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the guy just messaged me back, they still want to buy the rights to this story, what the cherry is going on today
Wednesday, 07-Sep-16 22:38:10 UTC from web-
@mrmattimation which story?
Wednesday, 07-Sep-16 22:38:43 UTC from web-
@rarity The prequel I wrote to my Undertale cartoon to sort of help build the universe a little more. I posted it to fanfiction because WHY NOT, and now somebody's messaging me saying that they're pursuing a marketing degree and part of their coursework involves buying exclusive rights to stories from their authors for some reason. They wanna pay me $30 for something that I'm like 95% certain isn't even mine to sell.
Wednesday, 07-Sep-16 22:40:47 UTC from web-
@mrmattimation if you could defend in a court that your work constitutes parody of a different work, then you have the rights to sell it. If not, I think it falls under "derivative works", the rights to which are held by the original matierial's copyright holder.
Wednesday, 07-Sep-16 22:44:55 UTC from web-
@rarity I'm sitting here reading the email in complete bewilderment. The sale basically boils down to this:
-By selling them the rights, I'm agreeing to send them the original .docx file and take it down from any website I've posted it to, as well as guaranteeing that I won't post it anywhere else again
-I can keep using the characters in the cartoons I'm working on, as well as any other stories I wish to publish in the future
-They're only offering to buy the "words on the page" and what I chose to do with the characters, and all potential copyright repercussions of the sale will fall on them and not me.
That last point confuses me because if I'm selling him the rights to the premise, and the cartoons are based on the same premise, aren't I technically also selling the cartoons to him?
I'm not selling ANYTHING, this offer just baffles me to no end.Wednesday, 07-Sep-16 22:50:30 UTC from web-
@mrmattimation if the plot of the story is intrinsically tied to the plot of the video, then you might be selling him the right to the video as well as it might constitute a derivative work. But the thing is, copyright law is so complicated, I would say NEVER sell the rights to ANYTHING without a lawyer.
Wednesday, 07-Sep-16 22:58:05 UTC from web-
@rarity Well yeah, I ain't selling Fluffle Puff today. What's really weird is I told him once that I wasn't comfortable selling the story and he's still trying to convince me. If I were a marketing student trying to just do an assignment, I'd move right on to the next story the second I got a rejection.
Wednesday, 07-Sep-16 23:00:11 UTC from web
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