From: Aline Soules <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2013 14:57:12 -0700

This is a critical question and I'm glad you asked.  I don't have an
answer, but I do know that you're right that the author has no way of
determining whose rights belong to whom UNLESS there is also a
statement in the contract requiring the publisher to provide the
author with 100% of the financial data on the book and its sales.
That's very hard to get them to provide, by the way.

Aline

Aline Soules, Librarian
California State University, East Bay
Hayward, CA  94542
[log in to unmask]

On Wed, Aug 28, 2013 at 6:56 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> From: Kevin Smith <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Wed, 28 Aug 2013 19:07:00 +0000
>
> I have been busy recently helping various faculty authors review
> publication contracts, and I ran across a clause recently that prompts
> this question.
>
> In a book publishing agreement from a major publishing house, the last
> paragraph of the section on royalties said this:
>
> “Any publisher’s proceeds from rights managed by national copyright
> organizations… are the sole property of [name of publisher].  Any such
> author’s proceeds are the sole property of Author.”  The clause went
> on to say that the author is responsible for taxes on this income and
> that this provision had precedence over any other royalty arrangement.
>
> On its face this seems like a very reasonable provision.  I am not
> sure why I have not noticed similar clauses before in other contracts;
> it may just be my own inattention.  But it raised the question for me
> (and the author!) of how the publisher’s proceeds and the author’s
> proceeds are determined.  I presume, but do not know, that this
> division is specified in the contract between a publisher and an
> organization like the Copyright Clearance Center (who are specifically
> mentioned as an example of a national rights organization).  If that
> is the case, the author clearly has no say in the division of
> royalties, but I wonder if s/he has any way to even know what that
> division is.
>
> Can anyone clarify for me how or where the publisher and author
> proportions of licensing income are decided, and if authors have any
> way to inquire into that determination?
>
> Thanks for your help,
>
> Kevin
>
> By the way, this contract is very clear and direct about the division
> of licensing income if the publisher licenses directly, which is one
> reason that the cryptic phrasing of this provision about licensing
> through a collective rights organization caught my eye.
>
> Kevin L. Smith, M.L.S., J.D.
>
> Director, Copyright and Scholarly Communication
> Duke University Libraries
> Durham, NC  27708
> [log in to unmask]