A question about Sticky Pen
Guys, I've just had a request for an add at MySpace from the online fiction archive Sticky Pen. You'll recall that I had some serious qualms about their contract a while back - namely, that they acquired print rights and audio rights, without compensation. That contract hasn't changed. Some of you are on Sticky Pen's Friends list, so could you say what led you to feel that it was an organization you could support publicly? I don't want to have a knee-jerk reaction, but I don't want to be Friending fiction archives that might take advantage of beginning writers.

Maybe it's just a matter of not having seen their contract yet. The profile page isn't a place where anyone would make a contract obvious.

Oh, and I don't have them friended. Forgot they existed after your last post. My brain has room for only a few thoughts at a time, I guess.

"Maybe it's just a matter of not having seen their contract yet. The profile page isn't a place where anyone would make a contract obvious." Well, I know that some of the folks here have also participated at Sticky Pen, and we had a discussion about the contract terms here, so I thought they might have made their decision *after* being aware of the contract, and that they knew stuff I didn't.

I don't know. When I check out a friends request, I usually look at the profile only. If it looks questionable, I try and dig further, find homepages, but if I don't see anything obviously bad, I'll click yes to a request. Obviously a publisher's contract habits should be checked. Did you read about Simon and Shuster (I know I spelled that wrong), btw? They're fucking over authors with a new clause allowing in perpetuity POD sales, rather than letting the rights revert to an author when regular print sales are no longer doing well.

I hadn't heard of the Simon & Schuster (I think that's the spelling? I'm too lazy to look it up) contract problem, but I'm not surprised. Authors have been having e-rights problems with presses since the 1990s, so it was only a matter of time before POD problems would crop up too.

I write stories strictly for Sticky Pen, and the guys there are some of the best I've ever met. I'd recommend them to anyone, whether they pay or not.

No thoughts on their taking print and audio rights? Because I certainly don't have any objection to lack of payment for online writings. I haven't paid my own e-zine's contributors. :) It's the non-payment for audio and print rights that's much more unusual.

okay, I was going to post my thoughts... but this is easier. Here's what Clarke the owner of Sticky had to say on the subject: http://www.stickypen.com/modules/pbboard/viewtopic.php?t=1095&highlight=rights

Well, they don't use the print and audio rights, anyway. And nope, I don't care either way. My stories are attributed to me, and that's all I care about when it comes to free sites. :)

"Here's what Clarke the owner of Sticky had to say on the subject" Doesn't change my views, I'm afraid. I just don't think that an online fiction archive should automatically take audio and print rights. Now, if they asked individual authors to contribute their stories for free to a podcast or an anthology, that's another matter. But that should be a choice made by the individual author, not a condition for posting.

Well, it doesn't personally bother me because some of the stories I've got up at Sticky are also on my website. They didn't make me take them down. But, it's up to the author as to whether they want to submit stories or not, so it's still in the author's hands.

Not to get into a wrestling match about this, but isn't that the same argument made by presses that try to rip off authors in their contracts? "Well, if you don't want to give us e-rights with no compensation, then you just don't need to submit to us."

I'd agree...if Sticky was trying to make a profit from the stories. But they aren't. :)

And honestly, I get at least 5 hits per day off my forum postings on thier site. That's more than I've gotten from advertising I've paid for. So, at least for me, I consider it one of my "advertising budget" stories... sota like Nifty (where I can't get my story back even if I wanted to... sticky will remove your stories if you ask).