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From: ccrrick@ucdavis.UUCP (Rick Heli)
Newsgroups: net.startrek
Subject: Re: Authors' rights vis a vis Star Trek novels
Message-ID: <436@ucdavis.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 13-Aug-85 02:38:46 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucdavis.436
Posted: Tue Aug 13 02:38:46 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 17-Aug-85 06:08:49 EDT
References: <3426@decwrl.UUCP>
Organization: University of California, Davis
Lines: 89

> [I showed the following quoted message to PDDB, who's contributed a few
> items to net.startrek. Unfortunately, she no longer has access to the
> newsgroup, and I'm typing in her response for her. Unfortunately, I've
> been short of time since she gave me her response, so this is a tad late.
> Better late than never, though. All typos, if any, are mine. I should
> perhaps mention now that PDDB is Pamela Dean Dyer-Bennet, who as Pamela
> Dean wrote THE SECRET COUNTRY. My comments on the article follow hers.]
> 
> > From:	ucdavis!ccrrick	(rick heli)
>  
> > I have been told by a fairly knowledgable source that anyone who
> > writes Star Trek novels has basically sold out and probably can't
> > sell non-Star Trek material.  Apparently Paramount holds all the
> > rights to Star Trek stories and pretty much has such writers at
> > their mercy.
> 
> 	How does this follow?  Yes, John M. Ford has remarked to me
> that the Paramount contract for writers of Star Trek novels is
> horrifying and makes any normal publisher's contract look kind,
> gentle, and uncomplicated. Yes, Paramount holds all the rights to
> Star Trek stories. But what has this to do with non-Trek
> material?  I am a very newly-published writer who's writing a Star
> Trek novel; not at their invitation, just because I want to. My
> agent would certainly warn me if writing a Star Trek novel meant I
> could not sell other material; she has not.
> 
> 	Besides, vonda McIntyre and Diane Duane have published
> non-Trek material after having published Star Trek novels.  A.C.
> Crispin wrote some "V" novels after publishing a Star Trek novel.
> furthermore, given my agents account of what sort of advances and
> royalties Pocket gives for Star Trek novels, a writer would be mad
> to restrict himself to writing only in that field.  They would not
> be able to get some of the real and talented writers they have in
> fact published if such restrictions applied.
> 
> PDDB/jmb
> 
> ************************************************************************
> 
> The trouble with the whole concept put forth by the "fairly knowledgable
> source" is that it doesn't hold up to logic. First fo all, as Pamela
> pointed out, some rather prominent authors --- John Ford, Diane Duane,
> and Vonda McIntyre, plus Greg Bear, Barbara Hambly, Lawrence Yep, et al.
> --- have all written Star Trek novels. None of them are in such dire
> financial straits that they need to sell a Star Trek novel under such
> ridiculous restrictions in order to feed themselves. Thus, to voluntarily
> place themselves at the mercy of Paramount by writing a Star Trek novel
> would be the stupidest thing they could possibly do.
> 	As far as A.C. Crispin goes, it was the sales on her Trek novel
> that got her the contracts for the V novels. And she has gone on to
> bigger and better things, such as collaborating with Andre Norton on
> GRYPHON'S AERIE.
> 
> The whole notion of Paramount having a Trek author at their mercy is
> patently ridiculous anyway. It would be tantamount to their owning you
> body and soul, which is not legal in this country. Their contracts
> *cannot* restrict your activities in other areas.
> 	Now, what *is* not uncommon for a new-author contract is that
> for a period of n years or n books, the publisher may place a clause
> in the contract by which the new author cannot sell a book elsewhere
> unless the particular publisher in question has a chance to buy it
> first (this is generally known as "first refusal rights"). There can
> be exceptions to this clause. PDDB, for instance, is under such a
> restriction from Ace/Berkley (I believe --- unfortunately, she has
> moved back to Minnesota, so I can't check with her right now), but
> since Ace/Berkley does not have the license to publish Star Trek books,
> Pamela is free to market such a book to a publisher that *does* have
> such a license.
> 	I suggest that you tell your "knowledgable source" that he
> doesn't know what he's talking about.
> 
> 
> --- jayembee (Jerry Boyajian, DEC, Acton-Nagog, MA)
> 
> UUCP:	{decvax|ihnp4|allegra|ucbvax|...}!decwrl!dec-rhea!dec-akov68!boyajian
> ARPA:	boyajian%akov68.DEC@DECWRL.ARPA

You misconstrue the issue.  It is not that Paramount would seek to
prevent writers from writing non-Star Trek related materials, only
that their restrictions are so bad that no writer would want to
write for them.  So who does?  Simply those who can't write anywhere
else...  in general, anyway...  if not in every particular...

And, PUHleeze, don't hold up Vonda McIntyre as an example of good
SF writing...  or even good Star Trek writing...  not to me at any
rate...
-- 
					--rick heli
					(... ucbvax!ucdavis!groucho!ccrrick)