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Starting July
Class #22… July 8th … World Building
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Class E-1… August 5th... Promotion
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Class #32… Sept 2nd … Essentials
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Starting October
Class #1… Oct 7th … Pitches and Blurbs
Class #2… Oct 8th … Promotion
Class #3… Oct 9th … Genre Structure
Class #4… Oct 10th … Openings
Class #5… Oct 10th … Cliffhangers
Class #6… Oct 11th … Pacing Your Stories
Starting November
Class #7… Nov 4th … Essentials
Class #8… Nov 4th … Ideas to Story
Class #9… Nov 5th … Plot Your Novel
Class #10… Nov 6th … Designing Book Covers
Class #11… Nov 7th … Designing Book Interiors
Class #12… Nov 8th … Promotions
Starting December
Class #13… Dec 2nd … World Building
Class #14… Dec 3rd … Pacing Your Stories
Class #15… Dec 4th … Cliffhangers
Class #16… Dec 5th … Genre Structure
Class #17… Dec 5th … Pitches and Blurbs
Class #18… Dec 6th … Promotions
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Folks should also read the comments, where a publisher makes a case for their side, and he and Mike meet somewhere in the middle. Interesting points all.
To be honest, I’ve been wondering when a publisher would start claiming “rights” to their edits on a manuscript. I suppose there might be some kind of case to be made there.
Isn’t there some precedent in real-estate law that might apply? Isn’t the rule that, just because you step in and make improvements to a property not your own, you don’t OWN the property. You don’t even own the improvements. Or am I totally wrong here?
Steve, the real property argument is logical and partially right, since copyright is a form of property law.
Problem comes in with the nature of what is protected. No character, no setting, no basic plot line is protected, just the form of the words, and when a publishers alters the form, then an argument can be made for a different form and thus protected also. Not much case law on that exact point yet that I have followed. But so far publishers have eased off this and not fought. Also, there is a threshold of substantial changes, which then also gets into derivative provisions of copyright law and it gets really messy.
Wow! That sounded harsh even to me, and I’m no fan of what the NYT publishers have been doing with e-rights (or LACK of what they’ve been doing in some cases).
But it makes sense. As far as writers go, I’m thinking the survivors of all this upheaval in publishing are going to be those who are smart enough to have business savvy. The rest are going to be eaten alive and won’t be around in a few years, or will be reduced to scrambling for crumbs. Eventually, though, even the crumbs will be gone.
The writers who just want to write, and not have to pay attention to the money end of things, don’t seem to realize they’re swimming with sharks. Sharks aren’t necessarily evil in and of themselves, but they have a voracious appetite. And you’re the food.
What I find interesting, Ty, is that every long time professional I know, meaning writers who have been making a living for twenty years and are friends of mine, are moving quickly on this. I have a hunch that’s because we have all had to shift and change a number of times in the last 25 years to stay alive and living. And that’s a trait of long term pros.
It’s the newer professionals who are trapped in the myths that will be flushed away by this new change I’m afraid.
The other side of the question is, what should I be looking out for while I’m BUILDING a backlist? (AKA “beginning to sell.”) That is, what digital rights are reasonable for a publisher to ask for? Exclusive for a year? Non-exclusive in perpetuity? Do we differ in the clauses we ask for and the ones we strike according to our individual sales-and-marketing strategy? You’ve addressed this some, but new-to-me things keep popping up.
I was unaware of this until, by sheer coincidence, in the exact same day, reading Mike Stackpole’s blog about the clauses you want in a digital contract, and…. having a conversation with some people in the biz about stuff that’s going on now whereby various bad e-publishing deals being offered to (and accepted) by writers, including for the backlists of established professionals.
Good on Mike for clarifying and stating the clauses people should seek if they choose to e-publish with a publisher rather than uploading/packaging their material themselves.
Hi Dean,
Saw it already, but it is great advice. Since we’re going to probably going to have another outbreak of new publishing norms in another decade, I suspect it’s better to just define the electronic forms of publishing, rather than give a blanket “all types.” Who knows what will work on the quantum phone readers of 2019?
The comments discussion about who owns the edited copy is well-taken. I also think Bob Kruger’s comment about “author-editor co-ops” becoming more important in publishing was a…pregnant comment.
heteromeles, yup, I think there will be a ton of new models popping up in this new world, and author-editor co-op is one I can see happening.
I also see things like co-ops of small publishers working together, co-ops of writers forming a small publisher to get their work out, and many, many, many new publishers springing into place that don’t mind those terms that Mike has set out. I read them and Kris read them and we agree that if we were doing Pulphouse today and buying electronic rights, those would be the terms we would use. Fair to both parties. No rights grab.
But remember Mike is trying to warn off authors who are taking the lazy and easy way out and getting screwed in the process.
Lazy and easy way out equals “I don’t want to handle these rights, I’ll just sell them for a tiny amount because a little is better than nothing.” That is happening all the time right now and stunning me as well when I hear about it. Just too stupid for words for writers to do that at this point.
On editors making changes,
It’s been my impression so far, and it could very well be a wrong impression, that the changes an editor would make involve fixing typos, grammar constructions, and other minor changes like that. And any major changes that would actually require some rewriting, the editor would ask the author to make those changes, so that any significant changes to the story line itself would still be the author’s own changes.
But I’m gathering from the discussion of editor’s potentially “owning” modifications that we’re talking the editor rewriting sections without the author’s knowledge or maybe added upon the author’s approval?
R.L.,
No, doesn’t happen without author knowledge in any major publishing house. The issue is on copy edits and is moot, since no publisher has yet to try to claim that ownership and I can’t imagine one would. Just a silly topic. Not sure why it got brought up in Mike’s post at this point. So, nothing to worry about.
For novels, all of those make a lot of sense but what about for short stories? Some anthologies are also buying e-rights for the anthology. Example:
“We are purchasing first English print and electronic rights for the anthology.”
How many of those 9 clauses should an author insist upon for a short story? For instance, since an e-anthology could theoretically exist for decades, after how long should the e-rights to a short story revert to the author’s magic bakery? Or should it just say “non-exclusive” in the contract?
J.M., for short fiction I tend to always make sure there is either a sunset clause (meaning it all stops at a certain date) or a non-exclusive clause, and the publisher only has the right to use the short story in the collection, not stand alone. That’s reasonable and solves any problems.