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Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware The Writer Beware blog will be on holiday hiatus for the next two weeks. I will still be answering email, though, so if you have a question, feel free to contact me at the email address in the sidebar. Many, many thanks to our readers, followers, and fans--and especially to all the writers who contact us to let us know about their writing and publishing experiences, good and bad. You are why we do this. See you in 2015.

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware As I've followed the discussion (for instance, here , here , and here ) over the past couple of days about literary ezine The Toast's demand that writers surrender copyright ( the demand was first reported by me , and The Toast has since announced that it's eliminating the demand from its contracts), I've been struck by the number of comments from writers who seem to think that a bad contract clause is not so very awful if (pick one) the publication is great; the people who run it are great; the bad contract clause is not always enforced. (See especially the comments thread on The Toast's post about the controversy .) That's all very well. But (and I'm speaking generally here, not in particular about The Toast) this is exactly how writers get screwed: by making assumptions about a publisher's intentions, by letting their emotions overrule their business sense, and by forgetting that, in the author-publisher ...

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware EDITED 12/17/14 TO ADD: The Toast has announced that it will change its contract terms. See the end of this post. The Toast is an online literary magazine that publishes stories, articles, artwork, reviews, and more. Launched in mid-2013 , it's associated with some respected names and apparently draws a sizeable audience. It also offers, in Writer Beware's opinion, a very problematic agreement for freelancers. Contributors to The Toast are paid a flat, one-time fee of $50 on publication. No further compensation is due, even if The Toast re-publishes the contribution. The Toast also reserves the right to edit at will. These aren't ideal provisions, but they're not uncommon. What is uncommon: contributors must hand over copyright and waive all moral rights (including the right of attribution). Here's the relevant language (my bolding): The Contributor hereby acknowledges and agrees that the Work, including any drawings,...

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware UPDATE 12/18/14: HBO has changed its terms of use to partially address the concerns below. See the addendum at the bottom of this post. If you're an artist and a Game of Thrones fan, you may have heard that HBO is inviting contributions to " the ultimate compendium to Game of Thrones ." What exactly is the Compendium? According to the FAQ : The Game of Thrones Compendium will be the world’s first collaborative, crowd-sourced compendium. The end result will be a printed and bound edition. Every entry chosen for inclusion in the printed book will receive a copy with their name listed as an author. Entry is open to anyone over 18 in the USA, UK, Canada, and Brazil. A wide variety of content is eligible : "anything from story analysis, arts and crafts, original artwork, costume or jewelry design, music – anything that extends the Game of Thrones experience." There's a rigorous selection process, conducted by "...

Posted by Victoria Strauss for Writer Beware The other day, I received this email: Dear Writer Beware, A couple of years ago, I published my mystery novel with [insert name of well-known deadbeat publisher here]. My contract won't expire for several more years, but I'm very unhappy with [deadbeat publisher] and would like to get out from under it. Can I change my title and publish on Amazon and hope [deadbeat publisher] won't see it? I often receive such questions from authors who've tried and failed to get their rights back from their scammy or incompetent publishers, and are desperate to publish their books somewhere else. Can I change my title? Or the names of all the characters? Move the setting to a different country? Alter 10% of the book and legally make it a new work? Would my deadbeat publisher notice? Would it sue me? In many cases, the answer to those last two questions is "very likely not." The odds that an author mill pumping out hundreds of boo...