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Public Domain Superheroes?
SerpicoWasTaken writes "Here is an interesting article about a group of comic book heroes from the golden age that are in the public domain. Apparently, a bunch of golden age heroes were never copyrighted and just faded into obscurity. The article also contains a long discussion of copyright and the public domain. It is an interesting read for all those interested in the public domain." Update: 09/25 17:51 GMT by M : Link removed at the request of the site maintainers because it's killing their server. Update: 09/25 19:02 GMT by M : They've put the document on a static page instead of a cgi script. :)
That's gotta be a record!
Join the Free Software Foundation
"Power over water" is now in the public domain. It's mine! Fools! Ph35r my 3133t 4rmy of fish! You will never mod my down again! You will be destroyed! Hahahahahaha!
Carousel is a lie!
No-one's even had a chance to comment. Apparently, the massive weight of our impending presence has reverse causality (See top ten physic experiments).
I can't wait till CowBoyNeal fades into obscurity.
I guess we have to dibs these guys to settle any disputes now.
Need a superhero friend?
How about BONZI BUDDY?
Sorry, a Linux version is still in the works, but if you're using Windows, you must get it!
-SexyKellyOsbourne
Dang...that doesn't take long :(
Try this!
Able to stop servers in 5 comments!
I don't see a (c) on the Arseman. Does that mean we all own a bit of his arse?
OLPC Australia
Maybe there's a good reason for these to remain obscure.
"Look...in the sky! It's ChickenMan!"
"Guess that villain's leaving him a bit henpecked."
"He flies so smoothly...it's poultry in motion!"
Vos teneo officium eram periculosus ut vos recipero is.
(here's a hint: watching Cowboy Bebop in your jammies and eating a bowl of Shreddies is *not* "getting on with your life")
Here's a hint for you: There are web sites called cnn.com, bbc.co.uk, etc. There are also any number of web sites (particularly web logs) that do nothing BUT discuss these issues. They're just a click away.It's not like story is preventing you reading about or discussing those things if you so choose.
Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.
The characters who appeared in Tom Strong #11 and #12, including Pyroman, Miss Masque, The American Crusader, The Black Terror, the Fighting Yank, and Doc Strange (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Tom Strong himself). In the story, "Terror on Terra Obscura," Strong teamed up with Strange to rescue the heroes, who had been imprisoned by an alien of impossible power.
In the next story, Pyroman teams up with michael to fight the evil webserver hosting the newsarama bulletin board...
"I'd rather have a full bottle in front of me than a full frontal lobotomy"
linux superheroes.... although everytime I try compiling superman.c I get errors in krypton.h
Well, you're certainly welcome to discuss the atrocities of the world with your other personalities. Slashdot, however, is a TECHNOLOGY news and discussion site, not NATO or the UN.
/., I suggest reading something else.
If you/the rest of your personalities don't like what's posted on
Thousands of people dying? Guess what, that's been happening since before the age of recorded history. And if more people played video games maybe they'd find its a nice outlet for aggression. It certainly keeps me from beating the snot out of air-wasting morons such as yourself.
Moderators: Feel free to mod me however you want, I've got Karma to burn.
Cruising the internet on my TI-99/4A @ a whopping 300 baud!
Apparently, a bunch of golden age heroes were never copyrighted
I thought copyright was automatic. It doesn't need to be registered or anything, it just is.
To become public domain, the copyright must either expire, or be explicitly declared so by the copyright holder.
Since the site is so hosed it's not even funny. So they remain obsure.
-sigh-
Didn't I see this idiot post, almost word for word, a few weeks ago? If not, you're a big moron who repeats the same thing often.
Given that the characters in the article are public domain, is there any way to preserve the original intent of the character? I mean since they are public domain, one person could create a Black Terror that reinstates Nazi Germany. Another person create a Black Terror porno. If someone truly loved the character, how can the spirit of that character be preserved amid a landfill of junk?
Look at Batman. 60's TV show Batman is an abomination to me. Batman to me is supposed to be dark and gritty. The guy watched his parents gunned down as a child. That has to have some serious psychological effects. To see Adam West's gut hanging out over his utility belt while he, supposedly someone that had honed his body to the limits of human ability, punched out the joker's cronies with splahses of POW! and BLAMM!... Awful. But that was what the company was pushing at the time. Since then, DC has brought Batman back to what he should be. If Batman became public domain though, there could be a deluge of 60's Batman stories written by anybody and the original nature of the character would be completely lost. How do you preserve it?
psxndc
The emacs religion: to be saved, control excess.
I've always wondered who would win in a fight between Bonzi Buddy and Barney the Dinosaur. I hope they disembowel each other.
"I love you. You love me..."
Aaaargh!!! They're coming after me!!! Nooooo!
OLPC Australia
Bugger! /.-ed!
DISCLAIMER:I'm not really a GPL cheerleader (I avoid politics, really), just providing some fast food for thought.
Though a character's history would be really erratic with a whole bunch of writers and artists doing their bidding with a GPL'd comic book hero(ine), it would provide opportunities for comic writers and artists to have a go at a story with a character they might not normally have a chance to. And that would definitely provide some interesting spins.
/*drunk.. fix later*/
err, right. And you're here, why??
Maybe you don't realize that perhaps some of the
people here commenting on public domain super
heroes are taking a few minutes rest from some
of the following:
A)active military service
B)political protest movements
C)writing opensource code
D)working for a living
E)going to school
F)writing closedsource code
G)parenting
Seemingly inane activities often reduce stress
and increase productivity in other areas. I
would suggest you aren't productive and also
don't have much fun. Maybe you should take
a timeout in your room???
There has gotta be something seriously wrong with the whole internet when first post on slashdot complains about the site being slashdotted.
Ahh - My eye!
The doctor said I'm not supposed to get Slashdot in it!
He is all but disappered from the Linux scence
If they were created, they were copyrighted. Perhaps the copyrights were not registered, but that doesn't make them public domain. Perhaps the copyright owners are dead or defunct, or just don't care. Perhaps no one knows for sure who had the copyrights. And perhaps the copyright has expired.
Just don't say "they were never copyrighted" because that's just not true.
Its pretty easy to create a new public domain super hero - here goes!
/. should start a repository of public domain shite heros!
Captain Spooner - he's got big spoons instead of hands! His feet are normal though. He can scoop up loads of water, earth, wax, ANTHING and dump it on top of criminals!
The Masked Kitten - Some sexy bint who runs around in a mask. She is NOT catwoman, because she wears a mask and is called 'huni' by her side kick 'Sheba' - who is actually her boss though neither of them know it. They were independent crime fighters when they first met at night while Sheba was kicking in a gang members head. The Masked Kitten liked her style!
FatCowboy - less of a super hero than an anti-hero this dude just floats around farting at people and then taking their chocolate!
Maybe
Today that is true, but not back then. Today if you create it you own a copyright on it. Back then if you didn't take steps (I'm not sure what, but registration most likely) you had no copyright.
Please research your rants before issuing them. The law changed so that works published after 1978 do have automatic copyright. Works published before 1978 entered the public domain unless the author or creator registered them. See this page on BitLaw.
In other cartoon public domain news:
The first Mickey Mouse cartoons would have eventually lapsed into the public domain if it weren't for the Sonny Bono law.
And if you want a 'real' superheroes in the PD: the 1940s Superman cartoon shorts (produced by Max and Dave Fleischer, the guys who make the old time popeye cartoons) are also (apparently) in the public domain.
The most disconcerting thing about the old Superman cartoons is that one of the villians had the same voice as Popeye! Gave me the willies.
My father is a blogger.
This is exactly why it's dangerous that people believe everything was always the way it is today.
AT THE TIME, there was no automatic copyright.
Soon people will believe that it was always as it
is under the DMCA.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
One of my faves Captain Marvel - and his firesign friends, The Caped Madman, Rocket Jock, Spy Swatter, Sleeve Coat, and Spike in J-Men Forever!
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Why is the site about golden age superheros down? Golden age super villains took it out. I suspect The Terror, Dr. Ironbeard, The Ktulu from Timbuktu and Bulgarian Boogeyman!
How ya like dat?
I propose that whoever invents the first working holodeck be made a superhero in advance (What, that isn't what the article was about? How would I know since it has been /.'ed into oblivion???)
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
The only super hero I care for is Tux. I cannot comment on the classic super heroes, as the site could not bear the load. Since there are several tux sites, they will probably survive the load better. Check here, here, here, here, here, here or here.
I predict that the Valanti Disney Warner Microsoft Act of 2015 (named partially in memory of Jack Valenti) will, in additon to increasing the legal limited copywrite term from 175 years to infinity minus 1 day, also reassign the ownership of all valuable public domain art from the public domain to whatever corporation can profit from them the most.
After all, as the new law's text will read, "what is the sense in having art if no corporation can profit from it?
Disney will be required Pay for all their new material by contributing $750,000 to the retirement fund for the Microsoft Geeks that run their "P2P DDOS Strike Force" that has been successful in knocking 99% of all P2P file traders, and FTP shareware sites off the net.
You sir are in the most desperate need of some stress relief of anyone I've ever seen. Even AFTER 9-11-2001 the Mayor appeared on SNL and told people that it is ok to laugh and that laughter was needed to try to help lift the pall that fell over the people when the towers came down.
If people do nothing but dwell on the negative that happens in the world, then they are on the fast track to a prescription of anti-depressants at best and at worse a trip to the psyche ward with a 24/7 suicide watch.
We play with our Legos and our Nerf Guns to give us a break from the depressing stuff that happens in our lives. We read comics and play EQ to relax. We watch Anime because it's fun.
And contrary to your belief, having fun is not evil.
We are BOMBARDED constantly by CNN over some crisis. We are shown time and time again pictures of dead bodies from some natural disaster. We are shown videos of that woman beating that child senseless or that dog getting nerve gassed. With that CONSTANT and INCESSANT exposure to the violence in the world, the only thing keeping us from going insane and possibly psychotic is the fact that we have outlets where we can back off and embrace all that is pleasant, positive, and good in the world.
So if ANYONE should "get some priorities" it is you. You are on the fast track to an early death unless you cut loose and enjoy life instead of brooding on all the death doom and destruction.
To quote Good Morning Vietnam "He is in the most desperate need of a blowjob of any white man I know"
-- Wiccan Army, 13th Airborne Division "We will not fly silently into the night"
You're right. The attack more than a year ago was terrible. Thousands of people died. You are correct in that aspect. However. You must understand, the attack, as you mentioned, WAS MORE THAN ONE YEAR AGO. Some of us want to move on. I'll take this further. You're going on about all of these world events stories. Why? Wait. Why do you even know about them? CNN? MSNBC? BBC? That's my point, exactly. CNN, MSNBC, BBC. You've seen in there. Why reprint the same regurgitated crap here? Yeah. It's the world. Yeah. It sucks. Horribly. Matter of fact, it's the worst. Y'ever stop and actually LOOK at Slashdot's synopsis? It says "News for nerds, stuff that matters.". Now, I'm not implying that these world events don't matter, but we don't need to rehash the same thing over and over and over again. If you want to read about tragedy, and terror, and people being blown to bits, go to MSNBC, or CNN, or BBC, and read THERE. We aren't them. We are us. To that end, have you ever thought that some of us visit this site to try and escape from that worldly crap? I come here, because I know that I can find happy refuge among other geeks, and we can discuss techy things, and fun things, and not have to worry about Saddam Hussien, and al-Quieda, and the problems of the world. I personally find thinking about such events and scenarios frightening, disturbing, and to think that my world could disappear tomorrow because some fanatic in the middle east doesn't like my pants, or that I could give less than a flying fuck what God whoever believes in really, really worries me. With that in mind, why not hang out with people you can relate to, and enjoy the things you do in life? For me, that's Slashdot. Here's another point: I'm not sure if I am more disgusted with the fact that you've acted just as these terrorists would. Yes. You have. Don't look at me like that. Just listen. What are terroists? People with a cause? Yes. And what do they do? Inflict pain, and fear, and anger, in people they wish to make their point to. Ok, that's a given. What have you done? Mm-hmm. You waltzed right into our little happy party, and took a big shit in the punchbowl. Yes. You, sir, in your gross and selfish display of arrogance, have become a terrorist. Thank you for taking time out of your important life to remind me that there are people out in the world who wouldn't give another thought to turning me, and everyone I know, into piles of radioactive dust from thousands of miles away. That's incredibly comforting. I digress; the other issue which sickens me is that you could attack us, at all. Are we hurting anyone doing what we are doing? Discussing science, technology, humor, entertainment, culture, and so on? Are we killing people? Are we the ones out there with superweapons threatening to commit mass genocide? NO! You want someone to be disgusted with? Someone to attack? Why not take out your anger and aggression on some of those assholes you mentioned? Yeah. All those terror networks and shit. Ever stop and consider that? Don't come down here and drop your crap on us, simply because you feel we are wrong for not dwelling on the past, or living in fear. I, myself, plan on enjoying every second I can get from life, with the things I enjoy doing, with my family, and my girlfriend, and if the time comes, I will defend myself, my home and the people I've mentioned, and my country. Until then, I plan on being myself. Take you, yourself, your bullshit, and go elsewhere, please. You are not welcome here. Thanks. </RANT
Informatus Technologicus
So - who owns the heroes of ABC/WildStorm's Terra Obscura? No one, everyone and DC. Kind of.
The characters who appeared in Tom Strong #11 and #12, including Pyroman, Miss Masque, The American Crusader, The Black Terror, the Fighting Yank, and Doc Strange (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Tom Strong himself). In the story, "Terror on Terra Obscura," Strong teamed up with Strange to rescue the heroes, who had been imprisoned by an alien of impossible power.
To Tom Strong, the entire mission was somewhat surreal - to him, the heroes that he was helping to rescue existed on his earth solely as comic book characters, something like how the JSA existed as comic characters on Earth-1 to the JLA, back when there was an Earth-1 and Earth-2, or, if you want something a little more metaphysical, the existence of the heroes on the far side of the galaxy percolated through...ideaspace, where it was captured by comic creators on Tom Strong's earth who were imaginauts...or..something...
The heroes are slated to get a return engagement in 2003 when Peter Hogan pens a Terra Obscura miniseries for ABC [with art by Yanique Paquette and Karl Story], utilizing the same characters on the same world. Ideally, interest will be high enough, according to Hogan, in the miniseries that ABC will launch the heroes of Terra Obscura in their own ongoing monthly.
If you're the gambling sort, it's a safe bet that a solid 99% of the readers of the Tom Strong storyline thought that the characters were simply fruits of Alan Moore's imagination, heroes who were shared shades of similarity to "real" Golden Age comic heroes. After all, the proper archetypes were present - the patriotic hero (the Fighting Yank), the science hero (American Crusader), the "dark" hero (The Black Terror, renamed the Terror, who comes complete with young sidekick), the jungle queen (Princess Panther), the monster, the fire-man, and even the talking ape were there.
The thing is, the characters weren't, or at least originally weren't the products of Moore's imagination - the heroes of Terra Obscura were, in fact, real comic characters published in the 1940s by Ned Pines under the Standard/Better/Nedor imprint(s). While the fact does little to change the story, it does raise a question or two. No, DC didn't quietly acquire another stable of comic characters as they had done with the Charlton characters in the late '80s by buying them outright - the Nedor characters are themselves in a unique position in terms of copyright: They are in the public domain, and can therefore be freely used by anyone. As an aside - in the ABC universe, the heroes are located on "Terra Obscura," a unique world which itself is an invention of Alan Moore, and is therefore copyrighted to DC/ABC/WildStorm.
Before we continue, a little history lesson is needed on how things got to be the way they are.
A Publisher of Many Names
The heroes which are collectively referred to as "Nedor" heroes were originally published by Pines, who had three names for his publishing company over the years, Standard, Better, and Pines. As a company, Standard began publishing in 1932, and was the king of comics with adjective titles - Thrilling Comics, Thrilling Detective, Exciting Comics, Startling Comics - all were staples of Standard/Better/Pines over the years.
From the early days, Standard employed editor Leo Margulies and Mort Weisinger, who took the ball and ran with it, in 1939 creating series after series, and hero after hero. Alex Schomberg provided dozens of covers over the series' runs. Standard's standard fair for the early '40s was pulp-inspired superheroes, but as Standard couldn't get a good footing against National Periodical Publications' stars of the costumed set, Superman and Batman (as well as the Justice Society) and others, and sales of Standard's hero line slipped, and by 1949, the company dropped costumed heroes, sticking to real-life adventures, funny animal books, and romance comics. Aside from the Nedor heroes, one character of Standard's original comic series remains alive today - Dennis the Menace.
Like many of the comic characters created in the 1940s, the heroes of the Standard line weren't copyrighted. It wasn't necessarily a careless move by the publisher, just a simple business decision. Remember - this was in the days before the phrase "intellectual property" was even coined, and comic book characters were disposable commodities. One was created in order to sell comics to boys, and when its sales started to slip, another was created to take its place. "Progress" was the theme of the day, and no one would have thought to bring back a concept that was perceived to have failed - why return to something that the public clearly had passed on? Thinking of the better world coming tomorrow was the name of the game, and nostalgia had yet to become a pastime for individuals and an income stream for companies. Everyone, from the man on the street to comic book publishers, was looking for the next big thing, and had precious little time to spend on the old thing that no one wanted.
At the same time, creators' right were largely unheard of, and the creators themselves were generally nose-to-the-grindstone workhorses, and no real interest or incentive to try to keep or reclaim their original work or worry about the rights to the characters they wrote or drew. After all, the first comic book fandom had yet to be born, and the first "comic book convention" was decades away. Aside from a few superstars, comic artists and writers were scratching by, and were immensely more concerned with putting food on the table and keeping a roof over their head than securing the rights of ownership for a pulp knockoff they jotted down when the publisher came looking for a comic book hero.
Additionally, the Standard/Nedor heroes were like many, many other heroes of the '40s - colorful, and attention grabbing when they were on the cover of a comic, but ultimately, their stories were pretty pedestrian. No kids were clamoring for fan clubs or decoder rings from the Nedor line, as they were for Superman. Within a few years of the end of their publication, the heroes sank beneath the waves of popular culture, remembered only by a very few.
"Come on Little Chum - We're Going Into the Public Domain!"
With the above influences working on them, in their original form, the Nedor characters were never trademarked, and the stories in which they appeared in have long gone out of copyright (a period which lasted 28 years after publication) and were not renewed. As such, the characters legally moved into the public domain one by one, beginning with Doc Strange, in order of their publication, making it free for anyone to use them.
The public wha...?
For example, Frances Hodgson Burnett's The Secret Garden has had multiple adaptations, spinoffs and derivative products come out - all of which are legal, from the Secret Garden Cookbook to the most recent movie adaptation, because the work is in the public domain. Anyone can create a work based on the original without having to acquire any kind of rights whatsoever - the work, legally, belongs to all mankind.
An aside - before you go off thinking that governments actually made one law that would ultimately benefit the culture of the planet in a timeless fashion, copyright critics, pointing fingers at recent copyright extensions, such as the Sonny Bono Act (which was lobbied for largely by large media companies, and the validity of which is slated to be argued to the Supreme Court by Lawrence Lessig on October 9th) claim that the number of works entering the public domain has been drastically reduced in the past thirty years, and they're right. The move is seen by many anti-copyright pundits as a move as a culture from valuing the expression of an individual artist to valuing a corporate property.
Ironically, Walt Disney, one of the companies that has lobbied the hardest for copyright extension (ensuring the company will reap the profits from their characters for generations to come) is also one of the biggest beneficiaries of the public domain - from Snow White to Cinderella, Jungle Book (released one year after Kipling's own copyright expired) and much of classical music in Fantasia came from the public domain. Without recent extensions approved by congress, Mickey Mouse would have gone into the public domain in 2004.
So - how does all of this apply to the Nedor heroes? Well, as alluded to previously, they didn't just go into the public domain, and ABC/WildStorm isn't the first comic publisher to publish them - or even the only publisher to currently publish them. The Nedor heroes have bubbled up a few times in the decades since their journey into the public domain, from Ace Comics and First Comics to Eclipse and currently, AC Comics.
The Point Is: No One's Fighting
Before moving on, it must be stressed that none of this is a matter of publishing legality - everyone, from AC to WildStorm to anyone reading this article could legitimately and legally create and publish comics starring any of the Nedor heroes that are based on the original materials from the '40s. There's the rub - the characters have to be based directly upon the original versions which appeared in the comics. From there, things get a little more...legal.
For example, take The Black Terror. Created in 1941 by Richard Hughes and David Gabrielsen, the character first appeared in Exciting Comics #9 in 1941. Both AC and ABC took the base character, The Black Terror, and modified it (in different ways), and renamed it The Terror (AC, after naming their version, later renamed theirs "The Terrorist"). Both were based on Nedor's The Black Terror, but were modified in unique ways by the respective publishers. Likewise, Beau Smith's version of the character, published by Eclipse (and co-written with Chuck Dixon and illustrated by Dan Brereton) used the name, but was worlds away from the original version. The character also showed up in the '80s in versions published by Ace Comics, and in Roy Thomas' Alter Ego comic series at First Comics.
In Smith's case, the desire to use the Nedor hero as a starting point for his own take was a result of childhood memories. "When I was a kid, my dad gave me a couple of old coverless Black Terror comics that he had as a kid," Smith said. "There were in the attic at my grandma's attic. I got hooked on the cool looking character with the skull and crossbones on his chest. I always wanted to do something with the character after that.
"He was in the public domain, and I had a high concept crime/alternate universe idea
that I had been saving up, and this was the perfect opportunity for it. I called my buddy Chuck Dixon and we decided to write it together. We changed the basic background of the character and did our own. As a result of what we did with the original concept, Chuck and I have the rights to the story and the characters as they appeared in our three issue run....names and all that."
Smith said he wasn't sure if Eclipse owned any of the rights to the characters, or if Todd McFarlane acquired the rights to his and Dixon's version of the Black Terror when he purchased the Eclipse assets. Smith did write a new story with the Black Terror while he was with McFarlane Productions, which was illustrated by Clayton Crain, but to date, McFarlane has opted not to publish it.
Smith wasn't the only creator with a soft spot in his heart for the characters - as mentioned previously, the pool of Nedor characters had been dipped into by Roy Thomas and ACE Comics, but in 1988, publisher Bill Black brought back a host of public domain characters, including many of the Nedor heroes for use in AC's Femforce series, placing them in new series, as well as reprinting original stories.
Over the years, AC Comics has taken the initiative to seek out and preserve many Golden Age comics and heroes, painstakingly retouching and correcting the art from the original comics - since no original art still exists - to produce reprint editions. As stated on their website, AC's reprints of public domain Golden Age comics is threefold:
1. To help preserve the history of the American comic book.
2. To make material available to collectors who have been priced out of the Golden-Age collecting market.
3. To introduce Golden-Age material to a new generation of comic book readers.
AC has also endeavored to compile information about the creators of the Golden Age comics - as much as it is available - and publish the information in various magazines, including Men of Mystery, which featured the Nedor heroes in a special edition.
Again, given the time period in which the work was originally created, many creators were never credited with their work, and in some cases, attribution of the creation of Golden Age characters is only anecdotal in nature.
Along with reprints of the original characters, AC has written the Nedor heroes as continuations of their Golden Age incarnations, maintaining the same general concepts and secret identities, but have also made some alterations in terms of costumes and names. The changes AC has made in the Nedor characters made done in order to make their versions distinctive in order that the publisher could copyright their stories, as well as protect their looks, just as Smith and Dixon did with their version of the Black Terror, and ABC has done with their versions of the characters.
To date, AC has been publishing the Nedor heroes (both on their own and as supporting characters) for going on twenty years, a run nearly double the original run the characters enjoyed in the '40s.
As the covers in this article show, the Terra Obscura storyline in Tom Strong #11 and #12 isn't the only connection between the Nedor line and WildStorm's ABC line - in 1942, Nedor launched America's Best Comics #1, a title which brought together Nedor's top three characters, Fighting Yank, Doc Strange, and the Black Terror together between two covers. And of course, there is that similarity between Doc Strange and Tom Strong, noted by Strong in issue #11 - the two could be brothers. It was a similarity Moore himself noted in an interview with Previews, but said that while he was inspired the America's Best Comics title as a name for a line, the similarity between the two characters was a complete coincidence.
For Moore aficionados, his account of later discoveries after creating both Tom Strong and Promethea come as little surprise, and fit into the creators' theories about ideaspace and the fact that he occasionally runs off and prays to a snake god...or...something under his house. "I didn't know there was The Book of Promethea by Hélène Cixous, or things like that," Moore told Previews. "I didn't know John Kendrick Bangs had written a bunch of stories about a place very much like the Immateria when I made Sophie Bangs the secret identity of Promethea. All of these things are delicious coincidences. I even found a character created from about 1910 in a series of novels published by the Boy Scouts of America about this ultimate Boy Scout named Tom Strong. It's just great! If you're hitting the right kind of vein of archetypal stuff then things like this will just happen. I'm just tapping into something. It works out."
In a recent interview with Newsarama, Moore expanded upon his decision to use the characters. "The original idea for the whole thing came when somebody, it may have been Rick Veitch, told me that there had been, back in the '40s, an America's Best Comics which I wasn't aware of," Moore said. "I thought it was a striking coincidence that we had America's Best Comics, and there was a series by the same name in the '40s. I asked [ABC editor] Scott Dunbier to check it out and see if he could find out anything about this comic, and whether there were any interesting characters.
"For all I knew, it might have been a Western comic book, but I asked him to tell me if there were any interesting characters, with an eye to possibly reviving them if they were sort of old, forgotten characters, in the current America's Best Comics as a kind of instant 1940s continuity. I left it with Scott, and he got back to me, along with some other people who sent me covers from the original comics - it was then I realized that Doc Strange looked very much like Tom Strong - he had the same kind of bizarrely muscled physique. He wore a red t-short, and these jodhpurs, and boots. I realized that we wouldn't be able to do a character with the name Doc Strange [due to this upstart company called Marvel, which had created a character named Dr. Strange in the interim]. I though that maybe we could change the name to Tom Strange, because at that point, I though that point his first name had never been given. I found out later that it was Hugo, so I think that the current orthodoxy at ABC is that his name is Thomas Hugo Strange."
Moore said that originally, the plan was to use the characters only for the two-part "Terra Obscura" storyline which would explain where Tom Strange came from - it was a story that needed a world populated with heroes. "I came up with the Terra Obscura idea, which I thought was an interesting variant on the notion that this is a planet which is in the same dimension as ours, and is an exact duplicate, just elsewhere in space," Moore said. "I started to research as many of the Nedor heroes as I could. Jim Steranko was a great help - he dug out loads of old articles which filled in a lot of details for me, and we did the story from there.
"That was originally going to be all we were doing. Then, Pete Hogan, after having just done a pretty splendid job on the Tesla Strong special was looking for something else to do. He suggested that, because there was such a lot of positive feedback and interest on the web regarding the Terra Obscura characters that he wondered about doing a miniseries. It sounded good to me. Pete and I have been working together on this, and it's coming along well.
"Initially, it was an idea if there was an interesting character in this 1940s, America's Best Comics we could kind of bring him back in the present day and pleasantly confuse readers as to whether America's Best Comics really did exist in the 1940s," Moore continued. "It was more that than anything - we'd exploit the coincidence and sort of pretended that we had this backlog of characters that stretched back to the 1940s."
The Perils and Promise of the Public Domain
By becoming part of the public domain, the heroes of the old Standard line of comics are part of the cultural heritage of the United States and world, just like Thomas Nash's versions of Santa Claus and Uncle Sam, and nearly all the classical music in the world. As such, they can be used by current creators as source material who would be "standing on the shoulders of giants" as it were to create their own, new works.
According to public domain advocates, what AC and ABC (and previously, Eclipse and others) are doing with the old Nedor heroes is exactly why material should go into the public domain, that is, the original works can be freely built upon to further enhance the cultural landscape of the world. Okay, so whether or not FemForce and Tom Strong #11 and #12 enhance the cultural landscape of the world is arguable, but again, AC and ABC are doing exactly what they're supposed to in regards to works in the public domain - using them as source works, and either re-presenting them or building upon them to tell new stories.
It's exactly what Borders or Barnes & Noble do when they publish and release their own editions of classic literature - or, for that matter, what Alan Moore did in creating League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. That said though, working with properties from the public domain, especially when using them as a foundation to build upon comes with its own problems due to the simple fact that anyone can do it. If one publishing house starts up a version of say, Pyroman (a Nedor hero) with writer A and artist B, a publishing house down the street can do their own version of Pyroman with writer C and artist D.
In such a setting, the market would determine which version of the character survives, based on everything from quality of the product to the marketing each publishers attempt. One publish could win out over the other and make millions while the other fails, despite the time and effort expended.
While neither Dunbier nor anyone from AC Comics chose to go on record, sources confirmed that, despite the legalities of each company's use of the characters, the smaller publisher is mildly annoyed at ABC's apparent ongoing use of the characters.
Also, in today's world where the creator of a property has come to be considered in higher regard than in years past, there is a danger in a property such as the Nedor heroes entering the public domain and then being revised or revisited by a creator such as Alan Moore or Peter Hogan, and that is that the original creators of the work may be forgotten or overlooked. Already, the specific creator pedigree of many Nedor heroes is unknown, lost in the mists of time and churning of the 1940s' publishing industry.
As stated above, many readers of Tom Strong #11 or #12 would automatically assign the creation of the Terra Obscura characters to Moore - after all, the guy did create heroes that were a shade away from the Charlton heroes for Watchmen, why couldn't he just do it again?
As a result, the original creators of the characters are lost to the mists of time - technically, as they should be, as part of becoming part of the public domain, but perhaps unfairly so in the view of fans indoctrinated in the creator rights battles of the past decades.
The public domain, in the eyes of its advocates, is a necessary part of the cultural landscape of America - something that the founding fathers outlined - something that allows a vigorous and growing culture without the restrictions of royalties. For every pro argument, there's a con, mostly from copyright holders.
For example, if Disney and other media companies would be unsuccessful in extending the term of copyright extension, Mickey Mouse hits the public domain in 2003. Legally, Universal could produce a line of Mickey Mouse cartoons based on the original appearance of the character from the 1928 Steamboat Willie, and anyone could package and sell the original Steamboat Willie cartoon - all without credit or payment to Walt Disney.
The challenges of public domain don't just affect the Nedor heroes - there are dozens upon dozens of Golden Age heroes who are currently in the public domain waiting for their chance at a second shot or re-presentation, or to be completely forgotten, their histories, creators, and adventures lost forever.
You're right. The attack more than a year ago was terrible. Thousands of people died. You are correct in that aspect. However. You must understand, the attack, as you mentioned, WAS MORE THAN ONE YEAR AGO. And some of us want to move on.
I'll take this further. You're going on about all of these world events stories. Why? Wait. Why do you even know about them? CNN? MSNBC? BBC? That's my point, exactly. CNN, MSNBC, BBC. You've seen in there. Why reprint the same regurgitated crap here? Yeah. It's the world. Yeah. It sucks. Horribly. Matter of fact, it's the worst. Y'ever stop and actually LOOK at Slashdot's synopsis? It says "News for nerds, stuff that matters.". Now, I'm not implying that these world events don't matter, but we don't need to rehash the same thing over and over and over again.
If you want to read about tragedy, and terror, and people being blown to bits, go to MSNBC, or CNN, or BBC, and read THERE. We aren't them. We are us. To that end, have you ever thought that some of us visit this site to try and escape from that worldly crap? I come here, because I know that I can find happy refuge among other geeks, and we can discuss techy things, and fun things, and not have to worry about Saddam Hussien, and al-Quieda, and the problems of the world.
I personally find thinking about such events and scenarios frightening, disturbing, and to think that my world could disappear tomorrow because some fanatic in the middle east doesn't like my pants, or that I could give less than a flying fuck what God whoever believes in, really, really worries me. With that in mind, why not hang out with people you can relate to, and enjoy the things you do in life? For me, that's Slashdot.
Here's another point: I'm not sure if I am more disgusted with the fact that you've acted just as these terrorists would. Yes. You have. Don't look at me like that. Just listen. What are terroists? People with a cause? Yes. And what do they do? Inflict pain, and fear, and anger, in people they wish to make their point to. Ok, that's a given. What have you done? Mm-hmm. You waltzed right into our little happy party, and took a big shit in the punchbowl. Yes. You, sir, in your gross and selfish display of arrogance, have become a terrorist. Thank you for taking time out of your important life to remind me that there are people out in the world who wouldn't give another thought to turning me, and everyone I know, into piles of radioactive dust from thousands of miles away. That's incredibly comforting. I digress; the other issue which sickens me is that you could attack us, at all. Are we hurting anyone doing what we are doing? Discussing science, technology, humor, entertainment, culture, and so on? Are we killing people? Are we the ones out there with superweapons threatening to commit mass genocide? NO! You want someone to be disgusted with? Someone to attack? Why not take out your anger and aggression on some of those assholes you mentioned? Yeah. All those terror networks and shit. Ever stop and consider that?
Don't come down here and drop your crap on us, simply because you feel we are wrong for not dwelling on the past, or living in fear. I, myself, plan on enjoying every second I can get from life, with the things I enjoy doing, with my family, and my girlfriend, and if the time comes, I will defend myself, my home and the people I've mentioned, and my country. Until then, I plan on being myself. Take you, yourself, your bullshit, and go elsewhere, please. You are not welcome here. Thanks. [/RANT]
Note to moderators: I do sincerely apologize for cross-posting. In my fit of rage, I posted in HTML-formatted mode, and had no line breaks. That... is not me. I'm sorry, but I had to post an edited version. I thank you for the work you do for this site, and, to that end, again apologize for this.
Informatus Technologicus
Yes, there is a way to preserve the original intent of a character that has passed into the public domain. Write stories with that character that fulfill the original intent, and make them so insanely great that everyone reads them instead of the schlock stories that violate the character's original intent.
As in all public domain and open source situations, it's up to you to make it what you want.
Interestingly enough, Mickey Mouse is due to enter the public domain in 2004, unless Congress passes a copyright extension. The copyright is only good for 50 years after the owner/creator's death. A move is underway to extend that to 75 years.
So in essence, most of your lengthy reply is just a waste, and only encourages them. But you're probably right about him needing a blowjob. Though like most trolls it would likely be his first and only ;-)
Freedom: "I won't!"
Figure out which authors write stories you like, and ignore those whose stories you dislike.
Frank Millers's Batman is not any less brilliant because of the existence of Adam West's Batman.
Worrying that someone, somewhere is doing something you dislike is not a productive use of your time.
Come on ye childhood heroes!
Won't you rise up from the pages of your comic-books
your super crooks
and show us all the way.
Well! Make your will and testament.
Won't you? Join your local government.
We'll have Superman for president
let Robin save the day.
At least today, you do not need to explicitely say that you have copyright to something, you get this automatically. Of course it helps if you type down your name and stuff to be easier to enforce.
There doesn't seem to be much on the news about the 24,000 people thehungersite.org who died of hunger on 9/11. I would have thought that a tragedy of that magnitude would deserve a large multinational operation to make sure it doesn't happen again.
It goes without saying but, just in case, no I'm not denying the pain, suffering or heroism related to other events of that day but it does need to put into perspective.
What if Batman were public domain? EVERYONE would have a Bat signal and there would be one jackass who would light theirs up just to get Batman to pick up a short case on the way over.
You mean like:
StallMan (real name: Richard Stallman)
Stalwart leader of the FSF, he fires his GPL Virus Cannon at all software in sight.
The Penguin (real name: Linus Torvalds)
Hacker extraordinaire. Uses Linux-grip action to bring monopolies to their knees. Annoyed that StallMan keeps calling it "GNU/Linux-grip action".
And their arch-enemies:
Mr. Big (real name: Bill Gates)
Leader of Micro$oft, Mr. Big uses his vast resources of time, money, and attorneys to make sure his Evil Windows Empire retains complete control. Also likes to eat kittens. Raw.
The Luddite (real name: Jack Valenti)
The Luddite is stringently opposed to any new technology that it enables people to have control over the music they purchase. Powers are similar to Mr. Big's. Mr. Big and The Luddite may team up to form an organization too powerful for StallMan and The Penguin to take on.
And don't forget:
The Citizens (real name: all of us)
We are the supreme power. Ultimately, it is not up to StallMan and The Penguin to stop the minions of Microsoft and the ??AA from controlling us. Fight back.
bytesmythe
Hypocrisy is the resin that holds the plywood of society together.
-- Scott Meyer
One could make the argument that if you recognize the current Batman as "canon" then you recognize DC as the current author or caretaker for the character. By that rational, the 60's series is also canon, because it was created with permission from DC.
Most fanfics are easy to filter because they are created without permission from the owners. But if corporate ownership is your criteria, you are going to be stuck with Bat-mite, Man-Bat, the 60's bat-suit, and all sorts of other wackiness. If you narrow Batman to Bob Kane, then you ignore the first (true) Dark Knight Returns series, Alex Ross' recent work, Dick Giordano's Batman stories, etc.
Original intent goes as far as Bob Kane. The rest is up to you.
Then you'll have errors from cc You can't compile a header.
Maybe he is, but you're an idiot, and should probably spend a little more time working on your spelling before trying to interact with others in a text-based forum. Thanks.
didn't Alan Moore use some abandoned Golden Age characters as the basis of the heros in Watchmen?
uh, it was a troll. Guy posts pretty much the same thing here pretty regularly, all fairly transparent. Your rant ("fit of rage?" Get a grip, camper!) has only encouraged him to troll here again.
Nice Work. Consider some Anger Management Therapy, 'kay?
Are you sure?
True, current copyright laws only require you to put your idea down on paper or on a computer for it to be considered copyrighted, but this was not the case always, was it?
--something witty
Not exactly. The copyright is good until January 1 of the year after the expiration date. Steamboat mickey came out in '28, meaning its copyright wouldn't have expired until Jan 1 of (1928+75+1)=2004.
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
Any discussion of obscure comic characters make me think of my favorate, "Arm fall off boy". I originally read about him in a reprint digest of Legion of Superhero classics. In the introduction, the editor related how they often got suggestions for new heros from fans. He mentioned the idea of "arm fall off boy" who could detatch his arm and hit people with it.
I was tickled by the idea of the worst super hero that never lived. Then I went looking for a link to post with this, and discovered that DC went ahead and used the character in 1996! I don't know whether to be horrified or pleased.
http://www.ian-rowland.com/Vault/FunAFOB.htm
His true name is Kip Winger.
Actually this dude has a point. There are more important things than superheroes.
On the other hand i am hanging around Slashdot since i'm #&!"&" tired of Indymedia and every sort of teenage radicalism it represents.
I agree with you - while still being generally undecided on a firm position regarding copyright, the position that tends to get ignored is that copyright wasn't a concern until we could so easily copy things right and left.
For thousands of years of human history, culture was fluid and the past was history. Art is always something different in its own time from what it becomes once its time has passed. One might say the primary purpose of art is to influence the present to become the future, but once the present has passed it becomes the past. Any art you look at contains within it some hope for the future, even if only because its creator hoped that someone would experience it after it was created, but once created, art exists as something from the past, already created, immutable.
But art is not always immutable - our perceptions of it change, and if we are discussing it, our discussion will change. Art influences us, and we influence all the art yet to come. The past exists as our soil, and we are the plants growing from it, but very soon we will wilt and decay into the soil, to become part of the history out of which the next generation grows. We, the past, will be incorporated into the structure of the future, but only if we allow what is created to decay into the natural "cultural soil" from which great things are born. If we hold our creations steadfast and immutable, never to change, then the only hope we are expressing is that the future is the same as the present and the past.
Now that everything seems to be recorded for posterity, people are obsessed with obtaining the "definitive edition" or the "original version" of books, films, albums, etc. If anything this stifles creativity - One imagines that the definitive version of all these stories has been cast in stone, and one wants to own it. Perhaps we then lose our ability to imagine something different, something new. Why not take elements of what has been created, and reconfigure it to your own imagination?
Did you ever notice how many heros are called "captain," and how many villains are called "doctor?" What does that say about our ideals? Why do we value brawn over brain so much? Is stupid but strong the ideal we strive for? Is there something wrong with being smart? Why not Doctor Good and Captain Evil? Is the military all good and science all evil?
That's Bigboo TAY! TAY!
It seems to me that some of the more recent movies took away a lot of the initial seriousness,etc from the batman series. JC (a good comedian but one shouldn't shove him into every role just because he's popular) made a joke of the riddler, when I remember him more an a form of "intellectual badass". There was a fair bit of humour in previous eps, but much of it was a quite dark variety.
And of course, the odd buddybuddy relationship between Batman and Robin, which was quite reminiscent of Ace and Gary from Saturday Night Live (not that there's anything wrong with that).
Quick Robin, back to the batcloset! - phorm
All I know is if it wsn't for my ritual serial killing i'd go mad
That's called Licensing
No, there aren't!
Slow down, cowboy! It has been 4 hours since you last posted. You must wait another few hours.
What kind of loser Heros do they have that in the public domain? Cottage Cheese man? Or maybe Tape Dispenser Boy. On a side note I always loved watching Whose line is it anyway on Comedy Central when they did the bit about super heros.
AForwardMotion Broadcasts "Scientologists KOS they are PKers using excuses based on religion to do whatever they like!"
:).
Sorry just had to do it
Copyright only controls the right to copy the works: reprints of the existing materials. Trademarks cover the superhero names, logos, etc. Trademarks are much tougher to keep going, since in the USA you must actively defend them (TrademarkMan to the rescue!) or you lose them.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
When OSDN had the big enema a few months back, Katz was the first to go. Pity really, what with him being the only janitor that could spell.
JC (a good comedian but one shouldn't shove him into every role just because he's popular)
Stupid Jesus freaks.
No, what people need to understand is that it need not be how it is now. That is always the case. It doesn't matter if it was or was not this way in the past. At the time of the American Revolution, there had only been one instance of democracy in the world. At the time of the formation of the Athenian democracy, there had not ever been a democracy anywhere in the world. Even if there had always been a DMCA, we needn't tolerate this oppression just as the Athenians didn't need to tolerate monarchy.
The knowledge that it wasn't always this way is just to demonstrate the point.
Well, I think we just found a few more superfriends for this project. :)
Mordor...a magical, mythical land where women are more rare than dragons--but where every man would rather find a dragon
Man-bat was cool!
The same way you preserve, say, HCA's "Little Mermaid" as a poignant story about love and loss and a total absence of Jamaican lobsters.
You can't. You just have to tell the story your way, and hope that more people will like your vision than that of $MEGA_ENTERTAINMENT_CORP.
--
E_NOSIG
Okay, so there's an example of a character under copyright being abused. Therefore, copyright stops a character from being abused in that way. ...
Look at an old public-domain character: Heracles. Sure there's been a lot of crap with him in it. However, there's been a lot of good stuff, too, and the original nature of the character hasn't been lost.
Or take, for example, Space Balls. Campy crap parody of Star Wars. Perfectly legal. If Batman was as serious as you claimed before the TV series, anyone could probably have made it and claimed the parody exemption.
Copyright may protect the author's profits. It doesn't protect the author's vision.
WORD, thas my nigga.
Secret identity? Not under GPL! Hidden lair (Batcave, Fortress of Solitude)? Forget about it! The mysteries of your secret weakness (Kryptonite)? Open to foe and friend alike.
check out www.ninjai.com
Eye-n-Apple Productions has plans to publish a compilation of comic book heroes that have gone to the public domain. The book, titled "Age of Heroes" is a faithful reproduction of superheroes "The Arrow", "Wonder Man", and "The Phantom of the Fair." Most of the research on these heroes was done at Michigan State University's special collections department at the university library. The curator of the collection is an avid golden age comic book collector.
The editor promises the book will be published in the near future. Keep your eyes open for it.
What Would Scooby Do?
These are ideas, which are not copyrightable.
People so often misunderstand copyrights that it's not even funny any more.
You can copyright text, and you can copyright pictures (among other things such as performance recordings). You cannot copyright 'ideas'. You likewise own the copyrights of anything derived from your work.
So, draw a picture of Captain Spooner, write a story about him, and these things are copyrighted. Then, if someone tries to write a "Captain Spooner's Revenge", feel free to sue them for creating a derivative work.
Worst Website Ever!
-- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
Update: 09/25 17:51 GMT by M: Link removed at the request of the site maintainers because it's killing their server.
Great, now we'll be discussing the article without ever having read it!
Oh, wait, that's what we do anyway. Nevermind.
Kids, here's a tip for you. If you don't want people to read your stuff, DON'T PUT IT ON A WEB SITE. If you're unprepared for such a load, then just give up and go home now.
...anyone who writes Transformers fan fiction deserves everything they get, AFAIC.
Arrrgh, we know who done it. But we're busy rewriting our SuperPowers to adapt to computer-age threat models, and we'll be back and kicking butt Real Soon Now. That's the nice thing about being Public Domain - Steamboat Willie can only do what his fat-cat employers want him to, but we can do anything we want!
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Am I going to have to agree to some sort of GPL to read comics now?
Read the story. When the original copyright expired, nobody applied for renewal.
You can copyright text
You likewise own the copyrights of anything derived from your work.
So, draw a picture of Captain Spooner, write a story about him
Copyright (C) 2002 Anonymous Coward Intnat'l Ltd. Inc.
The Lord of the Rings (and possibly The Hobbit) were not published in the US, initially. So Brit copies were imported. When a certain number were imported, the US copyright automatically expired, since US copyright is for the protection of US publishers, not authors. Ace published inexpensive pb editions, arguably bringing in a large audience. The Brit publisher twisted Tolkien's arm to put out a "revised" edition and got a US pub to do the US edition. Ace may have sent money to Tolkien (volunarily) and it may have been more (per copy) than he got via his Brit pub for the US pub copies, since it went through fewer hands. (?)
parl
Tut tut tut. These are not ideas, these are short works of fiction. I have created a character and introduced him / her. The middle one even had the back story in place.
I did this using TEXT!
Are m 30 words less copyrightable than a 20000 word story? How many words do I need? 100, 500, 2000??
semantics, chap...wouldn't hold up in court.
How many words? Don't ask me...ask a copyright judge. Copyright law interpretation is *highly* subjective. While your message itself would be copyrighted, I doubt very much that you would be able to gain any judicial relief in a court of law if someone made a story about Capt. Spooner.
GIven that the context was NON copyrighted super heroes I don't, personally, give a rats ass wether its copyright or not. We're not talking Captain Dolphin here!
"I have examined Bogota," he said, "and the case is clearer to me.
I think very probably he might be cured."
"That is what I have always hoped," said old Yacob.
"His brain is affected," said the blind doctor.
The elders murmured assent.
"Now, what affects it?"
"Ah!" said old Yacob.
"This," said the doctor, answering his own question. "Those queer
things that are called the eyes, and which exist to make an agreeable soft
depression in the face, are diseased, in the case of Bogota, in such a way
as to affect his brain. They are greatly distended, he has eyelashes, and
his eyelids move, and cosequently his brain is in a state of constant
irritation and distraction."
"Yes?" said old Yacob. "Yes?"
"And I think I may say with reasonable certainty that, in order
to cure him completely, all that we need do is a simple and easy surgical
operation -- namely, to remove those irritant bodies."
"And then he will be sane?"
"Then he will be perfectly sane, and a quite admirable citizen."
"Thank heaven for science!" said old Yacob.
-- H.G. Wells, "The Country of the Blind"
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