Most of what Barry says is spot on. But accusing AAR, AG and AU of "masquerading" is misguided.
As he and others clearly document, AU is created and dominated by authors who have a vested interest in the current publishing system. For AG, though, while they certainly have an old-fashioned view of the publishing world they have also been a consistent antagonist to publishers on contract issues, even if not loudly or publicly enough for Barry's liking (or my own). [For those who don't know, AG has a contract review service for members, which consistently recommends a wide range of revisions to standard publishing terms that would strongly improve the balance in authors' favor, but of course AG does not and cannot actually negotiate publishing contracts for its members.]
And AAR is an association of literary agents who have a legal, moral and fiduciary responsibility to represent their author clients, which sometimes involves getting them traditional publishing deals and other times means helping them direct publish through Amazon, Smashwords and other outlets.
I resigned my memberships in both AG and AAR several years ago because of my strong disagreement with their public stances on many of the issues Barry so comprehensively highlights above. But accusing either of them of "masquerading" as author advocacy groups is sloppy thinking and sloppy language; tarring all of these organizations with accusations of perfidy is wrong. Much more accurate and useful is to highlight the areas where these organizations' long-standing missions have developed potential tensions and conflicts in the new world made more readily possible by digital publishing.
Techdirt has not posted any stories submitted by tedweinstein.
Alignment of interests
Most of what Barry says is spot on. But accusing AAR, AG and AU of "masquerading" is misguided.
As he and others clearly document, AU is created and dominated by authors who have a vested interest in the current publishing system. For AG, though, while they certainly have an old-fashioned view of the publishing world they have also been a consistent antagonist to publishers on contract issues, even if not loudly or publicly enough for Barry's liking (or my own). [For those who don't know, AG has a contract review service for members, which consistently recommends a wide range of revisions to standard publishing terms that would strongly improve the balance in authors' favor, but of course AG does not and cannot actually negotiate publishing contracts for its members.]
And AAR is an association of literary agents who have a legal, moral and fiduciary responsibility to represent their author clients, which sometimes involves getting them traditional publishing deals and other times means helping them direct publish through Amazon, Smashwords and other outlets.
I resigned my memberships in both AG and AAR several years ago because of my strong disagreement with their public stances on many of the issues Barry so comprehensively highlights above. But accusing either of them of "masquerading" as author advocacy groups is sloppy thinking and sloppy language; tarring all of these organizations with accusations of perfidy is wrong. Much more accurate and useful is to highlight the areas where these organizations' long-standing missions have developed potential tensions and conflicts in the new world made more readily possible by digital publishing.