Published on August 8, 2012
legal
Ug! It happened again! We were contacted last week by a woman claiming to be the daughter of one of our authors. After logging into his author account, she posted a note, saying he’d died last month and she wanted his future royalty checks mailed to her. I checked the author’s contract and – UH OH. In the beneficiary clause, the author had assigned his copyrights, control of his author account, and all future royalties to someone else (a female friend / associate), not to his daughter.
Published on August 8, 2012
I read your News from the Home Office in this week’s WritersWeekly. I’ve noticed a lot of people have stopped using social media during the Olympics so that they don’t get any spoilers. I guess the same should happen with online news, too!
Dawn Colclasure
https://dawncolclasureblog.blogspot.com/
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Published on August 8, 2012
Prior to becoming a freelance writer, I had a career in marketing. Managing campaign schedules, building brands and doing competitive analyses filled my nine to five workday. When I made the switch to freelance writing, I thought I would ditch marketing vocabulary such as “target audience”, “brand development”, “ROI” and “customer relations” at the door. Instead, I have come to discover that the tools I honed as a marketing professional have enhanced my success as a freelance writer. Here are some ways I have used these marketing terms to build my business.
Published on August 8, 2012
I generally write in two niches where I am comfortable, one is pets and the other is travel. I hardly ever write outside of my comfort zone, until I saw a call for writers to contribute to an encyclopaedia.
Published on August 8, 2012
Publisher Louise Blouin, whose firms produce Art+Auction, Modern Painters and the Web site artinfo.com – Sued by former housekeeper over an (alleged) wage dispute. The article alleges she has been sued over wage disputes before.
The Times of London – Sued by Elton John for (alleged) libel.
Virginian-Pilot – Not guilt of libel on appeal. Judge said, “There was no clear and convincing evidence of actual malice.”
Published on August 1, 2012
Ug!! I’ve spent four years waiting to watch the Olympic women’s gymnastics and I was so excited on Tuesday because it was coming on at 8:00 p.m. After dinner, it was still too early so I was casually reading the day’s news. I went to USAToday.com and discovered they’d done what many other news sites did NOT. They posted the results IN their headlines! There was NO spoiler alert warning! ARRRRGHHH!!! Well, that’ll teach me to surf the Internet for the next couple of weeks! I’m also very excited about watching the diving.
Published on August 1, 2012
self-publishing
Writing a book is hard. Publishing and promotion can be difficult as well. Most authors are professionals but some still fall for the outrageous marketing verbiage dished out by some of the Print on Demand (P.O.D.) publishers. A lot of this garbage is downright insulting. Do authors really fall for this stuff? Unfortunately, some do!
Published on August 1, 2012
Thank you for your article about republishing book reviews from Amazon.com. As a professional writer who often posts reviews there, I would be very annoyed if another author lifted my work without asking me first! Obviously, I hold the copyright to my review. I have never given Amazon the right to hand my work to anyone else.
Although I don’t get paid for those reviews, I enjoy writing them as a favor to other authors. It would be a real slap in the face if one of those authors stole my writing and published it without my permission!
Keep up the good work, Angela. Your newsletter has been quite helpful to me over the years.
PUBLISHER RESPONDS:
You should know that some employees at Amazon are indeed giving authors the right to republish book reviews in their entirety.
Here’s an email from an Amazon employee that was forwarded to us last week –
On Jul 16, 2012, at 6:57 AM:
Hello (author),
You can certainly use your book’s Amazon reviews on your website. While the Terms and Conditions allows for adding those reviews on your website, it does not allow you to use Amazon trademarks on your website. For more information, please review our Terms and Conditions…
Published on August 1, 2012
As writers, we all long to earn the big bucks by penning the next best selling novel or Hollywood-bound screenplay. The reality of this scenario is that it is a reality for very few people. Often, it is years in the making. Not many writers see their first novel or screenplay gain the status of fame, fortune and six-figure royalty checks.
The truth is, while we’re working and writing and waiting for our well-deserved global recognition, we have to pay the bills. For that, I suggest you think local.
Published on August 1, 2012
I messed up. I published my book with 1st Books, now named AuthorHouse. I want to have an ebook to sell, but not thru AuthorHouse. Do they own publishing rights? I know they have sold some books, but I have not received any money from them in years.
