So I’m following some blog links today and the more I do, the more my mind feels like it’s a captive kindergartner on a non-stop merry-go-round to blogging hell.
It all started when I was told by blogging buds, “Dude thou must go-eth to A Dribble of Ink and partake-eth of the beauty that is the next N.K. Jemisin cover for The Broken Kingdoms.”
I’m all kinds of crazy in love still with the first cover in that series, so I donned my internet liederhosen and away I went to partake-eth. And oh, it was somethin’ purty to behold. I feasted. I ooooed. I ahhhed. I joked that the guy in the background looked like Dr. Manhattan of The Watchmen fame. And I…urrred?
The blogger had been chastised in the comments section by an Orbit re/employee for posting the cover.
Hold up there, pony, le whoa. Lemme straighten my liederhosen.
Said rep claimed the cover was not finished. Now, Aidan didn’t, at that time and still when I began to write this post, say where he got the image (I suspect this is in part what makes him such a kewl kat blogger, his mysterious sources), but another commenter piped up to toot the reveal horn: the parent publisher, Little, Brown and Company, had posted the cover in their catalog (dudes, it even has “resources” in the url). It is an online resource. Clicks if you don’t believe me, that link will lead you to a file you can download via their site.
It has no copywrite info on the cover. Though I know this means nothing, they DO hold a copywrite, hello, they’re the publisher.
It says nowhere on that book’s catalog page that the cover is a work in progress.
The Orbit commenter says the cover still should not have been posted.
I had no idea a publisher would post a cover anywhere that wasn’t final, but I did learn this was not the case when I posted Meljean Brooks’ cover for The Iron Duke. Still…it seems odd a publisher would post covers that are not finished, in any place, be it catalogs – which are available to the public and I thought the beginning of an official promo effort – or a specific site, without at least alluding to its unfinished state somehow. Perhaps there is miscommunication within the ranks?
Or, rather, is it that bloggers just cannot have pretty pictures? I think there is a misconception at times that bloggers are content-hungry hoors who only want the attention a shiny NEW NEW cover will bring their blog. And OK, that may be somewhat true. I love finding a new bunch of covers to share. I am a cover hoor! Is there a 12-step program?
I also happen to just love talking about books, though. That very much includes the covers, as I have an artisitc background. You don’t need an artistic background to love a pretty or especially well-done cover, though. Covers are just great attention-getters and the Blogoshpere seems to love them just as much, too, sparking lots of convo about the books themselves as well. The hoors. The covers – not the Blogosphere!
But now I wonder if I ought to be posting covers. Story Siren happens to have posted on this very subject yesterday (she will be doing a follow-up soon, with questions posed to publishers). Some commenters (I was skimming, it might have only been one commenter saying this) there think posting book covers is internet piracy, which is a pretty big accusation. However, if I’m grabbing a cover to post it and the blurb on my site to spread word and hopefully discuss a book, I guess it’s possible some see me as an internet pirate. At the risk of an Arrrr, or two, I’ll just move on and say that I’m genuinely confused on the matter now and wonder if I’ve been an irresponsible blogger by talking about books via their oh so tempting and lust-inducing covers.
It’s enough to make me want to dispense with my happy-go-lucky internet liederhosen. The things seem a bit dingy now and I wonder what to do. I shall have to ponder this some more, but in the meantime, as usual, feel free to toss your opinions in the hat.
February 21, 2012
January 3, 2012
January 11, 2012
February 28, 2012
April 3, 2012
April 3, 2012
May 8, 2012
March 6, 2012
February 28,2012
Definition of piracy: is the downloading or distribution of unauthorized copies of intellectual property such as movies, television, music, games and software…Hard goods pirates also use the Internet to sell illegally duplicated media through auctions and websites.
How on earth is pimping out a book cover on one’s blog piracy? I understand that image copyrights are a tricky thing, but for the book industry an author/publisher would want as much marketing to a book as possible. Right?
I agree – I dont see this as piracy in fact as far as I am aware as long as you don sell or change the cover in anyway its not even a breach of copywrite. The only thing that is a mistake is the fact they posted this publicly by mistake and covers change all the time.
As long as you are providing commentary on the cover (or the book) it is perfectly within your rights to post the image on your blog. (As long as you’re not hotlinking, anyway.)
The only time when you should even consider taking the image down is if you get a legit letter or full (verifiable) email from the publishing house itself that holds the copyright. Random comment from who knows who claiming he’s who knows what? Ignore it.
If you get said letter or email than you can choose to play nice or play hard. Play nice and take it down and have nice relations with said publisher, or play hard and risk getting a C&D from a lawyer and having your host pull the plug.
I have NEVER heard of this happening with book covers, by the way, this is just what happens with other bloggers providing commentary on copyrighted materials.
Publishers as a rule seem to enjoy the hype about a book no matter what incarnation the cover is in when people throw their panties at it. Hype is hype. The killjoy was probably a troll or else they would have backed up a professional courtesy request with a professionally courteous means of contact and way for your to verify their legitimacy.
As far as I’m concerned, if it’s in the catalog, it’s up for grabs if any blogger wants to point it out/post it.
Re: the not-final cover in the catalog — in the Iron Duke’s case, I think it’s just that the changes are small enough that the “look” of the cover still does the marketing job that its required to do, and is better than putting on a blank “Cover Coming” notice as I’ve seen in some catalogs. Covers do change all the time — sometimes big changes, and some small, but unless it’s completely awful, it’s better to have something up there than nothing at all. Mine says steampunk, and it says romance (because of the mantitty) … and that’s primarily what the buyers need to know at this point.
It’s also possible that the cover *had* been final when it was put into the catalog, and only after feedback did they decide to change it (these changes happen quite often after the booksellers get a look at it). So the catalog would be out there with the former cover and no notice that it wasn’t the final one.
Re: copyrights — while it is true that book covers are copyrighted, and under fair use that means they should only be reproduced at full size with permission (but thumbnail sizes are fine), I’ve never seen any author/publisher take issue with it before, especially when it promotes the book. If someone used the image as part of their blog design, sure — a notice for takedown would make sense. But in a post? Why? It doesn’t hurt for bloggers and everyone else to be reminded that the images *are* copyrighted (as are all of the mantitty, random pics, etc etc that show up on blogs) but in terms of publicity and promo, it’s a million times better for the book if a not-final cover is floating around than to have authors/pubs yelling “copyright” when someone reproduces the image from their catalog.
And final or not — that blogger would be absolutely able to show that image at a thumbnail size, because that falls under fair use. So one option is simply: make a thumbnail, and link to the catalog.
…now I better go actually read that link before lunch is over.
How many early covers have been posted on blogs? And how many times has that caused problems?
Tons of covers, very few problems and only recently, right?
I say keep posting covers. There’s a huge difference between being officially asked to remove a cover and just being whined at by a picky employee who thinks s/he needs to quote rules to you.
I know the authors appreciate the promo.
I would think they would want the positive publicity – obviously you were sharing your excitement. I like posts about covers – it reminds me of upcoming releases and gets me excited about the book all over again.
I’m always happy when anyone shares my book covers and links to my site. (Even happier if they say good things about it!) However, I will add that just because a cover’s in a catalog doesn’t mean it’s final. I once had a lovely two page spread in the S&S catalog. That title and cover got picked up by Amazon, B&N, Borders, BAM, and other sites.
Unfortunately, by the time the book came out, both the title and cover had been changed by the publisher. Yes, the next catalog did have another lovely full page showing the new cover and new title, but the copy neglected to mention there’d been a change. Years later, I still receive mail from readers, booksellers, and librarians looking for that book that doesn’t exist. Sigh.
Very interesting question. Again, why would the publisher have it in an on-line catalog anyone can look at? How is that different from posting the cover on a blog?
Copyright can be a sticky issue, but I think there’s an unwritten rule (or maybe it is written, who knows) that advertising material can be reproduced as long as it’s not altered to sell another product. And I do consider book covers an advertisement for the book.
For the love of the shiny things!
Piracy?????? PIRACY????
My last brain cell just gave up the ghost.
How can it be piracy? Where’s the profit from posting a cover? Hell, it’s not even copyright violation–you are not altering the cover or claiming any rights over it.
Personally, I think that some overzealous employee at Orbit can’t see the forest for the trees: whether the cover changes a bit down the road or not, it’s all free publicity for the novel.
If this is the final cover, it’ll be re-posted as the release date comes closer. If this is not the final cover, once that one becomes available, there’ll be a second post everywhere with the ‘correction’–and a re-post as the release date comes closer.
I don’t know the letter of the law on this stuff. JR Ward’s mods will take down anything that includes cover art in the forums because it’s copyrighted material which I always thought was draconian and annoying, but the forum members there are also prone to photoshop fun and games– if the covers were allowed, it would only be a matter of time before people’s avatars showed up with themselves photoshopped in.
Generally I think bloggers fall under fair use and perhaps some journalistic protections. But I could envision getting hassled if the review was bad or the cover art panned in the article.
Bitsy’s advice above seems smart and rational. If it ever comes up for me, that’s what I’ll do!
The one [obvious] thing I’d add is that you shouldn’t alter the art in any way ( like superimposing text onto it) or imply that the work is your own.
OK, two things I’ll add — if your blog is not a money-making enterprise, you have very little to worry about other than a very unlikely request to take down an image.
Doing blanket reply now till I can answer everyone, but thank you all for commenting.
This isn’t the first time this issue has been raised on the internet, but I found myself very alarmed at the accusation of internet piracy in regards to a publisher catalog (which was an accusation made by a commenter at Story Siren’s post, not the Orbit rep at Aidan’s blog, jsut to be clear), which is indeed released to the public as a resource. Regardless of whether it’s intended for libraries or other businesses, strictly, people like me and other bloggers do see them and if we weren’t meant to use them as a resource, surely something would have been done about it by now.
There are ways to give out materials to the users who they’re actually intended for, FTP sites, internet drop sites, where passwords are the only means of entry. Wouldn’t it make more sense, if bloggers are not supposed to use them, to put the catalogs on a password protected area?
I think it would.
I thought about this a lot last night, to the tune of a very upset stomach, because even though I admit I may not know all the ins and outs of the correct way to do things online, I take it to heart, this issue of piracy in any form.
Perhaps the answer for now is to do some kind of small disclaimer that catalog-sourced covers aren’t always final, and to anticipate some possible changes on them in the future. As many of you have noted, covers change all the time. With the recent whitewashing debate, we know they change even after the book is released to the public.
But the issue is really that bloggers share these images for primarily promo and the like purposes. Some seem to call that internet piracy, others see it as a legit right. I suspect the reactions and opinions wil differ from publisher to publisher as well.
I’m going to continue using cover images. If no one but the publisher is allowed to use them, then what the heck are they creating them for.
I definitely think you should still post covers, finished or not. Feedback from sites like this and Dribble regarding unfinished covers may actually help get terrible designs changed to something much, much more appealing–and that’s never a bad thing.
I don’t think the rep had any place in chastising Dribble for posting the cover at all, whether it was done or not.
In some way, I can understand not wanting an unfinished cover to get out there. In the case of Jemisin’s Broken Kingdoms cover, though, the publisher parent released it. That was where the blame needed to be laid, IMO.
Interesting topic.
I can see where it might cause confusion to post a WIP cover. I imagine that Lauren, who is one designers of the cover on Dribble’s blog, had kittens when she saw a cover she KNEW wasn’t finished — how did he get that?? What the frak’s going on?? So her initial response is understable — and so is her wish that WIPs not be posted (the whole confusion thing again, like what Ms. Ross mentioned).
As for it being piracy — it’s not like you’re claiming it as yours. Most bloggers link back to official sources and/or include the book info (author, isbn, publisher, etc).
I like the idea of waiting for the author to post covers. Then you can visit her site, squee over it with her, grab it, and run. ;-) I looked forward Ilona Andrews releasing both Bayou Moon and Magic Bleeds on her site. I think I would have been disappointed had I’d seen them anywhere else first.
The problem with waiting till the author has posted a cover is by then it’s usually been posted already somewhere else by numerous others. Some bloggers to blog for the cutting ege info they can offer. If I was an author I could see this being the way to go, but I’m a reader talking to other readers for the most part, which authors are as well, true, but it’s a reader blog….don’t know if that makes any sense. Readers seem to like seeing the new covers. If a blogger was always coming across the great new covers, but waiting because A, B and C hadn’t posted it yet….well, that blogger would just always miss out.
The thing with the Orbit rep and whether or not to post WIP covers – Adan’s case aside – how would we know it’s a WIP cover? As with the catalogs, they usually don’t say they’re WIPs, and despite a god bit pf people just seeming to somehow know catalogs feature WIPs sometimes….how is one truly to know if they don’t state that they are such?
“The problem with waiting till the author has posted a cover is by then it’s usually been posted already somewhere else by numerous others. Some bloggers to blog for the cutting ege info they can offer.”
True and that crossed my mind when I wrote the orignal comment. I do look forward to your cover post. The funny thing is, I normally read it when I’m at work (in Google Reader) and I don’t get the cover images. So my first taste is usually just the blurb. :-)
I wonder if it varies from House to House. Using my previous example — Ilona Andrews. Until she posted the covers, I hadn’t see any other site/blog featuring them. Do some hold off releasing covers until they’re final? Is it based on author (established vs. debut)? For example, publishers could hold off posting the next Nora Robert’s cover, until its final, because the booksellers and libraries will snatch her up on name recognition alone; but a debut author would need an attention-grabbing cover and blurb, even a WIP cover, to spark interest.
Out of curiosity, I looked at recommended upcoming releases on Amazon. Most had covers, yet there were a few with late June or earlier dates that did not cover….very confusing. And you’re right — there is no way to know what’s a WIP until some one in the know points it out (like the designer for Orbit). I wonder if that’s why Simon & Schuster uses that little red banner?
I’ve always assumed S&S used their red banner for covers that weren’t done yet, yes. When I see those I figure one is being worked up and will be releases ASAP.
As far as what particular publishing houses do, who knows. I bet it does vary from house to house, and as we see with the case of Orbit and The Broken Kingdoms cover, the parent publisher might not always be talking to the imprints. Things might change even as a cover is released. Covers seem to be a very much up-in-the-air sort of business!
In a huge rush and apologize if I am repeating what other have said, but here; my two cents:
I have actually wondered about his myself. I mean, I don’t own the cover image. Someone else does. But I figure, like you said in the post, that it is such a benefit to the publisher to have the free (if tiny bit of) publicity I provide by posting the cover that no one in their right mind would exercise their rights to the cover send me a take down notice.
As for finished covers, that might be slightly different. I guess l think it is kind of unfair to post a review of an unfinished ms, so why should this be any different? but there are other considerations to consider, like that you aren’t evaluating the cover the way you do the book, and that by waiting for the finished cover you might waken the value of your post both in terms of your blog and the timeliness of the information and in terms of the publicity you provide.
Great topic!
Hey, no apologies, we can’t be expected to keep up with a long list of comments. ;)
The whole situation sounds at the same time to be very complicated and uncomplicated, you know? I just don’t know what the right answer is, but in some cases bloggers seem to fall under the umbrella of media, so I would HOPE this could be the case with cover issues on blogs. But I just do not know.