In the past few years, Conan Doyle's legacy foundation has spared no effort to protect the Sherlock Holmes copyright, and has collected a large amount of royalties from countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States.

In the past, the Conan Doyle Heritage Foundation claimed that they managed all copyrights to Sherlock Holmes, and that no one had access to them except for them.

Even Warner Bros., the creator of the just-released "Sherlock Holmes", had to shell out a lot of silver.

Conan Doyle had three children, one of whom was the son Adrian, who had sold many of his father's skinny heights to others, and it was not until 1981 that Conan Doyle's daughter reclaimed the copyrights.

These rights were then inherited by the Conan Doyle Legacy, and because of the value of Holmes's image, many people still have a penny of money every year.

Every year, many writers want to write about Sherlock Holmes, but few of them are actually published due to the hindrance of the Heritage Foundation, and they openly claim that the character of Sherlock Holmes has not entered the public domain of the United States, and even does not recognize the rest of the country.

Most of Mr. Conan Doyle's works were published before 1923, and the last series of four works was published after 1923.

Paying the Foundation for Sherlock Holmes-related elements seems to be the norm, but researchers, hobbyists, and small publishers are deterred from using, interpreting, and adapting these elements compared to deep-pocketed film and television theater companies and large publishing companies.

Although Qin Mu didn't know if the Foundation would be interested in distant China, it was worth a try.

Over the years, Qin Mu's English level has long been returned to the teacher, and he used translation software to write intermittently, and then copied it into a document.

Then he went to the Internet café he hadn't seen for a long time, and after re-registering an email account, he searched for the official email address of the Conan Doyle Heritage Foundation through Google and sent out the information he had reported!

……

Charles Doyle, grandson of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's younger brother Innes, is now in his forties and is now one of the administrators of the Conan Doyle Foundation.

Over the years, Charles has been transformed into a millionaire with the image of Sherlock Holmes, and now he is sitting in an office chair with a cigar in his mouth.

The recently released "Sherlock Holmes" did very well at the box office, although the word of mouth plummeted like Lushan Waterfall, earning $46 million in North America in its first weekend, and it also performed very well worldwide.

This is likely to set the highest box office record for a Sherlock Holmes movie, and commercial success is the key, and word of mouth is nothing.

"It seems that we still need to push the cinematization of Sherlock Holmes and seize the time to make money. Charles said to himself, "The licensing fee for that comic is too small, and now that Holmes is so popular, the price should be increased." ”

The work of the foundation is actually very small, and Charles is a little bored, and he has already thought about taking the beautiful secretary he has just recruited to the golf course with him later.

Just as he was thinking about it, the secretary in a black suit and skirt walked in with high heels, "Mr. Doyle, we received an email from China today, I think you might want to know." ”

"Show me, there's a big market in China. Charles Doyle took the email printed out by the secretary, and he glanced at it casually.

The syntax of the email seems stiff and there are some errors, but the meaning is clear.

"Warner Bros.'s Sherlock Holmes essay gave us royalties, and that shouldn't be a problem. However, he used it for publishing, which should be paid separately. Linda, you go find this publishing company and give them an email informing them that they have to pay before they are published, otherwise it will be a provocation to our Heritage Foundation. ”

Linda briefly reminded: "Mr. Doyle, according to China's copyright law, Sir Conan Doyle's works published between 1923 and 1927 only enjoy a 50-year copyright protection period, which is a long time since they were in public use. ”

As long as any part of Sherlock Holmes is under copyright, all parts of Sherlock Holmes should be protected. Even if a literary work enters the public domain, all characters, including Sherlock Holmes, Watson, and Moriarty, must pay royalties. The laws of their country can only be directed at their own writers, and cannot bind the rest of the country. ”

It seemed to Charles to be a trivial matter, and he spoke again, "Is there an English version of Sherlock? If so, get me a copy." ”

"I'm sorry, Mr. Doyle, it seems that this is only available in Chinese. However, I immediately contacted the publishing company to see if they were interested in publishing in English. ”

……

Located on China's second largest island, Nanhai Publishing is one of the most complete and powerful publishing houses in China, and can be launched nationwide within a week.

On the 5th floor of Xinghua Building, Zhang Sen, a staff member of the editorial review department, was cleaning up the spam information in the contact mailbox, and at the same time forwarded some manuscripts that had been submitted in the wrong place to the editorial department, when an all-English email caught his attention.

As a qualified editor, Zhang Sen is proficient in English, and after reading it carefully, he immediately called for support.

"Hey, Chen Lei, can you help me check whether the sender of this email is Conan Doyle's foundation, why do I think this is like a cheat, looking for us for a $5,000 authorization fee, is this crazy for money. ”

Chen Lei, who was not far away, was quite puzzled, of course he knew that his company was about to publish a fanwork related to Sherlock Holmes, and he had inquired about the relevant information at the beginning, and now the use, interpretation, and adaptation of Sherlock Holmes's related elements can be used for free.

"It should be fake, even if it's true, don't bother. The complete works of Sherlock Holmes can be published for free, and we just publish a fanwork, so what does it matter?"

Zhang Sen kept an eye on it, he found Gu Xinxue's mailbox on the address book, and then forwarded the email, five thousand dollars is not a small number, equivalent to more than 30,000 yuan.

He was quite puzzled, his company's publication of "Sherlock" has not yet been publicized on a large scale, how could foundations far away in Europe and the United States know about this news, could it be that Warner Bros. revealed it?