Scott Turow: The Slow Death of the American Author (NYTimes)

[DiapDealer]

I'm on your lawn, Turow. Smooshing your geraniums. Me and all my damn (pushing 50 years-old) kid friends. And I'm not getting off it, either.

You can't unring the bell (which incidentally sounds better when manually rung by hunchbacks). Stop whining and move on. Join the '90s already.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by caleb72

I sometimes get the impression that people really do understand. However, understanding doesn't always suit their purposes and so they have a temporary cerebral bypass and rock on.

Rock on Mr Turow - I guess.

Its called politicking.
AKA shameless lying.
When truth and the facts don't fit your agenda you change the "facts" to fit the agenda.
Very common in this age of subjectivist thinking.

Bah. This is more of a rant than an article. The issues brought up are not even related. Important factors are completely ignored. I can only think of one word to describe his argument: conflated.

I suppose that I could bring up a whole host of counter arguments. These are things like ebook lending being as necessary to libraries as ebook sales are to book stores or that the practice of writing has become incredibly competitive, but it would be incredibly difficult to create a coherent analysis of an article that isn't coherent to start with!

[wizwor]

“If Aereo’s model is ultimately upheld,” Stifel Nicolaus analysts Christopher King and David Kaut wrote in a recent note, it could force “the broadcast/content companies to seek Congressional relief.”

Kind of related, the television networks -- in the person of News Corp. president Chase Carey -- threaten to lobby congress for more restrictive laws if the courts continue to rule against them.

I cannot understand this. Broadcast television gets revenue from ads which pay by audience. How is it bad for them to expand their audience via OTT? Clearly, the issue is control.

[Soldim]

Originally Posted by QuantumIguana

If there's a slow death of the author, then why do I have no trouble finding authors who want to sell me books?

This!! Over and over again. I strongly doubt ever in history there have been as many authors as today. Both in absolute and relative numbers.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by wizwor

Kind of related, the television networks -- in the person of News Corp. president Chase Carey -- threaten to lobby congress for more restrictive laws if the courts continue to rule against them.

I cannot understand this. Broadcast television gets revenue from ads which pay by audience. How is it bad for them to expand their audience via OTT? Clearly, the issue is control.

The broadcast networks also get money from the cablecos.
They're afraid the cablecos will stop paying those fees. They had to fight long and hard to get them to submit in the first place.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by BWinmill

Bah. This is more of a rant than an article.

Yup!
Here's one right back at him, with a few choice expletives:
http://willarium.wordpress.com/2013/...erican-author/

...the biggest problem for the value of that copyright is it’s initial devaluation by the mainstream publishing houses. The big four (is it three yet? I think it might be three) do not treat authors (who are not bestsellers) particularly well, and are completely opaque about their practices. Authors have to fight tooth and nail to even get accurate sales numbers for their own books. The overwhelming corporate concern with the bottom line, the saber-rattling over piracy, and the very public battles over pricing and ownership are all huge turn-offs for the investor-consumer. In attempting to protect their particular Way of Doing Things, publishing houses are devaluing the American author’s work and ownership of that work. They will either have to change or they will collapse, but the American author isn’t going anywhere. Like the American musician and the American game designer, the American author will find other ways to flourish.

Yeah, it’s going to suck for a while, and a lot of people with expectations base on the old system are going to be very disappointed, but it’s a change, it’s not The End. No, if you want to talk about pernicious threats to literature, start with the publishing industry…well, and our failing education system, but that’s a whole other article.

[Ken Maltby]

I doubt that any of us have the actual numbers to do a definitive analysis, but that
never stopped us from our speculations or expressing the results of our perception of
the situation.

So... from my point of view; there seems to be a shortage of ebooks from authors I
have found to provide the reading experience I am looking for. Those authors that
have impressed me cannot seem to produce ebooks fast enough to make it so I don't
have to wait longer than I would like for the next book. That there are a number of
newer authors joining the ones I have always enjoyed, is a good thing from my point
of view. That there may be more that I find annoying, than there might have been
when the BPHs were able to operate as a "Gatekeeper", making it necessary to weed
through many to find the gems - is offset by the fact that the open gate allows me
to see many that I find enjoyable that the gatekeeper would have kept from me, in the
past.

I doubt that there was ever a time when getting to be a successful Author was easy
or in any way a sure thing. In fact I would guess that it has always been long odds
for even the most talented. I don't think that has changed much. What may be
changing could that we readers have to do more of the "gatekeeping" ourselves, not
a bad thing, even if it can be tedious to go through a number of free or $2 offering to
find that new author you want to follow.

Perhaps the "slow death of the author" sentiment, comes from someone who feels
that he represents those who have made it past the old gatekeepers, and finds it hard
to see so many new writers starting to find their way to so many reader's TBR lists.
Plus the fact that some of the older established writers are slowing down and essentially
leaving room for new blood.

Just an opinion based on my own search for a good read.

Luck;
Ken

[QuantumIguana]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

Its called politicking.
AKA shameless lying.
When truth and the facts don't fit your agenda you change the "facts" to fit the agenda.
Very common in this age of subjectivist thinking.

It's never been any different. People have been lying since the invention of language, probably before the invention of language. In order to lie, people have to know what is true and deliberately choose falsehood. But if someone is going to make claim X regardless of whether or not X is true or false, why bother actually checking if X is true or false? Often people aren't lying so much as bullsh*tting, without caring about what is actually true.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by sabredog

Another analysis of Turow's ramblings.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/201...-authors.shtml

Turow is sounding increasingly like the church hierarchy way back when moveable type was invented.

Take e-books. They are much less expensive for publishers to produce: there are no printing, warehousing or transportation costs,

Apparently, he is unware of how little of the cover price of a book is to pay for paper, ink, and getting it in to the store to buy. Generally, 10-15%, according to industry insiders.

Somehow, I'm not surprised.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by wizwor

Finally, nothing irks me more than to read that someone got a cease and desist after showing up at a birthday party dressed as a purple dinosaur.

That generally has nothing to do with copyright. And trademarks must be defended, or you lose them. There's a lot of stupidity in trademark C&Ds, yes, but it's far more understandable stupidity than what you imply.

Originally Posted by wizwor

No work created with public money should ever enjoy any protection.

Very little of what is on PBS (including Barney) was "created with public money." (Especially nowadays, when PBS gets so little public money to begin with.)

Originally Posted by wizwor

Scott's real problem is that technology has made it possible for people who are not as interested in profiting from ideas as sharing them are producing content that is good enough for many people. Time to look for a real job, Scott.

That's hard to argue with, though.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by Ninjalawyer

You are entirely correct; it wasn't previously illegal, it just wasn't that clear and it's a little sad that Scott, a lawyer, doesn't seem to understand that.

It's even sadder that he so badly misrepresented what the Constitution says about copyright, and the reasons for it. Especially as a lawyer.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by caleb72

I sometimes get the impression that people really do understand. However, understanding doesn't always suit their purposes and so they have a temporary cerebral bypass and rock on.

Rock on Mr Turow - I guess.

And sometimes, they're just look for attention, often in the assumption that the only bad press is your obituatry. He does have books to sell, doesn't he?

[taustin]

Originally Posted by wizwor

Kind of related, the television networks -- in the person of News Corp. president Chase Carey -- threaten to lobby congress for more restrictive laws if the courts continue to rule against them.

I cannot understand this. Broadcast television gets revenue from ads which pay by audience. How is it bad for them to expand their audience via OTT? Clearly, the issue is control.

The only thing that television networks really understand is that their revenue (and profit) has plummited in the last couple of decades. Online advertising revenues are a small fraction of what tradition on-air ads bring in, despite being able to more precisely measure how many eyeballs see each one. Television is a dying industry, and dying faster than publishing. The reasons are many and very, very complicated, but the industry is dying.

Fortunately, one of the biggest reasons is that, like book publishing, the barriers to entry in to the market have made the centralized industry irrelevant, or will very soon. Max Allen Collins called digital video "the keys to the kingdom." We live in an age where a homeless bum could, literally, beg enough money to make a movie of sufficient quality for a theatrical release.

[Ken Maltby]

Originally Posted by taustin

Apparently, he is unware of how little of the cover price of a book is to pay for paper, ink, and getting it in to the store to buy. Generally, 10-15%, according to industry insiders.

Somehow, I'm not surprised.

Hmm... I wonder if those "industry insiders" use those figures when dealing
with authors and their agents? Have you heard of Creative Accounting?

When the book buying public comes to not need a supply of pbooks that
exceeds the amount of ebooks they consume, and the production of a
pbook is not a part of the book production process anymore, we may find
less use of such figures. When the author can produce his/her own ebook
and acquire such a following that even the pbook publishing houses take
interest, all on their own, the $35 pbook may find it hard to compete with
the $10 ebook. I wonder if the "industry insiders" will be telling the authors
"Hey we can get $35 a copy for your book, if we make a pbook!, why settle
for what the ebook gives you?".

Luck;
Ken