sfcityduck

Now you have me curious - examples I should check out? I can only think of one Superman bootleg.

Phantom, Duck Tracy and Prince Valiant are in constant reprints with PV on-going also.

I have pretty much all of the DC archives and other high quality GA era comic and newspaper strip offerings. So far, the best collections have come from the original publishers or with their cooperation (EC, Barks Library, Spirit Archives, DC Archives, Prince Valiant, Terry, Rip Kirby, LoAC, etc). The alternative is low quality scanned stuff like the PS scanned offerings, which sometimes are duplicating (and undercutting the market for) higher quality offerings. But Archives are not really what's at issue here. It's the characters and new media offerings. On that point, I do agree that there's lots of room for creativity when it comes to the lesser characters that have dropped off their rights owner's map. But here's the thing, Tarzan (1912) has been in the public domain for a long time. The expiration of the copyright in 2007 has not led to a plethora of high quality (or even low quality) Tarzan material. Not sure who is going to take up the flag of DC back-up features. In any event, we are going to have a good idea how this goes long before we get to Superman and Batman. Next up are Buck Rogers and Popeye (created 1929 and both former movie properties). Other upcoming former adventure/hero media properties that will expire before Superman include: The Shadow (1930), Dick Tracy (1931), Conan (1932), Lone Ranger (1933), Doc Savage (1933), Flash Gordon (1934), Green Hornet (1936), Phantom (1936), and Prince Valiant (1937).

The late 40s to early 50s issues of Star Spangled are some of the most enjoyable comics around. Adventure of the same period is also highly underrated. Really, all the anthologies. Folks just don't seem to care about the back-ups. Me, I love them also. Especially Vigilante, Shining Knight, Robot Man, Wildcat, so many!

I think you now know this, but for everyone else per Wikipedia: Dell was acquired by Doubleday in 1976.[29] Doubleday was acquired by Bertelsmann in 1986, who formed Bantam Doubleday Dell as its US subsidiary.[30] Bertelsmann acquired Random House in 1998 and renamed its US business after the acquisition.[31] After the merger, Bantam was merged with Dell Publishing.[32] In 2001, Random House purchased Golden Books' book publishing properties[33] effectively reuniting the remnants of Dell and Western Publishing. Bantam Dell became part of the Random House publishing group in 2008.[34] Ballantine Books was merged with Bantam Dell in 2010.[35] In 2013, Random House merged with Penguin to form Penguin Random House.[36]

Given the high quality of the two books, and their closeness in time (only a seven month gap in cover date - probably less for hitting the stands), my assumption is that the stamp was put there by the OO. Be interesting to see if other copies emerge.

I remember a lot of discussion of the Poughkeepsie file copies back in the late 70s early 80s. Especially in the Barks Collector and the dealer who published that fanzine's own sales lists. The story was that they were owned by a former employee. I think it was presumed he just took the issues home as they published them or stole them out of the offices. Supposedly they were sold to various dealers. Another story is he died in 1980, and his wife and daughter sold the last 1,600 he had to Fishler who brought them to market in 2003 as Poughkeepsie copies. Presumably, Fishler knew who the original source was to have pulled that deal off. The Random House archive was sold by Heritage in 2005. They were warehoused for many years. Whether you want to call those "file copies" or "warehouse copies" - they were uncirculated copies that never left the publisher. This contrasts with copies held by someone like Crowley which were gathered for his personal records or enjoyment and not retained by the publisher at all. To me, a "file copy" should have been saved by the publisher - whether warehoused or "filed" (whatever that means) - things like the Gaines copies and the Random House archives and a number of books called Harvey file copies were were clearly kept by the publisher I think. The copies that were used in the production process, like the Racine and some of the Poughkeepsie, were also clearly kept by the publisher given the "file" stamps. The copies kept by employees may be a different thing. But we call them all file copies - and I'm ok with that as long as we attach the name of the employee to them.

And yet CGC says: "He [Tom Reilly] was reportedly killed in a kamikaze attack near the end of the war, at which point the collection stops." Reported by who?

A lot of people have researched that one. There's never been any confirmation of Beerbohm's backstory on the collection. I would not be surprised if (1) the names were changed to protect the comics source (they got the comics in three batches and maybe thought there was more?) and are now lost to time, and (2) the how "Tom Reilly" died part as told by RB is exaggerated. None of that matters because the books are beautiful. But I wouldn't be paying a premium because of the backstory.

Prof. K did great work on tracking down the family. Not surprising they had no answers. This came up a year ago, which is when I think he started chasing the story hard back then. As for why the books have the checkmarks, a pretty good theory is that Holt was checking off females, and that maybe as painting references? My book supports the checking off females part. But it could be the subject matter being checked changed over time if he was trying to learn to draw. Here's a thread that was discussed: As for W.C. Holt, Jr., he was also discussed a bit on this thread, which is incomplete, because it looks like Prof. K pulled some of his comments off from back then I assume to keep the niece from being bothered: Again, Kudos for Prof. K, and Prof. K don't stop out of deference to CGC. It's your story to develop further.

Well ... I don't think you need to be concerned about stepping on CGC's toes. They are sitting on a lot of info that they don't put into their pedigree discussions - like that the Mesoperas are the source for the Promise Collection. And if CGC is waiting until "the Pedigree Book" is finally put out by Matt Nelson et al., it could be decades! Not sure why CGC gets to be the arbiter of what's a pedigree, on what they get to base the decision, and when that gets announced. It sort of has converted a status conveyed by the collecting community into a marketing ploy and way to control potential customers. For example, I sure view Bangzoom's core group of Gilchrist books as a pedigree, whether or not he goes to CGC to get them certified.

Great idea, but now its in the public domain. The Winnie the Pooh horror movie made a couple million off a $100K budget. My guess is that its not real high quality, but I have not seen it (and don't intend to). That's the kind of cheap exploitation I would expect to occur initially. But, on the other hand, there's been some brilliant post-expiration work on Sherlock Holmes. Young Sherlock, Enola Holmes, a number of straight up Sherlocks, like Benedict C's, have all been pretty brilliant.

On the other side of the coin: What exactly is the public interest in letting the Harry Potter copyright expire 125 years from now? Or Superman or Batman in 2034 and 2035? Or any literary property? For me, the public is better served by forcing creators to imagine new vistas, like Marvel did in the 1960s. Prior to the 1976 Act, the term of protection was was 28 years with a possibility of a 28 year extension, for a total maximum term of 56 years. Imagine a world where Superman's copyright would expire 28 years after his creation. That would have been 1966. We may never have seen the many new characters that arose because the oldest most popular characters were still protected. I have no problem with the copyright protection afforded then or now from a public interest perspective.

Since the copyrights are good for post 1978 creations until 70 years after the creator dies, e.g., Harry Potter's clock has not even begun to click, it seems unlikely that there will be much of a deterrent to new creations. Someone like J.K. Rowling shows the incentive to create is to become a billionaire off of a zero investment story, and a constant stream of funds in a market with no competitors that has already run 27 years with another 70 years to go after she dies, which may not be for another 25 plus years (she's 58 now). If so, that would lead to copyright protection lasting 122 years. That should inure not only to her benefit but also her three kids who will all be dead under this scenario before the copyright expires (one born before the book came out and the other two in the early 2000s), and her grandkids (who will be born soon - next ten years or so - if she's going to have any) who might also die before the copyrights expire. So, no, I don't see existing copyright laws as a deterrent at all.