Vanity anthologies are a popular way for unscrupulous companies to make money on writers’ hunger for publication. By far the most common vanity anthology scheme is the free contest scheme, in which writers are enticed to enter poems or stories in a competition, and then pressured–though usually not required–to buy the anthologies in which their work appears.

An “interminable agency clause” (sometimes called an “interminable rights clause” or a “perpetual agency clause”) is language inserted into an author-agency agreement whereby the agency claims the right to remain the agent of record not just for the duration of any contracts it negotiates, but for the life of copyright.

Last October, I blogged about David Boyer, a self-styled author and publisher who was discovered to be committing extensive plagiarism, publishing stories and books both under his own name and his many aliases.

The question now becomes, “where do we go from here?” The parties were left free to negotiate a new settlement, or continue the original lawsuit.

Throughout the year, book fairs draw crowds of publishers, agents, and industry professionals of all kinds to promote their products, take stock of the competition, and make rights and other business deals.

Once upon a time, a motley crew of knights, hobbits, and assorted elves–all members of the Fellowship of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America–set out to prank a certain publisher of ill repute.

This blog post was inspired by a recently-seen “acceptance letter” from a fee-charging publisher (which doesn’t admit its fees on its website; writers don’t find out about them until they’ve actually submitted).

Robin Price, a fake literary agent and film producer accused of bilking writers out of more than £500,000 over a number of years, admitted in a UK court on Wednesday to six counts of theft.

I often hear from writers who are convinced that they’re being cheated by their self-publishing services because they’ve been vigorously promoting their books, and yet their royalty checks are tiny.