The Recommendations of the SFWA Copyright Exploratory Committee

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November 1, 2007

Greg Bear
Jim C. Hines
Elizabeth Moon
Cat Rambo
John Scalzi
Charlie Stross
Jane Yolen

Contents:

• I. Introduction
• II. A Note on Recommendations
• III. Committee Recommendations
• IV. Concluding Notes
• Appendix A. Questionnaire Results
• Appendix B. Committee Workflow

I. Introduction

In September of 2007, the Executive Board of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) empanelled this exploratory committee to "investigate the views of the membership on issues of copyright, authors rights, what role the membership would like to see SFWA take on these matters and what level of risk (legal, public relations or otherwise) is acceptable to the membership in regards to that role, and what - if any - public policy statement SFWA might issue on these subjects on behalf of its membership."

Pursuant to this, the members of the committee engaged a two-pronged exploratory approach. The first prong involved extensive and wide-ranging discussion among the committee members on the issues facing SFWA, regarding copyright and how the organization could and should assist its members on the subject. In our own internal discussions, the committee focused on several issues, most particularly models for systematizing the process by which SFWA engages with member copyrights; the practical issues of SFWA acting on member copyright concerns; education on copyrights, both regarding members of SFWA and the general public; and if, when and how SFWA should coordinate with outside entities, including publishers and other writers' groups, on copyright issues.

These discussions ran parallel to a discussion of how best to investigate the views of the membership on the issues requested in the timeframe provided. We decided the best way to do this was to distribute a questionnaire to the membership, the questions of which were informed by the committee members' own discussions of the issues. All the members of the committee had input on the questions and signed off on the questions. This questionnaire and the responses therein were the second prong of our exploratory approach.

The questionnaire in itself consisted of two parts: four "yes/no" questions, one question offering two separate action paths, and space for each responding member to offer in-depth comments. The combination of questionnaire answers and comments worked very much as we wished it to; the questions gave us a broad indication of member sentiment, while the comments acted as "fine tuning," allowing us to drill down on specific member concerns, desires and complaints. The questionnaire garnered more than 400 responses; the breakdown of the questionnaire responses may be seen in appendix A.

In tallying up the responses and reading the comments, we discovered a number of things. Primary among them: SFWA members overwhelmingly want SFWA to have a role in helping them with issues of copyright. SFWA members equally overwhelmingly want the organization to support copyright in the public sphere with educational materials.

Aided by both our internal discussions and guidance from SFWA members, the committee has now crafted a series of recommendations for the SFWA board to consider as it moves forward on copyright and rights management issues.

II. A Note on Recommendations

The recommendations we offer here are ones that every committee member has discussed and agreed to. The board therefore may consider these recommendations as unanimous, and being recognized by the members as constituting the heart of our mission.

III. Committee Recommendations

1. The exploratory committee has unanimously recognized that all writers have the right to control how their works are distributed, within the legal boundaries of copyright law.  This includes the full spectrum of distribution, including enforcing copyright, using systems such as Creative Commons licenses, or immediately releasing all work without restraints. We recommend that SFWA support individual members in whatever distribution model that member chooses for his or her work, and publicize such support, both inside and outside of SFWA, including on the public portions of the SFWA Web site.

2. When SFWA members need help with issues regarding copyright and the management of their rights, including the protection of their work, they should be able to get advice and/or active help from a SFWA committee actively focused on those subjects. We recommend SFWA create such a committee.

3. This committee's work will be both publicly visible and concerned with legal issues that may directly and materially reflect on SFWA. With these in mind, we recommend the following:

We have modeled out one possibility for how this committee might assist a member with infringement concerns. Please see appendix B for this example.

4. We recommend that this new committee not use the word "piracy" or "electronic" or variations thereof in its titles. Among the names we suggest for this committee are "Copyright Committee" and "Rights Management Committee."

5. SFWA's members have a wide range of opinions as to how SFWA should assist them, if at all, in the management of their rights, and in the event of the infringement of their copyrights. In order for SFWA to best act in the interest of its members, we recommend the creation of opt-in lists that will allow members to directly specify the level of involvement they wish SFWA to have in their management of rights. Specifically, we recommend a system of four lists:

Every member should affirmatively choose to be on one of the four lists. Members should be able to move from one list to any other list at any time. If a member does not select a list, he or she should be considered by default to be on List A: No assistance from SFWA.

6. SFWA should be at the ready to assist its members with issues of rights management and copyright infringement. That said, members must understand that SFWA currently labors under constraints, both financial and in regard to volunteer manpower, and will continue to do so in the foreseeable future. Because of this simple and unavoidable fact, SFWA members themselves can and should be prepared to be the front line actors in defense of their own copyrights and rights management. We recommend SFWA create and publicize among its members an information and education site on copyright and infringement, to include "do-it-yourself" information enabling members to act independently to handle copyright concerns. The site should also include information for members on Creative Commons, online distribution and other topics of interest in the area of rights management.

7. SFWA's initiatives to assist members in copyright and rights management will work better if its members also assist SFWA. We recommend SFWA create and publicize an information site or database where members can share information on copyright infringement/abuse they have seen online and offline, with space for information on specific titles they have seen, with an eye toward maintaining a list of sites and/or persons which or who repeatedly infringe copyrights. This information should also be shared in existing SFWA publications.

8. We believe that a public that understands copyright is a public that will be more sympathetic to authors' right to distribute work as they choose. We recommend that SFWA create and publicize an online site with friendly, engaging material on copyright and the business models of authors and writers. This site should include links to author-approved online work and/or act itself as a depository for work for SFWA members who choose to display and distribute work online. This work will act as enticement for readers to visit, and to underscore SFWA's commitment to supporting its members' right to say how their work is distributed, whatever form that may take.

9. SFWA is not the only organization or entity with a stake in assisting writers in the task of controlling the distribution of their work. We recommend that SFWA engage in outreach to other writers' groups and with publishers, in order to co-ordinate efforts in assisting our members, to investigate the feasibility of sharing information to common advantage, and to explore the possibility of developing an outside, independent agency to inform and assist these organizations and their members in issues of copyright and rights management.

10. Issues of copyright, and of rights management, are fluid and evolving, as are the opinions of SFWA's members on what are the right actions for the organization to perform in assisting its members. We recommend that on a regular basis, SFWA poll its members on copyright and rights management concerns and use this information to fine-tune SFWA's outlook and policies on these subjects.

IV. Concluding Notes

The chairman of the committee would like to thank the members of the committee for their work and their wisdom. The members of the committee constituted a cross-section of SFWA members across a number of axes; each member came to work with a seriousness of purpose, a generosity of spirit, a willingness to listen and the desire to do good work for the benefit of SFWA and its members. They deserve the gratitude of the board and of SFWA in general.

The committee as a whole would like to recognize the invaluable assistance of Megan Lindholm, who as an observer of the committee and non-voting member in our discussions offered substantial insight and clarity of thought. Her participation was quite useful, always gracious and very much appreciated.