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Topic: I found my work online, how to ask for web pay?
| Author | Message |
| Righter | Posted – 3/3/2008 7:23:18 PM | show profile I just found some of my articles published on FreeLibrary.com. I originally sold them for print rights only so I'm wondering how you'd suggest I approach the editor about being paid for reprints on the web. Also, does anyone know how FreeLibrary.com works? Do they buy the articles from publications and how do they generate revenue? I'm wondering if the publication did in fact make money from my article, thus entitling me to part of it. Kinda new to reprints online, so any advice would be appreciated! |
| rhino writer | Posted – 3/5/2008 6:24:03 PM | show profile I don't know, but I'm bumping this up because I think it should get answered! |
| Righter | Posted – 3/5/2008 7:08:17 PM | show profile Thanks, rhino! So kind of you :) |
| Righter | Posted – 3/5/2008 7:11:27 PM | show profile oh, and I just realized, it's TheFreeLibrary.com. Originally I wrote it without "the" |
| eriksherman | Posted – 3/5/2008 7:43:23 PM | show profile | email poster Please note that I'm not a lawyer and that this isn't legal advice. You have a few things to consider here. One is that unless you registered copyright within three months of first publication, legal action to get money won't work because you will only be able to sue for actual profits and not even for legal fees. If you had registered (or still can) within three months of first publication, then you could sue for statutory damages, which are a minimum of $750 and can go up significantly from there. Next, it may be that the publisher sold the rights, or it may be that the site just lifted the piece. This happens. Or it might be that someone at the first publisher thought it had the rights to convey either to the site or to an agregator that might then have sold rights. In any case, go register, because you might be able to successfully bluff if you have. Directly address the site and say that you are the copyright owner and have not given permission to anyone to make rights available. Say that the piece is registered (without saying when - that's why you register now) and deliver an invoice to let them sweat. Then see what you can negotiation. If you want your material off there, go find the ISP hosting the site and then send a Digital Millennium Copyright Act take-down notice. (I have details at http://www.eriksherman.com/index_files/DMCAComplaint.htm.) It doesn't get you money, but it can get your work off their web site. ------ Free writer resources: http://www.eriksherman.com/WriterBiz |
| snappiness | Posted – 3/9/2008 12:08:30 PM | show profile "register copyright?" What? I'm confused. The legal advice I've always gotten was that the copyright exists and is held by the writer the moment he/she writes down words. If you sell first rights, or print rights, you by default hold copyright on the rest. I've never had this challenged, and I have had to contact publications a few times in the past to be paid when reprints ran. |
