In a message dated 1/5/2005 4:45:20 PM Mountain Standard Time, jeroen.mailinglist@bohol.ph writes:

This is not a flame. It's a careful exchange of views with whoever I'm quoting.

 

Do I understand correctly that the fellow who works in the steel mill should be paid only what is necessary for the steel to be produced? And the waitress in a restaurant should be paid only enough for the orders to be taken and the food put on the table. Well, let's see, how much is the wear and tear on her shoe leather and her apron and the clothing she wars at the restaurant?

 

For cryin' out loud, YOU CANNOT HAVE LABOR OF ANY KIND, WHITE COLLAR OR BLUE COLLAR, WITHOUT PAYING THE LABORER. Karl Marx and Jesus Christ agree on this, though they disagree as to how it should be done.

 

It is 5:40 PM on a snowy day and we just called the plumber. Why should we have to pay him $35 just for coming here, before he even looks at the problem? Does it cost that much in gasoline? Surely it isn't the cost of the truck, because it's old enough that it's already paid for.

 

I have been working for SIX YEARS on one book. At the moment it's about 200,000 words long. I have thrown away closer to two MILLION words that I wound up tossing and rewriting. Let's see, what is the cost of the paper . . . and the ink . . . and the computer . . . and the printer . . . Does that sum up the cost of writing the book? And I shouldn't get any more than that?

 

WHY? I would make this 100-point type except that it would wind up perfectly ordinary type on other people's machines. Why should the publisher be paid . . . and the bookseller be paid . . . and the ink supplier be paid . . . and the paper supplier be paid . . . and the shipping companies be paid . . . and so on and so forth, for as long as people want to read a book, but the person who wrote the book should fall out of the loop and stop getting paid?

 

Life plus 100, or life plus 70, or life plus 60, is absurd. Life plus 25 is not absurd. That's all I'm asking for. But too many people think I should get royalties for 10 years or 15 years and then no more, even when everybody else is still making money from the book.