Copyright Law - A bad situation

[photocartoonist]

All I can speak to is my experience. For example, my work-for-hire contract with freelancers includes such a clause because it is paramount to my licensing that I keep control of my properties. For example, I have exclusive licensing deals that do not allow the content to be on any other website. So I require permissions for promotional use to be in advance, and in writing, so I know how and where my content is being used.

There have been cases where I have decided that I do not want to be associated with animation studios I have worked with in the past, because of bad experiences. In such cases I do not allow them to even use my name to promote their services.

Because of these bad experiences I no longer use studios. I only work directly with individual artists.

[Steve_S]

Interesting and thought provoking

1. Josh/Czar has also presented yet another way to make this work. A great idea from a person you can trust. At the end of the day it really doesn't matter what I think or a given Artist or Publisher thinks. The "marketplace" will decide and my sence of the issue is that the basic structure is very sound and will make money for all parties without the need to try and make every person happy.

2. JT, respestfully, I am very happy that your issue is resolved. IMHO, the final dollars spent was much lower than I first thought. This is good for you and should help send a signal to others. It's not "extoriation" as the word is generally defined

3. With respect to a given buyer/client and an Artists licensing terms which are normally but not always incorprated into a "work for hire" relationship:

All parties should carefully read and understand the relavent documents

It's negotiable and just business. Please, I beg you, don't take it personally The last 2 times that I licensed work involved 2 of my students who were also my TA. I used the experience to teach them about the numerous ways the deal could have been structered and in this case they could use the work in their "book" and I even refered them additional work

Iv'e also walked away from deals which were to restritive and continue to maintain contacts with these creatives.

4. Kat posted a link to istockphoto which is great and probably right in tune with what Josh/Czar will do.

See: http://istockphoto.com/faq.php#faq114

I found this very interesting. On a $1.00 sale an artist makes 0.20 (twenty cents) and it looks like more with an exclsuive.

5. To help illustrate the "challenges" that the Internet presents for some artists, please visit:

http://www.bannersmall.com/

I have zero connection with the firm. I refer folks thier and they do great work, follow deadlines, tweak, revise, and IMHO are Professionals in every sence of the word. Twenty bucks for a banner verses $400 presents real world challenges that all parties should take carefull note of

6. Where are the Webmaster posts? Chuckle...I know your reading and discussing this very thread.

Good luck to all

[CLKeenan]

I'm surprised no one suggested countersuing the person who sold you the site in the first place for all damages that you receive... who knows? maybe the orig owner was sent a C and D and just ignored it and after that happened, you got sent the lawsuit?

Hell, if you wanted to, you could probably sue the orig owner for emotional damages for the amount of stress this has put on you.

(this is all assuming he claimed the content was OK to use)

-Chris

[photocartoonist]

Chris it was suggested, by me, early in the thread and you can see batcavenet's response.

In light of recent events, and copyright infringment striking close to home, I feel compelled to reinterate:

Availing yourself of your legal remedies is not extortion.

Copyright infringement damages the value of licensing.

Courts are practical and will rule against artists if they do not see activity to stop unauthorized usage of their works.

[batcavenet]

Originally posted by CLKeenan
I'm surprised no one suggested countersuing the person who sold you the site in the first place for all damages that you receive... who knows?

-Chris

Well - the person suing me wanted the name of the previous owner of the site, so they could sue them too to get money out of them. I refused to give them this as part of the settlement.

[fusionhosting]

I saw this thread, read through some of the discussion and wanted to add my experience to the comments about artists and website licensing.

Back in the dot com boom I managed several popular humor sites, both featuring licensed or free cartoons (with linkbacks), up until the market crashed.

My experience then was the company responsible for licensing out the premium cartoon content such as Dilbert, Garfield, etc simply charged too much for a site to feature them (United Media, I believe). We did license a number of strips for awhile before finally dropping them after watching logs for demand, and the high licensing costs.

We were also paying to BMG & ASCAP for music licensing (which hardly did a thing to help licensing as artists continually disputed licensing as they claimed to have exclusive internet agreements with other .com properties they had been given stock in). Then add in all other costs of doing business and the math just didn't work, especially with where the CPM rates were at during the bust cycle (and even today).

If there's a organization handling the licensing and collections in order to make a dent, the licensing needs to be inexpensive enough to actually get webmasters to cough up the money. If you're going to bother doing this and have a real effect, it needs to be a volume business. Otherwise there's always been other options, abeit only feasable for major web sites commanding premium CPM rates.

I'd much rather see more of a radio station style system, or something more friendly for websites that provides free exposure and demand for the IP with the possibly of affordable subscription fees for high traffic sites over 1m/imp a month.

As it stands now I'd seriously question the value of online comics for drawing traffic to a general entertainment site in any case. Most savvy users know they can visit the strip's official website for free anyway, and that's where I believe most artists should attempt to extract their primary online revenue stream.

[photocartoonist]

Excellent advice.

I still think there is a place for online syndication in addition to the established offline syndicates.

Most established offline business, including the professional artists yet to understand the revenue potential of the Internet. Which is understandable since most don't understand the technology, and even fewer have a significant online presence.

Licensing has started and although it is limited it is powerful. It is up to the content providers to be ready technically, or they willb e at the continued mercy of the establishment who will eventually try to control online licensing too.

[vik88]

too much interesting information! thanks for sharing! =)

[geekstory]

I am sorry to hear that all, I want to suggest you one more thing.
that is to stick to one God and ask his help with deep heart. ask other ppl to pray for you.
next thing is try to contact that guy by all means and make the situation clear.
dont give up in any way.
May God help you!

[nidhish]

I feel for u dear friend ..but i guess you have got yourself in a big mess ..i doubt that guy would sit down with just content removal & a written apology .My advice to u would be to hire a really good lawyer & just try to settle outside the court .

[kate_jakn]

As for me, this is a problem to settle such a problem not in a court. Everything has gone too far. But may be I'm mistaken...