io9 
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San Francisco, 9:11 AM
Tue Dec 1
28 posts in the last 24 hours
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08/14/09
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08/14/09
Doesn't sound like they lost that much except in the way of publishing collectors' treasuries.
I think a more interesting question though is whether or not this will affect the ability for current writers to draw upon and reference those stories.
Like with Morrison who generally likes to do the 'everything is and was canon' approach and regularly lifts from/ reworks obscure articles from the Golden Age.
08/14/09
08/14/09
Seems like the Siegels only own copyright over specific volumes of work published before the rights were sold to DC...
08/14/09
DC isn't going to lose the rights to Superman just the material listed in the judgment. I guess the current execs of DC Comics wish their predecessors had treated Siegel and Shuster better when they were alive. Ironically, it was giant media companies like DC that originally pushed Congress to extend copyrights -- as a way to protect copyrights they held. Now it seems that those extended copyrights are going to benefit Siegel's heirs for years to come. I believe copyright is death + 70. Jerry Siegel died in 1996.
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I'm all for creators rights, but this is getting a little crazy...
08/14/09
Hmm. Now I want an orange.
08/14/09
what's amusing about this whole thing is that even if they get the rights back, DC holds the trademarks on a ton of stuff related to Superman - including the 'S'...
it's a mess.
08/14/09
08/14/09
Do you have any idea how much money $75000 was back then in 1938?
$ 1.127 million in 2009 dollars.
They never got that.
They got 135$ + a 10 year contract + $35 per page + half the net profit on comics.
$0 from EVERYTHING else.
Later, when they sued in 1946 they lost, got kicked out in the street, but later settled for $94000 ($ 1.018 mill. today) - for selling Superboy.
From then on they had NO money from ANYTHING Superman.
Even their names were no longer attached to the byline.
In 1975. WB felt sorry for them and gave them a handout of $20,000 per year + health care benefits.
That would be about $78000 in today's money - only their pensions never got adjusted for the next 15-20 years they lived.
First Superman movie alone grossed $300 million - $973 mill. today.
They got cheated alright.
08/14/09
Could DC have treated the creators of their biggest property more generously? Absolutely. And they should have. But looking at it through the filter of the 1930s and business practices of the time is incredibly challenging.
First, DC made a deal, probably similar to thousands of deals made in those days. 99% of things written got published and died. This one just happened to be much bigger than that.
Second, the argument can quite easily be made that DC created what Superman ultimately BECAME through investment of time, money and resources in publishing and growing the character. Without DC, could Siegel and Shuster have made more money? Could they have ever self-published to the point that it would have made the millions it did? Who knows? Without the backing of a publisher like DC, it may have been a flash in the pan and never gained much attention like so many comics of the day.
All pointless speculation, of course, but my point is that it all happened a long, long time ago - sorting through it all 70 years later is just making a lot of lawyers wealthy and resolving very little.
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07/10/09
If Shuster/Siegel win, they can't use those ideas, and DC will probably be barred from using some of them as well. Can you imagine reading a Superman comic put out by another publisher where he has the triangle "S" and can't fly?
07/10/09
The thing I don't understand, though--why are they making Superman stuff? After the Bakshi/Rankin-Bass thing, there was a dispute over who actually had film rights to LOTR for a good long time. Nobody did anything with the property because it was uncertain. If Superman's ownership is unclear, why are they making things like Smallville and cartoons and stuff?
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07/10/09
If it's about the money, surely the estates of Siegel and Shuster realize that once they own the copyright outright, if they start asking for ridiculous terms and payment, DC could just drop Superman from continuity. No DC, no sales. No sales, no money, and Superman is now a worthless property.
And if DC drops it, what studio in their right mind would option it for a movie?
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