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Where it went wrong is when the "big guys" were allowed to pull tricks like patent-slamming and overwhelm the patent office.

That and when the rules were changed so that a corporation, rather than an individual, got to own the patent.

Absurd patents have always existed, but now they're allowed to destroy industries - and not just the software patent. When Wizards of the Coast was granted a patent on card games, for instance, the patent NEVER should have been granted. It's a motherfucking joke.

A copy of Mr. Hoyle's Games Complete, circa THE YEAR 1750, offers every single mechanic WotC's patent describes that could possibly be counted as a nontrivial change. The idea of a "trading card game" in the patent ought to have been invalidated by, to name one early example "The Base Ball Card Game", produced by the Allegheny Card Company in the year 1904.

But some dope-on-a-rope in the patent office, overworked and underbrained, granted the patent to WotC. Sheer lunacy but the patent-slammers prevailed yet again.

And before you say "well but you could sue to have the patent invalidated" - NO. The point is that crap like this should never be granted. Most of the competing CCG-makers simply folded up shop after WotC started demanding royalties. It took until years later for Wizkids to finally offer a lawsuit to try to invalidate WotC's patent, and then it got settled without judgement, meaning WotC can still bully and make asses of themselves on an obviously invalid patent.

I disagree with your disagreement. If that were true, then why are DVD sales dramatically declining?

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/190848-DVD_Backend_Is_Dwindling.php?
http://www.icv2.com/articles/home/11879.html
http://www.nypost.com/seven/12042007/business/dvd_isaster_sales_806649.htm
http://www.cinemablend.com/television/Sales-Decline-Portend-Possible-DVD-Doomsday-2110.html

Meanwhile, digital sales of video content are on the rise:

http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS148561+29-Aug-2008+BW20080829
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/1621/125/

I'll grant you that online sales of video content is still a developing market. But it is a market that is clearly putting a dent into the traditional distribution model of DVDs.

I think your confusion stems from far too narrow a view of the market. You're looking at Bluray discs and noting that they are failing to dislodge DVDs en masse. The reason is that Bluray is not the future. The market is going a radically different direction with its technology.

No, the Comics Code Authority sucked. The reason why it sucked is not just because it censored adult content.

Put it this way, do you consider Mickey Mouse and Scooby Doo adult content? No? But they have ghosts, witches, werewolves, zombies and vampires in them. Uh-oh, they broke the comics code.

The comics code went completely overboard, specifically to put E. C. out of business. The code wasn't about censoring adult content (comics had been limited in what they could legally show before the code, although E. C. always pushed the limits of 50's censorship, they were censored even before the code) but about eliminating whole genres of comics. All you had left were superheroes and funny animals when they were done, and Archie's I guess (I've always thought Archie's were a bit weird).

Of course, by the time you were reading comics, the code had already been revised a bit. I've no doubt that although the damage had already been done, you were reading comics after they decided that it was OK to include ghosts and vampires again, unless you are very old. (Hey, E. C. had been reduced to one comic book, which they had to change to a magazine format, Mad Magazine. They had effectively been forced out of the comic market, so changing the code to allow Frankensteins was meaningless at that point.)

The thing to remember about the code is that they wanted to put comics completely out of business, and they more or less suceeded. Sure, the broken, ghettoized American comic model still manages to put out the occaisional good comic nowadays. Heck, some people might even read them that aren't already comic book fans. Maybe. (not bloody likely) Of course, it's mostly love in the wards even today, and they are getting creamed by manga.

It's sad that games have to be cut for the American market while European countries allow them to be kept intact. But that won't change even if we were to ignore the Constitution and allow them to be legally restricted from minors.

I think the problem here is like a story I once read. These scientists open a portal to an alternate universe that looks like a quaint Victorian version of our universe and they see a cute little Victorian family sitting down to a picnic. One guy thinks it looks so great that he jumps through. Well, the cute little Victorian family proceeds to gruesomely tear him apart and eat him.

I think Europeans looking at our country think that it is somehow analogous to their countries. They see people who basically look European, and speak English, and they think, "Oh, America is something like England." But no, much of our country is filled with ravening, insane monsters. Legally restricting games from minors would be the first step in pressuring stores to remove them from the shelves. Even though their contents was no worse than, say, The Girl Next Door or an episode of I Clauvdivs. Understand, there are parts of our country where contraceptives aren't stocked in pharmacies. There are types of contraceptives that are hard to get in the US.

Just ask Jesus Castillo, whether he could sell and adult comic book, from a roped off part of his store, to an adult without consequences.

Sorry for jumping on you about the Constitution thing, though I stand by what I said. Hey, you try living in here for a few years... it's the kind of thing you really have to experience for yourself over a period of time....

o/~ We'll hang Burt Cates to a sour apple tree, our

Lord is marching on! Glory, glory, hallelujah o/~

It was only recently confirmed that Warren Ellis is writing a Castlevania animated film.

Did the owners sell the live-action and animated movie rights to different people at the same time?

From the sound of things, the Simpsons has been renewed till at least 2008. http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/8403.html

Actually, Nintendo took back the card making rights from WotC about a couple of years ago right after the invent of Pokemon-e. (here's a link to a news story)

Agreed -- both on the suckitude of this public Zonk-giving-head-to-PA-fest and the unparalled awesomeness of Bill Watterson. While I join you in hoping for undiscovered Calvin & Hobbes, in the meantime, we can take comfort in Andres McMeel's plans to relase a COMPLETE collection of C&H (a la The Far Side) in '05!

<Cartmen> sweeeet </Cartmen>

-Bill

Doh, though of one other reason a split second after I hit submit.

If you're cynical about large corporations the reason Marvel's suing is actually quite clear.

Marvel's own MMORPG would be in direct competition with City of Heroes. What better way to help their baby along than to get rid of CoH?

For all I know, PowerPuff Girls or Samurai Jack or any of the other distinctly American style animated series are great.

Ahem- both of those have a heavily anime-derived style.

PowerPuff Girls especially was based on the anime maxim "Big Eyes, Small Mouth" and taking it beyond all sensibility.

There's a Manga version of the Marvel universe. I saw it in a bookstore the other day.

Familiy Guy - is back in production of Fox! Yay! (airing early 2005)
Futurama - isn't. Booo! The article says the production costs are too high. (...but stay tuned)

http://www.icv2.com/articles/news/3341.html

Dreamworks To Distribute Ghost In The Shell II
In Spring Of 2004

August 14, 2003
Screen Daily reports that Dreamworks SKG has formed a specialty distribution arm, Go Fish, which will distribute its first film, Satoshi Kon's Millenium Actress, on September 12 in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and San Francisco. Dreamworks set up Go Fish just after Warner Bros. announced the launch of Warner Independent Pictures, which will release films from independents and small production companies. While Go Fish will undoubtedly release its share of indie films, the second film announced by Dreamworks was Ghost In The Shell II: Innocence, the follow-up to the extremely successful science fiction anime feature, Ghost In The Shell, which was directed by Mamoru Oshii and based on the manga series by Masamune Shirow (published in the U.S by Dark Horse). It should be interesting to see if Dreamworks primarily uses Go Fish to compete with Warners for indie films or to gain a beachhead for anime feature films in the rough and tumble arena of theatrical exhibition.

Ghost in the Shell II is in the final stages of production in Japan, and Go Fish plans to release the feature film late in the first half of 2004. Back in 1996 the original Ghost In the Shell film made a major impact in the U.S. and launched a plethora of successful tie-in products including posters, statues, art books, manga, and action figures. With a Ghost in the Shell TV series (see "Bandai Gets Ghost In the Shell TV Series") set to debut in the U.S. and the merchandising potential of a second Ghost In The Shell movie (see "New Ghost In The Shell Movie"), this property is poised to take off once again.

Oh, puh-leeze. He's not a writer. He "writes" balloons for silly little drawings, and occassionally whores out his name for some ghost writer on a book.

Two words: Hugo Award.

Two more: Nebula Award

The rule of thumb in the industry is that a film must make 3 times it's production cost at the box office TO BREAK EVEN. Now, 360 million is streching it - cost of promotion and prints for this film was probably about 60-80 million domestic, meaning that to break even was about 300-320 million (120 million budget x 2, + 60-80 million.)

Remember, the studios only collect about half of box office gross - the rest goes to the theatre chains. As a result, if Hulk made 130 million at the box office, the studios only got 65 million. With the costs of prints and advertising at about 60-80 million (probably a low figure) Hulk is losing about 115-135 million at this point (-120 cost + 65 box office to studio = 55 + 60-80 p&a).

Now, for the nit-pickers in the audience, true, if the studio and the distributor are one and the same, the studio gets to collect part of that 60 million prints and advertising, but the end result is that the Hulk needed to be a super-mega-blockbuster (along the lines of Titanic) to earn the cost back.

Break-even is the holy grail at the box office today - very few films surpass break even. Instead, the real money comes with cable, pay per view, syndication, and licensing/spin-offs. Get the movie to pay for itself at the box office, and use the great sales as advertising for DVD sales, etc.

The big problem for studios is that they need to make their money back faster - they need films that can open big for a few weekends, because there's no room for a film to build an audience anymore. The only way to open big is to make films with a built-in audience (ie, comic book properties, remakes, or TV spinoffs), or with big stars. As a consequence, they're locked into this death spiral of bigger films that need to make more and more money back in a shorter and shorter span.

There's even strategy for opening shitty movies - advertise the hell out of it to pack in as many people on the opening weekend before word gets out that it sucks. If you don't believe me, ask any marketing exec or producer in the business.

Oh, and one last thing. Remember how the Hulk is losing about $125 million right now? This is why you ask for a cut of GROSS profits, not NET profits. Anyone who was foolish enough to sign for a cut of the net is getting NOTHING right now. Someone who is in for a cut of the gross gets money, even if the studio hasn't made their money back yet. For example, on the HULK, Marvel had gross participation, so they still got money.

If I read the interview with the head of the CBLDF, however, it appears that the prosecution failed to do this:

The fund brought in three experts to testify on the merit of the medium, the merit of the work in question, and the community standards of Dallas while the state prosecutor brought in no experts and simply the arresting police officer...

And when the closing arguments were given, we went first and reminded the jury that the work was not proven to be Constitutionally obscene; that we have expert testimony that was not contradicted that explained the literary, artistic, and cultural value of the work in question; and without conflicting testimony they had to side with the experts.

-schussat

Recently, the US Supreme Court denied his appeal, with the notion that obscenity is a state-level affair, despite the First Amendment being a Federal law.

But the Supreme Court didn't actually say that, or anything of the kind. Read the linked article. Castillo thinks the Supreme Court refused to hear his case because Castillo thinks the Court thinks it's a question for the states. But the Court itself didn't say one word about why it refused to hear Castillo's case, so we have no way to know whether his belief about their reasons is an accurate belief or not. The Court gets asked to hear thousands of cases every year and actually hears fewer than a hundred of them. The Court generally doesn't offer any explanation of why it takes, or fails to take, any particular case -- and its order denying Castillo's petition says nothing about why they decided not to hear it.

Universal Vivendi has snapped up the rights to produce a game based on the Marvel universe.

Universal signs 10 year deal with Marvel

As we all know, tabletop gaming hasn't exactly been growing by leaps and bounds lately.

Ahem. Are you really sure about that?

Jack

They do jump over the important stuff to mention their favorites, don't they?

1990s: A whole lotta nothing going on. Uh huh. The obviously slept through 1992.

Could buy and sell Evangelion six times before corn flakes. It also deserves mention in the U.S. licensing portion of the article, since it was one of three shows that formed the basis for the current
success of anime in general.

Oh, and it did about ten figures in merchandising too.

Keeping in mind Stan Lee's recent troubles, the definition of 'profit' seems to be pretty flexible in Hollywood.

If he treats the "big guys" worse than he treated Gaiman... we might see a couple of another cases enter court as well.

I thought games weren't speech at all!

If games aren't speech, then there is no reason these "interative political cartoons" can't be censored.

And heck, why not censor political cartoons altogether? I mean, it's common sense that all cartoons are meant for children, right? Comic books too, since they're practially the same thing.

From there it's a short step to books, music, video, and anything else these pesky consumers invent.

And no, you can not ride the slippery slope when I'm done with it. :-P

Damn! the first link, here(1) tries to set 56 friggin cookies! That's just obscene!

Cuz that's the movie that Osamu Tezuka saw 80 times and decided he liked so much. Details