Bent Corner

There has been a spirited debate among funny book nerds over on the Newsarama forums concerning the Z-Cult FM comic book BitTorrent controversy. Comic book artist Jamal Igle has been weighing in on the matter from his prospective. Even though the comic book industry has enjoyed a steady rise in sales during the time Z-Cult FM has been in existence, Jamal believes people that BitTorrent comic books cost professionals such as him money.

In fact, he believes that people that do it should be prosecuted:

Bit torrents of copyright material for mass downloading and file sharing are illegal and should be prosecuted.

Prosecuted? Jamal seemingly thinks it’s wrong to reproduce copyrighted material except when he’s the one that is doing it. Like many comic book artists, Jamal frequently attends comic book conventions and does commissioned artwork of licensed comic book characters that he does not own or have the rights to.

Using BitTorrent to share digital scans of comic books and producing unauthorized comic book art for sale are both illegal. One of the two is done to make some extra money and the other isn’t.

It’s true that comic book publishers know that many of their artists do commission work on the side using their licensed properties and they choose to turn a blind eye to it. They used to do the same thing to the people the used BitTorrent for comics. Marvel and DC Comics never seemed to care about Z-Cult FM. Now they do.

Obviously things change.

If comic book publishers don’t think commissioned sketches adversely effect their bottom line, they are wrong. Comic book fans only have so much money to spend at a comic book convention. Every single dollar they spend on high priced, unauthorized comic book art is one less dollar they have to spend on licensed, authorized products. If I was a vendor at a comic book convention and I paid money to set up a booth on the sales floor so I could sell licensed, authorized comic books and collectibles, I wouldn’t like the fact that a substantial amount of money was being spent on unlicensed artwork in Artist Alley.

If comic publishers want to crack down on copyright infringement, then they need to be consistent about it. They shouldn’t just single out people who upload scans of comic books while turning a blind eye to comic book artists that crank out $500 Wolverine sketches at comic book conventions.

They can’t have it both ways.

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This week’s edition of Rich Johnson’s Lying in the Gutters includes a piece about Warner Bros getting eBay to remove a Batman sketch from auction. Rich brings up some interesting points, especially in light of the recent actions by Marvel and DC Comics against comic book BitTorrent groups.

From Rich Johnson’s column:

Craig Hoffman, Director of Warner Bros Entertainment’s Worldwide Anti-Piracy Corporate Communications told Christian “no one is authorized to manufacture, reproduce, copy, sell and/or offer for sale any products/services which utilize the Batman Property without the express written permission of Warner Bros. The drawing which you have offered for sale has not been authorized by Warner Bros., therefore we suspended your auction. I apologize for the inconvenience of your suspended auction; however, I hope that you understand our position. Further, please be assured that we never attempt to single-out any one, or group of, sellers. In that regard, please feel free to forward any other questionable auctions to our attention and we will be sure to investigate and take appropriate action.”

Every comic book convention I have ever attended has had a plethora of comic book artists doing sketches of comic book characters for money. Some artists charge hundreds of dollars for an inked sketch of a comic book character. I can’t even begin to guess how much revenue comic book artists are able to earn doing sketches at conventions. If the official position of Warner Bros is that no one is authorized to reproduce and offer for sale any product which utilizes a DC Comics intellectual property, I have to believe this will have a monumental impact to the whole comic book convention sketch business.

What would happen if comic book artists couldn’t do commissions at conventions?

Fans would certainly have more money to spend at the convention on comics and other licensed material. It’s hard to spend a lot of money in the dealer room on comics and other licensed material when you are paying an artist in Artist’s Alley $500 for a sketch of Wolverine fighting Wonder Woman.