eBook protest on CNN frontpage

[starrigger]

Originally Posted by =X=

That is great news, Jeff I always felt you had a fair view of TTS. Yes, even though Amazon back off due to AG pressure that does not mean they are correct in their claim. I’m sure the when you get your audiobook contract, and I hope you do, you should not see any conflict.


You know the more I read their press release the more I dislike them. Fools with blind greed that do not see a business opportunity in front of them if they see one. I guess they is why they are a “GUILD” and not a “corporation”.


Well just a couple points. First the eBook was purchased so that is putting “chicken and broccoli” on the table for them. Second a large majority of books do not have audio versions, Jeffery C. is a good example, here are some fine SF books without any audiobooks. So buy disabling TTS they get nothing since most authors don’t have audiobooks in the first place.


Do you listen too much to TTS? I do and I’ve listen to audio books as well I can tell you there is no comparison. The readers inflections and the background music give something to the production that will never be rivaled in TTS. The difference is as stark as watching Hamlet in a high school production and going to a Broadway production. While the high school production is tolerable it is in no way going to take business away from a broadway production.

=X=

Couple of points:

1. I don't think many of us disagree that a true audiobook experience is very different from the TTS. (For a great example of this, especially if you like SF/F, try any of the wonderful productions by Bruce Coville's Full Cast Audio company.)

2. Maybe it would be helpful to cut through all the crap about this right and that right and publishers' rights and readers' rights, and suggest...maybe each individual author should have the right to decide whether they want to include the TTS right as part of what they sell. That doesn't seem so outrageous, does it? The ebook-savvy writers will probably say, "Of course." The less ebook-savvy writers might not. Their loss, in my view, but it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that it's their call, not someone else's.

3. I believe you are mistaken in your characterization of the Authors Guild. I have been a member for many years, and I've seen them go to bat for me (meaning, for writers as a group) time after time in situations where nobody else was in a position to do that. To characterize the Guild as "greedy" is indicative to me that you're not seeing the whole picture.

The Guild is absolutely right about one thing in their statement: writers have been getting hammered economically for about the last 20 years. For most writers, sales are down, advances are down or at least not keeping pace with inflation, publishers sit on their royalty money for unbelievable lengths of time, the collapse of a once-vibrant distribution system has been devastating to the mid-list writers (people like me), and many writers have had to abandon any hope of earning a living at their craft. If it were not for groups like the Authors Guild and the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, writers would be all but powerless as individuals--except for the few rich ones who a lot of people think are typical--but trust me, they're not.

So, on this particular issue, many people are in disagreement with each other, and it's going to take a little while to settle out. It took me a while to figure out where I stood, I know that. But don't judge the Authors Guild solely by their stance on this one issue. (And, by the way, to call the Guild "greedy" suggests that they somehow have something to gain. The Guild really doesn't. It's not like the Guild offices are getting a piece of the action, whatever the action is. They're just volunteers and paid staffers doing their best to protect the interests of their constituency, working writers.) If you disagree with them on this issue, I don't blame you; I think it's one on which reasonable people can disagree. But what the AG does for writers goes way beyond what you see in these press releases.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by starrigger

2. Maybe it would be helpful to cut through all the crap about this right and that right and publishers' rights and readers' rights, and suggest...maybe each individual author should have the right to decide whether they want to include the TTS right as part of what they sell.

Better yet, just let the reader decide how they want to use an ebook that they already purchased.