Text 75, 207 rader
Skriven 2005-10-22 16:20:26 av Kay Shapero (1:102/524.0)
Ärende: [4 of 4] JMS posts to moderated b5 newsgroup
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creative accounting), so I get zero off the sales of the DVDs as a
producer.
As a small potted plant, I get even less.
So to answer your question...no, I get nothing off the DVDs. At all.
Even if I were, to engage someone's services to perform a job of work
for you is what it is, and you're doing a different job. You don't say
to a carpenter, "Listen, I paid you to make this chair for me, and now
I want you to make a cabinet for me, for free, since I paid you for the
chair."
But in any event...it's a moot point. I've never received a dime off
the DVDs and likely never will.
jms
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Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2005 07:00:59 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Re: JMS: Re: Babylon 5 Universe Novels?
From: jmsatb5@aol.com
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Jan wrote:
> More recently, over at B5TV.com, a Tony Lee posted that he's going to be
doing
> the first of the novels and that (unnamed) DC had prevented the previously
> announced comics so his novel would be based on one of proposed comic
outlines.
> The thread he posted to is here
> http://www.b5tv.com/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/303831/page/0/fpart/8/vc/1
>
> JMS, if you're reading, any chance you could comment?
>
Mongoose asked me to consult with them, since they are doing just a
couple of books and as I understand it ONLY for release in the
UK...asked if I could help come up with some stories for them, or
provide material from myh notes, proofread the manuscripts, make
corrections, maybe write an intro, and do lots of other stuff...and I
said okay, great, what are you going to pay for my work?
At first, silence. As if they were stunned that I would actually ask
to be paid for my time and work. Then finally, they came back
with...five hundred bucks per book.
To which I responded, "You have GOT to be kidding me."
I have, subsequently, washed my hands of the Mongoose books. I haven't
seen anything, don't know what they're doing, so sure as hell it ain't
canonical.
This is getting annoyingly commonplace. I got an email from the Warner
Bros. division handling the German DVD superbox, for instance, wherein
they said, very happily, that they were figuring on getting maybe six
to ten million bucks for this new edition, and would I help them to
make sure everything was right, to consult with them on the design, the
packaging, the text, the artwork, the docs, a bunch of stuff. So I
said, again not unreasonably, "And what is WB's standard fee for this
consultation?"
To which WB responded that they don't pay people for the honor to be
involved in these DVDs. But he's getting paid, the guy who did the
artwork is getting paid, the only person who's not getting paid is the
guy who made it. So I declined. They replied with ominous words
suggesting that it would be bad if I let the fans down...but I don't
bow down for emotional blackmail.
Writing is a job no less than being a carpenter. All a writer has, at
the end of the day, is time, energy and visceral material. And right
now, there's an awful lot going on career wise, and my free time is at
a premium. You pay for someone's time if you have them consult, or
write, or research for you, or if you otherwise engage their
professional services. That is pro forma for every profession on the
planet...except, it seems, for writing, where they think you're so glad
to be asked to the ball that you'll go along with being treated
unprofessionally.
Pass.
jms
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Date: Tue, 18 Oct 2005 08:37:41 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Re: A Little Private Funding?
From: jmsatb5@aol.com
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
jmsatb5@aol.com wrote:
> via the babylon5scripts@aol.com paypal account,
I'm an idiot. The paypal account was babylon5auctions@aol.com. I
don't want anyone confusing that with the babylon5scripts.com site
(which I did as I typed this).
jms
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Date: Tue, 18 Oct 2005 08:36:00 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Re: ATTN JMS: What happened to the Quote Book??
From: jmsatb5@aol.com
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Wendy of NJ wrote:
>
> So Joe, what happened to the quote book?
>
> -Wendy
The book was going to come out from Simon and Shuster under Byron
Preiss' ibooks imprint...but just as things were being finalized, Byron
was killed in a car accident, and the whole reason I'd placed that (and
the other books of mine) with ibooks was because of Byron being there.
So when he was gone, there was no reason to keep it there, and I'm not
sure what the future for ibooks is going to be without him there to
oversee it.
We are, however, considering bringing it out via the same venue as the
B5 script books, should that initial publication work out as planned.
And speaking of...the babylon5scripts.com site is scheduled to go live
at the end of the month. I've finished writing the last bits --
captions for some of the behind-the-scene photos I took back then,
including the first makeup tests of G'Kar, Londo and Delenn, candid
shots of the cast and crew, the first time we assembled everyone...it's
quite a cool look back, and stuff nobody's ever seen.
But the main thing, again, is the publication of the scripts. It's
been an exhaustive process, gathering up all the script files, cleaning
them up, and writing introductions for all of the episodes. (The
intros are now averaging about 40-50 pages each per volume...so that by
the end, there will be enough new content in the intros to make a whole
book all by itself.) It's a real chance, with the passage of time, to
talk about stuff I could never talk about before, and other stuff I can
now discuss in more detail than could be possible in an article or a
convention appearance.
So keep an eye out...the site goes live in about ten days....
jms
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Date: Tue, 18 Oct 2005 08:28:15 +0000 (UTC)
Subject: Re: A Little Private Funding?
From: jmsatb5@aol.com
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
bam wrote:
> I can't help but wonder with JMS making all of this outstanding B5 stuff
> available to the fans........
>
> Could he be raising money for some private project that the studios can't
> seem to get behind and bankroll.......
>
> Could he be gathering funds to produce something that the fans have been
> begging for......perhaps something that almost came to past late last year?
> This way if JMS is the money man he can do it his way. I can't recall the
> name of the project as my "memory" fails me now.
>
> I can dream can't I?
It was something I actually did think about briefly, but ultimately
decided that it wasn't fair or right...in the sense of saying,
"Listen...for everybody for whom the show meant something, if it had an
effect on you, if it was important...and you'd like to see something
done outside the system, without studio notes, or interference...and
you wouldn't mind never seeing that money come back to you...you could
invest whatever corresponds to what the show meant to you via the
babylon5scripts@aol.com paypal account, which if enough shows up would
be used for a short film, a development fund for future B5 projects, or
a full length feature."
Thought about it...but again, ultimately droppd the idea. Just didn't
seem right.
jms
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