For example, they advocate adding the following to the contract: “Excerpt Limit equal to the least of (x) 7,500 words, (y) 10% of any Title, or (z) five pages of graphic material, any such excerpt being approved by the author before its use”

They also want to stop it when “somebody downloads your book, photoshops the images, and writes offensive but wildly popular slash fiction using your characters. Can that person do so? Can you sue said person?”

Seems to me that they’d like to curtail some free speech rights there. It also seems like you could have read what they actually said about the contract a bit more closely before giving them a soapbox.

I mean the committee even comes right out and says “If Amazon gives someone a copyable version of your Digital Book, and that person copies it a million times and floods the internet with free versions, don’t come crying to Amazon. By the way, if we (Amazon) thought this was a good idea, we could strip the DRM without your consent”

How the heck does that fit under the term “copyfight”?

All you can ever collect, under any theory, is what they have paid you over the last twelve months. In other words, Amazon is uncollectible. This means that your sole practical remedy under this contract is termination.

This part isn’t a whole lot of fun, either:

If you want to enforce rights under this Agreement, you have to go to Seattle.

This deal is a loser for any individual author. A large publisher, willing to keep tabs on Amazon, might be able to make it work, but better not to sign the damn thing in the first place.

The sheer sleaziness of offering this deal to authors means, in my view, that Amazon is a business to deal with only when one must. Krawk!

@11–the slash fiction example was my favorite part of the whole annotation. It’s such fabulous hyperbole. It’s like warning me not to post pictures of my cat on the web because someone could download them and use them as a modesty banner in a review video for a razor. Yes, it is possible. Yes, it might be something no one wants to happen to their pictures. But, in a serious discussion, is it really the best example to use? When I queried that bit on the sfwa site, both of the comments in reply had more valid concerns that didn’t resort so slash fiction ‘scare’ tactics.

So far as the contract and the annotation, I thought that whether or not I agree with the original or the suggestions, it was an interesting thing to see–we talk a lot here about the rights of the reader of the kindle being limited, I thought it was interesting to see how the kindle treats authors/publishers.

In the meantime, I think I’ll stick to actual books and PDFs.

Anyone up to any mischief who has bought a kindle book? I’m thinking almost-out-of-copyright media, a self-employed ‘corporation’, and a hopeful goal of unassailability.

“Neither side can assign any rights without consent, except:
– Oh wait, we can. We can, in fact, do whatever we want (note the term “any”) under any circumstances (“without consent”) with anyone, anywhere.
– you can sell your rights to another publisher (note the term “all”) provided it is in the U.S., and you tell us immediately about it. That’s it.”

More translation:

“We can do whatever we want. You can do these things, and no other. But to look like we’re being equitable here, we’ll start with ‘Neither party may’.”

If such one-sidedness is “standard” and “fair” assigment provisioning, I’m glad I’m not a lawyer.

Having read the whole thing and the comments, I’m also amused by the committee’s fear of “digital piracy” in the context of it being on BoingBoing. They don’t seem to notice that the section they’re all worried about “you can’t force us to use DRM, so millions of people will Steal Your Book” *also* stops Cory from saying “you are not allowed to release it *with* DRM, because that hurts my sales, and violates the commitment I have made to my readers.” Either way bad, but only one seen by the SFWA committee.

The rest of it (especially the “this is the agreement unless we feel like changing it. You have 30 days to accept the changes or cancel the agreement. You don’t get to change anything, now or later.” traditional shafting) does, indeed, look like the tradtional shafting.

You’re letting them distribute your book. They want to be able to sell their e-books business without having to track down eight zillion sellers and renegotiate. They’re saying that you can transfer your rights to somebody else as long as you notify them. Presumably that’s so they can find whomever owns the rights to the books they sell.

If I were the same size as Amazon, I’d ask for a slightly more symmetrical clause. But since I’m not, this seems pretty reasonable.

I’ve already saved about twice as much money as the cost of the Kindle, and couldn’t care less about what they want to write in their license agreement as long as they keep converting those torrented pdfs I send to my Kindle through their service ^_^

Oh and once I graduate, pay off my loans, mortgage, car and stuff I’ll probably buy all the books I really enjoyed.

Either way, it works for me. . . .

Unlike analog or digital media, with books the work is not easily copied from the medium, because the medium IS the work.

It’s funny how I don’t feel that way about anything else. When it comes to CD/DVDs, I value the physical container as property, but not as the actual work: I just rip them and then store them safely. I never lend them out, but if someone wants a copy, I make them a copy and don’t think twice. Most mf my music and video doesn’t even have a physical medium anymore.

Books are different: I enjoy having something tangible and single-purpose that I interact with directly. There’s a lot of power in the written word, and when you have a physical copy, you _have_ it, and you can do whatever you want with it… but you can only do it in the finite.. you buy it, or receive it, then you can carry it, loan it, give it away, sell it, even burn it if you want to, but it belongs to you, or whoever you transfer it to. DRM or not, “eBooks” are never going to be the same, they don’t have the same presence in your hand or on your shelf.

The same goes for writing as for reading: I can’t write from the heart at a keyboard. I have to put pen to paper.

I remember when self-publishing through the ‘net was supposed to be the salvation of authors.

Not like that to me– when a interesting new book comes out, I think “boy, I want to read that”, not “boy, I want to fondle that paper and smell that, uh, glue or something.”

The words are the work, not the substrate on which the words are printed.

BTW, on a related note, I see that Amazon has dropped the price of the Kindle II. Hopefully, that’ll push the producers of better, more open e-paper based readers to drop their prices, too.

That’s not poor, that’s spoiled.

And this entire post is a beat up, Cory is chasing windmills on this one so far as I can see from reading the contract excerpt thoroughly. It’s a standard agreement.

What’s wrong with that?

Is the language quoted above the language you think says that? It doesn’t say that. It says Amazon can sell the specific rights it bought from you.