Origami Unicorn

Being an Author in the 21th Century

Publishers Weekly visits the London Book Fair, and talks with Hugh Howey about how to succeed as an author in the 21th century.

The hybrid model, Howey said, allows an author to "feel out [their] market," find their readers and, ultimately, get the traditional publishers to come calling.

Literature, Gaming, and Future of Stories

Some books make the transition to gaming (and movies) seamlessly, while others are neglected. Why? Should the two universes have more to do with one another? The Millions talks about it all.

English Is Crazy

Copyright, Cafe Press, and DMCA

Plagarism Today talks about:

[A lawsuit that] centers around the popular printing site CafePress and, specifically, whether or not the service qualifies as an online service provider that should receive protection under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

In short, although Cafe Press avoided major damages because the content owner only registered copyright after the material was uploaded to Cafe Press, the damages could have gone into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. More notewrothy, Cafe Press did not qualify for safe harbor protections.

The Hunt For Gollum

http://www.thehuntforgollum.com/.

Wind Mills

ASCAP For Books

ASCAP for books? Galley Cat reports that is what the Authors Guild is calling for.

Jan Constantine, General Counsel of the Authors Guild, testified before the House Judiciary Committee this week where she argued that Congress should help establish “a collective licensing organization to deal with both mass digitization and “orphan” books.” The idea, she argued, “would pave the way for a true national digital library.”

Related articles

As it turns 100, ASCAP focuses on legal battle with Pandora

The Authors Guild Forgets They Lost the Google Books Case, Proposes an ASCAP-like Agency to Solve the Issue

Orphan Works, Again

The Authors Guild claims that discovering the copyright owners of orphan works is not nearly as difficult as, say, Google claims, and cites European experience, among other things. Publishers Weekly has the story, incldung this:

Constantine emphasized that collective licensing would be solely for display rights for out of print books, “to avoid disrupting commercial markets.” In fact she said “foreign licensing and collecting organizations have been efficiently licensing orphan works for decades. We should learn from their examples.”

With a Helping Hand

Plagarism

Lemony Snicket and Malcom Gladwell made charges and counter-charges, probably to celebrate the first day of April. Galley Cat has the tale.