Quote:
Originally Posted by darryl
Because right now I am asking the question as to why any new author would want to publish an ebook with one of the big publishing houses. They seem to be surviving on their existing authors and chasing a few blockbusters, including print only and sometimes regional contracts with successful Indies.
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A question that is getting dicier by the minute, really.
The BPHs have apparently adjusted their thinking about ebooks. They now see them as pure profit generators and, in accounting terms, as assets rather than products. This has lead to a change in thinking reflected in new contract terms. (And their quarterly financial reports.)
The change is not in authors' favor.
KKR has a detailed look at the way it used to be and how it has changed:
http://kriswrites.com/2014/12/17/bus....ZmoWXmU4.dpbs
Essentially, with the new contracts, signing with the corporate publishers is not terribly different from work for hire, with residuals. The publisher gets control of all the associated IP and derivatives, as close to forever as legally possible.
Selling a book under those terms is pretty close to selling not just the story but also the characters and milieu. Kinda like in Hollywood, where selling a screenplay means selling the right to make sequels and remakes. They may be royalties forthcoming (or not, depending on contract land mines) but the author has no control over what is done with the IP they created after they sign the contract.
VAMPIRE DIARIES is an (extreme) example of where this is headed.
At a minimum, if the author of a popular book doesn't want to do a sequel or prequel or derivative, the publisher can just shrug, turn around, and farm the project to somebody else. And the author won't be able to do a thing. A future J.K. Rowling won't be able to decide that Harry Potter is a done and over with after volume 7. Instead, the publisher will be free to do RETURN OF THE POTTER, BRIDE OF POTTER, SON OF POTTER, and VOLDEMORT'S RETURN ad infinitum.
What George Lucas did with STAR WARS voluntarily will be the norm now, whether the author wants to or not.
So, when Sargent says they will be experimenting he doesn't just mean looking for new ways to sell the story; he means more ways to exploit the IP inside the story.