Had a fairly uneventful weekend. I won't say quiet or relaxing, because that's seldom the case. So, I'll take uneventful.
There is much drama in writing circles about Pay Pal forcing third party carriers to pull works they deemed immoral. While I agree with Pay Pal in theory (I wouldn't want to read books about incest, bestiality, rape, etc), I don't like the idea of what is essentially a bank or payment processing center deciding what is and isn't available for sale. Because -- first incest, bestiality and rape ... next it'll be something I do read or write. In fact, they're even required "pseudo-incest" books be pulled. This is sex between non-blood related family (i.e. step-father and daughter; step-uncle, niece) and I had this idea for a step-brother / sister story, so I guess I *am* impacted since I can't publish it at Smashwords.
Anyone know of another reliable payment processing company?
If you want to read more about it (and all about the (now former) treasurer of the Kiss of Death chapter of RWA caught plagiarizing, or the scuttlebutt about Dreamspinner Press and fan fic that may or may not be copied), go to Dear Author's post here.
DD is off this week, and we don't have a lot of plans. I am going to get her hair cut on Wednesday, and mine trimmed ... it's *almost* long enough for Locks of Love, but the ends (THE ENDS!) they are so damaged, I'm going to have 1/2" or so snipped off. Yeah, it'll take me a little longer to donate, but I can't stand how it looks.
Hope your weekend was happy!
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4 comments:
Dear Author is one of my daily reads.
Hope you have a good day.
I think the author community is getting a little riled for what has been in play in other industries for decades.
It's all about money. Advertisers' entire existence depends on the market. If the market stirs up a hornet's nest about some author writing incest, it can go viral in minutes, destroying years of work building the advertisers image.
Joe Blow writes a graphic and seedy incest novel. Smashwords publishes it. Paypal handles the money, but a customer for Bank of America (or whoever) finds out and rallies his friends. Before long the bank has a black eye, and a tarnished image. So to stop this from happening they implement restrictions.
It's not personal. It's business.
We can thank Twitter and FB for making big business jump every time someone whispers boycott.
I'm not a fan of the whole paypal ordeal. As much as I don't want to read about incest, or rape, if the next reader does want to read it, who is paypal to say they can't?
I've heard both sides of this story, and I can kinda understand some of the reasoning, but I dislike the cencorship. If paypal now deems this as inappropriate, what will they do next? Every book genre has something in it that can offend someone else. So are they slowly going to ban all books because they are all offensive?
It still surprises me (and probably shouldn't) that in this day and age of computers and software that is used to detect plagiarism, some people still think they can get away with it.
Best wishes for your week!
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