Monday News: IP protection for images, the wisdom of VAT, another author v. reviewer disaster, and the evolution of Wonder Woman
Publishing NewsBook Reviews / copyright / digital books / feminism / infringement / trademark / VAT / Wonder Woman27 Comments
Authors: Don’t Scream “Piracy!”, Then Turn Around & Pay Thieves To Represent You Or Your Work – If you know anything about the Charles Schultz estate, you know that they are *very protective* of Schultz’s intellectual property. So you may very well share April Hamilton’s frustration and anger at the irony of an author services provider advertising itself using an image of one of the Peanuts characters. Hamilton wrote a blog post about the situation, including the company’s response to her inquiry regarding the IP issue. She also makes the point about how important it is for creators to respect other creators’ legal rights to their intellectual property.
I was angered that an author services provider—a company ostensibly in the business of helping creators of intellectual property—would do such a thing. I was angered that many authors whose names are familiar to me (some of whom are quick to point the intellectual property theft finger at ebook piracy sites) have books listed with this service, and probably have no idea they’ve thrown their lot in with an intellectual property thief.
I was angrier still when, after sending a private message to this outfit’s Facebook fan page earlier in the week, today I received a response claiming total ignorance of what intellectual property was stolen, and from whom. –April Hamilton
EU Approach to eBooks Is Nonsense – I’ve reported on the VAT controversy briefly here, and this is an opinion piece by Martyn Daniels, who argues that digital books are not different in kind from physical books, and therefore should not be subject to VAT. He references the recent EU court holding the digital books are “services,” not “goods,” a distinction that has some pretty far-reaching and substantial implications, even beyond the question of taxation.
One of the greatest challenges the European media industry faces is getting the unelected commission and courts to realise that the world has gone digital and that in doing so has created new opportunities not threats. This taxation rule is a daft as the current lack of real action to address the tax avoidance plays being made by multinationals. It is matched by the lack of a rights and IP database. The inability to resell digital goods because…. –Brave New World
Baba ??? Tyler, Marcus, Archer, Dean, Adrian, Dan & Hunter’s Reviews > Black Balled – I’m not even sure I can explain this situation clearly, so I encourage you to visit the reviewer’s page on Goodreads and check out the story she tells. The short version is this: apparently author Andrea Smith decided she didn’t like popular GR reviewer “Baba,” and she wrote a book, Blackballed, which featured a reviewer named “Babu,” who was bent on ruining the career of an indie author. Got that? There are some other interactions the author had with the reviewer that, suggest the author has, shall we say, a strong and disturbing interest in the reviewer. Also apparently the author changed the book blurb and character names after the reviewer drew attention to the situation; however, the original blurb is posted on the reviewer’s GR page, so you can see it for yourself. Very, very troubling. –Goodreads
She’s Come A Strong Way, Baby: The Ass-Kicking Evolution Of Wonder Woman – This short video history of Wonder Woman rocks. Tracking the evolution of the character and her relationship to World War II, feminism, and cultural representation, there are even some interesting details about her creation and marketing (and yes, I have the MAC Wonder Woman lipstick and I LOVE IT). It also made me think about this great piece on Wonder Woman in hijab. –Fast Company/Daily Motion
*Reads the Blackballed review* *Rereads* *Boggles*
Do you think some of these authors will ever figure out that bad review(s) ≠ the end of the world!™?
The Blackballed thing is just…too much. Andrea Smith has a history of provoking and questionable behavior on the Amazon Romance forums, so this doesn’t surprise me at all. But to write a book about a reviewer… Really, really scary. If you’re too fragile to handle negative reviews, stop publishing stuff PLEASE.
Strong and disturbing interest in reviewer is truly the best way to describe this :(.
That Blackballed thing has to be one of the strangest things I have seen in a while. It makes you think twice about doing any solicited review.
Adding more people to my own list–with pseudonyms.
What the ever loving fuck, though.
Holy crap the author (Smith) has posted this letter on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author_blog_posts/8081281-author-s-letter
Beyond the usual “free expression defense,” which, let’s not forget, doesn’t insulate you from criticism, nor is is ABSOLUTE, there is an IMO completely distasteful and inappropriate reference to the attack on Charlie Hedbo, presented on behalf of Smith’s French co-author.
I have to say that when Smith referenced her French co-author, my first thought was Scarlett Johansson’s successful case for defamation against the French author who used her as a reference for his novel: http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-scarlett-johansson-wins-case-against-bestselling-french-novelist-20140707-story.html. That seems much more relevant to this particular situation…
She compared Charlie Hebdo situation with this?!
I was reading comments on review up to point where Baba posted screen-cap of conversation Andrea Smith is having with Graysen Blue where they refer to each other as Auntie and Niece. ( for those who didn’t read- Graysen Blue is her pen name).
But mentioning Charlie Hebdo? That makes me really angry.
@Janet:
I’ve been following this and that letter is a patently disingenuous attempt to justify a spiteful act by scrambling to occupy the high ground. I’m amazed at the people supporting her. Maybe they didn’t see the original blurb, which was a gleefully malicious taunt, or realize she’s basically written RPF (real person fiction).
It’s a shame all this drum beating for tolerance of other viewpoints didn’t kick in before she began the book or when she got a (gasp) two star review that prompted a two-year vendetta.
Jane Davitt, yes and lets not forget that if the reviewer did not like your book, you (obviously not you) must must to contact the reviewer under a different pen name, and ask her to read your other book. Because hey, that does not make you look obsessed with this reviewer at all, at all. Oh how happy I am with not accepting ARCs any longer – that does not make a guarantee that another obsessed individual may take an issue with something in my review, but at least I cannot be accused of not liking a book because I was denied an ARC to it, as poor Baba was. Ugh.
Interesting that the book has a fulsome five-star review giving the character names as ‘Troy’ and ‘Larsen’. The original blurb had the reviewer as ‘Babu’ and the indie writer as ‘L. Blackburn’. So is the reviewer Troy Babu/Babu Troy or has a quick find and replace happened before the official release in an attempt at damage control?
@Sirius:
That bit had me blinking. Yes, of course that explains the bad review; Baba was annoyed at being forced to pay to read it and took revenge. Don’t we all after shelling out money for a book?
And to pay her back, they wrote a full length novel so they could make their fictional version dance to their tune and see the error of their evil reviewing ways and repent. By falling in love with the indie author and having hot sex, I’m guessing from the review.
Excuse me. Must throw up.
Jane Davitt, yep totally agree. Re: names didnt they edited the blurb after the backlash? I am not sure, but in the initial screenshot the names are different.
P.S. I am actually glad that someone brought the link to all of this elsewhere, because who knows, I may have been in the mood of trying new to me m/m author and bought this. No thanks.
I side with the poor reviewer on this, and Smith’s entire freedom of speech argument completely misses the point. Unless I’m remembering my Constitutional Law incorrectly, the First Amendment only protects you from censorship by the government (and even that isn’t absolute). Instead of righteously waving the first amendment flag, she and other authors should be more concerned about whether their behavior could lead to civil charges for defamation, stalking, harassment, etc.
@Jenn:
She claims the name similarity is unintentional. :
Actually, “Babu” is a portion of his surname, and it is used in this book to represent the pseudonym that it is used for in his internet column. There are reasons he must go by a pseudonym, and remain somewhat anonymous. That is explained in the book, along with the Corsican roots of the name and what it means when translated. It feeds into his character’s ego-which is part of the conflict between that M/C and Larson, the author.
The only reason that blurb was deleted was because too many people were jumping to that conclusion, the MC’s name has not changed nor will it. It is about a man, who reviews, and a male author who writes, and how they try to find middle ground.
Um. If they jumped, it’s because she pushed them. Not buying it.
@Jenn: Smith did manage to avoid hanging her hat on the First Amendment, although you could definitely hear the echoing of the University Declaration of Human Rights in her ‘inalienable rights’ language (http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/). Still, you’re right that people aren’t really trying to limit her creativity or free expression – they’re just *really* disturbed by what appears to many to be an extreme and unreasonable pursuit of a single reviewer.
@Janet: You’re right. I read all the “freedom of speech” and “freedom of expression” buzzwords and immediately thought of the First Amendment since that’s the legal basis of freedom of speech in the U.S. That’s what I get for reading/commenting before my afternoon caffeine boost!
@Jenn: Oh, I’m not exculpating her or criticizing you – I just wanted to make the clarification because IMO the philosophical principle of freedom of expression is a really important element of creative production. But, as you pointed out, it’s really beside the point here.
@Jane Davitt: And of course she ignored that she is so obsessed with Baba that she wanted to have her review her other book so badly that she contacted her under pseudonym. This frankly what boggles me the most (pretty much everything does in this situation but this is a standout for me) – it is one thing if the reader who did not like another book of yours wants to give another try (I usually give two chances for new to me authors if I am not sure what I think), but you are so invested in convincing the reader that she might like your book that you will do this? And your freedom of expression is violated when people find your behavior creepy?
@Janet: There’s also this: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1058239486?book_show_action=true&page=1 (Scroll down for the March 22 update)
Turns out that Graysen Blue is a pseudonym for Andrea Smith. It’s not there anymore but the link contains a beautiful screencap of a glowing 5 star review Smith did for the Blue book.
@Kaetrin: Twist: Andrea Smith is Andrew Smith, he of the “ten novels shut up a$$h0les” tweet.
@azteclady: No way!! For reals? Where did you find that out from?
@Kaetrin – yes, Graysen Blue is her pen name which is why this boggled my brain:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1232568362?book_show_action=true&page=4#comment_116516227
No words, really.
I knew that Graysen Blue = Andrea Smith. I haven’t seen anything that says Andrea Smith = Andrew Smith – maybe my Google Fu is bad but I couldn’t find anything.
@Kaetrin: @Kaetrin: Gah!!!
I knew I should have use quotes–it was a poor, poor attempt at a joke
@azteclady: Ah. Sometimes you have to speak slowly to me! LOL
@Kaetrin: Oh it was me, believe me.