RWA Backpedals?
Originally published at Insert Witty Title Here. You can comment here or there.
And so it comes crashing to a halt.
Dear Members,
RWA’s strategic plan, as amended in March 2009, identifies the need to incorporate a uniform, objective application method to be used for conference space allocation. Many of you are aware that RWA’s Board of Directors and staff participated in a special-issue board meeting in Houston this past weekend. The agenda encompassed the findings and recommendations of a task force that was charged with reviewing the publisher evaluation system and recommending changes to RWA’s policy. Taking into account emerging trends in publishing that may offer opportunities to writers, the task force recommended that RWA adopt methods used by other trade shows and conventions and to shift its method of evaluating publishers as a whole to evaluating publishers by divisions, imprints, or lines.
Under this revised method, RWA will extend invitations to a wide pool of publishers. Invitees may only represent their non-subsidy/non-vanity publishing programs (imprints, divisions, or lines) at RWA’s conference. Space for spotlights, workshops, and booksignings will be allocated to lines, imprints, or divisions that best meet the requirements for “Qualifying Markets.” This new process of evaluation will likely increase opportunities for small presses and e-presses that previously have been excluded.
The potentially broader array of publishing companies present at RWA’s national conference in no way signals a change in our mission or core values. RWA has no intent to tell publishers how to conduct their business, but as a professional writers’ association, RWA stands firmly against any attempts to directly solicit RWA members to pursue vanity/subsidy publishing or other author-financed forms of publication. Members can be assured that publishers and agents allowed to participate at our national conference will have met this criterion.
Michelle Monkou
RWA President
For those new to the game, the big stink isn’t so much over Harlequin Enterprises having a “vanity” imprint, DellArte Press - although, in my opinion, ick - but rather that Harlequin mentions in its rejection letters that authors may want to consider printing their manuscripts at DellArte Press. (In other words, the manuscript isn’t good enough for Harlequin to pay the author, but it is good enough for the author to pay Harlequin.)
So how does this mesh with RWA insisting that “RWA stands firmly against any attempts to directly solicit RWA members to pursue vanity/subsidy publishing or other author-financed forms of publication”? Simple: it doesn’t. As long as the commercial imprints of Harlequin Enterprises steer authors toward its “vanity” arm via its rejection letters, RWA is choosing to look the other way.
Yes, I understand this was a business decision, and that by shunning all Harlequin imprints because of the main enterprises’ decision to have a “vanity” arm, RWA was poised to lose a lot of money. But an organization that is supposed to protect writers has to draw the line somewhere. Back in November, RWA did draw that line when it declared Harlequin an ineligible publisher. As it turns out, that line has been erased.
Shame on you, RWA. I take back my previous bravo.
(It’s possible, of course, that I’m completely misreading the RWA statement. If that’s the case, please let me know - but then, shouldn’t a writer’s organization make its communications crystal clear?)
EDITED TO ADD: Okay, it is very possible that I have jumped the gun. RWA has **not** mentioned Harlequin specifically. I may be damning RWA without cause. In which case, I would owe the organization a huge apology.
UPDATE: I have just emailed Michelle Monkou to ask her whether Harlequin, either the publisher as a whole or its individual imprints, is considered a qualifying publisher. Stay tuned.
UPDATE 2: No word from the RWA president, but over on Absolute Write, one of the authors says she received a Harlequin rejection letter via email…and there is no mention of DAP in it. If this is the case - if, in fact, Harlequin is **not** referring rejected authors to its “vanity” arm - then I will officially have no problem with either Harlequin (although I still don’t like the “vanity” press, I can hold my nose and look the other way) or with RWA. More to follow.