Hello rob642~
How you submit a cartoon to a newspaper, magazine, or website depends
entirely upon that media. Generally speaking, you simply send them a
copy, along with a brief letter, explaining that you?re submitting
your work. A self-address, stamped envelope (large enough and with
enough postage to return your work, if necessary) should also be
included.
Publications at the uppermost level often do not accept unsolicited
material. You can view The New Yorker?s submission guidelines on their
website: http://www.condenet.com/mags/newyorker/submissions.html
Notice that they don?t accept snail mail material, and do not provide
submission info for cartoons; therefore, information on their fees for
cartoons is private; it varies according to artist.
However, there are many other places that do accept unsolicited
material. Here are just a few, which I found by doing the following
Google search: submissions cartoons
? The Bear Deluxe Magazine, http://www.orlo.org/sub.html
? Hatch, http://www.hatchmagazine.com/about/submissions/
? King Features (syndicated cartoons), http://www.kingfeatures.com/subg.htm
? Utne, http://www.utne.com/magazine/submissions.html
? Funny Times, http://www.funnytimes.com/submissions.html
? Grapevine, http://www.aagrapevine.org/submit.html
If there are other media that you?re specifically curious about, just
do a Google search, either for the media?s main website (then look for
a link labeled ?submissions? or ?writer?s guidelines,? or something
similar). Or search the media?s name, plus the word ?submissions.?
Notice that each media has different requirements for how to submit,
so follow them carefully.
If you're serious about publishing your work, you'll also need to
purchase "The 2004 Artist's & Graphic Designer's Market" by Mary Cox
and Mona Michael. This book lists thousands of markets for visual
work, including cartoons, including who to contact, how to send, and
how much the pay is. You'll find this book at almost any good
bookstore; here's a link to the Amazon listing:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1582971846/qid=1078170152/sr=2-1/ref=sr_2_1/002-4421624-0183207
Cartoons, like all artwork, are copyrighted the minute they hit paper.
If you?re going to be submitting work for publication, you may wish to
file copyright information with the Copyright Office, which enables
you to sue if someone infringes upon your copyright. For economy?s
sake, gather multiple cartoons together in a ?collection,? and file
the whole. For complete information on filing copyright papers on
cartoons, check out ?Visual Art Works,? the U.S. Copyright Office,
http://www.copyright.gov/register/visual.html
You are right that ideas are not copyrightable. The law does not
protect themes or ideas behind cartoons, paintings, etc., since it?s
not uncommon for more than one person to have the same thought. Do
know that reputable people in the publishing world will not steal your
ideas, if they value their reputation and business; word gets around
very quickly if a publisher or editor is delving into dubious
practices.
You might find the following article on copyright and visual arts
helpful; ?Protecting Your Artwork: Copyright,? The Dennis Kennedy Law
Firm, LLC., available for a limited time in this Google cache:
://www.google.com/search?q=cache:Y07qJm8eoPsJ:www.denniskennedylaw.com/article.jsp%3FpractArea%3D25%26articleIndex%3D3+protecting+artwork+copyright&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
And ?Protection of Graphic Characters? by Lloyd Rich,
http://www.clearlakemedia.net/selfpub-resource/printable-rich-graphical-characters1.html
Good luck!
Kriswrite
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