created an “echidna” that looks like SEGA’s conception of an echidna at any point before SEGA came up with it.
Ken can make his characters echidnas, of course, because no one can copyright the use of an actual animal. There have been plenty of cartoon echidnas out there even before SEGA popularized the species. But he can’t lift SEGA’s idea of an echidna and use it, because that concept is SEGA’s property.
@Thab-Thanks for clearing that up for me. Also, has Archie lied like this in the past or something, because a user named Anonymous claims that Archie could be lying to avoid fan propaganda.
But then again, maybe not. The only real way to know is to wait.
@Kiondrick: Archie’s got a pretty awful record in terms of creators’ rights. To this day it won’t acknowledge Bob Montana as the creator of Archie (the character); it was one of the last publishers to actually credit the writers and artists on its stories; and today it’s one of the few that has strict “house style” guidelines and does not pay royalties. And that’s without even getting into its abominable treatment of Dan DeCarlo, quite possibly its definitive artist, in the last few years of his life (and even beyond; Archie has actually gone so far as to REMOVE HIS NAME from reprints — see http://www.misterkitty.org/extras/stupidcovers/stupidcomics91.html ).
All that said? It’s hard to believe they would actually do something as illegal, unethical, and INEPT as forging a freelancer’s signature on a contract. That’s a serious allegation — and I must repeat that it’s an allegation Penders hasn’t actually made, just one that I think he’s implied.
As far as not getting him to sign a contract in the first place? That’s a little more believable, I suppose. It’d still be a pretty serious mistake, and one I wouldn’t ordinarily associate with Archie, a company which, as I’ve said, is well-known to run a tight ship and make sure it doesn’t owe its creators a dime more than a page rate.
It’s possible that the mix-up resulted from this being a licensed book — when the Sonic series started, Archie’s only prominent licensed title was TMNTA, and that book had a much more liberal approach to creators’ rights than Archie’s SOP. (My understanding is that Steve Murphy, AKA Dean Clarrain, actually retained ownership for all the characters he created for TMNTA, though he later sold them to Mirage.) It’s not out of the question that Archie employees got sloppy and didn’t file all the paperwork they needed to, especially on a new licensed title that had a completely different ownership policy than their previous licensed title.
But again, I’m not a lawyer and that’s all conjecture.
As I say, I find the forged-signature implications hard, but not impossible, to believe. I likewise was initially very skeptical of the claim that Archie forgot to make Penders sign a contract in the first place, but given the number of witnesses supporting his story at this point I think you can probably downgrade that to “somewhat skeptical”.
We’ll see what happens, the full extent of what Ken and Archie are actually claiming, what the witnesses say, and how the court rules. For my part I think it’s a fascinating story and I’m very curious to see how it plays out.
Personally I think that the whole creators rights movement is selfish.
These creators signed a contract. They give up their ownership rights a long time ago.
In the end the only thing these legal battles do is hurt the fans.
In the past Archie has probably been unfair to some of their past writers and artists, but so weren’t Marvel and DC.
Anyway I still think that Penders is lying about never signing a contract, but I guess we’ll find out.
@Vampfox: “Personally I think that the whole creators rights movement is selfish.”
As opposed to having a big corporation profit from somebody’s work while not compensating them. That’s not selfish at all.
“These creators signed a contract. They give up their ownership rights a long time ago.”
Except that, in many cases, they DIDN’T sign a contract.
Jack Kirby didn’t sign a contract. Gary Friedrich didn’t sign a contract. Dan DeCarlo didn’t sign a contract. And Ken Penders is claiming that he didn’t sign a contract either.
“In the end the only thing these legal battles do is hurt the fans.”
Nonsense. When has a legal battle EVER hurt the fans?
Jerry Siegel’s heirs have been involved in legal maneuvering with DC since 1999, and indeed currently co-own the Superman copyright (as is their right under the termination clause of the copyright extension in 1976). Superman comics continue to be published. There was a brief period where DC wasn’t allowed to use the “Superboy” name; that was the extent of the changes seen by fans.
Jack Kirby’s heirs sought termination too, and Marvel sued them. Marvel came out on top; the Kirbys have appealed. During all that, how have the fans suffered? If this is what it looks like when Marvel fans suffer, I can’t WAIT to see what it looks like when Marvel fans are HAPPY.
Anyway. I DO enjoy the irony of somebody starting off by complaining that it’s “selfish” for a creator to ask for rights and then launch right into how it “hurts the fans” — in other words, you don’t care about the law or the ethics, you care about how it affects YOU.
“In the past Archie has probably been unfair to some of their past writers and artists, but so weren’t Marvel and DC.”
No kidding. How is that justification? “Other companies mistreat their freelancers, so it’s okay if Archie does it too”? What?
And as I’ve said, as bad as DC and Marvel’s records are on creators’ rights, Archie’s is worse. I’ve already listed off a number of reasons why Archie has lagged behind Marvel and DC in reforming its treatment of creators.