random house goes after writers

[solarbird]

Via John Scalzi: Random House is trying to adopt ALL the wretched, musician-bankrupting models of the record labels, and force them onto writers, all at once.

I DO NOT HAVE STRONG ENOUGH WORDS FOR THIS: DO. NOT. BUY. IN.

John’s post, with all the gruesome details. The imprint is called “Hydra,” but it’s Random House.

DO NOT BUY IN. DO NOT LET FRIENDS BUY IN.

This is EXACTLY the model that labels have used to take ALL the money from the artists – ALL of it, so strings of chart-topping hits never “make money” and send artists into bankruptcy after years of below-minimum-wage returns.

DO NOT BUY IN. RUN from this. Run from it, and STOP OTHERS FROM SIGNING.

Seriously. This new model from Random House is the EXACT model musicians are trying to work around and recover from. IT IS BUILT TO STRIP MINE YOU FOR EVERY PENNY YOU EVER MAKE, AND MORE.

There is no winning here; not just for anyone who signs this agreement, but every other writer trying to sell their work. EVERYBODY loses – except the imprint, of course. And eventually even they even lose.

DO. NOT. BUY. IN. And tell others. This cannot be allowed to fly.

Mirrored from Crime and the Blog of Evil. Come listen to our music!

Comments

[jessie_c]

It's an attempt to drive new authors into self-publishing. I mean it must be. They can't possibly expect anyone with any intelligence at all (and intelligence is quite common among SF authors) to fall for that garbage. Therefore they can't possibly be serious.

Unless they are actually that stupid, in which case they deeply deserve the raking over the coals they're about to be getting, and the genius who came up with the idea is going to find themselves unemployable in the publishing industry.

[solarbird]

Nah, they're doing the same thing with their mystery imprint too. And being all butthurt about being called out on it. I think they're totally serious and trying out the record industry model.

[jessie_c]

Good luck to them in their impending bankruptcy.

[solarbird]

This has been SOP for record companies for decades. It made them lots and lots of money, and it's still how they make all their money. The only thing that's even making it possible to break out of it is cheap but decent-quality digital and the internet. That's why so many of us are in this new-paradeigm-building model.

If they all switch to this - as did the record companies back in the day - writers will be in real serious trouble. The only escape hatch in that circumstance would be that the technologies we're trying to exploit to break free already exist.

By the way, turns out they're doing this with a new mystery-publishing imprint ("Alias") as well.

[jessie_c]

If they all switch to this - as did the record companies back in the day - writers will be in real serious trouble. The only escape hatch in that circumstance would be that the technologies we're trying to exploit to break free already exist.

Which is why I'm wishing them well in their as yet unrealised bankruptcy. They're trying to use a business model which is now out of date. The power is no longer in their hands and if they can't see that they're even stupider than they've been proving they are.

By the way, turns out they're doing this with a new mystery-publishing imprint ("Alias") as well.

I saw that. And by extrapolation they're likely doing it with "Flirt" as well.