I’m thisclose to signing a book contract with Wiley to write a book on web workerhood under the brand of Web Worker Daily and we had some back and forth over the non-compete clause. While I understand why publishers would include a non-compete clause, I don’t think that authors should accept anything more than the narrowest of definitions of competing works. It’s incredibly hard to make a living as a writer and noncompete clauses only make it more difficult.
Most authors work from home, have to buy their own health insurance, cobble together enough to live on from a variety of income sources, and don’t have any perks of corporate life. I can only imagine the overhead of a publishing company with their full-time benefits-protected workers, offices, PR departments, and so forth. So it galls me that they want authors to agree to not writing about a certain subject forevermore.
Incidentally, Tim O’Reilly is also against noncompetes.
Having just read The Black Swan, I have been reminded that we need to keep our futures as exposed as possible to positive random events and as protected as possible against negative events. Publishers, by issuing blanket and generalized noncompetes, protect themselves against negative events but at the cost of limiting authors’ exposure to positive events (writing a new competing or complementary book that will bring more income).
I have options other than pursuing this particular contract. I could go to another publisher. I could contact an agent… I have the names of good ones from blogging friends who have written books. I could scrap the book idea and get back to consulting jobs that would pay me better. Anyway, we’ve narrowed down the noncompete pretty much to the point I don’t think it will affect my plans in the future. And I really like dealing with Chris and enjoy the perspective of his boss, Joe Wikert.
The problem is I just don’t know what will happen in the future. And neither do you. So if you’re about to sign a contract of any sort with a noncompete clause, try to get out of it.
8 Comments
Nice theme, and I agree on the non-compete, although for a different reason: You’re writing a book about your experience. You should not have to sign away “your” experience.
I’m glad you were able to work out the contract to your satisfaction. I think there’s a general trend with publishers to want to cover all their bases, make sure they don’t lose out on revenue areas that may become more important in the future. It’s not just non-compete clauses, but electronic rights, the effect of print-on-demand on reprints and when copyright reverts back to the author, and so on. But contracts are always negotiable, and I don’t think most publishers are trying to cut authors out of deserved income so much as being excessively paranoid about getting the wrong side of the deal.
Actually, I’m curious about the copyright arrangements for your book. A quick browse of the books on my shelf seems to indicate that O’Reilly holds copyright for most (all?) of what they publish, but the books I have from other technical publishers assign it to the authors.
I like the new theme too.
My book contract with Addison Wesley had a clause that states that if I write another book about the same subject (in this case, it was a book about a specific software/hardware firewall), I had to give AW a 30-day right-of-first refusal. Not quite the same thing as a non-compete clause, but it’s close.
Since my book was based on a lot of stuff that I had already published on a public website, not to mention stuff that could be viewed as “work product” by my employer, I made them put language in my contract that basically said they understood that. Basically I didn’t want to get sued for copyright infringement for stuff that existed prior to the publishing of the book.
To be perfectly honest, I don’t know that I’d ever want to go through all the BS that goes with writing a book again.
Hi Anne. We haven’t met (yet!) but I wanted to let you know that I’m very much looking forward to this book project. I also wanted to weigh in on the non-compete clause…
I’m totally supportive of narrowing the focus for what’s considered “competitive”. In fact, any good lawyer will probably tell you that the more specific and narrow non-compete language is, the more enforceable it’s likely to be; broader non-compete language is often considered unenforceable.
It’s a tricky subject, but I want you to know that we’d never try to impede your right to make a living and write other books. We just want to protect our investment and prevent anything that’s an obviously competitive book from popping up on the shelf.
I apologize if this step has been problematic and I hope you’ll give Chris or myself a call if there’s anything we can do to ease your mind. Chris and I would both like to think that we’ve forged many solid relationships with a variety of authors over the years. Since you don’t know either of us that well just yet, I’d invite you to ask either/both of us for “author references”, people who have worked with us in the past who will give you the straight scoop on whether we’re trustworthy. Drop me an e-mail if you’d like to chat or if you’d like a list of author references.
Cool! Great new theme. Hmmm..I really want an orange now.
Audrey: I think it’s fairly typical for the publisher to hold the copyright, but even if the author retains it I understand it practically doesn’t matter because of the rights granted to the publisher in the contract. For my book, Wiley will hold the copyright.
Joe: I’m not too concerned with the noncompete clause at this point. As a serial enthusiast I can’t imagine writing a similar book. I’m sure I’ll want to write something totally different in the future. But still, can’t really predict. I’m looking forward to the project too.
Thanks, Ryan. The oranges have nothing to do with anything, but I liked the image and the colors. Maybe need to do something different than the green background, but I’m glad to get away from old theme.
Joe and Anne, here’s a suggestion: Limit it by time. ie. the non-compete (no matter how broad) expires 1 year from publication.
After a year, the publisher definitely should be worried about competing titles from other publishers (if the book was successful), but who the authors are of those books is largely irrelevant.
Hi Anne,
I came here via your comment posted at Chris Webb’s ckwebb.com site on the non-compete clause. What an interesting post that is (and the responses too). As an aspiring writer I found it very useful information.
I went on quite a trip, following the links from his respondents to their various web sites, and wrote it up on my blog as ‘The Real Value Of Web 2.0′ - my name link takes you directly to it. I hope you’ll find the time to pop in and have a read. I’ve added you to my links because I’m sure I’m going to be visiting you regularly! Best of luck with the new book.
Best wishes,
Somerset Bob