Ryan Bliss over at Digital Blasphemy does some amazing work. (the link is to the free gallery. A membership is totally worth the price.) It’s no surprise then, that his work gets snagged a lot. That doesn’t make it okay, but at least it’s not a surprise.
What does surprise me is the reaction people have when he quite reasonably objects.
“It’s just a picture. Let it go,” is what one person’s comment boils down to. Another basically said, “You should be glad people want to steal your work! Lots of artists can’t get any notice.”
Oh really. So if I just take, oh, $20 out of your wallet because I like the way you add up numbers at your accountant job, that’s okay with you?
I’m not one of the militants. I think DRM sucks, and I believe in the Baen Free Library and loaning books, even e-books, to friends. (Haven’t done it, but I think it’s a good idea.) If, when I find a publisher, they don’t suggest posting at least the first three chapters for free, I plan to suggest it. I think it helps to build a readership.
But you can believe any bit of my work anywhere had better have my name on it. I see that stuff as advertising, and I believe it works, because every book I’ve read on the Baen Free Library (not every book I started, some I didn’t like) I have bought. David Weber has a lot of Honor Harrington books, and I didn’t notice them until he was a bunch of books into the series. Think I would have hunted them down if On Basilisk Station hadn’t kept me glued to my chair for hours on end, reading online till my eyes jiggled?
Advertising. Marketing. Good thing.
Theft. Bad thing. Taking Ryan’s work–and yes, this is his livelihood, the way he pays to put food in the mouths of his family–and posting it here, there, and everywhere because it’s pretty is theft. Not even putting his name on it makes it ten times worse. And then others add insult to injury, telling him to be glad that people are stealing his work?
It goes back to the incredibly stupid idea that artists should not expect to get paid. Well, I’m all for that–as soon as you find me a rich patron who will provide my every want (but they don’t get to tell me what to create.) I will create for free all day long–so long as my every need and at least some of my wants are taken care of.
But then, that sort of looks like getting paid.
I usually assume that the people who say things like this don’t actually have the faintest idea how creativity works. It doesn’t look like a job to them so they don’t understand why we might need just a little compensation for something that, if we’re serious about it, usually takes up a huge chunk of our lives.
They could also just be a bunch of ungrateful jerks, but my way at least we have a chance of educating them. Never attribute to malice, and so on…
As long as the re-education involves smacking them with large smelly fish, I’m up for that.
See, while I understand the idea behind this particular post of yours, I do not feel that I need compensation for my writing. I do think that I – deserve isn’t the right word – I would appreciate readers, fans, etc – which is why I have not yet put any of my work in its entirety online for free. I just don’t know exactly how to direct traffic to my site to satisfy that need, without sinking money into it (which you have to admit, if I don’t want money, would be pretty stupid). That is also why I haven’t gone with vanity publishing either.
I just think it’s kind of silly to take something that should be fun and turn it into work. And I do understand how creativity works.