Breaking News! Bill Willingham's Fables are now in the Public Domain

 The one thing I didn't think I'd do on this blog is cover breaking news. Bill Willingham, the writer and comics artist, has placed his creations in the Fables comic line in the public domain. The reason? Well, the publisher of the line, DC Comics hasn't been playing fair with Willingham in regard to their contractual obligations, and failed to pressure Willingham into giving up his creative control of the Fables intellectual property. 

Willingham has released a public statement explaining his decision, which can be read in full at These Foolish Games

Fables Press Release

Subject: Fables Enters the Public Domain

15 September 2023

By Bill Willingham

For Immediate Release

The Lede

As of now, 15 September 2023, the comic book property called Fables, including all related Fables spin-offs and characters, is now in the public domain. What was once wholly owned by Bill Willingham is now owned by everyone, for all time. It’s done, and as most experts will tell you, once done it cannot be undone. Take-backs are neither contemplated nor possible.
[...]
When I first signed my creator-owned publishing contract with DC Comics, the company was run by honest men and women of integrity, who (for the most part) interpreted the details of that agreement fairly and above-board. When problems inevitably came up we worked it out, like reasonable men and women. Since then, over the span of twenty years or so, those people have left or been fired, to be replaced by a revolving door of strangers, of no measurable integrity, who now choose to interpret every facet of our contract in ways that only benefit DC Comics and its owner companies. At one time the Fables properties were in good hands, and now, by virtue of attrition and employee replacement, the Fables properties have fallen into bad hands.

Since I can’t afford to sue DC, to force them to live up to the letter and the spirit of our long-time agreements; since even winning such a suit would take ridiculous amounts of money out of my pocket and years out of my life (I’m 67 years old, and don’t have the years to spare), I’ve decided to take a different approach, and fight them in a different arena, inspired by the principles of asymmetric warfare. The one thing in our contract the DC lawyers can’t contest, or reinterpret to their own benefit, is that I am the sole owner of the intellectual property. I can sell it or give it away to whomever I want.

            I chose to give it away to everyone. If I couldn’t prevent Fables from falling into bad hands, at least this is a way I can arrange that it also falls into many good hands. Since I truly believe there are still more good people in the world than bad ones, I count it as a form of victory.

This isn't a unique issue, it's extremely common, there are many well known cases but to pick just a few, recently Disney has been embroiled in an ongoing dispute over failure to pay royalties prompting Alan Dean Foster to pen an open letter to Disney airing the issue publicly. "Some of you doubtless are by now aware of my complaint that Disney has failed to pay royalties on books owned by companies they have purchased: Twentieth Century Fox (the first three ALIEN novelizations) and Lucasfilm (the novelization of STAR WARS and SPLINTER OF THE MIND'S EYE). With reluctance, this ongoing imbroglio has been made public in order to generate a response. Turns out I'm not the only author being similarly shafted. SFWA is involved and details of the disagreement went viral within twenty-four hours. You can read the details in many places, on numerous sites. For those who are interested, here is my letter of complaint to Disney:" According to Foster's personal site updates, the `imbroglio` was settled on the 1st of May 2021.

And while the lawsuit punishing the Internet Archive for its digital lending policies was eating up headlines and exposing several authors for less than ethical views on libraries, Stephen King and other authors were engaged in another lawsuit against their own publishers Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster, who were attempting to merge. The reason for so many authors lining up to support the United States Attorney General was because they feared this merger would further strengthen the publisher's power at the expense of the authors.

I fully sympathize with Willingham and applaud his decision, as a method of resistance to corporate control, is brilliant. It is also not without precedent, last November the mathematician and musician Tom Lehrer publicly renounced his copyright on all of his songs:

I, Tom Lehrer, individually and as trustee of the Tom Lehrer Trust 2007, hereby grant the following permissions:All copyrights to lyrics or music written or composed by me have been permanently and irrevocably relinquished, and therefore such songs are now in the public domain. All of my songs that have never been copyrighted, having been available for free for so long, are now also in the public domain. In other words, I have abandoned, surrendered and disclaimed all right, title and interest in and to my work and have injected any and all copyrights into the public domain.The permission granted includes all lyrics which I have written to music by others, although the music to such parodies, if copyrighted by their composers, are of course not included without permission of their copyright owners. The translated songs on this website may be found on YouTube in their original languages.Performing and recording rights to all of my songs are included in this permission. Translation rights are also included.In particular, permission is hereby granted to anyone to set any of these lyrics to their own music, or to set any of this music to their own lyrics, and to publish or perform their parodies or distortions of these songs without payment or fear of legal action.Some recording, movie, and television rights to songs written by me are merely licensed non-exclusively by me to recording, movie, or TV companies. All such rights are now released herewith and therefore do not require any permission from me or from Maelstrom Music, which is merely me in another hat, nor from the recording, movie, or TV companies involved.In short, I no longer retain any rights to any of my songs.So help yourselves, and don’t send me any money.

The disclaimer statement of Lehrer's official music page. 

 Though, as far as I am aware, Lehrer's decision was not motivated by corporate overreach. 

Of course, it is no surprise that I view the actions of Willingham and Lehrer favourably, in particular with Willingham's statement I found myself nodding vigorously while reading the section marked philosophy 

Philosophy: In the past decade or so, my thoughts on how to reform the trademark and copyright laws in this country (and others, I suppose) have undergone something of a radical transformation. The current laws are a mishmash of unethical backroom deals to keep trademarks and copyrights in the hands of large corporations, who can largely afford to buy the outcomes they want.

In my template for radical reform of those laws I would like it if any IP is owned by its original creator for up to twenty years from the point of first publication, and then goes into the public domain for any and all to use. However, at any time before that twenty year span bleeds out, you the IP owner can sell it to another person or corporate entity, who can have exclusive use of it for up to a maximum of ten years. That’s it. Then it cannot be resold. It goes into the public domain. So then, at the most, any intellectual property can be kept for exclusive use for up to about thirty years, and no longer, without exception.

I am a believer in the abolition of property intellectual and physical, however I am not a dreamer. I know for that to prove feasible we'll have to build a new society where exploitation and scarcity are also abolished, and that this will take time and effort. So for the interim, I think Willingham's proposal would be a rational compromise while we work towards the new dawn. It would also protect artists from corporate hitmen that alarm so many. I felt compelled to send Willingham my support as I'm sure he'll be under a Mammoth's weight of pressure from DC Comics and its owners to recant. Here is the text of my e-mail.

 Hello

I've just read your press release concerning your decision to give Fables to the public domain. I congratulate you on your decision and the clever way you've overcome the predatory ways of the DC representatives. I'm am archivist of social history and have fallen foul of the copyright system on many occasions while trying to share rare articles that have come into my possession so I share your frustrations.

I also found your copyright reform proposal to be a rational one in keeping with the spirit of Victor Hugo and the other original copyright advocates who wanted to check the power of business interests over art. I'm of the opinion that at some point in time the scales shifted and now most intellectual property agreements are designed to empower a corporation at the expense of the author, illustrator, musician and so on.

I am part of several groups that have been advocating for international copyright reform and your stance has met with approval and I hope will galvanise others in the future to take similar steps.

I look forward to your future endeavours and wish you luck in your fight to get what is owed to you by DC.

Warmest regards

I'll be watching this story very, very closely.