Intellecutal rights to product, ancillaries, future editions

[Editor Drew]

One of the other posters in a closed thread mentioned that he had been approached by a publishing company and offered a percentage of the revenue generated from the sales of his product under their imprint.  This was discussed in terms of intellectual property rights.  Is this kind of agreement different from royalties earned and paid by a publishing company based on the sales of a contracted, published text?  The authors at our company receive royalties for contracted texts, but the life of that royalty percentage only applies to that single text.  It seems to me that the owner of intellectual property rights for a game system would have more leverage in wording the agreement to include items such as future editions, ancillaries, and expansions.  Does anyone know if there is a difference between the two, and if so, what the specifics are?  Can the poster in the other thread extend his revenue generating possibilities beyond what is currently printed?

As ever,
  ACE

[lumpley]

Hey Drew, do you mean me, in Mongoose contacted me?

If so, would you mind asking the same question again, but with more specifics or an example or something? I'm having trouble figuring it out.

In my particular case with Mongoose, future editions and expansions and supplements and stuff weren't even on the table. I'd never sign a contract that gave anyone but me the right to use my work in that way. I'd (happily) negotiate those kinds of projects with people case by case, but I'd never sign over the blanket rights.

-Vincent

[Josh Roby]

Drew, work-for-hire stuff is what you're probably used to.  The writer (not author) is contracted to write something specified by the company, who owns all the rights and who pays the writer a fee which may include royalties.  The writer has no rights to the work, even if the company never publishes it.  It's like being hired to make shoes in a factory.  You don't own the shoes in any way, despite the fact that you made them.

Mongoose offered Vincent a deal under which they'd take a work that he still owned the rights to, and publish, market, and distribute it themselves, offering him a cut.  Technically this was probably a license, by which Vincent licenses Mongoose the right to publish the book.  In this case, I believe Mongoose was after exclusive rights to publish the book, which is one of the reasons Vincent turned them down.  Mongoose would not have owned said rights, they'd be licensing those rights.  The fee that they offered him may be a flat fee, or royalties, or whatever; it doesn't change the nature of the relationship.

Make more sense?

[Editor Drew]

Sorry i didn't get a chance to post all weekend...4th and all...

The issues of exclusive reprint rights and WFH  (Work for Hire) agreements are kind of separate than what I was trying to get at. Let's take, for example, the intellectual property rights of Stan Lee's Spider Man comic.  If i'm not mistaken, he is still able to garner some percentage of new product content rights because he owns the intellectual rights to the character, the idea. Thus, I couldn't write a Spider Man novella and publish it without obtaining the rights to print such content from Stan Lee (Or perhaps DC comics if he's signed over those rights)....it depends on who owns those rights and that's what I was trying to ask to all here and specifically to Vincent.  If Vincent (or any game designer here) sells the publishing rights to his game to Mongoose (or another publisher), shouldn't he be able to negotiate royalty compensation rights for ancillaries, derivatives, expansions that are based on his game design?

This is different than a typical author-publisher relationship where the authors sign a contract or WFH that CAN limit royalty distribution and future rights to subsequent editions, ancillaries, etc...but this can be negotiable as well.  Some of my authors ask for some strange things in their contracts and sometimes get them (ancillary royalties, non-exclusive reprint rights, and [yes] 10 cases of wine from their favorite California winery).  Maybe the gaming industry is different <shrug> but that's why i asked if anyone here has additional input on this topic.  It seems to me that there may have been missed opportunities to negotiate on the Vincent offer...

As ever,
  ACE

[lumpley]

Hey Drew.

All the rights are mine. All ownership would've remained mine. Mongoose's offer was to license only the right to publish my book: for the duration of the contract, they'd be the only people who could print it and sell it. That's it; they'd have no right to create derivative works at all. If they'd wanted to create and publish derivative works, they would've had to negotiate that right with me AS WELL.

So I don't ever have to negotiate royalties. In order to create derivative works in the first place, they'd have to offer me hard cash up front, and frankly quite a lot of it.

So you say:

It seems to me that there may have been missed opportunities to negotiate on the Vincent offer...

What do you mean? Do you mean that Mongoose missed an opportunity to sweeten the deal and maybe win me over, by offering to buy the right to create derivative works too?

Because like I say, that's not petty cash.

-Vincent

[lumpley]

...Or wait, maybe that's all you were asking, and I'm just being strident for no reason. Drew, does this answer your question?

No, they wouldn't have had the right to publish derivative work. If they'd wanted to do that, I'd've expected royalties, yes.

-Vincent