Copyright & Competitions

[dgaughran]

Hi,

I have a question about copyright and competitions.

I know that many writers share their writing online, and that many sites have sample chapters from books, both published and unpublished, and that this doesn’t seem to affect the potential to publish the novel and the associated rights. I have been entering some short stories in competitions, and have noticed some competitions for extracts from a novel, or for the first chapter of a novel. Some of the prizes involve publication of the chapter, either online or in an anthology.
My question is, does this affect the copyright of your novel, or affect the rights in any way that may be detrimental to your chances of publishing the novel from which the extract is taken?
Thanks,
Dave

[Mishell]

To make things simpler, I just never put anything online or enter it into contests if I hope to have it published later. I just finish it and head straight to SubmissionLand.

[Theo81]

It depends on the terms and conditions of the competition.

What I would expect to see in a reputable competition is: 1)Your copywrite is not affected; 2)You allow the company running the comp to print and reprint your work without paying you. These are fairly standard terms.

However. I have seen competitions run by giant publishing houses in which entry conceeded copywrite to them; not winning - Entering.

Read the terms and conditions very carefully.

Personally, I say never allow your copywrite to be taken from you but if you are comfortable with it, make sure you aren't using anything you could possibly want to use at all, again, ever.