* * * * *
                                        
                      Sailing the Corporate Seas, Part II
                                        
> How many people know how the “Disney system” of comics works? When I
> describe this to some fans when asked about it, they often think I'm
> kidding them or lying. Or they are outraged. But it's an unfortunate fact
> that there have never been, and I ultimately realized there never will be,
> any royalties paid to the people who write or draw or otherwise create all
> the Disney comics you've ever read. We are paid a flat rate per page by one
> publisher for whom we work directly. After that, no matter how many times
> that story is used by other Disney publishers around the world, no matter
> how many times the story is reprinted in other comics, album series,
> hardback books, special editions, etc., etc., no matter how well it sells,
> we never receive another cent for having created that work. That's the
> system Carl Barks worked in and it's the same system operating today.
> 
> How can such an archaic system still be in operation in the 21st Century
> when royalties have been paid in other creative publishing endeavors for
> literally centuries? All book authors, musicians, actors, singers, non-
> Disney cartoonists, even people who act in TV commercials … they all
> receive royalties if success warrants it. Even Disney pays normal royalties
> to creators and performers in its own movie and TV and book and music
> businesses. As near as I can tell, correct me if I'm wrong, but it's only
> the creators of Disney comics who have no chance to receive a share of the
> profits of the success of the work they create. And yet Disney comics have
> never been produced by the Disney company, but have always been created by
> freelance writers and artists working for licensed independent publishers,
> like Carl Barks working for Dell Comics, me working for Egmont, and
> hundreds of others working for numerous other Disney licensees.
> 
> Why is this? I don't know.
> 

Via Hacker News [1], “Don Rosa Collection | An Epilogue by Don Rosa [2]”

My very first post [3] was about the importance of creator owned IP
(Intellectual Property). This is more of the same, although it's from the
other Good Duck Artist™ [4] (the Good Duck Artist™ being Carl Barks [5]).

It's sad that this still happens to this day.

It's also sad that artists still sign their lives away like this too.

[1] http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5189490
[2] http://career-end.donrosa.de/
[3] gopher://gopher.conman.org/0Phlog:1999/12/04.1
[4] gopher://gopher.conman.org/0Phlog:2007/09/26.1
[5] http://stp.ling.uu.se/~starback/dcml/creators/carl-barks.html

Email Sean Conner at sean@conman.org

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