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My Take on Copyrights

From a business/economic perspective, copyright laws make plenty of sense. Anyone who does creative work for a living would like to be sure that no one else can begin stealing the source of their daily bread.
However, from a creative standpoint, copyrights inhibit free thought and place creative minds in a more concerned, "am I allowed to use this?" state. Traditionally, in the world of comics, the only new perspectives we get on classic characters are those approved by the publishers themselves. New revisions are now sometimes available on the internet (see the picture in a previous post of the Peanuts dressed as Watchmen), but rarely do we get new, interesting views at characters whose qualities many may take for granted. Consider "Punisher kills the Marvel Universe," a fun one-shot comic in which the Punisher murders just about every other hero Marvel has ever produced, including all of the X-Men AND their villains. The overall effect is fanciful and darkly comedic, yet in no place in the comic does it seem like this could ever fit into continuity. Still, its a fun look into the potential future of the character.
If companies were able to handle their own titles and characters correctly and consistently create high-quality work, they would have nothing to fear from others who would be producing non-canonical versions. When fifteen versions of Spider-man hit store shelves and four of them are from independent creators, audiences always seem to win.

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