Thanks to Mr Ploppy for his comment re Moore & LLoyd...
To Rogue librarian... read my words "it is not unknown," I didn't say any thing else, I didn't say "this is a definition," I didn't say, "It is general, common or anything else..." I said, "It is not unknown..." which implies that it happens, not that it is general or common or anything else... and YES it is an attempt to evade contractual obligations, THAT is the point I was making... and, if you wanted to do anything about it then you'd have to prove (in a civil court) that the publisher intentionally did this... and, anarmadoll, read preceding lines as well... so "bazillion dollars to buy..." hah, hah
It doesn't actually even have to be deliberate... there was a well known case where a publisher actually lost a small storeroom in their warehouse complex (a shelving unit was moved across the access) for a couple of decades... when it was eventually rediscovered, there were a bunch of titles that were thought out of print and rights reverted to the authors but (some titles had up to a 100 or more copies) were in fact still in print and the publisher still had the rights to them...
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Originally Posted by elcreative
And here's another way to be sneaky... if the book is in print then the publisher retains contractual rights but in print doesn't necessarily mean for sale... it is not unknown for a publisher to retain ten, twenty copies in stock but not to supply orders for it just to retain contractual rights by being able to prove the book is still in print...  |
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Originally Posted by rogue_librarian
Really? I don't think that would fly in a court of law. This does not fit my (or, indeed, the generally accepted) definition of being "in print".
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Originally Posted by rogue_librarian
As I've said, that's not a common definition. "In print" means it's still being published and, therefore, available for purchase, at least in general and abstract terms.
Details will depend on the publishing contract, but as a rule books are deemed out of print if there are less than a certain number of units of the book available for sale to the public. While there is clearly no obligation to sell to a particular buyer, keeping a few copies without any intention to sell them won't automagically keep the book in print forever.
In legal terms you'd simply call that an attempt to evade contractual obligations.
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Originally Posted by anamardoll
Yes, if that's the common definition of "in print" - We have a copy, no you can't buy it - then I'd expect all publishers to have an "in print" Vault where they keep a pristine "for sale, but not really, it'll cost you 1 bazillion dollars to buy" copy of everything they've ever published ever.  |