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David Miller
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Joined: 16 April 2004
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| Posted: 11 January 2013 at 6:44pm | IP Logged | 1
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It's more like an artist selling copyright and then reclaiming it years later. There's a law governing this so analogies aren't necessary. The question in Kirby's case is if his Marvel work qualified. The judge ruled the early Marvel stuff did not, but the Silver Surfer is a different animal.
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Clifford Boudreaux
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Joined: 19 July 2012
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| Posted: 11 January 2013 at 7:11pm | IP Logged | 2
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It's more like an artist selling copyright and then reclaiming it years later. There's a law governing this so analogies aren't necessary.
True, but many people seem to be a bit confused by exactly what these companies bought all those years ago. National Comics didn't buy Superman lock, stock, and barrel all those years ago. They bought a copyright and copyrights have an expiration date.
The new law honored the length of the original agreements. It merely changed the rules of what happened at the end of that agreement.
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Robert Bradley
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Joined: 20 September 2006
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| Posted: 11 January 2013 at 7:20pm | IP Logged | 3
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The Superman situation is unique in that it's well-known that Seigel & Shuster created the character and then shopped him around to publishers before coming to an agreement with National.
That's different than a writer or artist doing work for hire for a publisher - which is what Kirby, Ditko and the other creators in the '60s did..
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David Miller
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| Posted: 11 January 2013 at 8:07pm | IP Logged | 4
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Clifford makes a good point. If anyone changed the rules, it was Congress in 1978. If it weren't for their meddling, we could be looking forward to an IDW-published John Byrne Fantastic Four comic in 2014.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 5:58am | IP Logged | 5
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an amazing portrait of the King by Drew Friedman If it wasn't for the Kirby-esque background, I would not know that was supposed to be Jack.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 6:07am | IP Logged | 6
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Minimum wage is now, at the national level, $7.25 per hour. When I first entered the workplace it was $1.85 per hour. Should I now sue my former bosses for that extra $5.40 I didn't make back then?++ Did the work you did on your minimum wage job later net your company billions of dollars? Is filling a spot on an assembly line comparable to inventing the X-Men, drawing a monthly comic that's been collected and reprinted consistently for decades, building up a property into something that Hollywood executives feel would make a good movie or cartoon series? It's not an apples-to-apples comparison by any means, unless a minimum wage-earning employee invented the Big Mac or Coca-Cola or something equally enduring. The Big Mac was created by Jim Delligatti, operator of a McDonalds franchise in Uniontown, Pennsylvania. In his own words, "All I got was a plaque." Not spoken in bitterness, either. He reportedly "takes pride" in having invented such an iconic piece of Americana, absent financial rewards notwithstanding. (The "invention" of the Big Mac parallels Superman's in one important respect, too: it took the McDonald's corporation about 2 years to realize they had a "hit" on their hands.) Coca-Cola, like many comicbook characters, was born out of a collaborative effort between several people.
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Shawn Kane
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Joined: 04 November 2010
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 6:29am | IP Logged | 7
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From what I gather, Kirby's family want's Kirby recognized to the same extent as Stan Lee, which I think is more than fair. Also, I think they want what Stan Lee gets from his relationship from Marvel, retroactively, in place of what Kirby would be getting if he were still alive.
I agree with the first part (of course Marvel really doesn't acknowledge Stan much these days) but the second part is where I don't think Marvel has any responsibility. I've always thought that Stan's deal, and please correct me if I'm wrong, is that he's paid an annual sum and he has a pension along with his wife. With Jack being deceased and Roz receiving a pension until she died, it seems that Marvel would be paying money to people that had nothing to do with those creations outside of Jack being their father. If Jack were still living I could see where Marvel would have the opportunity to "do the right thing" and pay up but now I'm not so sure that's the case. I can understand the frustration that the Kirby family has but outside of more acknowledgement of Jack's contributions I can't see Marvel doing anything else.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 6:38am | IP Logged | 8
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As far as most civilians are concerned, comicbook characters all spring fully grown from Zeus' head. There's no "creative process" in characters like Superman or Spider-Man. They have simply "always" been around -- like Santa Claus or Paul Bunyan. (And how many people know that both those iconic figures began their lives, as we know them, as advertising icons?)This lack of awareness is underscored by the number of times I have been introduced at parties as "the guy who draws Spider-Man" (whether I happened to be doing so at the time, or not), to be greeted with a somewhat confused "You created Spider-Man?" Stan has managed to turn himself into a Cultural Icon, and more power to him, I say. The fact that Jack does not occupy a similar status in the minds of the general public comes mostly from that lack of awareness of how these things are creates, PLUS the fact that, in the minds of civilians, he would have been "just the artist". (Again, personal experience: people are impressed that I draw comics, but they're MORE impressed that I "write them too?!")
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Brian Miller
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 7:35am | IP Logged | 9
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Who say's they were "content"? *************** They signed the contracts, didn't they?
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Aaron Smith
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Joined: 06 September 2006
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 7:48am | IP Logged | 10
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like Santa Claus or Paul Bunyan. (And how many people know that both those iconic figures began their lives, as we know them, as advertising icons?)
***
I knew about Santa Claus, but that fact about Paul Bunyan is, it seems, my history lesson for today.
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Paul Greer
Byrne Robotics Security
Joined: 18 August 2004
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 8:00am | IP Logged | 11
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That portrait of Jack looks more like Nixon to me.
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Robert Bradley
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| Posted: 12 January 2013 at 8:20am | IP Logged | 12
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From what I gather, Kirby's family want's Kirby recognized to the same extent as Stan Lee, which I think is more than fair. Also, I think they want what Stan Lee gets from his relationship from Marvel, retroactively, in place of what Kirby would be getting if he were still alive.
The thing is - his relationship with Marvel wasn't the same as Stan Lee's. He was doing work-for-hire. Stan was not only a writer, he was the editor, and their public face. They figured he was as close to indispensable as the company had, so they paid him accordingly (and I think everyone would agree he's been compensated pretty well over the years).
Guys like Jack Kirby, Don Heck, Dick Ayers, Stan Goldberg, Wally Wood and Steve Ditko were all a major part of the process, but the company saw them as replaceable talent. And when you get down to it, that's what determines how well compensated you are. They felt that they could bring in experienced people like John Romita, John Buscema, Gene Colan, John Severin, Gil Kane, Marie Severin and Werner Roth and still get out a quality product. And they more or less did - it wasn't as innovative as the early 1960's work Marvel did, but it they were still doing good work.
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Topic Closed)
