Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Comics, dc, dc comics, entertainment

That DC Comics Payment Change…

This was the bit of the DC e-mail to comic book creators that seemed to cause the most issues among recipients who contacted me,

There are a few significant differences between this new plan and what DCE has offered in the past.  Perhaps the biggest difference is that all participations will now be calculated based upon DCE's net revenue from a book's sale rather than on the cover price.   This change gives us more flexibility to sell our material in new distribution channels that have different pricing models.

One creator told me "We are doomed by the DC contract for net profits. It's all very Marvel now. We make less on the trades, colourists get a piece of the pie – but less pie."

Another simplified it to "That net revenue deal will not be a good thing for royalties."

Net revenue is different to net profits, famous in Hollywood contracts for often never paying out any royalties whatsoever if the project can be deemed not to have made a profit. This includes films such as Forrest Gump, Spider-Man, JFK, Coming To America, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Return Of The Jedi, Harry Potter And The Order Of The Phoenix and the Lord Of The Rings films that have all gone to court over it. But the principle could be the same. You could reduce payments to creators by finding more and more things to offset against the net revenue received, ComiXology, Apple, Amazon cuts an Diamond cuts, but also printer costs, publisher building lease, the cost of heating, trips to Starbucks, or the moving costs for a publisher from one coast to another.

Linda Carter, the TV Wonder Woman was quoted as saying,

I think that you're probably familiar with a problem in Hollywood, and that is that they market you, and they use you. They did a mask of my face and put it on the doll, and they put my name on for the first run of it. And then they took my name off and said they didn't have to pay me anymore. So it's the kind of thing that you can be used so much in this industry. I make nothing. I don't even make anything from the reruns. Don't ever settle for net profits. It's called creative accounting.

And that's Wonder Woman saying that. Might be worth keeping an eye out…

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