Authors Guild Statement on the Wylie Agency's New Epublishing Venture

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

One of last week's major publishing news items was super-agent Andrew Wylie's announcement that he is establishing a brand-new digital publishing venture, Odyssey Editions, to publish his clients' backlists.

The clients in question include some of the most eminent writers of the last century, such as Saul Bellow, John Updike, and Philip Roth. Most of these authors' book contracts pre-date the electronic age--so they don't mention electronic rights. This has become a matter of intense dispute, with publishers claiming that standard book contract language (which allows for publication "in book form" or "in any and all editions") incorporates those rights by implication, giving them the exclusive right to publish in electronic form as well as print; and authors, agents, and authors' estates arguing that since the rights were never explicitly granted, publishers have no claim on them.

Last year, Random House sent a letter to dozens of literary agents, claiming that its pre-digital contracts give it exclusive digital publication rights. But in the months since, a number of well-known authors have bypassed such claims, including Stephen Covey, who in December sold e-rights to two of his best sellers exclusively to Amazon, Ian McEwan, who in January made a deal for his backlist with epublisher Rosetta Books, and the estate of William Styron, which is working with digital publisher Open Road Integrated Media.

Wylie's bold move is the latest salvo in this ongoing turf war--and the most aggressive one yet. But it also speaks to two other issues of great importance in publishing right now: the fact that e-rights--which until recently had very little actual value, despite persistent predictions of an imminent tipping point--are publishing's new gold rush; and the fact that the lines between agents, editors, publicists, and publishers are becoming more blurred by the month, with more and more agents taking on more and more functions outside of just brokering rights and guiding careers.

So far, three major publishers have expressed their displeasure with Wylie: Random House, which now considers him a direct competitor, and says it isn't going to do business with him any more; Macmillan, whose CEO John Sargent referenced the conflict of interest concerns raised by combining the functions of agent and publisher, but was most concerned by Wylie's exclusive deal with a single retailer; and Harper UK, whose CEO Victoria Barnsley said that "the only winners in this are Amazon."

The Authors Guild statement follows (it has also been posted online).

-------------------------------

Wylie-Amazon:  Publishers Have Largely Brought This on Themselves

Thursday's announcement that the Wylie Agency, through its new publishing arm, Odyssey Editions, has a deal with Amazon to exclusively distribute at least 20 books in electronic form has shaken the industry. The 20 books include many important 20th century American works, including Invisible Man, Lolita, Portnoy's Complaint, Updike's Rabbit novels, The Adventures of Augie March, The Stories of John Cheever, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat. These works are all in print and all, apparently, governed by old publishing contracts in which the authors didn't expressly grant electronic rights to the print publishers.

Random House, which holds the print rights to many of these titles, reacted Thursday afternoon by disputing that authors retained electronic rights to these books and saying that it would not do business with Wylie for English-language works "until this situation is resolved."

This is the most important development in electronic publishing since Apple entered the market offering publishers an "agency model" for selling e-books. Several aspects of the Wylie/Amazon/Random House entanglement merit comment:

1. Authors retain e-rights in standard publishing contracts unless they expressly grant those rights to the publisher, as we've consistently said and as a federal court held in Random House v. Rosetta Books. It's fine and proper for these authors and their heirs to exercise those rights, and we applaud the Wylie Agency for finding a way to make it happen.

2. That said, when an agency acts as publisher, serious potential conflicts of interest immediately come to mind. The most obvious of these is the possibility of self-dealing to the detriment of the agency's client, the author. If, by acting as publisher, the agency receives a higher percentage of the author's income than it would normally be entitled to, or if it receives other benefits that the author doesn't share in appropriately, then a conflict seems unavoidable.

Our understanding is that Wylie, as agent and publisher, is taking no more than it would as an agent. That is, Wylie/Odyssey is limiting its total compensation to its rate for commissions. If our understanding is correct, then our concerns about conflicts of interest are considerably eased. Other literary agencies contemplating similar deals should be aware that even non-monetary provisions in e-book distribution contracts could create conflicts of interest. A clause binding the agency to not sign exclusive deals for any of the books the agency represents with other e-book distributors, for example, would present a clear conflict of interest. (We have no reason to think Odyssey's contract with Amazon contains such a clause. From what we know, it appears that Wylie has avoided any conflict of interest.)

3. That the Wylie/Odyssey agreement is reportedly exclusive raises many questions and concerns. Authors should have access to all responsible vendors of e-books. Moreover, Amazon's power in the book publishing industry grows daily. Few publishers have the clout to stand up to the online giant, which dominates every significant growth sector of the book industry: e-books, online new books, online used books, downloadable audio, and on-demand books. (That Random House, by far the largest trade book publisher, has retaliated against the powerful Wylie Agency but not against Amazon, which must be equally culpable in Random House's view, tells you all you need to know about where power truly lies in today's publishing industry.) Adding to Amazon's strength may yield short-run benefits, but it's not in the interests of a healthy, competitive book publishing market.

There must be consideration for this exclusivity, of course, and we can only speculate as to what it is. Though we'll keep our guess to ourselves, we think the consideration wasn't monetary: we doubt that there was an advance paid for the rights or that Amazon has agreed to pay Odyssey more than 70% of the retail price of the e-books, since that might trigger most favored nation provisions in Amazon's contracts with other publishers.

Regardless of the exclusivity issues, any direct agreement between a literary agency and Amazon is troubling. Amazon has, time and again, wielded its clout in the industry ruthlessly, with little apparent regard for its relationships with authors or publishers or, for that matter, antitrust rules. Any agency working directly with Amazon may find its behavior constrained in unpleasant and unpredictable ways. Agencies should proceed with extreme care.

4. To a large extent, publishers have brought this on themselves. This storm has long been gathering. Literary agencies have refused to sign e-rights deals for countless backlist books with traditional publishers, even though they and their clients, no doubt, see real benefits in having a single publisher handle the print and electronic rights to a book. Knowledgeable authors and agents, however, are well aware that e-book royalty rates of 25% of net proceeds are exceedingly low and contrary to the long-standing practice of authors and publishers to, effectively, split evenly the net proceeds of book sales.

Bargain-basement e-book royalty rates will not last. Low e-book royalty rates will, as e-book sales become increasingly important, emerge as a dealbreaker for authors with negotiating leverage. Publishers will, inevitably, agree to reasonable royalties rather than lose their bestselling authors to more generous rivals and startups. We suspect publishers are well aware of this and are postponing the unavoidable because it seems to make sense in the short run. We believe this is short-sighted.

A major agency starting a publishing company is weird, no matter how you look at it. This sort of weirdness will only multiply, however, as long as authors don't share fairly in the rewards of electronic publishing. Publishers seeking to manage this transition well should cut authors in appropriately. The sooner they do so, the better. For everyone.

Guest Blog Post: Active Reading For Better Writing

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

One of the things that writers often argue about, in writers' forums and on writers' message boards, is whether writing is an innate talent that can be honed but not learned, or simply a skill that can be taught to anyone willing to be trained.

Whether you subscribe to one view or the other, a large part of a writer's honing, or training, or whatever you want to call it, is self-directed. Practice is vital: you don't have to write every single day (unless you want to), but you do need to write frequently. Outside criticism (from editors, colleagues, writers' groups) can not only help you improve your work, but teach you how to criticize yourself. And then there's reading. Reading widely, reading critically--analyzing how other authors handle structure, achieve effects, solve problems, etc.--is one of the best ways to build your skills.

In today's guest blog post, writer and educator Aimee Weinstein discusses the vital importance of reading, and how it can help you become a better writer.

---------------

By Aimee Weinstein

My new relationship with reading started because like many writers, I hate to exercise. I love reading, though, and I discovered the solution to the problem was podcasts. I could listen to podcasts of short stories from various genres while making my way around the gym to use those disgusting and pain-inducing machines. Then, a week or two ago, I was using some leg-torturing device, when there was a surprising twist in the plot of the story in my ears. I allowed the weight to fall and let out a loud, “oh!” causing everyone in the gym to look over at me.

“Podcast” I explained sheepishly, shrugging my shoulders.

The story was titled “Water Child,” and its author, Edwidge Danticat, had made me to drop everything and shout out. The writer in me wanted to know how to do that. How had the plot twisted in such a surprising way that I lost control of myself while listening to it? I rewound a little bit and focused on the section that had so shocked me. The main character calls an ex-lover on the phone but the reader does not have any information about the relationship – how involved it was or why it broke up or anything. But then, instead of the man answering the phone when she calls, the man’s wife answers. CLICK. Everything fell into place with a surprising thump of a nautilus machine.

I listened again to the entire story. I realized that the author uses the telephone as a device to drive the story. We learn about the relationship in the first place because the ex-lover leaves messages on an answering machine. The main character’s parents live in another country and implore her in letters to call them on the phone; they are too poor to call her. And then the misstep of the story happens on the phone. I wondered how I might create a similar device for my own characters to use.

There is so much to be learned from reading. Put succinctly, writers need to read. There’s no substitute.

I realized that this was a pattern with me. A few weeks prior I had read Olive Kitteridge, the Pulitzer Prize winning book of related short stories by Elizabeth Strout. I admired the way the author created a world for the main character, Olive, where everyone around her thinks they know her so well--but actually, she has a completely mysterious inner life that is known only to the reader. The juxtaposition of real life versus inner life fascinated the writer in me.

I then thought about all the books I had read recently and how voracious a reader I really am. I call myself a writer because that’s how I spend much of my life, but the reality is that I read as much as I write.

From Lorrie Moore’s recent novel, I learned about creating a full and deep character. From Pat Conroy’s newest novel, I learned how the location of a story can play such a huge part in the plot that it almost functions as another character. From John Irving, I learned how a plot can stay cohesive even if the story takes place over a long time-span. And these are just the books I’ve read over the past couple of months!

Authors are our best teachers of writing. Their books wouldn’t be published if they didn’t have something to offer the reader, and it’s up to the aspiring writer to pick up the skills they present.

In order to write, one has to read what has come before, and here’s another key to the puzzle – pay attention to the details of the craft. Ask questions. How does metaphor function in the story? Is the overly bold sister supposed to function as the main character’s conscience? How does the mystery writer incorporate clues subtly without giving away the ending? How long should it take for the girl to realize that she’s in love with that vampire? It many sound monotonous, but it’s ultimately true: active reading enlivens creative juices.

If you’re a genre writer, close reading can help you figure out how to better fashion the mystery/fantasy/science fiction world that you want to create. If you write fantasy, it behooves you to read as much fantasy literature as you can, both old and new. The same goes for science fiction writers, mystery writers and even romance novelists. How can a person become conversant in the specifics of his craft if he does not immerse himself in it? Reading is crucial to every writer.

So I’m going back to the gym with my iPod and podcasts ready. I can learn as I listen. Maybe this exercise thing isn’t so bad after all.

------------------

Aimee Weinstein is a freelance writer and writing professor based in Tokyo, Japan. Her most recent work can be found in Asian Jewish Life, and she is currently working on a book regarding Japanese/English translation issues in the public sphere. Her blog, TokyoWriter, covers life in Tokyo, writing issues and sometimes her kids, who are ages 10 and 7, and have already discovered the lack of privacy that accompanies having a writer for a mother.

The Importance of Self-Editing

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

In the comments thread of my post last week on the myth of the evil editor, a reader posted this, in reference to writers who don't want or don't believe they need outside editing:

Wouldn't the adage apply: A writer who edits him/herself has a fool for a client.

I would turn that around: A writer who doesn't edit him/herself has a fool for a client.

No writer--especially, no fiction writer--can be completely objective about his or her own work. We all need an outside eye--not just an editor for the finished book, but input from readers (friends, colleagues, a writers' group) as the project progresses.

But those outside sources of advice and criticism are only part of the editing picture. Just as important (I'd actually argue that it's more important) is the ability to self-edit--to be able to evaluate pace and structure, to recognize when plot, character, theme, etc. are working and when they aren't, to spot when you're showing too little and telling too much (and vice versa), to make your dialog flow, to polish your prose. The more skilled a self-editor you are, the more command you will have over your own writing--which surely should be one of a career writer's major goals.

Self-editing, in other words, is an essential aspect of the craft, and any writer who is serious about getting published needs to work hard to learn it--even if they hate it or find it boring, which many writers do. (For me, editing is the best part.) This really ought to be a no-brainer. Even so, I encounter a surprising number of (usually aspiring) writers who don't feel it's all that important (you can always hire an editor to clean things up, right?), or who believe that readers will accept not-so-great execution if the story's good enough (because isn't the story the most important thing?). But how much of a writer are you if you're unwilling or unable to polish your work, or if you have to rely on others to fix all your mistakes--or, worse, if you feel that mastering the basic mechanics of writing, such as grammar and spelling, is just a bagatelle? Getting the words onto the page is only the beginning. As E.B. White is supposed to have said, "All good writing is rewriting."

So how do you learn to self-edit? The same way you learn to write: by practice, by reading critically, and by paying attention to that all-important outside criticism, which can not only help you improve your work, but teach you how to criticize yourself. (Two caveats: you need to seek out people who will give you intelligent, reasonably objective criticism--which probably means not your relatives, your spouse, or your friends--and to remember that not all advice is useful. One of the most important aspects of dealing with criticism is learning to recognize what to take on board and what to reject.)

Much of what I know about self-editing was taught to me by my first editor. I was a complete novice when she bought my first novel--other than a few short stories, it was the only thing I'd ever written--and from her sensitive, incisive, and exacting criticism I came to understand a tremendous amount about structure, character, and my own weaknesses, such as my tendency to dwell too much on description. She taught me how to pare down my prose and sharpen my dialog. It's because of her that I learned to recognize--and respect--that nagging uneasy feeling that's usually the first sign that I've fallen into a plot hole, or picked the wrong focus for a scene, or temporarily lost sight of the character. She and I worked together on three books--the best and most fruitful editorial relationship I've ever had.

These days, I share my work with a couple of excellent beta readers, who are not only willing to read my manuscripts-in-progress but to talk about plot or other problems as they come up. My current agent also gives me editorial input, and then I go through the whole process again with a publishing house editor. I'd never want to put my fiction out in public without the scrutiny of all those extra eyes--but after so many years of writing, I'm a confident enough self-editor that my manuscripts generally just need tweaking, rather than the kind of major overhaul my first novel required.

How did you learn (or how are you learning) to self-edit? Do you love it or hate it, or is it just a job you know you have to do? Let me know.

The Myth of the Evil Editor

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Recently, in an online conversation touching on self-publishing, a self-published writer commented on how happy she is that her books are truly her own--published exactly as she intended them, not mutilated or adulterated by some big publishing house editor whose main goal is to turn out cookie-cutter authors. When I replied that I've worked with three editors at five large publishers over the course of seven novels, and have never had my work mutilated or adulterated, much less transformed into a cookie, she told me that I was "very lucky," for she knew of many writers who'd had the opposite experience.

I didn't ask her who those writers were. If I had, I suspect I would have gotten a vague response about a friend of a friend, or an article she'd seen at some point, or some other form of non-first-hand information. Like the fear of theft, the idea that the main function of publishing house editors is to turn books into clones, and that authors who publish "traditionally" can expect to have their manuscripts slashed and burned in callous disregard of their original voices and intents, is largely unfounded. Nevertheless, it's quite common. I've often seen it used to justify a choice to self-publish ("I want my book to remain MY BOOK!"), or presented as one of the reasons why self-publishing is superior.

At its best, the author-editor relationship is a partnership. The editor doesn't want to turn your book into a cookie; she wants it to be as good as it can possibly be so it will sell robustly and make money for everyone. To that end, she suggests ways in which your manuscript could be strengthened and improved, and leaves it to you to make those changes in the best way you can. You're well-advised to take her comments seriously--she's a professional, after all, and writers who believe they don't need an editorial eye are letting their egos run away with their good sense. But it is still your book, and if you disagree with your editor you're free to say so, and to make a case for keeping things as they are, or for making a different change.

My best editorial relationships have been like this. My editor spotted weaknesses or inconsistencies that I missed, and suggested ways to make what was strong in the book even stronger. I didn't always agree; in that case, we talked about it, and sometimes I realized she was right, and sometimes she realized I was right. At the end of the process, I wound up with a work that was still completely my own--but better. Even in my most adversarial relationship, with an editor who inherited the book and neither liked nor understood it, there was never a question of being strongarmed into making changes I didn't agree with. I simply said no, and that was that.

Does every commercially published writer have a fabulous relationship with his or her editor (the kind that is the subject of those gushing thank-yous in the Acknowledgements sections of so many books)? Of course not. Are there horror stories? Of course there are. No doubt some will appear in the comments thread of this post (I'm thinking of the story I heard from an author whose editor inexplicably decided to transform one of her characters into an animal). But contrary to the evil editor myth, horror isn't the norm. The experience of most of the commercially published writers I know has been more like mine--relationships that range from great to just okay and sometimes poor, but that don't typically involve the kind of manipulation and mutilation that the myth says we should fear.

In fact, the greatest number of editorial horror stories I've heard have come from not from commercially published writers, but from unpublished or self-published writers who hired less-than-qualified independent editors from listings on the Internet (there are many, many dubious editors out there), or from micropress-published authors whose inexperienced publishers employed editors with no relevant professional skills, whose idea of editing was to eliminate all words ending in "-ly," or to switch all the punctuation around, or to rewrite random sentences in their own style. Since smaller publishers often reserve the right to edit without the author's permission "so long as the meaning of the work is not materially changed" (this can cover a lot of ground), the author may not have any recourse. By contrast, every big-publisher contract I've ever signed has included a clause ensuring that no substantive editing (other than copy editing) is done without my approval.

There are many reasons to self-publish. Fear of editors should not be one of them.

PublishAmerica's "Brand New Start": Independence Books

Seems to me that this latest "offer" from PublishAmerica speaks volumes. What it says should be fairly obvious to even the most naive writer.

(For some background on PA's other recent offers, see this thread at Absolute Write.)

-Ann C. Crispin
Chair, Writer Beware
www.writerbeware.com

-----------------------------

From: "support@publishamerica.com"
To: [email address redacted]
Sent: Tue, July 13, 2010 12:57:52 PM
Subject: A new start for your book

Dear author:

Sometimes a book deserves a new start.

Not labeled in book vendor databases as POD.
A low list price.
A new publisher.

Introducing:

Independence Books.

Independence Books is our new subsidiary. It is treated as an independent publisher. Not registered as POD in vendor databases. Not registered as PublishAmerica. Uniform list prices are $14.95.

Want a new start for your book? We will cause it to be published as an Independence Books title. It will receive a new ISBN and the new $14.95 list price. It will not show as POD. It will not list as PublishAmerica. ISBN-fed databases will show that your book is an Independence Books book, readily available from Independence Books.

Go to www.publishamerica.net, find your softcover, add to cart, use this discount coupon: IndyBooks40. Minimum volume is 7 softcovers. For 12 or more softcovers use the IndyBooks45 coupon.

This will cause your book to be published as an Independence Books title. It will no longer be available from us as a PublishAmerica softcover. (Your book's paperback or hardback versions, if already activated, will keep their PublishAmerica designation.) Your order today will be printed under the new Independence Books logo (www.publishamerica.com/independence), with its new ISBN. Transfer may take up to 6-8 weeks to be completed and will be permanent. Book remains under contract with PublishAmerica. Use this coupon for your softcover only; other applications will not be processed. PublishAmerica's online bookstore will re-list the book as an Independence Books title generally within 24 business hours. Other vendors may do so at their discretion.

Thank you.

--PublishAmerica Author Support Team

How to Fail on the Internet Without Really Trying: AuthorForSale.com

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

An alert reader sent me this link: AuthorForSale.com.

Gosh, I thought. Are authors so desperate these days that they're selling their favors online? Could it be a patronage thing--authors in search of sugar daddies to finance their careers? Or perhaps you can buy an author to walk your dog or clean your house. Heaven knows they probably aren't cleaning their own, what with deadlines and all.

As you have no doubt guessed, AuthorForSale is none of those things. It's yet another brand new iteration of an old idea: the manuscript display website. These websites, which have been around in various forms since the late 1990's, promise to match writers with agents and publishers, enabling all parties to bypass the slush pile. AuthorForSale describes the process (somewhat opaquely) thus:

Simply put, the author of an unpublished proposal, creative idea or manuscript, creates a Showcase that is tightly profiled in line with a matrix guideline intended to package their offering in a manner likely to suit a prospective publisher's strategic requirements in discovering a business interest in the intellectual property for sale.

How does it work? I can't resist another quote:

Upon gaining subscribed, validated membership access to the site, both the Author & Publisher/Agent, will be able to view a Genre Matrix as detailed below, under which there are listed categories, subject-matter fields, or word length options etc intended to add refinement to tightly catalogue and code the author's work or creative intention, as will ultimately be featured in their unique Author's Showcase.

The Author's Showcase displays a generic, yet comprehensive Proposal Template that will identify either a proposed literary project, a work-in-progress being undertaken or indicate a completed manuscript formatted and edited to go. And since both parties will be following the same cataloguing route path in refining their search or profiling interests, they'll eventually meet at the most tightly aligned junction: an author's talent and intellectual property showcased on display in a precise format.

What this boils down to is that member authors create a profile of their work, including such basic descriptive categories as genre, target audience, and word count. Publishers and agents can search the resulting database, narrowing or widening their search according to their needs and interests. If they're interested in a property, they can contact the author directly.

As I mentioned above, manuscript display websites have been around since the last century. The early ones were similar to AuthorForSale: categorized, searchable databases of literary properties. The more recent ones add more features: a ranking system, a social media component, peer critiques. But have they ever provided authors with a true alternative route to publication? No. There have been some isolated success stories, but for the most part, display sites merely shift the location of the slush pile, and agents and editors haven't yet manifested a preference for display sites over their own overflowing inboxes.

So AuthorForSale, which bills itself as "The original web-based showcase for authors where publishers find the next Best Seller," offers a service that's neither very original, nor very serviceable. These reasons alone would probably ensure its eventual demise. In its current form, however, it won't need to look to outside factors. Most display websites/online slush piles are free, or keep fees under $100. If there are fees, they're charged to writers, not to the publishing professionals who participate. AuthorForSale dares to be different. For a year's membership, authors must hand over US$225 (act fast, and you'll  get a 25% discount). Publishers and agents must pay...wait for it...US$5,600.

Um, yeah. Good luck with that. Authors, unfortunately, can easily be persuaded to part with their money, but somehow I don't think that publishers and agents will be lining up to pay thousands of dollars for access to what they're already drowning in for free.

AuthorForSale is the brainchild of Australian author and businessman Allen H. Munro, whose publishing credits include publishing service Trafford and fee-charging publisher Morgan James. I see nothing to suggest that AuthorForSale is ill-intentioned--but it is woefully ill-conceived.

Beware of Book Publishing Spam

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Lately, my inbox has been plagued with a rash of emails with subject lines like "Help with your writing," "Book Publishing," "Publish your book with reliable services," "Publish your manuscript," "Learn how to publish," and "Do you have a story to tell?" It's spam, of course--advertising for pay-to-publish companies, which pay email marketing companies (a.k.a. spammers) to contact lists of harvested email addresses, in hopes of luring writers sign up with them. Those who are Internet or publishing-savvy are probably wise to this. But inexperienced new authors may not be.

Clicking the links in some of these spams (spammers keep track of clickthroughs, so the more you click, the more you'll be spammed) whisks you to faux price comparison/buyer guide websites (actually link farms) like this one or this one, where vanity publishers like Dorrance Publishing and publishing services like iUniverse and CreateSpace pay for advertising. You'd think that most people would know better than to trust such sites, but I regularly hear from writers who've purchased services (often to their regret) as a result of one of these links.

Links in other spams I've been receiving lead directly to Xlibris, a print-on-demand publishing service owned by Author Solutions Inc., which also owns AuthorHouse, iUniverse, and Trafford. Why only Xlibris, out of all the ASI brands, should be paying for spammage, I have no idea.

More insidious, and most numerous, are the spams that direct writers to websites such as ChooseYourPublisher.com ("Your book is your passion. It's important to select a publisher you can trust...Choose Your Publisher will help you find the publisher that best suits your personal publishing goals") and SearchForPublishers.com ("Designed specifically for budding authors, Search for Publishers gives you free access to an impressive array of options for anyone who wishes to publish a book"). Ostensibly, these websites are intended to match authors with appropriate publishers--but if you fill in the information forms, one of the first questions you encounter is how much money you're willing to "invest" in publication ("zero" is not an option), and the publishers with which you'll be "matched" are all POD publishing services.

Neither ChooseYourPublisher nor SearchForPublishers names an owner or sponsor.  SearchforPublishers has an anonymized domain registration, but a bit of websearching reveals that it's owned by PlattForm Advertising, which maintains a number of lead generation websites (a.k.a. tarted-up link farms). ChooseYourPublisher is registered to Author Solutions. This explains why ASI brands are the only ones on the website--but Writer Beware finds the lack of disclosure just a tad deceptive.

ASI owns another website, FindYourPublisher.com ("You've poured your heart and soul into writing your book; and you’ve long dreamt of the day when you will finally see your words in print"), which also "matches" writers with ASI brands. ASI does reveal that it owns FindYourPublisher and the companies it recommends; even so, many newbie writers may not be familiar with the ASI name, and will likely pay more attention to the references to "indie book publishing" that are plastered all over the site.

Spam isn't the only place you may encounter these faux comparison sites. Type "find a publisher" or "publish my book" or "book publisher" or "how do I get published" into a search engine, and they'll be the subject of sponsored links on the first page of your search (along with other pay-to-publish services). This is just one of several reasons why you shouldn't start your publisher search on the Internet.

Though you may be tempted by an email that promises to save you time and effort by matching you with just the right publisher, remember the old adage: If it seems too good to be true, it probably is. Or this one: There are no shortcuts.

The Case Against Reading Fees

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

I never thought I'd be re-visiting the issue of literary agents charging reading fees. After all, the problems inherent in the charging of reading fees are recognized by all four literary agents' professional trade groups (the USA's AAR,  Australia's ALAA, and New Zealand's NZALA prohibit them outright to members; the UK's AAA allows them only if the client or prospective client is first informed in writing). And "never pay a reading fee to a literary agent" is one of the few pieces of anti-scam wisdom that has passed into the collective consciousness. Even if they aren't aware of other scams and schemes, most new writers know that reading fees aren't kosher.

But one of the most surprising things--to me, anyway--to come out of last week's vigorous twiscussion of how agents should be paid (see the #agentpay hashtag) is the proposal that agents should once again charge reading fees. See, for instance, this blog post by writer Nadia Lee. Several commenters on my blog post last week also suggested a return to reading fees; similar suggestions are scattered in the comments of other blog posts about #agentpay (including Colleen Lindsay's partial roundup of these posts). The idea has even been put forward by some agents; see this pair of posts by Robert Brown and Sharene Martin of Wylie-Merrick Literary (though I have to say I have trouble taking seriously Sharene's suggestion that expecting agents to operate within ethical guidelines is equivalent to racial profiling).

Here are four arguments in favor of reading fees, and why, in my opinion, three of them don't hold up.

- The Darwinian argument. Requiring writers to pay a fee to submit their work would winnow out the non-serious and the non-ready, providing relief to agents' overburdened inboxes.

Unfortunately, one of the things you learn when you deal with large numbers of aspiring writers is that many are deeply deluded about the quality of their work. An unmarketable writer is just as likely to be convinced of his or her readiness as a marketable one, and therefore just as likely to pay a reading fee. (In fact, there may be an inverse relationship between confidence and quality--but that's a whole 'nother question.)

Some people believe that if writers are stupid or unschooled enough to throw away their money, they deserve what they get. Possibly. But again, that's a different question.

- The It's For Your Own Good argument. If writers had to pay to submit their work, it would force them be more cautious about whom they queried, diminishing the likelihood that they'd fall into the clutches of the scammers and amateurs who would also be charging reading fees.

In some cases this might be true. But more than twelve years of documenting the pointless and fraudulent things that writers can be persuaded to pay for tells me, sadly, that money is not a barrier to bad decisionmaking. Plus, this argument ignores the power of desperation, which drives some writers into the arms of dubious publishers whose charges make reading fees look like chicken feed. 

- The You've Got to Give Something to Get Something argument. One of the things that's most distressing to writers is the impersonal nature of rejection. A reading fee might offer genuine benefit if it guaranteed some sort of personal feedback or evaluation.

But what would ensure that the fee was commensurate with the feedback? If you're paying $150, or even $50, will a couple of scribbled lines suffice? A page of generic writing advice? More to the point, do overburdened agents have time to provide this kind of service? (That, I suspect, is why this argument is most often advanced by writers.)

- The Why Should I Work For Free? argument. It takes time and effort to carefully evaluate manuscripts. Why should agents undertake this crucial task without remuneration?

For me, this is the one convincing argument in favor of reading fees, at least at the partial and full level. It is time-consuming to read manuscripts--and more often than not, the reading results in a rejection, so this really is time for which the agent doesn't get paid.

Is it convincing enough to justify a return to reading fees, though? No, in my opinion.

- Reading fees would unfairly burden non-wealthy authors. Like hourly billing, reading fees would disproportionately disadvantage writers with fewer financial resources. Agents may justifiably feel they deserve income beyond their commissions--but creating a world in which only the well-off could afford to seek agents doesn't seem like the best long-term solution (especially since fewer writers looking for agents means less need for agencies).

- Reading fees are incredibly easy to abuse. How? Well, for instance, by requesting manuscripts in which the agent isn't interested, just in order to obtain the fee. Given the volume of queries most agents receive, even a small processing fee--under $50--can bring in a substantial yearly income.

Or using the carrot of possible representation to entice as many writers as possible to submit and pay--as the Scott Meredith Agency did with its (now discontinued) Discovery Program, employing a bevy of readers to bang out three-page evaluation letters for which writers paid several hundred dollars. Some writers did move from the Discovery Program to the agency proper--more than twenty-five, according to the agency's website. Compare that, however, to the hundreds or even thousands who paid for evaluations over the years that the program was running.

Or charging an evaluation fee and providing not a real evaluation, but a form letter slightly personalized for each writer.

Or running a full-on scam, where the agency's sole purpose is to collect reading fees, wait a couple of weeks, and then send a form rejection. Reading fees are easy, easy money; of all the writing-related scams, they involve the least amount of work, and guarantee the least contact with the marks.

I'm not making any of these examples up. All come directly from information in Writer Beware's files. We have voluminous documentation of the ways in which literary agents--not necessarily scam agents, either--can abuse reading fees, and their ugly cousins, evaluation fees. You don't have to take my word for it; here's what the AAR's Canon of Ethics has to say:

Members may not charge clients or potential clients for reading and evaluating literary works, including outlines, proposals and partial or complete manuscripts...The AAR believes that the practice of charging for readings is open to serious abuse and may reflect adversely on our profession.

When Writer Beware was founded in 1998, reading fees were in decline among reputable agents, but were the dominant form of literary scam. That they are almost nonexistent today--even among scammers--is, I think, a direct result of their rejection by the AAR and other professional agents' groups.

Unfortunately, as sometimes happens when a bad practice is eliminated, people eventually begin to question whether the practice was really so terrible, or even whether it existed at all. In his post defending reading fees, agent Robert Brown observes, "As for the specter of abuse, I think it’s mostly fantasy made up by those who have prospered by spreading rumor and innuendo." It's hard to know what to say about a remark like this, except that the ethical codes of the AAR, the AAA, the ALAA, and the NZALA didn't just pop up out of the blue.

Is it impossible for agents to charge reading fees in an ethical manner? Certainly not. Even before the AAR, etc. prohibited them to members, there were agents who were entirely ethical and careful in their use of reading fees. I have no doubt that this would also be the case if reading fees came into wide use again. But they are also a green light to scams and abuse--and that's no fantasy. It's a can of worms I don't think we want to re-open.

Edited to add: It was becoming apparent that my original title, Should Agents Charge Reading Fees?, was causing people to assume I was advocating reading fees. Since I most emphatically am not, I've changed the title to be more reflective of the content of the post.

Are Agents Underpaid?

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

A fascinating discussion began today on Twitter (as of this writing, it's still going on--check it out under the #agentpay hashtag), kicked off by agent Colleen Lindsay, who asked, "How would publishing change if agenting moved from commission-based payment to billable hours?" 

Those in favor pointed out that agents' job descriptions have expanded over the past couple of decades, and that they must now do much more for the same 15% they earned twenty years ago. They also get no payment at all for a good portion of what they do on a regular basis--reading queries and manuscripts, editing, submitting books that never sell. In a highly competitive environment, with shrinking advances (at the midlist level, anyway) and cautious publishers, it's getting harder and harder to make a living.

Those against raised the specter of abuse (there are several questionable agents in Writer Beware's files who soak their clients for billable hours while doing little or nothing to place manuscripts with reputable publishers), the loss of agents' entrepreneurial edge if they got paid no matter what (the fact that the agent profits only when the writer does is at the heart of the traditional author-agent relationship); and, of course, the possibility that only wealthy writers could afford to have agents. Several lawyers participating in the discussion also pointed out that keeping timesheets for billing is a soul-sucking timesink that no one in their right mind would want to undertake.

For authors who at this point are feeling their blood pressure rising, I should point out that this is a hypothetical discussion; none of the participating agents are advocating an immediate switch. Colleen's question does, however, highlight an important issue: agents' job descriptions really have expanded over the past twenty years, while their commission percentage has remained the same. Just as writers are now routinely expected to take an active role in promoting their books (two decades ago, self-promotion was still very much optional), many agents now feel obliged to take an active role in promoting their writers. Selling books is also much more work than it used to be, especially in the hyper-competitive and risk-averse environment produced by the recent economic downturn. I also think that the droves of laid-off editors who've transitioned to agenting--not just recently but during the height of the publisher consolidation frenzy in the 1990's--have contributed to the problem, with more agents than ever vying for the time of fewer editors than ever.

So it's not surprising that some agents feel they are underpaid. In my opinion, though, billing hours is not the way to go. It's too open to abuse. It shuts too many writers out of the picture. It also might have a backlash effect--if only well-heeled writers could afford agents, there would be less need for agents, putting a lot of agents out of business. (Which might in turn limit publishers' choices. Could that spell the end of big publishers' agented-submissions-only policies?) Compromise measures--charging commission until the first sale and billable hours thereafter, flat per-project fees, fees charged for adjunct services such as editing, even reading fees--create the same concerns. Would agents select clients on the basis of their ability to pay? Would they drop clients who took a long time between books and didn't use enough billable services? As for reading and editing fees, that battle was fought years ago. Most agents' trade groups prohibit them for members.

So what's the answer, for agents and others who think the current system should change? A commission hike is the most obvious solution. During the 1980s and 1990s, US agents raised their commissions from 10% to 15%; it seems to me that an increase to 20% could be undertaken with relatively minimal pain on all sides. This would acknowledge the ways in which agenting has changed and expanded, but wouldn't unfairly burden writers.

Another idea might be for agents to sell their expertise. Branches of an agency could be established for fee-based editing, marketing, publicity, packaging, consulting to self-publishers, and the like. These services wouldn't be sold to clients, however--that would be a conflict of interest (if an agent can make money from a service s/he is urging you to buy, how can you be sure that buying it is really to your benefit?) and could easily be misused. The agency would need to erect an impenetrable wall between the agenting and the fee-charging sides of its business--for instance, no client would ever be sold editing services, and no one who bought editing services would be eligible to become a client. This would be made clear on the agency's website and in its literature.

Agents can also become publishers. Of course, that's even more fraught with ambiguity than selling editing or marketing services. If an agent can publish a client's book herself, how driven will she be to sell the book to another publisher? If an agent is selling a client's book to himself, how can he adequately represent both parties' interests? (See the blogs of authors Stacia Kane and Courtney Milan for a more detailed examination of these potential conflicts of interest.) There are very good reasons why the AAR and the ALAA prohibit members from representing both buyer and seller in the same transaction (the AAA allows it, but only if the client is first informed in writing). Again, to ensure ethical practice, there would need to be an impenetrable wall between the agency and the publisher. 

All of these things are already happening. A number of established US agents charge 20%. There are agencies with editing and consulting businesses; there are even agencies that own or co-own publishers. In coming years, I think this blurring of lines will become commonplace, as authors, agents, and publishers all struggle to survive in the digital age. As agencies expand their capabilities, it's essential that they consider the importance of ethical practice, and take the time and trouble to establish rules and customs that ensure that their clients are protected, and their potential clients are fairly dealt with.

(One last thing. I'd love a lively discussion of these issues, but I don't want this post to become a forum for anti-agent hostility. Please don't comment if all you want to do is rant about how greedy, elitist, capricious, undeserving, etc. agents are.)

Lie Down With Dogs, Get Up With Fleas

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Part of Writer Beware's mission is to accept complaints from writers who've had bad experiences with questionable agents and publishers (first-hand complaints only--we have to hear from the writer directly--and always documented, if possible). But questions, not complaints, make up the biggest portion of our email. How do I start my publication search? How should I format my manuscript? Is self-publishing a good way to kick off a writing career? Is Agent A reputable? Is Publisher B's contract language standard? Is Editor C experienced?

Often, when I let someone know that the agent who just requested their manuscript has no sales, or the publisher that just promised a contract charges fees, they will sadly say something like, "My manuscript is a magnet for the bad guys," or "My writing must suck, since the only interest I ever get is from people who want me to give them money."

Of course, it's always possible that your manuscript isn't publishable. The hard truth is that most manuscripts aren't; whether you've written a publishable book is one of the biggest "ifs" that you must face as a writer. But when the only publishers and agents who are responding to your queries are disreputable, it's likely that the quality of your writing--along with bad luck, karma, or whatever outside influences you may fear are holding you back--is only incidental. Other factors are likely to play a much bigger part.

1. Fee-chargers respond to everyone. Whether they're dishonest, inexperienced, or just plain clueless, the money that fee-chargers extract from authors represents the bulk--or possibly the entirety--of their income. So quality is not a pressing concern. Or it may be no concern at all. Bottom line: regardless of how bad or good your manuscript is (and fee-chargers will as happily take on a good manuscript as a bad one), if you query fee-chargers, you will hear back from them.

2. You may not have done your research. If you're experiencing Factor Number One, this is probably why.

Writers: research is essential! There is no substitute. You CANNOT count on others' recommendations, on the publisher's or agent's expressions of goodwill, on a listing in what you believe is a reputable resource--you MUST investigate the publisher or agent for yourself. If you don't, and you wind up getting offers from the bad guys, it's not your writing or your karma that's to blame--it's you.

The timing of the research is important too. Don't wait to investigate a publisher's reputation, or to make sure an agent has publishing industry experience or a track record of sales, until you get a nibble. Check them out before you ever start to query. If you eliminate the scammers and amateurs at the beginning, you will never have to deal with them. Not only will this save you time and aggravation, it will protect you from the trap that many writers fall into, especially if they've been querying for a while without success: It can be very hard to say no to an actual offer of representation or publication, even if it comes from a bad agent or publisher. When your emotions come into play, when your desire for validation and success is triggered, your good sense may fly out the window. I can't count the number of writers who've told me that the excitement of an offer caused them to ignore their gut feelings of caution.

Don't know how to research, or where to start? The better you understand publishing and the publishing industry, the easier the process will be, so begin by becoming informed (my blog post, Learning the Ropes, offers some suggestions on how to accomplish this). For researching agents, see my article, "Researching an Agent's Track Record." For researching publishers, agent Rachelle Gardner offers a great blog post on how to figure out whether a publisher is reputable.

These are just a few resources; there are many more, in the archives of this blog, in the links on the sidebar, and at the Writer Beware website. Never forget: knowledge is your greatest resource, and your best defense.

3. You may be selling yourself short. Many writers believe--often based on misguided information they've found on the Internet--that reputable agents aren't interested in unpublished writers or that big publishers seldom take on newcomers, and that the only path open to them is lesser-known agents, small publishers, or publishing services.

This is a myth. Newcomers absolutely do get picked up by top agents and publishers--the pages of PW, or any other publishing industry publication, amply demonstrate this. That's not to say there aren't excellent small presses and savvy lesser-known agents--but the problem with scouting the margins of the publishing business is that the individuals and companies you'll find there are, well, marginal. When you set your sights low, you vastly increase your odds of running into inexperienced, unscrupulous, or just plain crazy people. Rather than beginning at the bottom in hopes of working your way up, start at the top and work your way down. You'll never know whether you could have landed that top agent or publisher unless you try.

So don't lie down with dogs. Do your research, eliminate the questionables at the beginning of the process, and never, ever sell yourself short.

Guest Blog Post: Ten Percent of Nothing (Book Review)

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Whether or not you're interested in literary scams, former FBI agent Jim Fisher's Ten Percent of Nothing makes for fascinating reading. It's a true-crime account of the Deering Literary Agency/Sovereign Publications scam, which flourished during the 1990s and cheated hundreds of writers out of thousands of dollars. To date, the Deering scam is one of the very few that has attracted the attention of law enforcement, and has resulted in jail time for the perpetrators. (There's more info on the Deering scam on the Case Studies page of Writer Beware.)

In the years since the Deerings plied their deceptive trade, technology has changed, but the methods--and the psychology of the victims--hasn't. Below, author Marian Perera provides a review of a book that should be required reading not just for authors, but for anyone in the publishing industry.

(Check out Jim Fisher's website as well--there's an interesting segment on publishing scams.)

-------------------------

by Marian Perera

Selling the Dream

A review of Ten Percent of Nothing: the Case of the Literary Agent from Hell

“I’ve built my publishing company by helping unknown authors and first-time authors fulfil their dreams. I will help you!”

Dorothy Deering, 1998

This is the story of a fake literary agent, a fake publisher and a real nightmare – for the writers who were bilked.

Dorothy Deering was behind one of the most infamous literary scams, and is even more noteworthy because she was actually brought to justice. I read Jim Fisher’s book about the scam and the case which brought it down, Ten Percent of Nothing: The Case of the Literary Agent from Hell, and found it fascinating. Any writer will be able to use the information in it – the tactics employed by the Deering Literary Agency in 1994 are the same as those scammers use today.

Deering started out as a writer who couldn’t get published, but after being taken for a ride by a fee-charging agent, she may have decided that there was more money in that particular game. She opened her own fee-charging literary agency and later set up a vanity press into which she funneled her own clients.

Fisher provides a meticulous accounting of the various schemes that brought in the money, how much of it they produced and how they eventually folded, one by one. Deering’s inventiveness was outdone only by her greed. In 1996, her vanity press, Sovereign Publications, charged a “standard author’s contribution” of $6125. Within a year, Sovereign Publications took over a million dollars from writers, and in the same year, the Deering Literary Agency bled writers for a further four hundred thousand.

All of the details and figures are extremely readable because they’re balanced with the human element, the writers involved and the psychology behind the con.

Just having an agent made him feel like a real writer. He liked that feeling. Now when people asked him about his new book, he could say that his agent was shopping it around to publishers. This part of being a writer was the most exciting.

The story is both insightful and heartbreaking. At one point, I longed to be able to tell a writer not to do it, not to trust the agency to the point where she wrote out another check to them. Nothing was too small or too sacred to be used as an opportunity for solicitation: after Deering’s son was murdered, she asked for donations to a memorial college fund. And her knee replacement surgery was an ongoing excuse for why Sovereign wasn’t publishing books.

With short chapters and an brisk, engaging style, the story unfolds almost as rapidly as Deering’s house of cards eventually did. Fisher also shows why law enforcement is often slow to react when it comes to literary fraud. When an FBI agent called Clay Mason did the research, though, he found that Deering had deliberately defrauded writers rather than just being a poor businessperson.

In Mason’s interview with her, Deering painted herself as a victim to the (replaced) bone, and explained that when she claimed to be related to William F. Morrow, writers drew the wrong conclusions. You know how imaginative writers can be. Her stock answers were that she either didn’t recall or that she had represented so many clients that she couldn’t be expected to remember specific claims she had made to individuals.

Deering divested herself of all responsibility, saying that as an agent she was obliged to pass all offers on to her clients, even those from vanity presses. So it wasn’t her fault if the clients signed up. There’s a semi-happy ending to the precedent-setting case, though, since she eventually pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 46 months in prison. The writers’ money was long since spent.

This book chronicles the glory days, the deceit and the downfall of the various literary scams that Dorothy Deering ran. It’s a wrenching story told with both facts and clarity, the story of a scammer who sold the dream of publication and the writers who paid for it.

------------------

Marian Perera studies medical laboratory technology when she isn’t writing, or blogging about writing. Her debut novel, Before the Storm, is a fantasy that combines steam engines and a steamier romance.

American Author Contest (or, Why Writers Should Use Craigslist With Caution)

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Craigslist is a fantastic resource if you want to buy bikes, furniture, kitchen equipment, etc. There's some research involved, and the listings don't always work out, but if you're diligent, you can find some amazing deals. For writing jobs, though...not so much.

It's pretty much a given that any agencies and publishers advertising for clients on Craigslist should be avoided. Let's just say that Craigslist is not a top literary venue; the best that can be said for these operations is that they're clueless (the worst, of course, is that they're scams). You need to be careful about freelance writing opportunities, too (here's just one example of why)--though this is true of just about any jobs listing site. And contests are another potential problem. I've heard from a fair number of writers who've had the experience of entering a Craigslist-advertised writing contest and having their entry fees vanish into a black hole.

Recently, I've gotten a number of questions about this Craigslist listing:

American Author Contest

Just like American Idol - but for writers.

If you are already finished or still working on your munuscript [sic], contact us for complete details.

Writers who respond receive the following:

Thanks for your interest. We are looking for the next generation of great American Authors. Please see our website: www.booksbybauer.com - American Author link.

Thanks & good luck.

I look forward to hearing back from you.

Patrick Boylen
Author / Editor
Bauer Communications

As it turns out, the American Author contest is not so much a contest as a promotion--though what exactly is meant by "promotion" is not at all clear. "We are excited about the opportunities we are providing for aspiring authors with our American Author promotion," the website declares. "We are providing access and opportunities where they previously didn’t exist from pretentious inaccessible publishing companies." (Uh oh. Badmouthing "traditional" publishers--never a good sign.) "Like American Idol’s phenomenal impact on unknown singers, if you are a great author, we’ll make you shine too. Granted, they are two totally different markets and processes." (Gee. Ya think?) "[B]ut the potential for both is unparalleled."

Okay, so that's about as clear as mud. But there's no ambiguity about the fact that, to be eligible for the American Author contest or promotion or whatever it is, writers must enroll in Bauer Communications' "First-Time Author Program," which costs $295 and appears to be a sort of mentoring/publishing program, providing a "getting started" tutorial, a couple of consultations, a finished product review, and a publishing and marketing strategy.

I expect I don't need to expound upon the obvious issues of excessive entry fees and contests that serve as shills for paid services. However, is it possible that the First-Time Author Program might be worth it? Could it provide enough value that authors wouldn't feel ripped off, even if they didn't make it into the contest?

Well...

The "Getting Started" tutorial (which is described as "a concise crash course on a proven formula for the book writing process," and is sent out as a teaser to writers who respond to the Craigslist ad) is rich in advice such as "Next, you will come to the middle of the book which will arise on its own once you have gotten past the beginning" and "Make sure that your ending is relevant to the beginning and the middle." I don't know about you, but that's not the sort of information I expect to pay for.

As for the consultations and reviews, Bauer Communications claims to have "over 100 entry-level and advanced editors standing by ready to work with you." Leaving aside the question of why one would want to work with an entry-level editor, the fact that no names are provided means that the editors' credentials (not to mention how many there actually are) can't be verified--and if you can't verify an editor's credentials, you have no way of knowing whether they're qualified to comment on your work.

As for publishing and marketing strategies, the existence of Additional Services suggests that further fees will apply. Also, it turns out that Editor Patrick Boylen of Bauer Communications is also Author Patrick Boylen of Bauer Communications (this information can be inferred from emails, but is not indicated on the Bauer Communications website). In other words, Bauer Communications is an outgrowth of a self-publishing endeavor. Draw your own conclusions about the level of publishing and marketing expertise that implies. (If you think that's snobbish, consider that neither of the two books Bauer Communications has published to date--The Lake Effect by Blake Sebring and Wawasee by Patrick Boylen; the third book, The Greatest Mistake I Never Made, is from AuthorHouse--are available at Amazon.)

So...a contest that's not exactly a contest, and can be entered only by paying $295 for a package of services of, shall we say, debatable value. Yet more evidence that on Craigslist, as elsewhere, it's Caveat Scriptor.

Author Solutions Inc. Expands (Again)

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Per a press release issued yesterday, POD publishing service juggernaut Author Solutions, Inc. continues to expand--this time, into the Spanish-language market.

Its new brand, Palibrio, is targeted to Spanish-speaking authors. "Palibrio authors will work closely with a team of Spanish-speaking designers, consultants, marketing professionals, and customer service experts to transform their manuscripts to finished books efficiently, affordably, and professionally."

The Palibrio website has the same cheery, upbeat look as the websites ASI has set up for the commercial publishers for which it runs pay-to-publish services (Cross Books for LifeWay, West Bow Press for Thomas Nelson, DellArte Press for Harlequin, and Balboa Press for Hay House), with vibrant colors and photos of happy authors. Prices for publication packages range from $599 to $6,499, and there's the usual a la carte menu of add-ons, from editing to marketing.

Where will ASI expand next? Stay tuned.

Copyright Protection Service: Another One You Don't Need

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

Ah, the Internet. An endlessly expanding universe of opportunities...and opportunism. Whatever the latest hot-button issue is, there's a schemer or a spammer waiting to cash in.

In the world of authors, the rush to digital is the hottest of hot-button issues right now--and with it (at least for some authors), comes the fear of piracy. Accordingly, if you've published a book, you may have received the following solicitation from an outfit called Copyright Protection Service:

RE: Copyright Violations

Dear [name redacted],

As of today, [date redacted], copies of your books are being sold on UN-Authorized internet sites in pdf and ebook format.

This is NOT an advertisement. Like you, I truly hate receiving email advertisements. There are currently pirated copies of your books being sold on unauthorized sites that I have personally located and have proof of, or you would NOT be receiving this message.

Words calculated to plunge a cold spike of dread deep into an anxious author's heart! Copyright Protection is, of course, eager to help.

My company specializes in locating and stopping copyright violations. We have a very successful 7 step process to stop the violators.

1. Violation located
2. URL immediately saved in our system
3. Request immediately sent to Violator to remove copyrighted material
4. URL revisited/checked every 24 hours
5. If URL is still live in 72 hours - Web Host is notified
6. If URL is still live in 96 hours - Web Host is contacted via telephone and/or certified mail
7. Author receives proof of violation and removal

This process allows an unaware violator to respond accordingly and willingly remove copyrighted material in a timely manner. In the event such response and removal is not forthcoming, Copyright Protection Service will send necessary notifications to Web Hosts and payment processors and make every effort to remove the violation.

Now, you don't get all this for free. But don't worry--the cost is "minimal." Just $25 per month, $75 per quarter, or $275 per year ("pay annually and save $25!").

Okay, so we're Writer Beware, and we're skeptical by nature. But piracy is a growing feature of our  increasingly digital world. Mightn't there be a good reason to pay for a service like this?

No.

First of all, Copyright Protection's website is innocent of any information about the company or the people who work for it. We're assured that they are "Highly Trained Personnel using Professional Tracking Skills," but there's no hint of who these highly trained individuals might be, or exactly what professional tracking skills they possess. (Copyright Protection's URL is registered to a Clint McCord of Dallas, Texas, who, based on a web search, could be a car dealer, a real estate agent, or none of the above.) Since you have no way to verify who works for the company, and thus to check out their resumes, you have no way to know whether they're actually competent to provide the service.

Secondly, copyright infringers and their web hosts don't have to respond to notifications or phone calls or certified mail. Copyright Protection's 7-step process might work for individual infringers who want to avoid trouble, but for companies such as Scribd, or for auction sites, or for torrent sites, it's all but guaranteed to be completely ineffective. There is, however, a very specific process that any infringer  does have to respond to if it's located in the USA, and will often honor even if it's not: a Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown notice. Will Copyright Protection send DMCA notices? Is that what they mean when they say they'll "send necessary notifications to Web Hosts" if the 7-step process fails? Who knows? Bottom line: if a copyright protection service can't or won't send DMCA notices, they aren't worth using, even if they don't charge a penny.

Thirdly, everything Copyright Protection claims to do, you can do yourself (for free), from monitoring the Internet to sending takedown notices.

Keeping an eye out for infringement isn't hard. Just set up Google Alerts for your name and the titles of your books (and any other phrase or subject you want to keep track of online), and you'll receive an email every time they pop up on the Internet. It's also a good idea to periodically do websearches on yourself and your books; you can also search on character names or distinctive phrases or sentences. If your work is cyber-lurking anywhere it shouldn't be, you'll probably find it.

If the infringer is a blog or a personal website, start with a cease and desist letter to the owner. In my experience, this is often all that's needed. But if the owner doesn't respond, or if you can't find contact info, or if it's torrent site or a company like eBay or Scribd, a DMCA notice is the best option. For info on DMCA notices and how to send them, see these three informative posts from Jonathan Bailey of the Plagiarism Today blog: DMCA Takedown 101, Takedown FAQ, and Stock Cease & Desist and Takedown Letters.

As I noted, US-based sites and services are required by law to respond to DMCA notices, and those based in other countries often have a policy of honoring them as well. Still, it's possible your notice will be ignored. In that case, you can send a notice to search engines such as Google, which will then block the site from search results. Another option, for non-self-published authors: enlist your publisher's help. They won't be any happier about pirated books than you are.

A final question to consider: how much does the infringement matter to you? When I find content from Writer Beware, or from this blog, reproduced without permission or attribution, I take immediate action--it's important to control such information, since part of its authority derives from its provenance, plus it quickly becomes out of date. I do the same if I discover that any of my work is illegally being sold in electronic form (I sent a DMCA notice just the other day to a buy-sell website where some jerk was selling PDFs of both my most recent books, whose electronic rights reverted to me in December; it took the website less than an hour to yank the listing). I'd also take action for any online plagiarism of my articles or stories (to date I've never found an incidence of this). But for the most predictable and frequent infringement--torrent sites, where pirated versions of two of my books are available for free download--I don't bother. I don't condone piracy, but torrent sites are hard to deal with--plus the books are out of print, so it's not as if I'm losing any royalty income. With a new release, I might feel differently.

Ultimately, you may not be able to resolve every incident of infringement. Or you may quash one only to discover another. Honestly, though, this is not an issue you should be losing sleep over. The truth is that for the average writer, infringement and piracy aren't nearly as ubiquitous or as damaging as the alarmists and those who would like to profit from alarmism want you to believe. And what incidences do occur aren't hard to track and deal with on your own. There's certainly no reason to pay some anonymous service to do it for you.

When Asking for Help

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware

I get a lot of Writer Beware correspondence. I mean a lot--up to 20 emails a day. I also often hear from writers who don't have scams to report, or an agent's or publisher's reputation to research, but are looking for answers to general questions about writing and publishing, or are wondering where and how to start their agent or publisher search, or just want to reach out to someone who's been there, done that and may have a bit of encouragement to offer. It can take quite a bit more time to respond to such emails than to the more basic questions, but I'm glad to help if I can.

Because of my volume of correspondence, and also the fact that Writer Beware is something I do in my spare time, it often takes me several days to reply, especially where the question involves research. My Writer Beware email address has an autoresponder explaining this, so that people won't be upset (I hope) if they don't hear from me for a week. But there's no autoresponder on my personal email, which is where I receive a lot of the less Writer Beware-ish questions--including one, last week, from an aspiring writer who was worried that his friend's negative reaction to his work-in-progress meant the work was doomed. He wanted to know if I could give him some advice, since the subject of his book paralleled some of the themes I work with in my own writing.

For a variety of reasons, I never critique unpublished manuscripts. But his brief description of his book intrigued me, so I wrote back to let him know that while I couldn't read it, I'd be glad to dialog about ideas. He immediately sent me a very long plot summary. It looked complicated and I wanted to give it serious attention. Because I was very busy right then--a writing project, a trip out of town to work on a construction project, a similar project at home, and of course, Writer Beware--I put off looking at it.

So a week goes by, and just as I'm thinking that I really have to sit down and give this writer a thoughtful answer, I get a nasty note from him implying that I've wasted his time and asking me to "at least" tell him why I found his work so offensive I couldn't be bothered to respond. Now, maybe when I received his plot summary I should have dashed off a note letting him know that it'd be several days before I could reply. On the other hand, it's not like anyone is paying me to answer requests for advice from total strangers. Given that he was asking me for a favor, I assumed that he was willing to be patient. I wrote back to tell him so, upon which he informed me that he wasn't going to kiss my ass just to get my help.

Ooooookay.

Now, I'm not writing this to whine about mean emails, or to complain about rude and ungrateful writers, or to pat myself on the back for doing volunteer work. Yes, I help writers in my spare time, and it takes up a good deal more spare time than it probably should. But that's my choice. I don't have to do it; I want to do it.

But if, as an aspiring author, you're going to contact a professional writer--or a publishing professional of any kind--and ask for their help for free, you need to be aware that a) they have no obligation toward you; b) they are probably very busy with their actual jobs and helping you is extra; and c) you are not going to inspire them to be more helpful by reacting rudely if they don't get back to you fast enough or they provide advice you don't like.

The Internet has provided a truly astonishing degree of access to publishing professionals. In the olden days, when telephones and snail mail were the only options, agents and editors responded only to queries, and writers could be reached only through their publishers. Nowadays, that divide has all but vanished. Agents, editors, and others freely dispense opinions and advice online, and almost anyone is reachable at any time by email, blogs, websites, social media, etc. I think that many aspiring writers, especially those who don't remember the pre-Internet world, have come to take this incredible degree of access much too much for granted--and in some cases, even to see it as a kind of entitlement, where it's the professional's obligation to help, rather than his or her generous choice.

I'm not saying that you should fall at the professionals' feet and worship them, or that you should be uncritical of what they tell you. They are people, and even the wisest people make mistakes, have opinions that can be disputed, and manifest bias. But if you contact a professional with a question or a request for advice, you do need to be aware that you are imposing on their time, and that you yourself should behave professionally.

In other words, if you want the milk, don't diss the cow.

(I should say that 99% of the people who contact me are polite, professional, and very pleasant to deal with. I thank them for that!)