8th
Reprinted with permission
Late yesterday morning, I received an unexpected email from Suzanne Schwalb, editor at Pauper Press and the person cited as the author of the recently released Tweet Nothings, the appearance of which so many of us have reacted with dismay and worse during the last two days. I’d written a mildly eviscerating Amazon review earlier that morning, but that wasn’t what she was writing about. Instead, her letter was a nice note of apology for having used one of my tweets in her book. The ensuing exchange revealed to me the cultural divide between old and new media on an unusually personal level.
What follows is our entire correspondence over the course of the last two days - unedited, and reprinted with Ms. Schwalb’s permission. And more than a little of my admiration. Enjoy.
I’m not one of the people whose material was used in the book, so all of my anger has been on behalf of others. But it seems the publisher realizes that they’ve done the wrong thing, and they’re taking steps to make it right. Whether those steps will satisfy the community remains to be seen; I can’t imagine everyone will be satisfied, but it’s valiant of them to try.
I honestly don’t know if there’s a copyright issue here. I’m not sure I want to live in a world where fair use is so weak it doesn’t even protect a book of quotations. But on the other hand, it chafes to see someone make money doing very little beyond assembling the work of others without compensation — especially when many of those others are people I’ve had drinks with.
I think if Tweet Nothings had been a web page instead of a book — even a web page with ads on it — I wouldn’t have minded in the slightest. It’s the sheer capitalistic opportunism of selling a book that crosses the line. For me, anyway. And especially so because it was an outsider doing it. If you want to cross that line, do like Nick and be part of the community. It actually isn’t that hard, and anything less smells like exploitation.
Anyway: read Geoff’s email exchange with the publisher. It’s good.
