digest #351

[Don Rosa]

From: Kriton Kyrimis <kyrimis at cti.gr>
> Or even, when he did that "Sun" story,
> what color socks was he wearing?
>>>Why would I not be surprised if Don answered this? :-)

I knew the answer, but I figured it wasn't worth mentioning.
I was wearing NO socks. I never wear socks at home.

From: "Luca Boschi" <cnotw at zen.it>
>>>> Not giving credit where credit is due will very likely continue
People who does it on regular schedule is/are LOUSY and BAD people not
deserving respect (nt mine, indeed). I'd like that someone can change this
bad trend and these thieves' behaviour.

I must be scanning these Digests too fast because I'm not sure what this is
about. But I'm guessing it refers to something like a Disney publisher
somewhere taking articles that appeared in a Gladstone or ZP issue and
using them without giving credit?
I agree with what you say in principal, but just to make sure this is not
thought of as being as heinous as you suggest... these publishers ARE
giving credit to the author of the article -- Walt Disney. Anything, and I
mean *anything* that appears inside a licensed Disney comic is the sole
property of the Di$ney Company and Disney "shall be deemed its author". I
wrote a whole series of articles about my "Lo$" for Gladstone for free just
as a favor to them and to please myself... but I later saw those articles
translated into other languages and I realized I had given all that effort
to a corporation who has deemed itself "the author" of my work, and those
other publishers have signed contracts that accept that fact and pay Disney
for the privilege to act on that fact. Yes, I agree that a publisher
*should* give credit and hire people who either recognize that moral
obligation or who can write new articles themselves, but to do so is
behavior above and beyond Disney's interpretation of the copyright law as
they have described it to their licensees. Using an article out of a Disney
comic without giving the original writer credit is bad, but not one iota as
bad as using the full story of a writer and artist who worked much longer
and harder and still get no credit for all that labor, and that also still
happens, though it's happening less and less often in an increasingly
"enlightened" Disney-licensee world. But it still happens -- they recently
published a handsome Polish hardback collection of my entire "Lo$" and the
only creator's name that appears anywhere in the entire book is "Marco
Rota". I had written his name in the book's frontpiece-artwork due to the
fact that I borrowed the pose from one of his drawings and wanted to give
him some sort of credit for that. I knew no one else would so I had to do
it in such a way that it could not be removed anywhere the art was used.
(But I guess I should have hidden my own name in there somewhere, as well?
Nah, it's not important...)
Anyway, when a Disney licensed publisher in Poland or Brutopia or somewhere
gives us writers and artists credit for our work, that should be considered
a really nice gesture, good for them. But when they don't, they can't be
cursed too much for simply following the letter of the rules that we who do
work for Disney publications are apparently accepting when we supply our
creations, however indirectly, to that corporation.
(This sort of discussion always reminds me of the time back in 1986-87 when
the Gladstone folks were writing an article about me to appear with "The
Son of the Sun" story -- they had planned to print some panels from my
"Captain Kentucky" and "Pertwillaby Papers" strips, but realized they
couldn't because Disney said that they owned *anything* that appeared
inside a Disney licensed comic. My reaction to that (since I had just moved
to a house in the country) was "So I want to send you a photo of a junked
truck in my back yard for you to publish. Then I can call Disney up and
tell them to come and get their damn wreck outta my yard.")

From: "Paolo Castagno" <p.castagno at libero.it>
>>>BTW, I'm also curious to see Beagle Boys origins in Rosa's story!!!

Oh, well, I will only briefly touch on it in the new story. I already told
the detailed "origin" of the BB (*my* version) in chapter 2 of the "Lo$"
back around 1992.