Go then, gunslinger; there are other worlds than these: Seanan ponders Amazon Worlds.

[seanan_mcguire]

So last week, while I was at Disney World, the "Amazon Worlds" program was announced. In a nutshell, Amazon has acquired a "derivative works" license for certain properties (inc. Pretty Little Liars and The Vampire Diaries), which will allow people to publish authorized fanfic through Amazon Worlds. It can't be smutty, and there are no crossovers

Comments

[aliciaaudrey]

I've been following this with some substantial interest. Leaving aside my personal feelings about fanfic (which can be summed up as "meh"--I think it's legally questionable and also basically harmless), it's interesting to watch Amazon essentially convert a bunch of "closed world properties" into "open world properties" and then essentially crowd-source it. I'll be interested to see 1. how successful this is, 2. how successful the "fanfic" writers are (although it's hard to call it that when they're essentially now producing a licensed work, because SOMEBODY--that being Amazon--holds the license

[aliciaaudrey]

1. Given that they fail to define "what the copyright term" is I'm assuming they mean the one generally used in the United States when another term is not stipulated. That's 70 years after the death of the author. (source: http://copyright.cornell.edu/resources/publicdomain.cfm) They may mean something else, I plan to at some point to get into the fine print (I haven't yet, so if someone else has and can correct me on some of this, I'll stand corrected

[willibald]

"all writers are magpies collecting shiny things they like and building it into an awesome new nest"

What a fitting description.

[aliciaaudrey]

Thank you.

Although in true magpie fashion I can't remember if I came up with that formulation myself or I heard some other version somewhere, liked it, and ran with away with it giggling madly while embellishing it like a demented tween with a bedazzler.

[dulcimeoww]

I share your concerns, and have a few related additional concerns

[dulcimeoww]

Incidentally, we do have a pretty fair policy on fanfiction, I think. I tried to come up with one, anyway. Fans cannot monetize the fic, and it is not canon, but they're free and even encouraged to write it and we've provided unlimited hosting for it on our forums. We ask that they post excerpts and links to the story in fanfic communities outside the board, rather than just posting the whole story, because in theory that brings people into the home fan community. Poe and I don't read the fic, and we have a "just in case" clause for overlap that lets Poe use any of the ideas posted because they might actually be something he was already planning (this is the same in the freeform RPG we also host, which is basically all OC fanfiction

[djonn]

In answer to your first question:

Any setting that Amazon offers as a Kindle World will have been licensed by the owner of that setting -- so, for example, if they were going to accept Star Trek fiction they'd need a license from the relevant people at CBS/Paramount, or if they were going to accept Kim Possible fanfic they'd need a license from Disney.

This invites a certain amount of speculation, because on one hand, usually the licensor makes money off of that deal by charging the licensee to make use of the property. In this case, however, Amazon is -- at least in theory -- providing a variety of services in the course of administering their license program, and Amazon being Amazon, I'd expect them to charge the licensor fees to do that.

Thus, my own suspicion is that Amazon is doing its level best to make money on both ends of the deal: from the licensors, to cover the operating costs of running Kindle Worlds, and from readers, as they take their half (or better) of the 65% of the proceeds not going to the writers. (And see

[dulcimeoww]

Fair enough, but my real concern in that first question is about the precedent this sets for fan entitlement. If Amazon has successfully established an arena for monetizing fanfic (which they now have, even if it bombs from here on out), then that changes the paradigm to, "Licensed fanfic can be monetized." From there, it's a very short jump to "ALL fanfic should be licensed." And then from there, you can count the seconds until creators start hearing, "Why won't you let me monetize my fanfiction?! Everyone else signed the license and I have a right to make money off my hard work. I'll bet you're just greedy, or super controlling. Well, I don't agree with that, so I'm going to organize the fandom against you, or even just sell my fanfiction anyway, so there

[mrs_norris_mous]

As someone who enjoys reading some fanfic now and then and as one of the people that keep one of the archives ticking, thank you.

[seanan_mcguire]

Welcome.

[lilac_fool]

I'm really glad to see someone pointing at the not-insignificant potential for Amazon's next move to be a truckload of C&D letters for all the archives out there. Most of the commentary I've seen on this issue has related to the horrific licensing agreement (which, fair, merits discussion), but when all is said and done, that is something that's only going to affect people who opt in and use the service. Whereas a crackdown on unlicensed fanfic is going to affect the whole community, whether they buy into the endeavor or not. Of course, one would hope that Amazon realizes kicking up a hullabaloo like that among fandom will completely scuttle any minimal chance they have of getting this thing off the ground. But that might be giving them too much credit. ;-)

[djonn]

I actually don't expect to see a flock of C&D letters ensuing from Amazon, save perhaps in the case of Kindle Worlds' contributors who leave their pre-existing works up on open archives while at the same time marketing those works through Kindle Worlds

[skelody]

Does the OTW really have that much heft? That's somewhat reassuring if so, I guess.

[filceolaire]

Looking at OTW you sort of get the feeling that they would appeal and appeal and never agree to a settlement. That sounds expensive to BCM lawyers

plus OTW might just win.

The commercial fanfic archives look much more likely to agree a settlement just to make the court case go away.

[weds]

The thing which got my attention: the launch properties belong to Alloy Entertainment. I can't decide whether this smacks of market research experiment, a breakdown in their ghost writing system, or both.

[mariadkins]

which is a subsidiary of Warner Brother's.

[djonn]

The corporate history of the present Alloy Entertainment is....interesting.

At least one of the three licensed Kindle Worlds (Vampire Diaries) originated with a book packager called Daniel Weiss & Associates (DWAI), some years before Alloy came into the picture. Alloy bought DWAI (and a subsidiary company of DWAI's, 17th Street Productions) before developing VD as a television property, and Warner Bros. didn't buy Alloy until relatively recently. Gossip Girl and Pretty Little Liars are both of more recent origin, but I have not looked up the dates on those to see where in the DWAI/Alloy continuity they fall.

Also unclear as yet is whether the Kindle Worlds license for Vampire Diaries will encompass only the TV series, or allow both TV-based fanfic and fic based on the books actually written by L. J. Smith (the two canons being sharply divergent) before Smith was dis-invited from continuing to write for the franchise. [Weirdly, even the more recent books are still copyrighted in the name of L. J. Smith, even though others are now

[mariadkins]

i remember alloy buying dwai - i mean, i had totally forgotten about it until i read your comment, but now i do. :)

yes and from what i understand LJ Smith's hands are totally tied about having her name removed from the books.