New Penny Arcade Books Now Possible

JonLatane writes "Some of you old Penny Arcade fans may recall a time when Gabe and Tycho were planning to publish their work, only to lose the rights to all their stuff to some scumbag. Well, Gabe said today in the bottom of his post that they have gotten back the rights to their own work. This means that we may finally see some new printed works, especially since Gabe and Tycho are much more legally savvy as a result of this whole fiasco."

Comments

Re:Umm, what happened, exactly?

[abysmilliard]

As far as I know, what happened was that about four years ago, Gabe and Tycho tried to negotiate a book deal. Because they were stone ignorant of such matters at the time, they entered into a legal agreement with their publisher to publish a book.

First, the book never actually ended up coming to market, insofar as I'm aware. While they were objecting to this development (despite paying money, I think), they also discovered that they had signed away their legal rights to have any of their comics in print (or at least, they had signed away control).

Enter their manager that showed up a few years ago, and the proverbial, "WTF!?" moment. They ended up in court after that, and have been fighting ever since.

Disclaimer: This is what I've gathered, and is probably RIDDLED with inaccuracies and suppositions. I'm not clear on the details, but that's about as much as I know/have inferred. If anybody wants to correct me, please be my guest.

Now for the inside cover

[T-Kir]

All we need is a print of Strawberry Shortcake in all her naughtiness and the book would be complete :-)

Re:Now for the inside cover

[sahrss]

For the curious, some more info on Strawberry:

PA Link:
http://www.penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2003-04 -14&res=l

Copies:
http://onethumb.smugmug.com/photos/147054-O-1.jpg
http://dailyramblings.com/images/shortcake.jpg

Re:Umm, what happened, exactly?

[aztektum]

First, the book never actually ended up coming to market, insofar as I'm aware.

Incorrect. My brother has a copy on his bookshelf of PA Year One. I would but at the time I wasn't a big fan.

Also, from what I can recall from their explanation at PAX04, I believe the publisher never paid them (although who knows, the contract could somehow say they never would see a dime since they didn't really know what they were signing) and held the rights to the first 5 years of PA strips. They were free to make books based on year 6 and up. The legal issues just tied up the first 5 years.

Finally.

[Threatis]

I'm a little bit of a hardcore fan. I own the first book, about 6 shirts, and a few other pieces of memorabilia. To be honest, they well admit this was their fault to being ignorant to the issues at hand, but at the same time, they where dealing with a scumbag. Seriously, how terrible a person can you be that you get 2 kids from Washington to sign over their work to you, when all the wanted to do is publish a damn book? some people should be hung by their toes over a shark pool.