Fiction Factory???

[Robin]

Does anyone else find Frey's new Fiction Factory creepy? Or is it a good way for a new author to break through?
http://nymag.com/arts/books/features/69474/

[Margo]

Creepy, to me, yes. A good way to break through? I don't know and don't think I'm going to find out.

[Guardian]

Actually a writer (Be it good or bad, really matter) doesn't need to join to these sort of factories, or team up with other "well known" writers (Actually I never heard about this guy.). I always used to be mistrustful with these sort of things.

#1: If he is a truly good author as it's mentioned in the article, a well known one, why does he need other writers to do the next Twilight? Why is he not doing it by own it's own? Why does he need other writers to do that? If someone is capable to write the next XY, be it Twilight or Harry Potter, that writer is used to do it by him / herself.

#2: A little background check is showing few trouble around him. Lawsuits, media scepticism. Not a good sign.

So personally I would avoid this "opportunity" as far as possible. I never used to doubt in the credibility of anyone, but I always have doubts regarding opportunities which is advertising itself with slogans like... "Team up with me to write the next Twilight.".

Writing is not working on this way. Good writers are also not working on this way. In my opinion it's an opportunity which is giving false hope, an illusion to naive writers whose are intending to get some hope that on some day they'll be published.

[polymath]

I guess only Fry could take an otherwise noble idea, throw some pathologically self-absorbed agendas on top of it, and come up with a Ponzi scheme for developing commercial literature at the expense of naive writers' trusting natures and good will. Caveat emptor: A Million More Little Lies coming soon to a bookstore in the wild blue yonder.

[Robin]

I guess only Fry could take an otherwise noble idea, throw some pathologically self-absorbed agendas on top of it, and come up with a Ponzi scheme for developing commercial literature at the expense of naive writers' trusting natures and good will. Caveat emptor: A Million More Little Lies coming soon to a bookstore in the wild blue yonder.

LOL!!! "A ponzi scheme" love it. So Fry is the Maddoff of publishing?

[polymath]

So Fry is the Maddoff of publishing?

Close to it. The Full Fathom Five contract looks like a work for hire writing contract on the surface. But it doesn't meet one test of contract law, mutually reciprocal exchange of value. All the throughput flows from the bottom to the top. A pittance might be showered on the bottom when and as the top sees fit. Nothing technically illegal about it, though, like for crooked financial investment schemes. Assigning a real value to an unknown writer's writing is at best subjective. Frey is trading in on his notoriously famous name, riding on his own coattails as it were. And his fingers, toes, and eyes crossed it might pay off for him. Phbbt. Go back to work writing and let others carry on as best they can without putting pie in the sky pipedreams in their way. Yet twenty-eight, at least, have fallen for it.

[steve]

You would be surprised how many YA titles these days are dreamed up in conference rooms, written by a writer-for-hire, and place on the bookshelves at your favorite bookstore under a fanciful pen name.

EDIT: you might also be surprised how many award winning poets make their bread-and-butter living by writing erotica for checks that pay the bills.

[polymath]

No, I wouldn't be surprised. I would be surprised if they didn't receive a fair share of the proceeds from their labors. Financial pyramid schemes are illegal because they promise huge returns that can't possibly be realized except by the apex of the pyramid.

[Guardian]

No, I wouldn't be surprised. I would be surprised if they didn't receive a fair share of the proceeds from their labors. Financial pyramid schemes are illegal because they promise huge returns that can't possibly be realized except by the apex of the pyramid.

Agree. Plus there is a chance the name of the poor "no name" writer won't be even on the cover page, regardless how much (s)he worked and added into the project... or even if (s)he figured out the 90% of it. Plus the "no name" writer also can say good bye to the rights.

You would be surprised how many YA titles these days are dreamed up in conference rooms, written by a writer-for-hire, and place on the bookshelves at your favorite bookstore under a fanciful pen name.

Maybe that's the problem as the quality of the works which is ever born in conference rooms is usually close to zero. Don't forget to add this little detail.

[steve]

Contracts are contracts, not schemes.

A writer presented with a writer-for-hire contract has a many options:

- sign it
- renegotiate it
- walk away from it

Bitching and moaning after the fact is strange, but if a party in a contract feels terms or good faith was violated, there are many options for redress.

Frey and other factory-like situations pay people money. That's a good thing.

[Guardian]

Frey and other factory-like situations pay people money. That's a good thing.

Underpaying people, exploiting naive writers is never a good thing.

[Margo]

I don't think there's anything wrong with a writer deciding to do something like this for the money. I'm never surprised to hear a writer (or agent) used to crank out erotica or romance novels to pay the rent -- hopefully they were good ones and fun to write. The possible financial freedom would then allow the writer to concentrate the rest of their time on the work they love. However, it sounds like the issue here was two-fold.

1) A promise (or at least a perception) that this was a career-launching opportunity instead of just a writing sweatshop, which would be Frey's bad.

2) A writer who found out after the fact money didn't compensate for the stress of having to remain anonymous, which would be the writer's bad.