thread: 2012-03-12 : Indie POV pt 1: the Very Basics
On 2012-03-13, Moreno wrote:
There is a specific case that point to possible problems with these kind of arrangements, I suspect.
Someone here is familiar with the Columbia Games - Robin Crossby case about Harn and Harnmaster? I don't know the details of their contract, but after years of Harn books written (or co-written) by Crossby and published by Columbia Games, they had a falling out. Both parties declared that they had the legal rights to the game and the setting, and that the other's publications were in violation of the contract. Both parties decided to avoid going to court about the matter (too costly, I suppose). So each one published a new (different) version of the game and setting material. This not only did split the player base, but caused a lot of problems with fan sites, who could be accused by either party to giving help to publications that violated their copyright.
I don't think that they had one of these "creator-owned" arrangement, but the point of the example is not that. The point is that a contract isn't worth very much, if you can't afford to use it in court.
And I am not talking only about companies screwing the designer: what if the designer, after signing the contract, enter in another agreement with a bigger publisher? What if they simply have different opinions about the best way to promote it, so that the publisher is acting in good faith but the designer believe that he is getting less that he should because of something that he consider a publisher's error?
What can be done to lessen these risks for both parties? (apart from the usual "work only with people you can trust", I mean)
