Royalties are probably the biggest part of an author’s publishing agreement. The section can read like a list of jargon-heavy terms that, unless you’ve looked at one of these agreements before, might as well be a foreign language. Generally, the royalty rate paid to an author will be based on the list price. The amount …
What is the author royalty rate in a literary publishing agreement? Read More »
An “advance” in a publishing deal is similar to an advance on future payment in any other context. That is, it is not just a check written to an author in advance of the deal like you might think from the name. It is an advance-on-royalties. Meaning, the amount the author gets in the advance …
What is an advance in a literary publishing agreement? Read More »
Choice of law provisions are common in business agreements. Where one or both parties are in North Carolina, a North Carolina choice of law is common, too. A new law in North Carolina allows for parties to choose North Carolina law and litigation in North Carolina, even when they have no other ties to the …
In the free eBook I recently released on game publishing, I wrote that music is a different animal than most other things because – in part – of the way the copyrights for music work. Here, I wanted to expand on that a bit. If a developer or publisher is looking to release an official …
Odin Law and Media will be among the exhibitors at this year’s NCWN Fall Conference in Wrightsville Beach this weekend. The conference features networking events, educational sessions, master classes, critiquing services and more. It should be a great gathering for North Carolina writers. Brandon J. Huffman will man the Odin Law and Media exhibitor table …
Join Brandon J. Huffman at the NC Writers’ Network Fall Conference Read More »
A “libel reading” is a form of content review where an attorney is reading a book or passage specifically to assess the risk of libel. What is libel? Libel is a published false statement damaging to a person’s reputation. So, the attorney is looking for statements that would, if published without revision, be damaging to a …
When dealing with game publishing, the question should come up: what about future games or expansions, DLC, etc. related to the same game? Does the publisher have any rights to those? Does the publisher get a cut of the revenue? Who pays for their development? What about games not related to the first title? In …
Video Game publisher options on sequels, expansions and future works Read More »
Content review is when an attorney reviews your creation for potential legal issues. Legal content review for an author generally involves a reading of the article, story, book, etc., marking up any sensitive passages or excerpts, then discussing them with the author at length to vet the sourcing and evidence. Content review for film and tv …
Some game-to-movie adaptations are good, some are terrible. What do they all have in common? They all give developers grand ideas about how great a movie their game will make. Most games will never be movies. But they could. There are two main considerations here: (1) is the developer permitted to sell the movie rights …
Getting an agent is hard work. You wrote a great book. You spent hours researching the perfect agent to query. You toiled over every word in that query before sending it off. Then, rejections came pouring in. Or worse, crickets. Stephanie Meyer (of Twilight fame) sent out 15 queries before getting an agent. Some authors send many, …
5 important provisions in literary agent agreements Read More »