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Oct. 8th, 2011 09:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lenora_roseJust came back from an excellent, if slightly overwhelming, Thanksgiving dinner with the extended family. A slightly smaller gathering due to one aunt being in the hospital recovering form surgery (And her immediate family's priorities being with staying with her, as they should be), but all went well, everyone seemed to be getting on. My cousins looked good & healthy and mostly happy. Much enthusiasm and questions about the two expected babies, naturally.
___________________
This week, I discovered that I managed to unknowingly hit what I consider to be a particular hurdle in my writing career, one I was sure I wouldn't encounter until after I've had considerably more published, and especially more of what's been published still available.
I'm on a list of boycotted writers.
No, really.
Just about since I've had a regular presence on the internet, I've been watching different writing groups discuss, expose, and in a few happy cases, help to prosecute, convict, and jail, the perpetrators of any number of scams intended to part naive young writers from their money. This started back when my most regular haunt was the sadly defunct Rumour Mill, a writing community I haven't really seen paralleled since its heyday. This included Dave Kuzminski, of the site Preditors and Editors, which attempts to list both scam companies and legitimate ones in a searchable format, and Victoria Strauss and Ann C. Crispin of Writer Beware, a scam watchdog site. It was here I learned most of the basic markers for a scam, watched the rabid defenders of scam publishers and agents leap to their defense and either be proven sockpuppets - or, if legitimate, naive writers, take back their words once the publisher or agency on which they'd pinned their hopes and their belief in their own writing proved to be just what they'd been warned about - someone who took away their money and either never sold or published their book, or did so in a manner which would sell possibly less than they would have made self-publishing. I learned Yog's Law (Money flows towards the author), and the discussions as to how this works with self-publishing, and how it thoroughly does not when publishing through a vanity press. And after a while, I could make the points about scams versus legit myself, and add my support to these discussions.
I left the Rumour Mill before it actually died out, but ended up in two other places - Absolute Write, a similar web forum, though where the Rumour Mill was focused on speculative fiction, Absolute Write is open to all genres. Some of its most invaluable members are James D. Macdonald, science fiction writer, who runs the "Learn Writing with Uncle Jim" thread -- and the numerous people, including Uncle Jim, who run their own scam watch threads. The longest of these the last time I was there was far and away the thread on PublishAmerica, a vanity press trying desperately to convince writers it's a "traditional" publisher. (I wandered away from this site, too, mostly due to sheer time on the internet)
And Making Light, run by Teresa Nielsen Hayden and Patrick Nielsen Hayden (and later, welcoming Avram Grumer, John M. Ford until his passing, James D. MacDonald again, and Abi Sutherland as posters) -- a general weblog, but, run as it is by people involved in the publishing industry, some of whom have a decided interest in exposing scams, it delves into this same territory, sometimes with razor wit, if Teresa's up for it, and sometimes in extended and gleeful detail, if Jim Macdonald chooses to raise his head. (I've varied between lurking and posting regularly here, depending on my internet time, but I read, including most of the comment threads).
Besides these, I've watched writers right on LJ, most noticeably![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jimhines and marthawells make similar points, or link to further scam discussions.
The Write Agenda claims that it's a site set up by aspiring writers whose purpose is to "watch the watchmen", as it were, and expose the lies and false commentary perpetrated by people like Dave Kuzminski, Victoria Strauss, Ann C. Crispin, James D. Macdonald, and Teresa Nielsen Hayden.
However. They are, as far as I can tell, obsessive, digging for the slightest possible offenses by the above, so that Victoria Strauss using a curse word in a Facebook status is proof of perfidy, Jim Macdonald mentioning a too-common trope in horror and action films where a heroine ends up in her underwear is Jim being some kind of an inappropriate sexist pig you wouldn't want near your daughters. And so on. Their page of quotes from P.N. Elrod seems like it's almost entirely made of Facebook and twitter remarks about PublishAmerica, most of which seem to me to be far from as nasty as one could get about that particular cesspit.
Here are a few points:
- I've never seen so much allegation, out-of-context quotation, rampant speculation, and distortion used to try and defame someone in one place. Not a pretty site.
- Cussing on Facebook is far from any kind of evidence of unprofessional behaviour. Facebook is not professional.
- I don't approve of boycotting writers -- though I will argue for an individual's right to choose their own reading material, I don't agree with trying to push one's views on other writers or readers by any means more forceful than a good or bad review. I approve even less of boycotting books based on something a writer does OUTSIDE the writing. (I have books by Orson Scott Card, and a collection of short fiction by Harlan Ellison. Card is a radical rightwing homophobic nutbar. And Ellison? I've had my say.)
- I REALLY don't approve of going about and posting one-star reviews of books you do not appear to have read, especially when the reason is that they're on your boycott list. Post one-star reviews because you hated the book. Sure. Go for it. Even of my favourite books. Even of my books, should such exist. DO IT FOR NO OTHER REASON.
- THIS? Is a whole new layer of madness.
So. Malice and insanity and obsessive fixation on a handful of individuals. Not an agenda I would follow. Where the people they're attacking are people I respect; published authors, people with a name in legitimate publishing, and/or strong and tireless advocates for a cause.
Boycott away. I think I'm in better company.
ETA: Just checked my links again. They cut their boycott list down to the bare minimums -- probably in reaction to the recent surge in traffic and commentary in any number of places on people WANTING to be on said list, or at least, like me, not unpleased by their company. Which means I'm off it. Alas, I don't know if anyone has a screenshot of the original.
_________________
On a related note:
My first three story sales are as follows:
- a short original fairy tale, purchased by Jackhammer Zine, a small paying online press that closed. In its day it had a good reputation for its size, and I generally liked to read its issues. Currently, I chose to put the story on my web site, since I had no intention of attempting a re-sale. One of very very few things I wouldn't rather wipe out if I ever get to updating the thing. The Ghost of Him
- A novella-length fairy tale (Loosely based on the Seven Ravens, which is a variant on the Six Swans/Wild Swans with a different means to cure the curse.) This won first place in a contest run by an e-zine I also believe is long defunct. (In the interests of honesty, the e-zine itself struck me as publishing mediocre stories, but again, it was paying. And I felt the contest winners -- that is, the second, third and runners-up -- were good enough to make me feel proud of the effort).
- A high fantasy novella mostly released as an e-book in .pdf format, or on a mini-disk as same. This made very little money as it was on a pay-per-copy-sold format, and less than a year later the publisher closed. (Again. This was the same editor as Jackhammer. Again, she seemed to garner a good reputation in counter to her low payments, and I bought at least three other novellas from them.) Essentially out of print, though I have four of the mini-disks I'd be willing to sell even now - though before I speak too soon, I need to check them, as one person did have a problem getting her computer to read her copy.
Now, the fate of the first is pretty decided.
The other, two, now. They're an awkward length at the best of times, and of course, before they were published where they were, I exhausted the few then-extant bigger publishers willing to touch that length. There may be one or two new ones out there I don't know about, but 20-25K is not a friendly length to try and sell separately. And I really don't know how much it's worth my time to try and re-sell old work of an awkward length when I'm not making near enough effort to sell short works of more manageable lengths.
OTOH, I like both of them in their basic form, though I'd be inclined to do some sentence-level edits.
Well. Except I could do the self-publishing thing. E-book formats have made this far easier and potentially more lucrative. Their having been accepted for publication does mean someone other than me thought they were cool. Having two of them show up at places like the Kindle store plus at least one current-enough-to-be-visible actual publication credit might help boost them slightly.
But is it worthwhile? I don't know, these days. I know for the novels, I'm going to exhaust my chances to publish before I self-publish. But these two are in a funny place.
Anyhow. Time to stop thinking and sleep.
___________________
This week, I discovered that I managed to unknowingly hit what I consider to be a particular hurdle in my writing career, one I was sure I wouldn't encounter until after I've had considerably more published, and especially more of what's been published still available.
I'm on a list of boycotted writers.
No, really.
Just about since I've had a regular presence on the internet, I've been watching different writing groups discuss, expose, and in a few happy cases, help to prosecute, convict, and jail, the perpetrators of any number of scams intended to part naive young writers from their money. This started back when my most regular haunt was the sadly defunct Rumour Mill, a writing community I haven't really seen paralleled since its heyday. This included Dave Kuzminski, of the site Preditors and Editors, which attempts to list both scam companies and legitimate ones in a searchable format, and Victoria Strauss and Ann C. Crispin of Writer Beware, a scam watchdog site. It was here I learned most of the basic markers for a scam, watched the rabid defenders of scam publishers and agents leap to their defense and either be proven sockpuppets - or, if legitimate, naive writers, take back their words once the publisher or agency on which they'd pinned their hopes and their belief in their own writing proved to be just what they'd been warned about - someone who took away their money and either never sold or published their book, or did so in a manner which would sell possibly less than they would have made self-publishing. I learned Yog's Law (Money flows towards the author), and the discussions as to how this works with self-publishing, and how it thoroughly does not when publishing through a vanity press. And after a while, I could make the points about scams versus legit myself, and add my support to these discussions.
I left the Rumour Mill before it actually died out, but ended up in two other places - Absolute Write, a similar web forum, though where the Rumour Mill was focused on speculative fiction, Absolute Write is open to all genres. Some of its most invaluable members are James D. Macdonald, science fiction writer, who runs the "Learn Writing with Uncle Jim" thread -- and the numerous people, including Uncle Jim, who run their own scam watch threads. The longest of these the last time I was there was far and away the thread on PublishAmerica, a vanity press trying desperately to convince writers it's a "traditional" publisher. (I wandered away from this site, too, mostly due to sheer time on the internet)
And Making Light, run by Teresa Nielsen Hayden and Patrick Nielsen Hayden (and later, welcoming Avram Grumer, John M. Ford until his passing, James D. MacDonald again, and Abi Sutherland as posters) -- a general weblog, but, run as it is by people involved in the publishing industry, some of whom have a decided interest in exposing scams, it delves into this same territory, sometimes with razor wit, if Teresa's up for it, and sometimes in extended and gleeful detail, if Jim Macdonald chooses to raise his head. (I've varied between lurking and posting regularly here, depending on my internet time, but I read, including most of the comment threads).
Besides these, I've watched writers right on LJ, most noticeably
jimhines and marthawells make similar points, or link to further scam discussions.The Write Agenda claims that it's a site set up by aspiring writers whose purpose is to "watch the watchmen", as it were, and expose the lies and false commentary perpetrated by people like Dave Kuzminski, Victoria Strauss, Ann C. Crispin, James D. Macdonald, and Teresa Nielsen Hayden.
However. They are, as far as I can tell, obsessive, digging for the slightest possible offenses by the above, so that Victoria Strauss using a curse word in a Facebook status is proof of perfidy, Jim Macdonald mentioning a too-common trope in horror and action films where a heroine ends up in her underwear is Jim being some kind of an inappropriate sexist pig you wouldn't want near your daughters. And so on. Their page of quotes from P.N. Elrod seems like it's almost entirely made of Facebook and twitter remarks about PublishAmerica, most of which seem to me to be far from as nasty as one could get about that particular cesspit.
Here are a few points:
- I've never seen so much allegation, out-of-context quotation, rampant speculation, and distortion used to try and defame someone in one place. Not a pretty site.
- Cussing on Facebook is far from any kind of evidence of unprofessional behaviour. Facebook is not professional.
- I don't approve of boycotting writers -- though I will argue for an individual's right to choose their own reading material, I don't agree with trying to push one's views on other writers or readers by any means more forceful than a good or bad review. I approve even less of boycotting books based on something a writer does OUTSIDE the writing. (I have books by Orson Scott Card, and a collection of short fiction by Harlan Ellison. Card is a radical rightwing homophobic nutbar. And Ellison? I've had my say.)
- I REALLY don't approve of going about and posting one-star reviews of books you do not appear to have read, especially when the reason is that they're on your boycott list. Post one-star reviews because you hated the book. Sure. Go for it. Even of my favourite books. Even of my books, should such exist. DO IT FOR NO OTHER REASON.
- THIS? Is a whole new layer of madness.
So. Malice and insanity and obsessive fixation on a handful of individuals. Not an agenda I would follow. Where the people they're attacking are people I respect; published authors, people with a name in legitimate publishing, and/or strong and tireless advocates for a cause.
Boycott away. I think I'm in better company.
ETA: Just checked my links again. They cut their boycott list down to the bare minimums -- probably in reaction to the recent surge in traffic and commentary in any number of places on people WANTING to be on said list, or at least, like me, not unpleased by their company. Which means I'm off it. Alas, I don't know if anyone has a screenshot of the original.
_________________
On a related note:
My first three story sales are as follows:
- a short original fairy tale, purchased by Jackhammer Zine, a small paying online press that closed. In its day it had a good reputation for its size, and I generally liked to read its issues. Currently, I chose to put the story on my web site, since I had no intention of attempting a re-sale. One of very very few things I wouldn't rather wipe out if I ever get to updating the thing. The Ghost of Him
- A novella-length fairy tale (Loosely based on the Seven Ravens, which is a variant on the Six Swans/Wild Swans with a different means to cure the curse.) This won first place in a contest run by an e-zine I also believe is long defunct. (In the interests of honesty, the e-zine itself struck me as publishing mediocre stories, but again, it was paying. And I felt the contest winners -- that is, the second, third and runners-up -- were good enough to make me feel proud of the effort).
- A high fantasy novella mostly released as an e-book in .pdf format, or on a mini-disk as same. This made very little money as it was on a pay-per-copy-sold format, and less than a year later the publisher closed. (Again. This was the same editor as Jackhammer. Again, she seemed to garner a good reputation in counter to her low payments, and I bought at least three other novellas from them.) Essentially out of print, though I have four of the mini-disks I'd be willing to sell even now - though before I speak too soon, I need to check them, as one person did have a problem getting her computer to read her copy.
Now, the fate of the first is pretty decided.
The other, two, now. They're an awkward length at the best of times, and of course, before they were published where they were, I exhausted the few then-extant bigger publishers willing to touch that length. There may be one or two new ones out there I don't know about, but 20-25K is not a friendly length to try and sell separately. And I really don't know how much it's worth my time to try and re-sell old work of an awkward length when I'm not making near enough effort to sell short works of more manageable lengths.
OTOH, I like both of them in their basic form, though I'd be inclined to do some sentence-level edits.
Well. Except I could do the self-publishing thing. E-book formats have made this far easier and potentially more lucrative. Their having been accepted for publication does mean someone other than me thought they were cool. Having two of them show up at places like the Kindle store plus at least one current-enough-to-be-visible actual publication credit might help boost them slightly.
But is it worthwhile? I don't know, these days. I know for the novels, I'm going to exhaust my chances to publish before I self-publish. But these two are in a funny place.
Anyhow. Time to stop thinking and sleep.
