Interesting
article in Wired today about the way that the Japanese manga market handles self-published fanfic,
dojinshi. Despite having the same sort of copyright law as the West, the manga publishing houses turn a bit of a blind eye to a huge dojinshi industry existing, as one publisher says, in the space between canon and public and connecting the two. It keeps the paying public interested, and seeds new talent because self-published artists are, by definition, passionate about what they write.
It doesn't seem to pollute the canon, either, which maybe shows "lie" to some of the twitchier Western franchises who seem to hate fan-work and menace efforts like the
Phantom Edit with lawyers and take-down guff. Gods know how they'd respond to a slashed-up Marvel fanwork or Jessica Rabbit getting futa on Betty Boop, let alone Jabba/Leia squelch.
Once a thing enters the public domain, you lose control over it. If it's good, people will play with it - be it Lego bricks or the X-Men. Hell, even in gaming, a good NPC can grow legs and walk out of your inventory into someone else's love triangle (or massive gambling debt, Oleg, that'll do). So even though you can protect the
piece, you cannot lock down the
ideas and that's good. Some of the most interesting, fun and thought-provoking comics are the one-shots (I'm
so looking forward to Ash vs X-Men). The can suck too (Transformers: Hearts of Steel, say) but hell, so can canon.
It's as if the media industry wants to create strong memes, but memes which only replicate once, in the sale from publisher to consumer. Replication restriction makes
weak memes. What they're creating and trying to control is too damn slippery for that. If it's good, it's got legs.
Creative types: How do you feel when someone does something unexpected with your work? Are you in the "heh, cool" camp or the "no, that's just wrong" camp? Do you think
your views would change if it were published in the traditional way?
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