tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7780182174577095197.post3712980699681273069..comments2024-03-25T09:56:16.164+00:00Comments on An Awfully Big Blog Adventure: Publishing as a Business Part II: A Call to Arms! by C.J. BusbyUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7780182174577095197.post-63840460842700263492016-05-10T18:32:50.047+01:002016-05-10T18:32:50.047+01:00I suppose the reason why I hit on a 'minimum a...I suppose the reason why I hit on a 'minimum advance' was because the idea of 'fairness' is a bit vague, and hard to quantify, but a minimum advance for a certain length/type of book gives us something to start from and by which to separate publishers willing to sign up to it and those not. But maybe it's unworkable.C.J.Busbyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12288574235370421625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7780182174577095197.post-90936177196295743992016-05-10T15:01:39.217+01:002016-05-10T15:01:39.217+01:00Hi Anne,
Thanks for your comments - I did say it w...Hi Anne,<br />Thanks for your comments - I did say it wouldn't help your 'fiction writing career' rather than 'writing career' as obviously non-fiction (and other kinds of writing) is a writing career too, but since I know less about them I was aiming what I said at children's fiction. And yeah, you're right, I should join the Society of Authors and maybe I will if I can scrape the £100 together. It may well be that £10,000 as an advance for 30,000 words isn't the right amount to equate to a minimum wage - but working practices and outputs could be compared across a lot of different authors to see what would make sense. After all, editing work tends to be paid according to numbers of words, and while some are faster than others, there is a sense that it's fair to pay a certain level for a certain number of words. My feeling is that is has to the the advance that's made fair, as if you made authors' royalties higher, there's even less incentive on publishers to get the book out there and selling! Whereas an up-front payment that needs to be clawed back through sales is a better incentive to properly back the book. And as I said in the piece, I am perfectly prepared to see the number of books published go down, I think there are far too m nay published at the moment And I have no sense of entitlement - happy not to be one of the ones who continues to be published under any new regime, if others are at least being paid properly.C.J.Busbyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12288574235370421625noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7780182174577095197.post-892163332741493142016-05-08T07:42:02.991+01:002016-05-08T07:42:02.991+01:00You can't expect the Society of Authors to tak...You can't expect the Society of Authors to take any notice of you unless you join. Those of us who pay our fees and give our time, free, to make it work will be happy to have you join and stand for election to one of the committees (CWIG - the children's writers and illustrators group would be ideal). You will then also see that it DOES act like a 'proper' union. The CEO has been running the CREATOR campaign for fair contracts since launching it in the House of Lords last year. They give advice to members (and non-members, for a fee) on contractual terms. The fee is not huge (about £100 a year) and you get 10% discount on books if you buy from the right shops (Waterstones, Foyles, Blackwells, for instance) and on some other things. You can easily earn most of it back. <br /><br />But you would need to modify your attitude to what counts as a book and an author: 'd) you work like stink on non-fiction or writing for a packager. Only a) and b) are going to help your own fiction-writing career flourish.' Writing books other than fiction is also a writing career. Most of the members of the Society of Authors are not novelists and most books published are not novels. The situation in some fields is worse than it is in the niche of children's fiction. The Society of Authors works for all writers, including writers of - eg - biography, screenplays, poetry, textbooks, radio documentaries, and so on.<br /><br />Certainly it would be better if we could all earn more from our books and we should be able to make a decent living from writing books that sell. There is a big problem with being branded as acting 'entitled' which comes from the perception that some people feel they are entitled to publication. That's not the case. Publication or not is a commercial decision. But if the publisher takes the book because they believe they can make money from it, they must be prepared to pay the author a decent amount of money. That is the basis of the CREATOR campaign (along with other aspects of fair contract terms). There is much distress amongst those writers who are being pushed towards a flat-fee contract for the first time (most EFL authors), yet that's the way publishers will move if you/we want more money up front as it makes their budgeting and forecasting easier. And they will take fewer books, of course, which doesn't benefit the reading public, and be less willing to take a risk on anything different.<br /><br />I suspect, also, that many people will wonder whether it is actually possible to work 7 hours a day, 5 days a week for six months on a novel 30,000 words long. That's about 200 words a day. Doesn't look like a full-time job, does it? And if you're not at your desk writing or doing research for those hours, why should the publisher be paying for them? When the working practice is so different from that in other careers, the concept of minimum wage doesn't look applicable. But I do agree that writers should be properly and fairly rewarded for their work. Join the SocA and help fight the cause!Stroppy Authorhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16560035800075465845noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7780182174577095197.post-7440793085752971652016-05-07T09:37:51.085+01:002016-05-07T09:37:51.085+01:00This comment has been removed by the author.Katherine Robertshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17196712319655603442noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7780182174577095197.post-57967999784075308562016-05-06T18:55:00.879+01:002016-05-06T18:55:00.879+01:00It would be really interesting to hear a publisher...It would be really interesting to hear a publisher's response to this. If you gave a £10,000 advance for a MG novel, would publishing it be viable? I have a horrible feeling that it wouldn't be. My feeling is that it would be make better sense all round if the royalties were higher rather than the advance being higher. That way, both author and publisher have every incentive to sell the book once it's out. And the rewards for a book that proves popular would be properly proportionate for the author. Pippa Goodharthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17709422048047155208noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7780182174577095197.post-46864704600040753612016-05-06T08:20:39.130+01:002016-05-06T08:20:39.130+01:00Now there's a thought!Now there's a thought!Sue Purkisshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09084528571944803477noreply@blogger.com