Cartoon Characters and Merchandising  Independent animator (and
former syndicated newspaper cartoonist) Chris Harding has a
thought-provoking rant on his blog about the perils of allowing
your cartoon characters to be licensed for merchandise. He
writes:  Here’s how it works: You spend all your energy and
passion, and it almost kills you, but somehow you manage to
breathe a tiny bit of life into a characterâ€¦ your baby. And
then some genius comes along and, bing-bang, sells the rights to
print that character’s face on a napkin. That people wipe their
food on. On your character’s face. That you worked so hard to
breathe life into. Chocolate cake all over their face. It shows
contempt for the very idea of a character, because they only
exist where we put them. And if they are even slightly real to
you, if you care even a little about them, it shows a lot of
disrespect to wipe your filth on their faces. It only makes
sense if your goal is just to cash out, leaving behind the husks
of other peoples’ once lively