The problem isn't with DAZ making money. I think we all agree that granting limited printing and publishing rights to a large Company is worth the exposure.

However, when an Artist gives a Company rights to reproduce the image FOREVER, without limit and without recourse to sharing in the profit made by future prints, then the end result is blatant exploitation.

Yes, an Artist can print the image themselves. But without the publishing connections and financial backing of a Company, the Artist is unlikely to get the work out to a large audience. If the Company holding printing rights floods the market with the image, then the Artist loses any chance for profit because the cost of privately producing the work would be more than the market value.

Nothing says this will happen. But that's what the "agreement" would allow.

It was this kind of agreement that left many of the original Motown artists penniless while the large record companies continued to rake in substantial profit from the singer's popular songs decades after they were recorded.

Message edited on: 10/30/2004 06:14