Comment by seanc

Not that I'm firmly in the camp of 'everything should be free', but in this case the agency promised the designer "There's no money now, but since you hold the copyright on the work, if we decide to distribute it, we'll have to pay you later. So work for peanuts, okay?"

If there were not copyright at all, then the agency wouldn't have had the promise of future revenue to lure the designer into the deal in the first place.

If everyone knew up front that once the work was done it would be free to the world, there would have been no misunderstanding, and the designer would have had an easier time insisting on getting paid properly up front.