Ladies and gentlefolk, J.K. Rowling is at it again on Twitter. Except this time, the author of the Harry Potter books isn’t proclaiming some horrible new toilet fact about her crowning franchise or going after trans people with a fervour reminiscent of her very own Dementors. No, this time, she’s soliciting free art from children under the guise of a competition to illustrate her new children’s book, The Ickabog.
According to the website, The Ickabog is a story that Rowling wrote for her children many years ago before abandoning it for other projects, Harry Potter presumably being one among them. She states that she was inspired to rekindle the project by the pandemic lockdown that’s been “very hard on children, in particular.” The story is completely unrelated to the wizarding universe and will be made available online in its entirety over the course of the next week, with a physical copy slated to be published sometime in 2020.
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Here’s where the art-soliciting comes into play: Rowling and Scholastic are holding a competition over Twitter, where kids can post their fanart of The Ickabog with the hashtag #Theickabog for a chance to have their illustration featured in the book. A heartwarming concept, until you get to the terms and conditions - as pointed out by Twitter use @miriatii.
For those of you not versed in legal jargon, this basically means that the act of submitting an image using the hashtag gives Scholastic and Rowling the right to use the image as they see fit without owing the creator any royalties. You can’t take your entry back under any circumstances, and it stays within their legal right to use forever. Scholastic and Rowling also have the right to use the image as they see fit (i.e. in material other than the book) as long as it pertains to the contest, even if your entry didn’t win.
J.K. Rowling did clarify that she would be donating all her royalties to “people who have been affected by the coronavirus,” with full details coming later in the year. Despite the unhelpfully vague wording, a contest to give free art to illustrate a charity endeavour doesn’t seem too heinous. However, it does beg the question: is Rowling not rich enough to pay these children royalties for their art and donate to charity? Will Scholastic be donating their share of the proceeds as well? Why put out a blanket ownership on ALL submissions in the fine print if it’s really just a well-meaning contest to have fans illustrate a children’s book?
It all seems like a thinly veiled attempt at soliciting free publicity and illustrations, but perhaps it’s a good thing that’s all that it amounts to, at worst. Gods knows what minority she’ll be going after the next time she takes to Twitter.
Source: The Ickabog Official Website, Twitter
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