Purgatory's Pit of Doom

I replied directly to the tweet, Red. I couldn't help myself.

It is amazing how smart people sign bad agreements all the time. I worked in copyrights and permissions many moons ago. We routinely had scientists and doctors sign away the rights to their own work, it was the standard form. Did they even read it? If they wanted to publish another article or book and use a figure, picture or excerpt we charged them money TO REUSE THEIR OWN WORK. In the two years I did this job, never once did anyone try to alter the agreement or question it. Until of course when they wanted the rights to their own work and I had to, regretfully, say give me $30. Now, when my hubby was working on a book chapter I told him to cross out the rights info and insert something reasonable. The publisher, as you can imagine, was none too pleased.

But what do I know? I'm a stupid writer...

Which is why I must resist the urge.

Teriann said:

People will not know you're being ironic.

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very true.

I have to say having Teri and Steve around, our resident attorneys, adds a bit of cachet to the Pit.

"a bit of cache" may be about the nicest description of a pair of lawyers I've ever heard.

I keep clicking that link thinking, "Did someone actually tweet that?"

Amazing that she has no idea at all how totally stupid and sleazy it sounds.

Well, that's what happens when your butt is kissed too often.

Alias, sounds like my job. The abundance of gray or missing hairs on my head comes from being screamed at by people who had no clue they were being enrolled in a membership - or even better, their elderly parents or teenage children enrolled with their credit card. Those are the people who make me say, "Would driving a food truck be so bad?"
Of course, these people are the opposite of scientific geniuses. They enroll by clicking on links to our coupons or gift card offers without reading the terms and conditions. I guess they assume we're just pixies giving away Walmart gift cards, throwing coupons carefree to strangers because we're kind hearted like that.
*sigh* That's what drives me to jobhunt, market myself, and take classes. There's got to be someone with integrity out there who will still hire me. I'll relocate, I'll take a pay cut.

Sorry.

AO, of course you could understand the contracts then. You were an editor! Now you have a mushy writer brain.

People sign bad contracts with big publishers because they think if the publisher is legit, they'll be fair. Well, they got big by making money where they could, and they build terms into their contracts that they expect to be negotiated but hope won't be.

ETA: Hugs on the job, Mario. I'm willing to be paid to get yelled at by clients, but I would want hazard-pay levels for sure.

kellion92 said:

AO, of course you could understand the contracts then. You were an editor! Now you have a mushy writer brain.

People sign bad contracts with big publishers because they think if the publisher is legit, they'll be fair. Well, they got big by making money where they could, and they build terms into their contracts that they expect to be negotiated but hope won't be.

ETA: Hugs on the job, Mario. I'm willing to be paid to get yelled at by clients, but I would want hazard-pay levels for sure.

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I give "bad" contracts the benefit of the doubt -- usually they're written carelessly. I've seen contracts cut and pasted together by people who are not lawyers and the result is sort of a mess. Yes, definitely, sometimes there is an intent to grab rights and all that, but sometimes bad contracts are just careless.

I know the annoying part of that tweet is she's saying writers are dumber than agents and editors, but what annoys me just as much is her cavalier attitude that she "gets" contract law.

I read contracts with much humility, aware that there is much I do not understand and as people know who have asked me for advice, I give it, but with lots of disclaimers about how really I'm no expert -- I would never claim to "get" contract law. I also worked for a while in an I.P. firm -- the only thing I've done besides criminal defense -- and I spent time with the copyright code, a difficult piece of legislation if ever there was a difficult piece of legislation.

I would never claim to "get" copyright law. Her arrogance is just flat amazing.

This is not even to mention the fact that writing a good book is a little harder than selling one -- and in fact, the better the book the harder to write and easier to sell.

Hard to understand what makes her think agents are inherently smarter than the person writing the book.

Teriann said:

This is not even to mention the fact that writing a good book is a little harder than selling one -- and in fact, the better the book the harder to write and easier to sell.

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Excellent point. Agents fight over the books that sell themselves, but they sure don't write themselves.

Teriann said:

Hard to understand what makes her think agents are inherently smarter than the person writing the book.

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Yep. Writing books is hard. Even writing bad books is hard.

She also tells writers not to argue with editors.

It's the patronizing tone (among other things) which is so annoying.

You can tell some writers not to argue, but not this group. That's what we DO (aside from write and query).

AO, I saw your response. Very well measured.

Morning, Pit.

Morning, Pit.

That tweet makes me

It's snowing here! First time we've had this much since Halloween. It's purty, and I'm working from home.

You know, I think the whole pubtip hashtag on Twitter is backfiring. I think it's great that some are actually trying to let writers know more about the business, but for the ones who just use it to let out their general irritation with clueless newbies, it comes across as high snark.

Mornin', Pit

Amarie, I agree, it is backfiring because the stuff isn't really helpful and its mostly snarky BS

Yep. And it's one thing (not a good thing) to snark querying writers, another to snark YOUR CLIENTS (a worse thing).

Heh, that tweet. Just shut up and sign indeed pfft. Like writers need to be any more vulnerable than we already are.

Yeah, the pubtip hashtag doesn't help much, except that it exposes the BS in the industry though I don't think that was their intention. It's also a good place to go when you're trying to weed out your list (well, if you're querying agents I suppose).

Ha, I was a moron to think I'd have this revision done by the end of February. I'm drowning in work. Drowning. DROWNING. What's more, I seem to be coming up with premises at the speed of light, but whenever I think on it further, I lost interest almost immediately. So I don't know what to write next. I need help.

Oh and it's my birthday or actually because I'm getting older and feel like I haven't accomplished much this past year...and I'll probably have to spend my whole birthday marking bad essays for a class I hate taught by a prof that is awful in almost every way.

lol, Happy March 1st everyone!

Moderately happy natal day to you, Roly! My goodness, you are VERY accomplished -- in grad school, books written, agented writer. You are well on your way to achieving your goals. Recognize how far you've come as such a young woman and celebrate the day.

{{{Roly}}} And Moderately Happy Natal Day.

I love how we even have our own birthday wishes down here. I hope your Uterine Expulsion Anniversary is relatively pleasant, Roly.

May you have a pleasant natal day, Roly. I agree with Kellion, but dare not expand on it for fear of hellhound retribution.

As to the pubtip hastag, I actually weed through it every so often and pick the most helpful tweets - sans the snark - to go on the blog. So, people can read the good ones, without the frustrating ones.

Snappy, yeah, some of the pubtip stuff is useful, but the snarkiness is a byproduct of the nature of the business.

The problem is that we're not performance arts. There is so many people out there that want to be pubbed authors with the big houses. The same number but likely more want to be singers and pro athletes.

But a singer has an audience. You can hear him or her sing. You can see an athlete play. You can witness the performance and those that promote (record label/sports league) are witness with the audience. They see what you see, but, of course, have a more discerning eye.

Yet with us, the audience does not see us until much later in the process. We can't just hold up a book and people immediately know it's great or sucks.

hey you guys...an editor responds to the "contract tweet" awesome! start 5 or 6 tweets down
https://twitter.com/#!/FakeEditor

silver76 said:

hey you guys...an editor responds to the "contract tweet" awesome! start 5 or 6 tweets down
https://twitter.com/#!/FakeEditor

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LOL. That was awesome.

Our thoughts exactly, but said in 140 character bites.

Awesome! Thanks for the link, Silver!

RedScylla said:

I love how we even have our own birthday wishes down here. I hope your Uterine Expulsion Anniversary is relatively pleasant, Roly.

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"Uterine Expulsion" is full of WIN!

silver76 said:

hey you guys...an editor responds to the "contract tweet" awesome! start 5 or 6 tweets down
https://twitter.com/#!/FakeEditor

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Who is this person who speaks his/her mind?! Loved the comment on funky erotica...nasty-ass freaks...haha

Happy, but not too happy Birthday, Roly!!!!!

Moderately happy natal day, Roly!

Silver, that's awesome. Ha!