{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/5985", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 5985, "subject": "OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "messages": 16, "voices": 8, "first": "2011-03-07T16:27:19+00:00", "last": "2011-03-15T15:31:52+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gwern Branwen", "address": "gwern0 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T16:27:19+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Linked in http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2011/03/sf-tidbits-for-3311/\n\nAn ad (http://locusmag.com/2011/Ads/digitallafferty.jpg) for the\nLafferty copyrights\n(http://www.sfsite.com/news/2011/03/02/lafferty-estate-for-sale/).\n\nThis does explain why Wildside Press didn't have any Lafferty when I\nwent to buy some last year." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "gwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net" } ] }, { "message_id": "<507764.16354.qm@web161805.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Marc Aramini", "address": "marcaramini at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T20:38:01+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "wow, so you can just buy the rights to everything he wrote? Insane. It would peeve me no end if I had a wealthy acquaintance that I despised in life buying up my life's work, just a scenario I see as a possibility in cases like this. Crazy. Wonder how much it will go for? Be cool to say, I own all Lafferty's work, but it just doesn't seem just that a man's intellectual legacy is for sale ..." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "--- On Mon, 3/7/11, Gwern Branwen wrote:\nFrom: Gwern Branwen \nSubject: (urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Monday, March 7, 2011, 8:27 AM\nLinked in http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2011/03/sf-tidbits-for-3311/\n\nAn ad (http://locusmag.com/2011/Ads/digitallafferty.jpg) for\nthe\nLafferty copyrights\n(http://www.sfsite.com/news/2011/03/02/lafferty-estate-for-sale/).\n\nThis does explain why Wildside Press didn't have any\nLafferty when I\nwent to buy some last year.\n\n-- \ngwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T20:46:35+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "<507764.16354.qm@web161805.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Actually, what's really disgusting is that the high bid is $70K. 23\nnovels, for ghod's sake." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 12:38 PM, Marc Aramini wrote:\nwow, so you can just buy the rights to everything he wrote? Insane. “It would peeve me no end if I had a wealthy acquaintance that I despised in life buying up my life's work, just a scenario I see as a possibility in cases like this. ?Crazy. ?Wonder how much it will go for” ?Be cool to say, I own all Lafferty's work, but it just doesn't seem just that a man's intellectual legacy is for sale ...\n\n--- On Mon, 3/7/11, Gwern Branwen wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "From: Gwern Branwen \nSubject: (urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Monday, March 7, 2011, 8:27 AM\nLinked in http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2011/03/sf-tidbits-for-3311/\n\nAn ad (http://locusmag.com/2011/Ads/digitallafferty.jpg) for\nthe\nLafferty copyrights\n(http://www.sfsite.com/news/2011/03/02/lafferty-estate-for-sale/).\n\nThis does explain why Wildside Press didn't have any\nLafferty when I\nwent to buy some last year.\n\n--\ngwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<3FC5FB2C-C976-4C1E-A98A-C44F4A55C871@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Adam Thornton", "address": "adam at io.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T20:48:46+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mar 7, 2011, at 2:46 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nActually, what's really disgusting is that the high bid is $70K. 23\nnovels, for ghod's sake." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Wow.\n\nI wish I had $75,000.\n\nAdam" } ] }, { "message_id": "<207940.65759.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "Craig Brewer", "address": "cnbrewer at yahoo.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T20:49:40+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Well, hey, let's start a collection and give him a proper home!\n\n\n\n\n----- Original Message ----\nFrom: Dan'l Danehy-Oakes \nTo: The Urth Mailing List \nSent: Mon, March 7, 2011 2:46:35 PM\nSubject: Re: (urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale\n\nActually, what's really disgusting is that the high bid is $70K. 23\nnovels, for ghod's sake." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 12:38 PM, Marc Aramini wrote:\nwow, so you can just buy the rights to everything he wrote? Insane. It would \npeeve me no end if I had a wealthy acquaintance that I despised in life buying \nup my life's work, just a scenario I see as a possibility in cases like this. \nCrazy. Wonder how much it will go for? Be cool to say, I own all Lafferty's \nwork, but it just doesn't seem just that a man's intellectual legacy is for sale \n...\n\n--- On Mon, 3/7/11, Gwern Branwen wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "From: Gwern Branwen \nSubject: (urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale\nTo: \"The Urth Mailing List\" \nDate: Monday, March 7, 2011, 8:27 AM\nLinked in http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2011/03/sf-tidbits-for-3311/\n\nAn ad (http://locusmag.com/2011/Ads/digitallafferty.jpg) for\nthe\nLafferty copyrights\n(http://www.sfsite.com/news/2011/03/02/lafferty-estate-for-sale/).\n\nThis does explain why Wildside Press didn't have any\nLafferty when I\nwent to buy some last year.\n\n--\ngwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net\n_______________________________________________\nUrth Mailing List\nTo post, write urth at urth.net\nSubscription/information: http://www.urth.net" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "_______________________________________________\nUrth Mailing List\nTo post, write urth at urth.net\nSubscription/information: http://www.urth.net" }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Adam Thornton", "address": "adam at io.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T20:52:15+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "<207940.65759.qm@web37605.mail.mud.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mar 7, 2011, at 2:49 PM, Craig Brewer wrote:\nWell, hey, let's start a collection and give him a proper home!" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm in for $100.\n\nAdam" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gwern Branwen", "address": "gwern0 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T21:48:01+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 3:46 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nActually, what's really disgusting is that the high bid is $70K. 23\nnovels, for ghod's sake." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Yeah, that is very high an asking fee for novels that never sold very\nmuch. ($70k invested over the remaining ~70 years of the Lafferty\ncopyrights is *a lot* of money; I can't see how the Lafferty\ncopyrights could possibly compete. Some quick figuring with the net\npresent value approximations says that at 70k, to be a good\ninvestment, the royalties/revenue would have to average like $4000 a\nyear every year.)\n\nPresumably the target audience is Lafferty fans, or those seeking\nstatus & prestige (kind of like how Encyclopedia Britannica or the New\nYork Times stay afloat)." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "gwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T21:50:40+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I dunno. With the right management, Lafferty could be the next Phil\nDick. A lot of his stories -- I'm talking more about the short stories\nthan the novels, now -- would make great movies." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 1:48 PM, Gwern Branwen wrote:\nOn Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 3:46 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Actually, what's really disgusting is that the high bid is $70K. 23\nnovels, for ghod's sake." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Yeah, that is very high an asking fee for novels that never sold very\nmuch. ($70k invested over the remaining ~70 years of the Lafferty\ncopyrights is *a lot* of money; I can't see how the Lafferty\ncopyrights could possibly compete. Some quick figuring with the net\npresent value approximations says that at 70k, to be a good\ninvestment, the royalties/revenue would have to average like $4000 a\nyear every year.)\n\nPresumably the target audience is Lafferty fans, or those seeking\nstatus & prestige (kind of like how Encyclopedia Britannica or the New\nYork Times stay afloat).\n\n--\ngwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "<971FD8C2-BCFD-4C4F-B124-4AAF513F06FE@io.com>", "from": { "name": "Adam Thornton", "address": "adam at io.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T21:54:44+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mar 7, 2011, at 3:50 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nI dunno. With the right management, Lafferty could be the next Phil\nDick. A lot of his stories -- I'm talking more about the short stories\nthan the novels, now -- would make great movies." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "For $70,000, it seems likely that you could publish 99-cent ebook editions and probably make it back over a few years, even if you sold zero of the movie rights.\n\nI mean, there are certainly several of the books I'd pay a buck for to read on my mobile-device-of-choice. Spend a little on marketing to make sure that blogs that people read, like, say, BoingBoing, knew about it...I bet if you had buck-a-book ebooks, and got someone to announce it on BoingBoing, you'd get halfway to making your money back on the first day.\n\nAdam" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Daniel Petersen", "address": "danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T22:40:26+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "<971FD8C2-BCFD-4C4F-B124-4AAF513F06FE@io.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Somebody alert Neil Gaiman! I bet he'd buy this up and do something great\nwith it. He's a huge Lafferty fan. He's definitely Laff's highest profile\npopularizer right now.\n\n-DOJP\n\n(Or maybe the mighty Wolfe would do it? He's a big fan too.)" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 9:54 PM, Adam Thornton wrote:\n\nOn Mar 7, 2011, at 3:50 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "I dunno. With the right management, Lafferty could be the next Phil\nDick. A lot of his stories -- I'm talking more about the short stories\nthan the novels, now -- would make great movies." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "For $70,000, it seems likely that you could publish 99-cent ebook editions\nand probably make it back over a few years, even if you sold zero of the\nmovie rights.\n\nI mean, there are certainly several of the books I'd pay a buck for to read\non my mobile-device-of-choice. Spend a little on marketing to make sure\nthat blogs that people read, like, say, BoingBoing, knew about it...I bet if\nyou had buck-a-book ebooks, and got someone to announce it on BoingBoing,\nyou'd get halfway to making your money back on the first day.\n\nAdam\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Dan'l Danehy-Oakes", "address": "danldo at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T22:46:45+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Somehow, I doubt that either Gaiman or Wolfe has $70K to toss around.\nI could be wrong. But neither of them is in Stephen King/JK Rowling\nterritory." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 2:40 PM, Daniel Petersen\n wrote:\nSomebody alert Neil Gaiman! “I bet he'd buy this up and do something great\nwith it. ?He's a huge Lafferty fan. ?He's definitely Laff's highest profile\npopularizer right now.\n-DOJP\n(Or maybe the mighty Wolfe would do it” ?He's a big fan too.)\n\nOn Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 9:54 PM, Adam Thornton wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On Mar 7, 2011, at 3:50 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "I dunno. With the right management, Lafferty could be the next Phil\nDick. A lot of his stories -- I'm talking more about the short stories\nthan the novels, now -- would make great movies." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "For $70,000, it seems likely that you could publish 99-cent ebook editions\nand probably make it back over a few years, even if you sold zero of the\nmovie rights.\n\nI mean, there are certainly several of the books I'd pay a buck for to\nread on my mobile-device-of-choice. ?Spend a little on marketing to make\nsure that blogs that people read, like, say, BoingBoing, knew about it...I\nbet if you had buck-a-book ebooks, and got someone to announce it on\nBoingBoing, you'd get halfway to making your money back on the first day.\n\nAdam\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Daniel Petersen", "address": "danielottojackpetersen at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T23:08:54+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I would've thought Gaiman was fairly rollin in it, but I'm not financially\nsavvy, so...\n\n(Although he's probably got rich friends that he could convince it was a\nworthwhile cause.)\n\nDOJP" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gerry Quinn", "address": "gerryq at indigo.ie" }, "date": "2011-03-07T23:08:58+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "<507764.16354.qm@web161805.mail.bf1.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From: \"Marc Aramini\" \nwow, so you can just buy the rights to everything he wrote? Insane. It \nwould\npeeve me no end if I had a wealthy acquaintance that I despised in life \nbuying\nup my life's work, just a scenario I see as a possibility in cases like \nthis.\nCrazy. Wonder how much it will go for? Be cool to say, I own all \nLafferty's\nwork, but it just doesn't seem just that a man's intellectual legacy is \nfor sale ..." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "At the end of the day, if it's for sale it's because the author sold it or \nleft it to someone who is selling it. Copyright initially belongs entirely \nto the author, and it's up to him to choose what to do with it.\n\n- Gerry Quinn" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Matthew Keeley", "address": "matthew.keeley.1 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-07T23:38:27+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Gaiman could buy the Lafferty estate with the income derived from a few\nspeech appearances:\nhttp://boingboing.net/2010/05/10/neil-gaimans-awesome.html\n\nI think he's in China and away from the Internet now though. Perhaps someone\nshould alert his assistant?\n\n-Matt" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 5:46 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:\nSomehow, I doubt that either Gaiman or Wolfe has $70K to toss around.\nI could be wrong. But neither of them is in Stephen King/JK Rowling\nterritory.\n\nOn Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 2:40 PM, Daniel Petersen\n wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "Somebody alert Neil Gaiman! I bet he'd buy this up and do something\ngreat\nwith it. He's a huge Lafferty fan. He's definitely Laff's highest\nprofile\npopularizer right now.\n-DOJP\n(Or maybe the mighty Wolfe would do it? He's a big fan too.)\n\nOn Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 9:54 PM, Adam Thornton wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "On Mar 7, 2011, at 3:50 PM, Dan'l Danehy-Oakes wrote:" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 4, "text": "I dunno. With the right management, Lafferty could be the next Phil\nDick. A lot of his stories -- I'm talking more about the short stories\nthan the novels, now -- would make great movies." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 3, "text": "For $70,000, it seems likely that you could publish 99-cent ebook\neditions\nand probably make it back over a few years, even if you sold zero of the\nmovie rights.\n\nI mean, there are certainly several of the books I'd pay a buck for to\nread on my mobile-device-of-choice. Spend a little on marketing to make\nsure that blogs that people read, like, say, BoingBoing, knew about\nit...I\nbet if you had buck-a-book ebooks, and got someone to announce it on\nBoingBoing, you'd get halfway to making your money back on the first\nday.\n\nAdam\n_______________________________________________" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gwern Branwen", "address": "gwern0 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-10T19:54:24+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Mon, Mar 7, 2011 at 11:27 AM, Gwern Branwen wrote:\nLinked in http://www.sfsignal.com/archives/2011/03/sf-tidbits-for-3311/\n\nAn ad (http://locusmag.com/2011/Ads/digitallafferty.jpg) for the\nLafferty copyrights\n(http://www.sfsite.com/news/2011/03/02/lafferty-estate-for-sale/).\n\nThis does explain why Wildside Press didn't have any Lafferty when I\nwent to buy some last year." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "A curious update:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=R._A._Lafferty&curidH245&diffA8162212&oldidA8161910" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "The Lafferty Estate has proposed to sell the literary rights to Lafferty's entire body of work to the Locus Science Fiction Foundation on May 1, 2011 for $70,000 plus a share of future profits, unless the bid is overturned by a better offer before then. Inquiries at LaffertyProbate at gmail.com." }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Different address than the ad, and note that none of my links mention\nanything about the Locus Science Fiction Foundation being the buyer\nwho submitted the 70k bid.\n\nOn a sidenote, the Wikipedia account goes back to 2006." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "gwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Gwern Branwen", "address": "gwern0 at gmail.com" }, "date": "2011-03-15T15:31:52+00:00", "subject": "(urth) OT: R.A. Lafferty estate sale", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "On Thu, Mar 10, 2011 at 2:54 PM, Gwern Branwen wrote:\nA curious update:\nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=R._A._Lafferty&curidH245&diffA8162212&oldidA8161910" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "The Lafferty Estate has proposed to sell the literary rights to Lafferty's entire body of work to the Locus Science Fiction Foundation on May 1, 2011 for $70,000 plus a share of future profits, unless the bid is overturned by a better offer before then. Inquiries at LaffertyProbate at gmail.com." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Different address than the ad, and note that none of my links mention\nanything about the Locus Science Fiction Foundation being the buyer\nwho submitted the 70k bid." }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "From http://www.mulle-kybernetik.com/RAL/messageboard/viewtopic.php?t–&p08#p308" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "I wanted to let you know that on May 1 the Lafferty Estate tentatively plans to sell the rights to the entire literary output of the science fiction writer, R.A. Lafferty, to the Locus Science Fiction Foundation for $70,000 plus 50% of any future profit from the Lafferty rights in excess of $30,000 in any single year. The sale will proceed unless someone makes a more favorable offer.\n\nIf you know of anyone who might be interested in purchasing the Lafferty literary works, please have them contact me at LaffertyEstate at gmail.com or 919-286-9519 and I will provide additional information to help them decide whether they would like to make a better offer before May 1.\n\nThis sale will include the rights to approximately 21 published and 13 unpublished novels, approximately 297 published and 96 unpublished short works such as short stories, essays and poems, approximately 8 published and 4 unpublished book-length collections of short works and approximately 24 published trade paperbacks or booklets. The complete description of the rights being offered for sale is contained in my \"Letter to Potential Bidders\", which I will provide upon request." }, { "kind": "sig", "depth": 0, "text": "gwern\nhttp://www.gwern.net" } ] } ] }