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Babylon 5 novels and graphic novels

So ... erm ... which comic company is connected to Warners?

And if they are so bothered about a B5 comic licence, why haven't they done anything about it before now?
 
Warners own DC. That also includes Wildstorm and Vertigo.
To be honest, they did an average job promoting previous B5 material, so it'll be intersting to see how this pans out.

Congrats Tony, I'll look forward to the previews and will put it on my list when it comes out..
 
JMSs reply when asked about the B5 novels from Mongoose (with comments on the German superbox DVD set):

Mongoose asked me to consult with them, since they are doing just a
couple of books and as I understand it ONLY for release in the
UK...asked if I could help come up with some stories for them, or
provide material from myh notes, proofread the manuscripts, make
corrections, maybe write an intro, and do lots of other stuff...and I
said okay, great, what are you going to pay for my work?

At first, silence. As if they were stunned that I would actually ask
to be paid for my time and work. Then finally, they came back
with...five hundred bucks per book.

To which I responded, "You have GOT to be kidding me."

I have, subsequently, washed my hands of the Mongoose books. I haven't
seen anything, don't know what they're doing, so sure as hell it ain't
canonical.

This is getting annoyingly commonplace. I got an email from the Warner
Bros. division handling the German DVD superbox, for instance, wherein
they said, very happily, that they were figuring on getting maybe six
to ten million bucks for this new edition, and would I help them to
make sure everything was right, to consult with them on the design, the
packaging, the text, the artwork, the docs, a bunch of stuff. So I
said, again not unreasonably, "And what is WB's standard fee for this
consultation?"

To which WB responded that they don't pay people for the honor to be
involved in these DVDs. But he's getting paid, the guy who did the
artwork is getting paid, the only person who's not getting paid is the
guy who made it. So I declined. They replied with ominous words
suggesting that it would be bad if I let the fans down...but I don't
bow down for emotional blackmail.

Writing is a job no less than being a carpenter. All a writer has, at
the end of the day, is time, energy and visceral material. And right
now, there's an awful lot going on career wise, and my free time is at
a premium. You pay for someone's time if you have them consult, or
write, or research for you, or if you otherwise engage their
professional services. That is pro forma for every profession on the
planet...except, it seems, for writing, where they think you're so glad
to be asked to the ball that you'll go along with being treated
unprofessionally.

Pass.

jms
Click to expand...

Jan
 
This is turning into a very predictable shame, isn't it? From guys who don't take a friend out to lunch without calling it a business expense, probably. :rolleyes:

I'm glad at least he has plenty of work. I just hope he has better contracts these days than in the days of B5.
 
Thats sad, possibly understandable from a small outfit like Mongoose, but it was odd to see Warners act in the same way, espcially when they are looking at the kind of profit.

I hope that money can be found and bridges be made.
 
I just hope JMS doesn't end up saying what I heard Orson Welles say in an interview once.

He was older, it was when his career was basically over, I think. Looking back he commented on how much time and effort it took to find the funding for your projects compared to actually creating those projects. He didn't quite go so far as to say it was just not worth it. But... he kind of came close to it. :(
 
Boy, B5 and JMS just go through the ringer, over and over again.

I second the thought, that I sincerely hope he gets much better contracts these days, than giving away his intellectual property like B5 apparently was.
 
JMSs reply when asked about the B5 novels from Mongoose (with comments on the German superbox DVD set):
Click to expand...

Mongoose asked me to consult with them, since they are doing just a
couple of books and as I understand it ONLY for release in the
UK...asked if I could help come up with some stories for them, or
provide material from myh notes, proofread the manuscripts, make
corrections, maybe write an intro, and do lots of other stuff...and I
said okay, great, what are you going to pay for my work?

At first, silence. As if they were stunned that I would actually ask
to be paid for my time and work. Then finally, they came back
with...five hundred bucks per book.
Click to expand...

LOL. Incredible. :rolleyes:


To which I responded, "You have GOT to be kidding me."
Click to expand...

Understandable response.


I have, subsequently, washed my hands of the Mongoose books. I haven't
seen anything, don't know what they're doing, so sure as hell it ain't
canonical.
Click to expand...

Then they're not worth reading.


This is getting annoyingly commonplace. I got an email from the Warner
Bros. division handling the German DVD superbox, for instance, wherein
they said, very happily, that they were figuring on getting maybe six
to ten million bucks for this new edition, and would I help them to
make sure everything was right, to consult with them on the design, the
packaging, the text, the artwork, the docs, a bunch of stuff. So I
said, again not unreasonably, "And what is WB's standard fee for this
consultation?"

To which WB responded that they don't pay people for the honor to be
involved in these DVDs.
Click to expand...

:LOL: :LOL: :LOL: :LOL: :LOL: :LOL: :LOL:


But he's getting paid, the guy who did the
artwork is getting paid, the only person who's not getting paid is the
guy who made it.
Click to expand...

No doubt.


So I declined.
Click to expand...

Naah, who'd have thought?



They replied with ominous words
suggesting that it would be bad if I let the fans down...
Click to expand...

That's pretty low, but not surprising.



but I don't bow down for emotional blackmail.
Click to expand...

Good.


Writing is a job no less than being a carpenter. All a writer has, at
the end of the day, is time, energy and visceral material. And right
now, there's an awful lot going on career wise, and my free time is at
a premium. You pay for someone's time if you have them consult, or
write, or research for you, or if you otherwise engage their
professional services. That is pro forma for every profession on the
planet...except, it seems, for writing, where they think you're so glad
to be asked to the ball that you'll go along with being treated
unprofessionally.

Pass.

jms
Click to expand...

Wouldn't want you to cut in on their profits, would they?
 
IT figures about the B5 novels I for one will read them regardless of whether they are canon or not .It's new b5 stories and that is all I care about.As for JMS turning them down I guess he either doesn't need the money or found the price insulting probably the latter at least to me .
 
500 BUCKS per book is low I'd like to make that kind of money.Can't help but wonder what a "normal" fee is.
Click to expand...

Look at all that they were asking for, though. It's not as if they just asked for an introduction:

asked if I could help come up with some stories for them, or
provide material from myh notes, proofread the manuscripts, make
corrections, maybe write an intro, and do lots of other stuff...
Click to expand...

Jan
 
Hmm, I'll reserve final judgement because I don't know the financial details of Mongooses' B5 books. Sometimes it seems that people think that the publishing industry is awash with money, and it ain't, particularly for a smallish company like Mongoose.

Basically, when you publish a book, before anything is commissioned a viability study will be done. They'll have a budget that they can't go a penny over. Into this they have to factor into everything from paying the author, cover artists, the fee of the Babylon 5 licence from Warners (probably quite expensive), any promotional stuff or market research, the costs of actually printing the book which can be a small fortune, plus their overheads and wages and general costs, as well as a multitude of other things. Mongoose will have done this study, shown it to their finance people and had it authorised. Now, my bet is that they've decided to ask JMS to do an intro as an afterthought, and as this cost wasn't factored in when the budgets were drawn up, they're now trying to keep the cost at a minimum so as not to go too much overbudget. It was cheeky of them not to have offered him something straight away, and it was also cheeky of them to ask him to proofread stuff. In fact, most publishing houses keep editing in house so that it fits their in-house style, and after all they pay their own editors and subeditors to do that job, so I'm a bit surprised that they asked him that. Very lazy of them.

Still, I would have thought that £500 to just write a 2-3 page intro was reasonable, if a little low. To ask JMS to do all that other stuff on top of it for the same fee seems to be laziness on their part, and I'm not surprised JMS turned them down. I don't think they are deliberately trying to show him disrespect, but they are being naive. His name attached to the books will help them sell, and a good editor would have realised this at the beginning.

Now WB not giving JMS a consultancy fee for the DVDs is bad. No excuse for that.
 
Just found over on the moderated newsgroup:

Title: Re: JMS: Re: Babylon 5 Universe Novels?
Author: "Matthew Sprange" <spare@mongoosepublishing.com>
Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2005 22:34:21 +0000 (UTC)
Message-ID: <dj6fs1$r8n$1@nwrdmz02.dmz.ncs.ea.ibs-infra.bt.com>

> At first, silence. As if they were stunned that I would actually ask
> to be paid for my time and work. Then finally, they came back
> with...five hundred bucks per book.
>
> To which I responded, "You have GOT to be kidding me."
>
> I have, subsequently, washed my hands of the Mongoose books. I haven't
> seen anything, don't know what they're doing, so sure as hell it ain't
> canonical.

Hi guys,

Okay, I have a slightly different recollection of events. There was no
silence at first - we had quite a rapid exchange of emails. I never
expected anyone to work on this project for free but I believe I was very
honest when I said I had no idea what your time was _worth_. No idea.
None. Never worked with anyone in your position before. Furthermore, that
offer was not the final one - we offered 10% of the revenue, the same
portion that Warner Brothers gets for the novels.

That is when the silence kicked in - you did not get back to us, did not
discuss it. We could have tried to work something out.

The important thing to remember here is that Mongoose is not Warner
Brothers. We are a small company employing 20 or so people. We cannot
throw money around with abandon on any project, especially as we are limited
to the UK market only (I believe it is Del Ray who have the US licence).
There is no guarantee that a new range of Babylon 5 novels will prove
successful in the UK and, at the end of the day, we have a business to run.

To put things into perspective, if we were to print and sell an entire print
run of, say, 10,000 novels, the profit is only a few thousand pounds after
printing and distribution costs. That is if we sell all 10,000. Sell half
that and we are at a loss. This is before Warner Brothers comes along and
takes their bite, plus any percentage we offered to Mr Straczynski. I must
point out, it is not the profit I have my eyes on with these figures but
whether the project would end up costing more than it would bring in - which
is obviously a huge problem with a business.

I can say that everyone at Mongoose is greatly dedicated to Babylon 5 and,
in our own way, we have been carrying the B5 banner for the past three years
with our games and a range of over 20 sourcebooks. I believe (I may be
wrong) that we have printed more Babylon 5 material than any other
publisher. We take this universe seriously.

I would like to extend an offer to Mr Straczynski to re-open negotiations
and, if there is a way we can find to work together, we would like to move
forwards. We have a lot of very exciting ideas for Babylon 5, across a
variety of media, that we would like to discuss. We very much want to carry
the banner further and I believe we have a lot to offer fans of the series.

You have my email. Please give me a shout.

Matthew Sprange
Mongoose Publishing

http://www.mongoosepublishing.com
Click to expand...

Jan
 
Sorry, Shaal Mayan! :) It only seemed fair to post the rebuttal wherever JMS's post had gone. I was going to check the Mongoose site, too.

Hopefully they can work things out but it should be done via email, not in public any longer.

Jan
 
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