F.A.Q. : Legal Issues

How Legal is This Site?

The Text

1. Editorial
2. Indexing & Cross-Referencing
3. Reviewing

Another large part of the site is the indexing and cataloging of facts and reference information. We analyse Spidey comics and extract summaries about apperances, stories, dates, etc. Basically, we're like the research division of a large museum. All that stuff is fairly straightforward.

Finally, there's the reviews. The site reviewers analyse Spidey stories. We provide highlights, analysis, contextualisation, and glue it together with unjustified prejudice. Sometimes, in the course of discussing a story, we will go into significant detail of the story.

Now, if this was done inappropriately, then that would be rather dodgy. If you just take a comic and relate the entire story into textual form, that's out-and-out breach of copyright. But we really don't do that. If we're not adding value, then we're doing a bad job of reviewing - and generally, I don't think the way that we use the stories can really be condemned.

The Images

We never reproduce any significant component of the inside of a story. In fact, we very rarely reproduce even a single panel of a story. We only do so when it has direct relationship to an editorial or review point which we cannot make without reference to the actual material under discussion.

99% of our graphical material on the site is contained within our database of comic covers. A comics cover is the public face of a comic. It appears on shelves, on newstands, and on web-sites everywhere. Marvel would have a heck of a time selling comics without the cover being made publically visable!

All the big comic sales sites, Mile High, Amazon, eBay, they all use the covers of comics. This is all in Marvel's interest. It would be unimaginable for Marvel to say that reproduction of their covers in the context of increasing public awareness of and/or promoting sale and resale of their product could in any way affect their own rights to use of their product.

The last use of Marvel copyright images is in the logos which appear on the top of the page. These are used to denote the fact that we are a fan club and fan archive database primarily concerned with Spider-Man. Perhaps a good team of lawyers could find some traction in this area... but it would seem a bit of a stretch.

Movies & Audio

We have a general policy, that we will not reproduce even a fragement of any audio, video or software component until it is seriously out of date, and no longer available commercially.

Basically, we care about fair use of copyright. We're non-commercial, but we want Marvel, and other licenced users of Marvel copyright and trade-marked material to succeed commercially.

Fair Use

They make a couple of key comments which I should like to emphasize.

Copyrights are actually mentioned in the body of the Constitution. Article One, Section Eight, Paragraph Eight grants Congress the power "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries."

"Fair Use" exists in statute (17 U.S.C. 107 in case you're having trouble sleeping) and in years of court rulings. Basically, a person may use a copyrighted work without the author's consent when the author is not deprived of the opportunity to profit. "The author's consent," by the way, could be interpreted as "paying the author money."

A fan Web site with a few pictures and articles is also fair use. It would more likely increase people's appetite for the original work than dilute it.

A fan Web site with hundreds of photos, fan fiction and plot summaries would be unfair use. People might get their fill of [Whatever] from you rather than from the original copyright holder. In general, reviews, criticisms, short quotations in a scholarly work, parody, news stories, and small batch reproduction for teaching purposes are fair. Anything that harms the ability of the author to sell the work or derivative works is unfair and illegal.

Plot Summaries? That is more of a concern. There are reviews on this site for probably a good 20% of the Spider-Man appearances. Most are purely critical comment and opinion, but admittedly, a few are detailed plot descriptions - mostly relating to older stories which are hard to obtain, or prohibitively expensive for many readers.

If we review Amazing Fantasy #15, can anyone honestly suggest that it will make a reader less likely to go out and purchase a copy? It is far more credible that it would increase the desire to own one for themselves. That's what it certainly does for me. How could lines of text on a computer be a substitute for the sight, touch, and smell of the real thing?

Also, there are lots of recent Spider-Fans who want to fill out their knowledge of events past, so that they can better enjoy the current comics which they purchase at their comic shop or newsagent. Reading a review of AF #15 is also more likely to make them want to read the latest stories. These young kids aren't going to spend hundreds of dollars on eBay, but this is the next best thing to help them get up to speed.

Sometimes we do review a key story in detail - but this has to be taken within the context of the huge amount of Spider-Man material produced in the last 35 years. The world of Spider-Man covers over 2000 comics, thousands of trading cards, hundreds of toys, a hundred of TV episodes, hundreds of thousands of Spider-Man pictures. All I can do is show you my favourites. The rest is up to you to track down the real thing and enjoy it for yourself.

So, until The Incredible Hulk takes up Macrame - Make Mine Marvel!