Current mood:	OMGWTF
Entry tags:	fandom failures, fandom: star wars, fanfic, self-publishing

Whoa. I didn't know anyone had balls like this!
EDIT: I didn't realize there was another wank about this topic until after I'd hit the submit button and this went into the fandom_wank queue. By then I couldn't delete it because it was in the approval queue. Sorry everyone!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1933456027/qid=1123612981/sr=2-/103-6073320-0586259

Someone decided she didn't like how George Lucas wrote the first Star Wars movie, so she decided to rewrite "Star Wars: A New Hope" (and according to the reviews, did so very poorly) and decided to sell it on Amazon!

The reviews are quite the panoply... ranging from "OMG PLAGIARIZM!!1!" to "HAY WTF?! COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT!" to "Not only is this illegal, it's SHITTY!" I'm even more amused by the lack of grammar and spelling of the reviewers than I am at the thought of this bitch Lori Jareo getting her ass handed to her by Lucas's attorneys (hey, maybe she's got herself one of them intarweb lawyers!)

I want to know why Amazon is allowing this in the first place! I mean, one bloody glance at the entry page on Amazon was all I needed to know exactly what this is -- without even reading a single actual paragraph of the "book"!

This isn't just plagiarism -- it's bloody copyright infringement on arguably the largest fiction franchise out there! (Star Wars ranks right up there with Lord of the Rings, but I don't know if it's bigger than LOTR, just cuz LOTR has some twenty or thirty years on Star Wars).

Well, methinks George Lucas is gonna hafta SMACK A BITCH soon. Holy shit.... exploding splooge!

*sits back to watch the wank unfold*

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(Anonymous)
2006-04-24 04:56 am UTC (link)

a) Check with Agent With Style if you don't believe that none of the authors see a red cent. We don't. End of story. Stop claiming that I'm making money when you haven't done a damn bit of homework or investigation into the matter. Find out more about zines before you talk about whether the authors are making money from them.

b) Yes, I think they're incredibly expensive. I think most people would agree. I also think most people going to that site would be smarter to Google the works there that interest them and find free, online sources for the same fics. As far as I'm concerned it's just another place for my work to be listed, like ff.net, where I don't post anymore but have a link from my author page to the places where I really do post. It's for reference; in fact, I've been contacted by more than one reader who said they thought the prices were high so they found the free files through a search engine, so the site IS bringing me readers, even if it isn't making AWS a lot of money. It's definitely making me NO MONEY AT ALL AND NEVER WILL.

c) If folks really want to pay that much money for the fics--I did not get any information about the list prices before the info went up on the website--that's their lookout, for not finding better and far cheaper ways to acquire the fics available for sale there. It's not my job to hold everyone's hand and tell them that they're throwing their money away on overpriced stuff. As far I know that isn't ANYONE'S job. If someone doesn't have common sense there's not much I can do about it.

d) To my knowledge, the overhead for AWS includes the website and venders' fees for cons (where they sell zines in the venders' rooms) in addition to the printing materials, the printing itself, and shipping/postage. If you have any questions for them about why the prices for the zines seems so high I suggest you contact them. My involvement ended with telling them which versions of the files had the fewest errors in them, which one of their copyeditors took the time to fix (so they may have had to pay that copyeditor for his/her time).

e) When I say I'm telling the truth, I'm telling the truth. I'm signing my name to every one of these posts (I don't have a JF account). Wouldn't it be nice if you did the same?

--Barb

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	estrella 2006-04-24 10:44 am UTC (link)
	Well, at best one would say publishers are making profit if it is not you. Still, you are letting them illegally profit with your name, so I think it wouldn't look right from a legal POV. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	(Anonymous) 2006-04-24 12:11 pm UTC (link)
	Again--it is not illegal and has been done for 30+ years. Look it up and stop pretending that you know what you are talking about when you don't. --Barb (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

musouka
2006-04-24 05:23 pm UTC (link)

Again--it is not illegal and has been done for 30+ years.

You ARE kidding right? Please tell me you are joking.

Of course it's illegal. Copyright violation is always illegal. Take a good look at that site. Did you know they have illegal copies of an author's work without her permission? (Not fan author, a published author) And they're charging 20+ bucks for them? And you think that's a site you want to get involved with? You think that's legal?

I think you're the one that needs to do some research instead of telling other people.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	(Anonymous) 2006-04-24 05:47 pm UTC (link)
	Did you know they have illegal copies of an author's work without her permission? (Not fan author, a published author) And they're charging 20+ bucks for them? O.o Which one is that? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

musouka
2006-04-24 06:06 pm UTC (link)

They have illegal copies of "From Eroica With Love" on that site. Yeah, twenty years ago when the fandom at large was unlikely to be able to read a complicated Japanese series and no manga company was going to bring over a gay themed espionage spoof, I can kinda understand. But that's still very very illegal.

Someone could have just done summaries or scripts without copying the artwork. And to still have them up for 20 bucks a pop when the series HAS been licensed for distribution here is just wrong, wrong, WRONG.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	phosfate 2006-04-24 08:01 pm UTC (link)
	Perhaps someone should let CMX (the American rights holder for Eroica) know about this. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	musouka 2006-04-24 08:16 pm UTC (link)
	But don't you understand?! Zines are legal! My hands are tied! Ohhhhhh, if only I had done my homework... No, seriously, I'd be the first one to fire off an email to CMX, if they weren't all but impossible to communicate with. No address where they can be reached on their site or anything... (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	phosfate 2006-04-24 08:24 pm UTC (link)
	Here you go: http://www.dccomics.com/about/?action=contact (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	musouka 2006-04-24 08:31 pm UTC (link)
	CMX is under Wildstormt. DC doesn't take letters for Wildstorm. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	phosfate 2006-04-24 08:35 pm UTC (link)
	Every 'contact us' link on the site, whether for DC, Wildstorm, CMX, or Vertigo, goes to that same page. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	musouka 2006-04-24 08:43 pm UTC (link)
	Yes, but on that page it says they aren't taking letters for Wildstorm, Vertigo, or MAD. I'm really not talking through my ass or making excuses here. There was a huge blow up involving Tenjo Tenge a while back, and people were trying to get in contact with CMX. It was like pulling teeth from a chicken. I guess I'll just write to DC and see if that helps... (Reply to this)(Parent)

	phosfate 2006-04-24 08:00 pm UTC (link)
	I would suggest that, at the very least, you need a different agent. (Reply to this)(Parent)

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