This is not meant to be discouraging, but a help, so read the entire article. Writing a book is extremely difficult to do—as opposed to those Politico’s or Hollywood’s who have someone else write their stuff and they sign their name to it. If you think writing the book was hard, once the book is finally written, the work truly begins. Also, you better have some money stuffed somewhere, because no one does anything for free. This was the one thing I never thought of. There is also the element that you also might make an enemy or two along the way. Why would it cost you anything? Consider, there is the cost for getting your book truly copyrighted, WHICH YOU NEED TO DO IMMEDIATELY BEFORE YOU START PASSING IT AROUND. There is also the cost for getting it posted with as many publishers as possible through the Internet. Those who do take cold sends, still want hard copies mailed to them. The upside is—when you begin to search, you will find there are still quite a few out there who will accept cold contacts, so long as you follow their rules. Shipping heavy paper to each one of them costs…. Then there is the Agent, who claims they don’t want any money up front, they are only there for you, until you find they never once read your book, an assistant did. Money? None, EXCEPT, for more shipping to publishers who MIGHT be interested, and the cost of printing X numbers of copies (ouch!), and for the assistant who proof read the work and cast their comments—not for corrections, but to advise if the book is sellable. If (God willing) it does gets printed, there are tons of hidden costs you have to pay to the Agent, that he/she neglected to tell you about. However, I’m ahead of myself. If your book piques a publisher’s interest, there is the cost of traveling to discuss a contract, and of course your Agent will need to go along, therefore YOU will be footing his/her cost for the trip. If you actually read the contract being offered, as I did, and if you, like I did, reject the contract—you have just made a half-dozen enemies—some will be people you never heard of before. Okay, all the while the above is going on, there will be sales people from the Self Publishers contacting you, because they can see the same sites you listed your book on for Traditional publishers to get a glimpse at. I took the time to talk to several of them, and for each one, YOU BETTER HAVE A TON OF MONEY TO SPEND AND LOSE. Do not believe a word one of the salespersons says. You will never see a copy of your book in Borders, or any other book store. They may ship it, but the store will never put it on their stand. Don’t dream of signing dates—it ain’t going to happen. What a bummer—who invited this jerk on our Forum? Ah, it isn’t the end of the world. What I’m trying to say, get the pie-in-the-sky look out of your eyes, this is business if you want to be a professional writer. First, make friends. All kinds of friends. DO NOT GIVE UP YOUR DREAM OF A TRADITIONAL PUBLISHER, and make sure your book is actually copyrighted by the government. Set up a website, put the book in PDF format, and offer it as an eBook, with your own ISBN number (which, of course cost a few hundred more dollars), but it is necessary to be legit. Burn the book on a CD, advertise it, hand out free copies to your friends and neighbors, and get the word out every which way you can. Surprisingly, you will get one order, then later another, then anther, until you are an honest to goodness selling author. I am proof that it does work. Does this harm your chance with a Traditional publisher? On the contrary, their constant complaint is that they are gambling because your book may never sell, and they will lose money. You now have proof that it will and does sell. Honestly, I believe this is the future for a budding author. These are just some of my personal experiences, and you may fly through the process, and become the next John Grisham with the ease of a fly. If so, God bless, but remember the rest who are still struggling after you have become famous.
you'd better study up on copyrights! [ www.copyright.gov ] all work IS 'truly' copyrighted as soon as it's completed and is in a reproducible form... the only thing that's done after that is to register the already existing copyright with the library of congress... which does involve a fee...
Tangible form. Doesn't even have to be reproducible. But yes, the copyright vests in the work automatically, by operation of law. There is no further step required for that. You will generally need to register the copyright before enforcing it, however, and registering it early can have other benefits.
what 'other benefits' do you refer to in re registering 'early'? per the copyright site's info below i don't see any, since all the benefits listed apply no matter when the copyright is registered, with the only exception needing to register before suing someone over infringement or whatever:
Almost all of the costs you mentioned are legitimate business deductions from your taxes. So yes, all that ink and printing manuscripts, even partials, and postage and anything else cost money, but keep your receipts for the end of the year write off. In addition, I take a home office deduction, internet costs, sample copies I purchase. There is a good deal that one (in the US) can deduct as business expenses.
Like it says in the quote, if you register within 5 years, it is considered prima facie evidence in court. Also, if you register within 3 months of publication, or before infringement, you may be able to get statutory damages, attorneys fees, etc., whereas otherwise you may only get actual damages (which can be hard to prove). If you pull up the PDF Circular from the Copyright Office web site, which should be linked from the same page you quoted, you'll get additional information, including the following (under reasons to register): The only thing that isn't quite right about what the Copyright Office says is that they make it sound certain you'll get these damages. You probably will get the statutory damages. Attorney's fees maybe not (the judge has discretion). Without statutory damages you're likely to have no shot at getting an attorney to take the case on a contigency, so you're left with the prospect of financing a lawsuit yourself and the very real possibility that actual damages are far less than what it will cost you to go after them.
i knew all that, but it didn't = 'registering early' to me... i took that to mean you were referring to registering the work before its first publication, which pros don't do... sorry for the confusion...
Ah...I see what you're saying. No, I can't think of any reason to register before the work is published. Sorry for the confusion.
