The NY Times published an interesting article today that details the struggle between classic authors and their respective publishing houses for ebook rights. The article is focused on William Styron, author of great books like Sophie’s Choice and Darkness Visible and his family’s struggle to maintain rights to the digital versions of those books.
It’s not that no one saw ebooks coming. They did. In fact, most titles published after 1994 have the rights for ebooks laid out in full detail. But there were a whole lot of books published before 1994, Styron’s books among them. As much as Styron’s family may want control of those titles for the digital age, the publishers are doing everything they legally can to maintain control. Random House recently sent out letters to authors and literary agents claiming control of the works, arguing that ebooks fall under the same category as books, so the rights extend to digital works.
It gets messier from there. In 2002 a judge in Manhattan ruled in the authors’ favor, but that’s probably not going to stop big publishing. In the mean time Styron’s family, like many others, have turned to third parties with the rights, trying to get things published before publishing houses can get a hold of the work.
Source: New York Times
