PAD isn’t letting go:
Some people are claiming that Marvel and DC and other major publishers should embrace the concept of having anybody, anytime, do whatever the hell they want with the publishers’ property because the fans have decided that it’s going to be beneficial to the publishers.
You know, the “some people say” tactic was annoying when George Bush used it. It’s not less annoying when Peter David uses it. Outside of a few fanatic comment drive-bys, most of which are motivated more out of spite for PAD than anything else, I don’t see anybody actually arguing what PAD claims they’re arguing.
So, a few points.
1.) When John Byrne is on your side about anything, strongly consider the possibility that you are wrong about everything.
2.) Nobody serious is arguing that reading scans_daily was exactly analagous to flipping through comics in a comic book store from a legal standpoint. The point was introduced as metaphor, to explain that comics – rather uniquely as art forms go – work very well when you can check out an issue before you buy it, not least because of the cost associated with a comic book. (Seriously: $3.99 an issue now? I can finish most Big Two comics in less than ten minutes.)
3.) Similarly, nobody serious is suggesting that Marvel and DC just say “calloo callay, do what ye will with our property!” Even the scans_daily crowd were under the impression (incorrectly, but still) that what they were doing qualified as fair use since they were using the scans for the purpose of discussion and had set (ultimately insufficient, but still) rules to keep their use what they believed (erroneously) to be reasonable; this was not, at heart, a community founded on the belief that breaking the law and/or stealing is fun and good.
4.) That PAD chooses to engage these strawman arguments is just kind of sad. It reminds me of why I hated Bill Maher’s film Religulous so much: there are perfectly good arguments to be made against religion, but Maher didn’t engage serious religious philosophers, the ones who can knock you back on their ass with their thinking. No, he decided to debate a guy dressed up as Jesus in a religious theme park, because he felt it made him look smarter.
5.) I and the other people pointing this sort of thing out aren’t the assholes who sent PAD’s wide hate mail, so stop tarring us all with the same brush.
And finally:
These fans have judged, on the publishers’ behalf, how the publishers’ property should be disseminated and distributed and marketed. And if the publishers don’t agree with it, then they are somehow uncool or evil or, at the very least, not current with the 21st Century.
I really wish PAD would stop taking personal offense when people point out that the Big Two’s business model as regards publishing is outdated and in need of recognizing the distribution power of the Internet. It’s 2008 2009; music and movie and television have all found ways to use the net to distribute more efficiently. This isn’t controversial and pointing that out isn’t mockery – at least, not until Peter David decides to act like a chump about it, because that retroactively turns it into mockery.
Top comment: When you realize that Peter David is trying to become the next Harlan Ellison, things make a helluva lot more sense.
But what do I know? Ants aren’t allowed to condescend to eagles. — Mister Terrific
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55 users responded in this post
Technically, isn’t it 2009? The whole thing is silly anyway.
I’m just glad I gave up on all the X-Books back in 2001.
The saddest part is that Scans_Daily was the only place that encouraged me to pick and buy good comics that weren’t previewed in “serious” comic sites. Fuckers. Now I’ll have to buy less and less comics. T____T
I wish Marvel and DC would, at the very least, start an iTunes type model with a per issue cost of .25 cents or so because I like comics but I literally can no longer afford them if I wish to ensure a roof over my family’s head and food on our plates nor do I have room for them in my new (smaller) apartment. At least I could manage to read some issues if I could read them on my computer, especially since I don’t like downloading off of BitTorrent.
However, should I change my mind about the latter, where’s a good site for things like that?
Just for the record and in case anybody was wondering, I’m not either. I mean, I’ve made no secret of how I view the man, but there’s some lines that shouldn’t be crossed. As far as I know, his wife hasn’t done anything aside from exhibiting questionable taste in men. Based on the occasional fill-in post she made on his blog sometimes, I have a really hard time imagining her doing anything nasty or rude. She struck me as a pretty nice person, so I cannot see any justification for anybody targeting her.
I’m not sending him death threats or making drive-by posts with “DIAF” or whatever in them, nothing like that. The people who are doing that aren’t helping. They’re just reinforcing his opinion that comics fans are assholes, also reinforcing his victim complex, and when this is all over he is probably going to act even worse towards fans on the internet as a result. Because he *does* often tar people with the same brush.
I’ve got reasons for not going there and posting. First is that I said I intended never to post there again back in January, and while I wouldn’t be breaking the letter of my word I’d certainly be breaking the spirit. Second, I can’t stand the guy and I like to avoid things I can’t stand. Third, even if I didn’t try to avoid things I couldn’t stand, those things would still really piss me off and in the heat of the moment I’d probably say something either stupid or excessive or both. There’s some precedent there.
I would honestly like to just forget he exists, but right now he’s pretty difficult to ignore.
How about a renting model for comics? If it works for movies, TV series and games, why can’t we make it work?
You could use in-store renting (sit down and read it, return when you are done)for a cheap prize, or take-home renting (like with movies) for a slightly higher price. And with the option to buy it after renting.
“However, should I change my mind about the latter, where’s a good site for things like that?”
Ha!
The flip side to Peter David’s argument is that while “some say” that Scans_Daily and other online services ultimately boost sales, there are a lot of people who just don’t way to pay money for content.
I agree that comics publishers should find a web model that enables them to make money (and garner interest) from digitized content, but I think there’s a lot of overstatement as to how many people would support that (i.e. by paying for it.) I’d be curious to know how Marvel’s Digital Comics Unlimited is doing.
Should they try to long-tail their old stuff that people would like to read but may not want to shell out real money for? Sure. I think more preview issues to accompany TPB releases would be good too.
But Peter David makes his living from doing these comics, and, as he’s doing “for hire” work, he probably has very little say in how they’re marketed. Maybe sales will go down noticeably as a result of Scans_daily being shuttered. But I doubt it. It seems the echo chamber of a small community is working in full force here.
there are a lot of people who just don’t way to pay money for content.
Yeah. And they’re on fucking bittorrent. And they’re still there. And getting rid of scans_daily won’t get them to disappear or stop.
Maybe sales will go down noticeably as a result of Scans_daily being shuttered.
Last time MGK posted the sales for X-Factor, it sure didn’t look like scans_daily was hurting them. And then there’s the whole crappy economy . . . but it’s easier for PAD to blame the internet I guess.
But Peter David makes his living from doing these comics
And alienating the niche audience of a niche product can’t help him. He could, so easily, not seem like an asshole but instead this guy who’s just out to protect his livelihood if he’d moderate his language like MGK suggests – as it stands now, if you’ve EVER looked at a scan online, PAD thinks you’re a pirate swinging by and grabbing food out of his mouth while shouting “HOT DAMN I’M BREAKING THE LAW FOR IT’S OWN SAKE, BECAUSE I LOOK AT SCANS ON THE INTERNET! FUCK YOU, CREATORS, I’M A SUPER-ENTITLED ASSHOLE WHO WANTS TO SEE YOU DIE, AND EVERYONE ON THE INTERNET IS JUST LIKE ME!”
I don’t have anything substantial to add, but I’ll just note that most Big Two comics are still $2.99 (including X Factor). I know that Marvel are upping the price on some of the bigger selling books (New Avengers, for example) but DC are sticking at the current price as far as I know.
“Outside of a few fanatic comment drive-by”
A few? Go through the blog and start counting the posts. “A few” won’t cover it.
“Now I’ll have to buy less and less comics. T____T”
Why? Because you’re too lazy to use this thing in front of you called the internet to search out other sites?
I just saw Religulous last night, so I’m going to go off-topic here and explain why else I thought that movie sucked. In addition to arguing with morons and psychos instead of people who might actually know something, he didn’t ask any fucking questions. He started every “interview” with “Tell me why you’re not totally wrong about everything you believe?” and then just made fun of whatever they said after that. I should have seen it coming, because that’s how he handles his show, but the previews made it look like there might be hope for this piece of shit. It makes his Academy Award Show whining seem even more bitchy than it already did.
Karellan: That’s how most Atheists argue in favor of it nowadays. Rather than debating theologians who might be able to actually put forward a defense of religion, they mostly just go find some devout nutjob to point at and say “this is all religion!”
Andrew W., I agree with each of your points (well, I think there’s some straw man in the last one, but whatever. Peter David is doing some strawman stuff himself).
Still, a common argument supporting Scans_daily and similar resources is that they boost interest in comics and creators, thus leading to an increase in sales. I’m skeptical that the Peter David/Scans_daily imbroglio will have any impact on the sales on his comics at all. (That’s just my humble opinion, but I think the purported “influence and outrage” of this community will have a negligible impact on the balance sheet.)
People are arguing that Peter David is misguided in all of this because he’s somehow shot himself in the foot by alienating his core customers. I haven’t seen any evidence that the Scans_daily community has any impact on comics sales.
As to the larger issue of how Marvel, DC, etc. should use the web to market their content, well, it’s their content. They may be misguided, and fans may tune them out as a result, but it’s their call to make. They don’t owe the Scans_daily community anything.
And why wouldn’t they want to create a preview community through their websites instead? Why would you outsource those eyes and influence?
Because independent media is better at reaching out to new readers than they are.
Sad, but true.
“Because independent media is better at reaching out to new readers than they are.
Sad, but true.”
Yeah, you’re probably right. But I’m sure they want to try to keep the audience (and the buzz) in-house, which probably motivates some of these decisions.
Maybe they can poach the Scans_daily crew (or some of the Comics Pants crew or Chris’ Invincible Super Blog..or you).
Scans Daily wasn’t just about new comics. It was about the crack, the funny, the old, the rude, the crack, Robin love, the crack, super dickery and in case I forget to mention it the crack.
“Why? Because you’re too lazy to use this thing in front of you called the internet to search out other sites?”
lol, no, because usually other sites’ opinions differ waaaay much from the kind of stories I like. So, if I read a few pages of the comic online, I can decide if those comics are worth spending my hard-earned buckos on. Besides previews on other sites are like tinyyyyyyy… so yeah, not lazy, just pennywise.
You know, I thought Religulous was a comedy? I mean, if anyone saw that movie expecting anything “serious” or “intellectual” then I would advise a few hours of serious self-examination.
Against my better judgment, when somebody linked to his post on CBR I did click on it and read it. Predictably, I got angry. I wouldn’t tell you this if I didn’t have a quote to go with it, so here you go:
Really? He’s honestly claiming that one thing has to do with the other?
Marvel declared bankruptcy before Scans Daily even existed. A company like that can fail on its own just fine, regardless of what’s posted online.
I sincerely doubt that declining sales had anything to do with the site. Maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with comics being not just readable in part but downloadable in their entirety elsewhere. But to blame it all on Scans Daily? Idiotic.
Sorry for the double post. I’ve got an unfortunate habit of thinking of something I should’ve put in the first post very shortly after posting it, and this happens a lot.
Anyway, the logic here is like what Lisa described in the Simpsons episode where Apu is in danger of being deported. You know, about how she could claim that a rock keeps away tigers because there aren’t any tigers anywhere near the rock.
Peter David can claim that since comic sales have declined while Scans Daily has been around, Scans Daily is causing sales to drop. It’s specious reasoning. I could counter that by claiming that since Marvel hasn’t gone bankrupt while Scans Daily has been around, Scans Daily prevents Marvel from going bankrupt.
Neither is true, and that should be obvious to anybody.
Rob Brown, I read that quote the opposite of how you’re reading it.
David isn’t saying that Scans_daily hurt sales, exactly. Instead, in saying that “golden geese aren’t what they used to be,” he seems to be claiming that there’s no positive sales impact associated with Scans_daily and its community.
A “pro-Scans” argument is that it was a great outlet to expose people to new comics and comics they wouldn’t read otherwise. He’s saying that “golden goose” effect was never reflected in sales.
The subject has hit the AV Club, which directed me to the following Comics Reporter post, which I thought was interesting:
“One thing does interest me, though, and I’d like to make a request. Can we — and by “we” I mean all of humanity — dump the argument whereby the use of someone’s else stuff is justified by some nebulous future material gain assigned to this item? First of all, it’s much too vague an argument for serious consideration. The evidence is at best anecdotal and almost certainly skewed in favor of testimony by those advocating the practice. Second, it’s almost always accompanied by a great deal of verbal bullying of any skeptics, in terms that stray far away from the heart of the issue. Third and most importantly, it’s beside the point. Creators should have the right to control their works even if the person who wants to usurp that right means no real harm, thinks they know better, actually knows better, supported that creator in the past, or whatever. If you want to support a creator, embrace with seriousness the actions they’ve taken or declined to take when it comes to on-line iterations of their work.”
Hmm. Yes, I guess he could’ve meant it that way. That would be a lot less stupid.
Olly, it’s just as possible that SD is preventing sales from decreasing more steeply – the logic is specious all around – it doesn’t prove shit no matter how he spins it
True, but it’s his comic (or Marvel’s, really).
Not sure anyone disagrees with that. He’s in the right on this shitstorm, mostly. Someone from the previous post quoted Jeffrey “The Dude” Lebowski: “You’re not wrong, you’re just an asshole”.
True, but it’s his comic (or Marvel’s, really).
True, but he’s the one who seems incapable of shutting up about it.
Chris, a correction – our official position never made reference to fair use at all – it was actually more like, “Hey, the powers that be know we’re here and they haven’t kicked our asses yet – let’s not piss ’em off!”
I’m not going to say much more about this because Comixmix has asked for an interview (?!) which which has some questions about our views on fair use and I might as well say it there, but I thought I’d come here and mention that.
– s_d mod one of three
re: Strawmen and taking things personally.
So, you’re new to Peter David arguments.
For one of the most intelligent and accomplished writers in the field today, he’s surprisingly petulant.
I haven’t seen his response, but I’d wager he’s dismissive of you for using a screen name. He slammed and straw manned me in a CBG column years back with the same tactic (wish I could recall the topic). Particularly annoying as we’d interacted for years in several online communities since the early net days.
You’d never know he was one of the pros who’s been online the longest.
re: Trying leads to buying. I can point to CD’s in my collection that I got cuz I liked songs I got on Napster (yes, the real Napster). Doesn’t mean I wasn’t stealing the songs. And even if it lead me to buy the music, there’s a 100 people who just want to get it for free.
Go to CBR’s forums. In every review thread there’s 10 posts following the review wanting
scans of all the big moments.
It’s not about wanting to sample…it’s about not wanting to pay and EVERY argument to the contrary is just a lie to convince yourself you’re the good guy.
re: Religulous – I enjoyed it, but you’re points are completely accurate and are why, as enjoyable as I found parts of the film, it’s no way an award level documentary.
A friend mentioned that he thinks the ultimate cause of all of this is that S_D got too brazen. I generally agree.
“That’s how most Atheists argue in favor of it nowadays.”
I wasn’t aware you *knew* most atheists. You sure as hell don’t know me. Most atheists I know* would rather forcibly remove their sexual organs with a back hoe than argue religion.
*and I know a *lot*. We tend to group together out of self preservation because assholes on the internet like make generalized, bigoted statements about us.
“Some people are claiming that Marvel and DC and other major publishers should embrace the concept of having anybody, anytime, do whatever the hell they want with the publishers’ property because the fans have decided that it’s going to be beneficial to the publishers.”
Okay, I admit, I haven’t really been following this, as I haven’t felt I had much stake in any of it, but only up until now.
Because: “publishers’ property”?
I’ll be the first to admit I don’t know much about law, but do publishers even have property? So far as I understood (which might, admittedly, be rather limited), publishers don’t pay for content; they pay for license to publish and distribute content. Doesn’t copyright nearly always reside with the creator? Isn’t that why authors can sell hardcover rights to one guy, paperback to another, audio to a third, and digital to a fourth? In addition, isn’t it also why a Canadian publisher can’t pay an American publisher for a book; the Canadian publisher has to go to the creator (or, more likely: the creator’s agent)? Scans don’t affect publisher’s “property”; they might affect publisher’s rights to creator’s properties, but that isn’t exactly the same thing.
Any time I see creators making this argument, I feel like they’re on the wrong side. The RIAA and the MPAA (to extend this argument to downloading/pirating, which isn’t really what scans are, so: sorry) aren’t concerned about artists’ rights; they’re concerned about money, because they’re the ones losing money on it, to a greater extent than creators, who generally aren’t favored in contracts, anyway. I can’t imagine what Peter David thinks he’s accomplishing, considering that the companies have probably screwed him harder than scans ever might: “Here, you do all the creative work, on characters to whom we own the rights, and all that work becomes our intellectual property–”
Oh. Erm. I think I just realized I fucked up the property thing. Because comics work differently, obviously (now).
So wow. Peter David’s just getting screwed all around. No rights to anything he’s done in the past twenty years? Kinda sad.
I’m shutting up now.
When you realize that Peter David is trying to become the next Harlan Ellison, things make a helluva lot more sense.
But what do I know? Ants aren’t allowed to condescend to eagles.
(God, I love that line…)
This honestly only brings me back to the question I was left wondering after Napster, and after MGK’s own exile from LJ, and many other such incidents…
The way the law is currently set up is pretty clear. S_D was not within its rights to post those scans. That’s not really up for debate — that’s fact.
But is the law on copyright as it stands ethical? At which point has something passed beyond belonging to a specific person or corporation and started becoming part of the cultural makeup? I don’t think that the current laws really reflect that.
Persia said:
“True, but he’s the one who seems incapable of shutting up about it.”
525 comments on his initial post, 105 on his follow-up post, 156 on someone else’s post about it on “Comics Should Be Good”, 87 and 34 on MGK’s post about it here, and it’s Peter David who’s incapable of shutting up about it?
It really does take two to argue. Or, in this case, several thousand. 🙂
“525 comments on his initial post, 105 on his follow-up post, 156 on someone else’s post about it on “Comics Should Be Good”, 87 and 34 on MGK’s post about it here, and it’s Peter David who’s incapable of shutting up about it?
It really does take two to argue. Or, in this case, several thousand.”
And there are plenty of post there from PAD himself. In fact, this is the most I’ve ever sen him respond to one of his own blog entries. At first it seemed like he was going to respond to each post! His regulars are also capable of wanking up a storm on even the most mundane of topics — you don’t think some of those are people defending him? It’s his blog, and of course he has fans there who want to defend him, so this isn’t exactly a dogpile here.
In the comments at his blog I mean. Bleh. I don’t doubt things are getting nasty in email, on message boards, etc.
you know comic book fans and comic book writers are the exact same sort of people.
We and they are both the types who are willing to cut off our noses to spite are faces. These issues currently are not going to end well for anyone.
“It’s not about wanting to sample…it’s about not wanting to pay and EVERY argument to the contrary is just a lie to convince yourself you’re the good guy.”
Well crap, I’m glad you cleared that up for us. If you’ll excuse me I have to go tell the owner of my local comic book shop that I didn’t in fact come back after several years of not buying comics and spend several hundred bucks on trades over the last 15 months because of my reading on S_D. I’m sure he’ll want to correct the error in his book keeping.
I for one don’t hate the man, I just wish he’d, for lack of a better phrase, MOVE THE FUCK ON ALREADY.
I’m sure that the general populace of S_D, the good ones, won’t bug him again. There’s always a few dumbasses in the flock, though, but they’re not representative of most of us.
If you’ll excuse me I have to go tell the owner of my local comic book shop that I didn’t in fact come back after several years of not buying comics and spend several hundred bucks on trades over the last 15 months because of my reading on S_D.
That’s almost exactly my experience as well*. Though statements to that effect remain anecdotal and statistically irrelevant, I’ve been really happy to be buying comics for the last few years.
* pre-s_d, the torrents used to be my barometer. They’ve fallen into disuse, and not for lack of sources.
PAD was using his wife’s lj username to talk to S_D. That was the name listed on the infamous screencap. People probably thought they were yelling at PAD.
You should correct your spelling! No lady likes to be referred to as a ‘wide’.
I recently paid for a years subscription to Marvel Digital Comics. It was only $60 ($5 if paid by the month) and worth the money, IMHO. Imagine if all those Scans_Daily scans had the whole issues! The most annoying thing was that I could take no screencaps or scans, and the mechanism for linking was only for email. It was terribly frustrating when I wanted to share my thoughts on it with somebody. Without a reference, I could only geek it with issue numbers. I visited the forum there, so I could maybe geek with other paid users but it wasn’t very user-friendly and I’m a bit of a Luddite.
It would be nice if we could get something like the personal blogs in Comicsblog with the ability to link the digital comics parts we wanted to talk about, with the caveat that only paid users could actually see the pictures. The whole S_D crowd would probably move in, and start paying each others subscriptions, like used to happen at Livejournal.
I recently paid for a years subscription to Marvel Digital Comics. It was only $60 ($5 if paid by the month) and worth the money, IMHO. Imagine if all those Scans_Daily scans had the whole issues!
@Badficwriter:
Given that, while Marvel was certainly popular on S_D, its not the ONLY comic book company that had its books routinely posted Marvel’s online “vault” isn’t really that useful as a legal, paid for replacement. It being standard for a comics company or their publisher to offer ways to download to customers for a nominal charge (the iTunes type thing) would be a more useful and legal alternative to piracy. Even piracy lite like S_D was…
[…] Brigid Alverson, Johanna Draper Carlson, Glenn Haumann, Tom Spurgeon, Christopher Bird (one, two — both getting my vote as the most insightful comments on the subject, not least of all […]
Whiske said:
“And there are plenty of post there from PAD himself. In fact, this is the most I’ve ever sen him respond to one of his own blog entries. At first it seemed like he was going to respond to each post! His regulars are also capable of wanking up a storm on even the most mundane of topics — you don’t think some of those are people defending him? It’s his blog, and of course he has fans there who want to defend him, so this isn’t exactly a dogpile here.”
Oh, I’m not saying that all the “thousands” are people attacking Peter David. I’m just pointing out that in any argument involving thousands of people taking both sides, the idea that you can point to any specific one of them and say, “He’s not moving on! That’s why this is dragging out!” is absurd.
No accusations of dogpiling were intended.
If he hadn’t made the initial post, those people wouldn’t have commented. Same with the followup post. The “Comics Should Be Good” and MGK posts are out of his control, of course, but those were made in response to the shutdown of s_d, which people were obviously going to talk about because it’s kind of important.
I’m just chucking in my two pennyworth on this one:
I read scans_daily fairly often, and occasionally contributed to the discussions there. It convinced me to buy very few comicbooks, so it didnt have a huge impact on the circulation of any comic from me. On the other hand it convinced me to buy a hell of a lot of trades! After all, if I saw something posted that I liked I was already home from buying my own comics, and I’m not going to go back to the shop for one book. On the other hand, I will remember that I read half an issue of something and enjoyed it when it comes to buying TPBs!
So without scans daily I personally would probably not have bought my Astro City trades, my PS 238 trades, Thunderbolts, Planet Hulk, Y: The last man, the JSA liberty files, Doctor 13, Aztek and I dont even know how many more. Those are just off the top of my head. Hell, the number of posts that would follow anything interesting that said some variation of “Wow, this is awesome… Is it in trade?” was impressive. Oh, actually when I think about it, the reason I started buying the Incredible Hercules issues was because I had enjoyed the Herc bits of World War Hulk, so when I saw that the hulk comic was switching to Herc I thought “Why not?”.
Which brings me to the other useful thing for me that actually probably DID keep me as a consumer for some of my comics. The big summer crossovers. I dropped Civil war after 2 issues, didnt buy any of secret invasion, final crisis made it to maybe issue 4 before being dropped. I wasnt enjoying them and I’m not going to shell out for something I’m not enjoying. But these comics intersected to greater or lesser extents with comics that I DID enjoy. If I hadnt read scans dailys precis of some of these events I would have dropped the comics that tied into it because they were continuing a story I didnt know.
The other thing I want to mention is the false idea that any person who read scans_daily and didnt ever buy a comic was a lost sale. Rubbish. I’m sure there were more than a few people who read a story they would have bought on the internet then didnt buy it (though I’d point out that I think they are more likely to go to bittorrent/newsgroups to get the whole issue rather than half an issue on livejournal). Whether they are balanced by the people who buy things they wouldnt otherwise no-one can say. But there are a lot of people (myself included) who are in the middle. I read a load of stuff I didnt buy on scans_daily, and yet I am still not a lost sale. I’ll explain:
There was no way I was going to buy an issue of (for example) Bendis’ Mighty Avengers. Didnt like the writing, didnt particularly like the characters, it span out of Civil War which I hated, I wasnt going to buy it. On the other hand, if I was bored and online, and saw someone had posted some Mighty Avengers, I might have a quick look. Whether scans daily existed or not made no difference to me not buying that comic. So while there are a lot of people who “Just want it for free” a lot of those people will not pay for it whatever you do. With a virtual product (such as Mp3s or a comic scan) it actually doesnt lose marvel any money for that person to read that scan, as they dont want it that badly, they just have idle curiousity or are bored.
As for whether PAD has shot himself in the foot, I know I personally will think twice before picking up a new comic with his name on it. I dont have a limitless supply of money for comics and I’d rather spend that on a writer who I dont have to mentally seperate the writing from the personality. I’ll echo a lot of others here; Technically, legally and arguably morally, PAD was in the right. But the way he goes about arguing it? He comes off as an unbelievable douche…
Pachango: Now I’ll have to buy less and less comics. T____T
Dave: Why? Because you’re too lazy to use this thing in front of you called the internet to search out other sites?
There is a difference between sloth and effective time management.
The whole thing is misdirected rage at bittorenters. Sure Peter David can’t do shit about them, but he can throw Scans Daily up against a wall, and don’ it feel good?
It’s like police making up imaginary laws for the sake of harassing anybody walking around a public place taking pictures with their huge-ass, conspicuous $500+ camera, when what they’re really angry about is that everyone and their mother has a cell cam so there’s no chance of covering up public police brutality.
Remember, fans: creators who point out copyright infringement are obvious assholes. It’s not that those creators don’t have rights, it’s just that fans should heap scorn on them if they ever try to use those rights.
As to taking a very strong line on rights…jeez, you know, every guy with a guitar outside a liquor store knows you’ve got to play “Rocket Man” a few times a day if you want to make a decent buck. Eh? And that totally infringes Elton John’s rights, because he’s not getting paid for it. But about THAT, we think “big whoop”, and rightly so in my opinion.
Also, the idea that we should cease talking about future benefits accruing from unauthorized use…I don’t see why we should do that, at all. We understand these same future benefits to accrue from authorized use, don’t we? People do get paid when their song’s played on the radio (mostly), but the benefit of radio play to the artist is overwhelmingly to do with radio functioning as a PR channel. This stuff’s all getting too damn moral, for me…I don’t give a damn if Peter David complained about something that he’s got every right to complain about, and I wouldn’t even complain if Elton John wanted a piece of every time somebody gets money for playing Rocket Man or Crocodile Rock, either…it probably adds up to a pretty massive pile, so I wouldn’t lecture him about it! But that doesn’t mean I’m in the market for a big speech about Right and Wrong myself. These moral pronouncements are so loaded with certainty you would think we had some kind of magical, idealized marketing info and bill-collecting apparatus in place with which to uphold them…but we don’t, and we never will. There are lots of grey areas and fuzzy boundaries, not to mention incompletely-worked-out principles, at play in these fields…or at any rate I assume there must be, because I would NOT call the busker a thief. Would you?
“So wow. Peter David’s just getting screwed all around. No rights to anything he’s done in the past twenty years? Kinda sad.”
Not quite. PAD has written both original novels (Sir Apropos of Nothing, for example) and creator-owned comic books (Fallen Angel). Not entirely sure where the licenced novels (he does a lot of Star Trek, and also does the novelisations of Marvel movies) fit in here.
Comics have always had the rights reside with the publishers (except in special cases), so he knew what he was getting into with that anyway.
Comics have always had the rights reside with the publishers (except in special cases), so he knew what he was getting into with that anyway
So by “special cases” do you mean most of Image’s line from its founding? Or do you mean the “special” like Marvel’s old Epic line?
That’s the saddest part of this whole kerfuffle: that PAD has made himself into the villain du jour for a huge portion of comix fandom for the sake of defending er copyrights and trademarks he doesn’t actually own himself…
Everyone’s tired of this whole mess, but this bit of data is worth passing along: LJ Abuse is now contacting individual bloggers about the complaint against their posts on scans_daily. The complainer is Gregory Pan from Legal Affairs at Marvel. The timeline seems to put his complaints as occuring soon after PAD’s kerfluffle about X-Factor.
The one or two people out there still thinking it might have been Photobucket can breathe a sigh of relief.