Traditionally, once a book's out of print for so long, the author gets his/her rights back. But what's "out of print" these days when publishers can always print on demand? And should this count?
Simon and Schuster, as reported by The New York Times article "Publisher and Authors Parse a Term: Out of Print" (see full article below), has changed their contracts accordingly, much to the dismay of the Authors Guild.
What do you think is fair?When is a book out of print?
A change in standard contract language at Simon & Schuster could effectively alter the answer to that question, and the Authors Guild, a trade group that says it represents about 8,500 published authors, is urging writers and agents to exclude the publisher from book auctions because of it.
Traditionally, if a book falls out of print, authors are contractually allowed to ask their publishers for their rights back so that the author can try to have the book republished somewhere else.
Until recently, that has meant that if a book was not available in at least one format — hardback, trade paperback or mass market paperback being the most common — or if sales fell below a minimum annual threshold, it was deemed out of print.
But with the advent of technologies like print-on-demand, publishers have been able to reduce the number of back copies that they keep in warehouses. Simon & Schuster, which until now has required that a book sell a minimum number of copies through print-on-demand technology to be deemed in print, has removed that lower limit in its new contract.
In effect, that means that as long as a consumer can order a book through a print-on-demand vendor, that book is still deemed in print, no matter how few copies it sells.
The Authors Guild says that is not fair. “If a book is only available in print-on-demand, it certainly means the publisher isn’t doing much to promote the book,” said Paul Aiken, executive director of the Authors Guild. “We’re not against the technology; we’re just against the technology being used to lock up rights.”
Mr. Aiken said that authors often ask to take back the rights of out-of-print books so they can place them with new publishers and give their work new life. He cited the example of Paula Fox, a novelist who had six out-of-print novels when Jonathan Franzen, the author of “The Corrections,” cited her work in an essay in Harpers Magazine. Ms. Fox took back the rights for her novels, resold them to W. W. Norton and revived her career.
Adam Rothberg, a spokesman for Simon & Schuster, said that the publisher was acknowledging advances in technology that made it easier for readers to order books on demand. “We’re anticipating that it’s only going to get better and that this is the best way to make our authors’ books available for consumers on a large-scale basis over the long haul,” Mr. Rothberg said.
The agent David Black said, however, that in reality, if a book is available only through print-on-demand, “an author’s book is going to be available in dribs and drabs.”
He added: “If there is the possibility that I can take this book and place it somewhere else where somebody is going to publish it more aggressively than on a print-on-demand basis, shouldn’t I have the opportunity to do that?”
Mr. Aiken said he was not aware of any other publishers who had made similar changes. Stuart Applebaum, a spokesman for Random House, which owns imprints that include Doubleday and Crown Publishing, said: “Our authors’ opportunity to have the publication rights revert back to them should their books go out of print remains unchanged.”
Jamie Raab, publisher of Grand Central Publishing, said that its contracts allow writers to take back rights if royalties in any format fall below a certain threshold.
Mr. Rothberg said that Simon & Schuster would continue to talk to authors who wanted their rights back, regardless of changes in contract language. “We’ve always been willing to have the discussions with agents and authors if there comes a time when they feel they need to have a book reverted to them and they can make a compelling case to us that it should be so,” he said.
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