A Few Good Links
I suspect that most of the people on my friends-list have seen enough posts about FanLib already, but here, I think, are some very important links.
AngiePen browses through FanLib's questionable Terms of Service.
This quote from the TOS really struck me:
You hereby grant FanLib a non-exclusive, worldwide, and royalty-free license to use, reproduce, distribute, and display the Submissions in connection with the Website.
And what ARE non-exclusive rights? The American Society of Journalists and Authors defines them this way:
"Although less blatant as a rights-grab than "all rights" contracts, "first right to publish" or "non-exclusive" agreements can achieve virtually the same result for publishers via the back door. These agreements often begin with a benign-sounding FNASR [first North American serial rights] clause and then tack on extremely broad (though "non-exclusive") rights to use a writer's work in perpetuity in various media. The writer may still technically own the property, but the publisher may continue to re-use the work whenever it wishes -- for no additional fee.
"Granting "non-exclusive rights" to a publisher may sound less onerous to a writer than signing an all-rights or WMFH [work made for hire] agreement, but the apparent safeguard may be deceptive. These non-exclusive rights clauses may also allow publishers to profit from the work through their own network of sister publications, syndication contacts, and resale markets without sharing that income with the author. The loss of potential income can be substantial. Think about the size of the potential market among corporate purchasers, for example. (How would you feel if Microsoft buys 10,000 reprints?) How would you feel if the article for which you sold all rights later becomes a film? (Think "Saturday Night Fever.") And if you plan to include your article "Why Eating Chocolate Makes You Live Longer" in your book "Surprising Foods That Keep You Healthy," do you want your article to become part of a competitive nutrition book the magazine throws together?"
If you post a story to FanLib, you are granting them rights in the story in perpetuity. Moreover, these are worldwide rights. They don't have to pay you anything, such as a flat fee, and they don't have to pay you a percentage of the profits ("royalties"). Oh, and did you notice that these aren't just online rights? The clause says "in connection with the website." Basically, that would allow FanLib to use ANY media to publish stories that had been made on the website--Podcasts, e-books, magazines, e-zines, print anthologies.
By the same token, there's also this cute little phrase: "But by posting here, you do not lose any of the ownership rights that you may have." First of all, that's contradicted by the fact that writers, by submitting to the site, grant FanLib non-exclusive rights.
But there's also a subtler message. The phrase isn't "ownership rights that you HAVE," but "ownership rights that you MAY have." The people who set up the terms of service didn't state definitely that fanfic writers had rights in their stories. From The Free Dictionary:
may v. a choice to act or not, or a promise of a possibility, as distinguished from "shall" which makes it imperative. 2) in statutes, and sometimes in contracts, the word "may" must be read in context to determine if it means an act is optional or mandatory, for it may be an imperative. The same careful analysis must be made of the word "shall." Non-lawyers tend to see the word "may" and think they have a choice or are excused from complying with some statutory provision or regulation.
Basically, it's a Cover-Your-Ass clause. It breaks down to, "We're telling you that by posting your stories on FanLib, you've granted us the right to do whatever we want with them, wherever we want, in whatever format, forever--even though we think that there's only a possibility that you might have rights to the stories in the first place. After all, you didn't create the setting or the characters, did you? And since fanfic is SUCH a grey area, and since the rights of a fanficcer have never been delineated in statute or in court...well, if you decide to make a fuss about your loss of rights, you're pretty much screwed."
Read the rest of AngiePen's analysis of the TOS. It is enlightening. And infuriating.
Icarusancalion provides a summary of what's going with FanLib and the writers they hoped to court.
makinglight talks about FanLib.
Stewardess has a whole slew of links on FanLib.
Henry Jenkins analyzes FanLib and its myriad mistakes.
Fandom_wank also has a link-filled summary of the entire situation. Includes a rather whiny quote from the FanLib CEO.
I'm sure that there's a lot more that I could say, but it all boils down to "Don't trust them." To me, they're crooks and scam artists, battening on the dreams of young and/or inexperienced writers who know no better. They are no better than the infamous Poetry.com or PublishAmerica.
I was loath to write this up; I didn't want to give them any free publicity. But warning people seemed more important.
AngiePen browses through FanLib's questionable Terms of Service.
This quote from the TOS really struck me:
You hereby grant FanLib a non-exclusive, worldwide, and royalty-free license to use, reproduce, distribute, and display the Submissions in connection with the Website.
And what ARE non-exclusive rights? The American Society of Journalists and Authors defines them this way:
"Although less blatant as a rights-grab than "all rights" contracts, "first right to publish" or "non-exclusive" agreements can achieve virtually the same result for publishers via the back door. These agreements often begin with a benign-sounding FNASR [first North American serial rights] clause and then tack on extremely broad (though "non-exclusive") rights to use a writer's work in perpetuity in various media. The writer may still technically own the property, but the publisher may continue to re-use the work whenever it wishes -- for no additional fee.
"Granting "non-exclusive rights" to a publisher may sound less onerous to a writer than signing an all-rights or WMFH [work made for hire] agreement, but the apparent safeguard may be deceptive. These non-exclusive rights clauses may also allow publishers to profit from the work through their own network of sister publications, syndication contacts, and resale markets without sharing that income with the author. The loss of potential income can be substantial. Think about the size of the potential market among corporate purchasers, for example. (How would you feel if Microsoft buys 10,000 reprints?) How would you feel if the article for which you sold all rights later becomes a film? (Think "Saturday Night Fever.") And if you plan to include your article "Why Eating Chocolate Makes You Live Longer" in your book "Surprising Foods That Keep You Healthy," do you want your article to become part of a competitive nutrition book the magazine throws together?"
If you post a story to FanLib, you are granting them rights in the story in perpetuity. Moreover, these are worldwide rights. They don't have to pay you anything, such as a flat fee, and they don't have to pay you a percentage of the profits ("royalties"). Oh, and did you notice that these aren't just online rights? The clause says "in connection with the website." Basically, that would allow FanLib to use ANY media to publish stories that had been made on the website--Podcasts, e-books, magazines, e-zines, print anthologies.
By the same token, there's also this cute little phrase: "But by posting here, you do not lose any of the ownership rights that you may have." First of all, that's contradicted by the fact that writers, by submitting to the site, grant FanLib non-exclusive rights.
But there's also a subtler message. The phrase isn't "ownership rights that you HAVE," but "ownership rights that you MAY have." The people who set up the terms of service didn't state definitely that fanfic writers had rights in their stories. From The Free Dictionary:
may v. a choice to act or not, or a promise of a possibility, as distinguished from "shall" which makes it imperative. 2) in statutes, and sometimes in contracts, the word "may" must be read in context to determine if it means an act is optional or mandatory, for it may be an imperative. The same careful analysis must be made of the word "shall." Non-lawyers tend to see the word "may" and think they have a choice or are excused from complying with some statutory provision or regulation.
Basically, it's a Cover-Your-Ass clause. It breaks down to, "We're telling you that by posting your stories on FanLib, you've granted us the right to do whatever we want with them, wherever we want, in whatever format, forever--even though we think that there's only a possibility that you might have rights to the stories in the first place. After all, you didn't create the setting or the characters, did you? And since fanfic is SUCH a grey area, and since the rights of a fanficcer have never been delineated in statute or in court...well, if you decide to make a fuss about your loss of rights, you're pretty much screwed."
Read the rest of AngiePen's analysis of the TOS. It is enlightening. And infuriating.
Icarusancalion provides a summary of what's going with FanLib and the writers they hoped to court.
makinglight talks about FanLib.
Stewardess has a whole slew of links on FanLib.
Henry Jenkins analyzes FanLib and its myriad mistakes.
Fandom_wank also has a link-filled summary of the entire situation. Includes a rather whiny quote from the FanLib CEO.
I'm sure that there's a lot more that I could say, but it all boils down to "Don't trust them." To me, they're crooks and scam artists, battening on the dreams of young and/or inexperienced writers who know no better. They are no better than the infamous Poetry.com or PublishAmerica.
I was loath to write this up; I didn't want to give them any free publicity. But warning people seemed more important.