William H. Vallely <103351.1752@compuserve.com> asks:
> Now, Warners does have *some* proprietary interest in the show,
> right? I mean, how can they expect to get a better deal from
> someone else when they could publish it themselves? Stirling
> written?

S.M. Stirling's credits are beyond reproach, and if you don't
know who that is, or what he's done, then the loss is yours...and
you're simply showing your ignorance here of written SF. And we've had
lots of other quality SF writers doing our books, like Neal Barrett Jr.
and Lois Tilton and John Vornholt, among others. But I guess maybe you
don't know who THEY are either.

That's okay...they don't know who you are, either.

Re: the comic...yes, WB did want DC to do it originally, and
they did so for some time. But they're really not set up these days to
do much licensed stuff, the Star Trek books and other licensed stuff
have pretty much all gone to other publishers. Creatively, things
weren't working out, and in reality, WB can get more from an outside
company that pays larger bucks for the license than with an in-house
company which doesn't have to.

So again, your facts don't touch reality at any two contiguous
points.

And yes, there *is* a large demand for B5 merchandise. And if
you used this forum for any purpose other than to issue snide
commentaries, you would know that from *day one* on this series, I've
stated very openly that I do not WANT a lot of merchandising on this
show while it's in production. I'm taking the Calvin and Hobbes model
on this one. I said here, in front of all the users on CIS, GEnie and
elsewhere, long before we were ever in a position to even get offers,
that I intended to drag my feet on licensing, because I've been
involved with, or seen too often shows in which the tail began wagging
the dog, where merchandise begins to drive the show.

I refuse to allow that to happen with B5. It's real simple:
you tell the story first. Make the show first. Then, when it's all
done, if it's a hit, and ours is growing steadily, then there's all the
time in the world to do some merchandising. If not, it's a moot
question anyway. For every 10 prospective licensing deals that come
through my hands, I appove only 1, and usually with a great deal of
conditions involved, and direct creative supervision.

Bill Watterson could've made gazillions of dollars licensing
all kinds of Calvin and Hobbes stuff. His friends wanted him to, the
company REALLY wanted him to, others couldn't understand why he
wouldn't do it...but he understood the importance of the story, and the
product. Take care of that first, and the rest will attend to itself
later. He made a good living doing what he was doing, and I do okay
too...how much more do you need?

I guess it's beyond your comprehension that anyone would
actually turn down money, or want to do something for reasons other
than money. Again, the loss is yours.

jms