Condé Nast Writer Deals Stir Dispute
From The New York Times:
It’s a dream tucked in the backs of many journalists’ minds: the article they write becomes a blockbuster movie and they reap a healthy share of the profits, a walk on the red carpet and — who knows? — maybe even an Oscar.
At Condé Nast magazines like Wired, Vanity Fair and The New Yorker, that wish has become reality for a small but steady number of writers. Condé Nast articles led to the movie “Argo,” which so far has generated $166 million in worldwide box-office sales, “Eat Pray Love,” which made $204 million in global sales and “Brokeback Mountain,” which brought in $178 million.
But now, Condé Nast, whose magazines are battling a punishing business environment, wants to capture more of the film and television profits, which previously went to writers who owned the rights to these works. The new contracts have angered writers and their agents who argue that it’s another cut at their already rapidly shrinking compensation.
“It doesn’t give authors the option or the alternative to go elsewhere for their movie and television rights, and therefore there’s no competition,” said Jan Constantine, general counsel for the Authors Guild who recently advised an agent negotiating one of these contracts.
According to copies of the various contracts provided and described to The New York Times, those exclusive rights ranged from 30 days to one year. The contracts also show that if Condé Nast decides to option the article, writers receive $2,500 to $5,000 for a 12-month option. If an article is developed into a major feature film, writers receive no more than 1 percent or $150,000 toward the purchase price.
. . . .
Many writers for Condé Nast magazines like The New Yorker work under one-year contracts that lack basic employee benefits like a 401(k) retirement plan or health insurance, but they are allowed to keep the rights to their work. (By contrast, newspapers typically own the full rights to articles published by their employees.)
Some agents have warned writers not to sign the contracts because they chip away further at their income. But other writers have signed the agreements because they don’t want to lose the chance to have their byline appear in The New Yorker or Vanity Fair.
Link to the rest at The New York Times and thanks to Keith for the tip.
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Yikes.
Grabbygrabbygrabbygrabby….
Terrible contract, of course, but I have a weirdly positive take on this.
Exploiting the writer, while writers go along with it because they think they have no other viable options, is old news. This is the way things have been done in Publishing for decades.
The difference is: an article was written about it! That is HUGE progress. I think even a few years ago, this type of thing would have been so status quo (as well as hushed up) that it wouldn’t have occured to anyone to write an article, or that there was even a problem.
Also, the fact that some agents are advising against signing it – and some writers are refusing to sign – that is also HUGE progress.
Sometimes, I’m amazed at how fast this is all moving. A couple years from now, this type of contract will be unthinkable. That’s my prediction, anyway.
Mira, not really. An article like that is inside baseball, and the publishing world is full of inside baseball articles, movies, books, etc. Note also that the Times is reporting on their competition, which makes it all the more delicious to people who work for the Times Corporation.
The agents are advising against it because it’s in their best interest to get 15% of the full movie rights instead of the piddling fee Conde Nast is offering.
I am unsurprised to see the rights grabs by newspaper and magazine publishers echoing the rights grabs by book publishers.
This type of contract will live on as long as publishers think they can get writers to sign them. When your income is all from freelance magazine articles, you can’t afford to give up a lucrative market like Vanity Fair and The New Yorker.
The writers will bitch, but they’ll sign.
And as a postscript, this is hardly a new thing in the magazine industry. I worked in and around magazines for much of the 80s and 90s. I can tell you who was the cheapest, who was the worst to work for, who was the best to work for–at least, from back then. Also who was the most fun. (Soap Opera Weekly, hands down.)
And in swoops Amazon to offer subscription-based access to magazine length articles and marginally better contracts for salaried writers…
Kidding. Until it happens.