You guys are really looking for something that isn't there and using me a symbol for every person who dismissed your career as a writer.
Damn it, I'd start the drinking game, but it's too early in the morning and I'd have alcohol poisoning within the hour.
No one's ever dismissed my career as a writer. You're not a symbol for anything. However, there are many, many people out there on ye olde internets who are looking to pay writers little or nothing for their work. Some of them are just starting out themselves. Some of them don't know much about whatever business they're in. And some of them are actively looking to screw over the writers.
I do not think you're in the last category, by the way. However, I think your model for "paying" writers is very flawed. I spend a lot of time reading
Writer Beware and the "Bewares and Background Checks" forum at
Absolute Write. Plenty of what you're suggesting raises red flags for me, especially in matters of fair pay and copyright.
I came here looking for advice specifically because I wanted a professional writer and I wanted to offer a professional deal.
Then act like a professional. When people balk at your suggested payment model,
listen to why they're leery of it. It's good that you're now considering an up-front payment. That's progress. However, you still admit that half-ownership may still very well result in no profits for the writer. The artist gets their full payment and it doesn't matter whether the comic succeeds or fails. The writer, however, takes the fall if the comic fails. How is that fair?
I never said writing was easy. I was just talking about time.
From your second post:
comic script writing is a pretty light work
and from your fourth:
It takes two hours to write 3 to 4 pages of comics. I know because I write 4 comics currently and I can crank out a page of script for each one in the time I get up before work.
That's how much time it takes
you to write 3 to 4 pages of comics. And, yes, "cranking out a page of script" certainly comes off as "writing is easy."
It is very difficult to do well.
Hooray! Yes! It is! Which means it takes
time. Writing isn't just scratching some words on paper and calling it done. Good, quality writing is going to take some editing and revising, and a lot longer than a half hour per page.
However this difficult task still does not take as long on a page by page basis as the equally difficult task of the art. Because comics have a time dimension the writing which would fill one prose page is usually spread over 10 or so comic pages. The writing, while still very difficult, has been spread out.
So you have two professional doing very difficult tasks on a creative work but one of these professional has to spend 20 times longer on each page. Logic sort of says that the professional that is spending more time on the work should get paid more. Unless your are suggestion that writing is MORE difficult than art and I find that insulting to the artist.
Er, no. You're talking two different mediums here, even though they're combining to make one tasty comic. Writing and drawing are two very different things, two different skill sets. I'm not refuting the part where the artist might spend more drawing and inking and coloring than the writer spends writing. That
still doesn't make it fair to pay the writer in pennies and promises while the artist gets real-world money.
At no time was I asking anyone to do it for free. I tried to be very upfront about the questionable profits on this endeavor, but I did offer ownership of a comic. You would get something in return for your work; an illustrated comic that costs $1000+ to produce. I think comics are fun and every day I pay to have someone make pretty pictures to go with my words. I have never made a dime off of my webcomics and I never expect to. I just like having my own comic and invest time and money to get that. I think there is a value in having images go with your words and making your work more accessible. I really did think I was offer something of pretty high value.
And if the webcomic makes no money, and fails after the first year -- a possibility you yourself stress -- the writer has... nothing (do I need to channel Jayne again?) Yes, they have an illustrated comic for which they wrote. They get to, what, to look at it on a website if you leave the domain up? Stick it in their portfolio?
At the end of the year, the artist has still been paid and the writer still has not.Another question: what can the writer do with half-ownership of a failed webcomic? I'm not being snarky here; I genuinely don't know what the benefit is. What if he or she would like to take that story arc and turn it into a novel? Do you have some kind of claim on the sale of that novel, with your half-ownership of the webcomic? What rights to their words do your writers retain? What rights to their words are you claiming?
Now just in case my "tone" is still wrong let me say this: Writing is hard. Writers should be compensated for their work. Writers are professionals. Writing is a noble art forum.
Is that good enough now?
Depends on whether you're being sarcastic or not.
Anyway $100 for 300 words.
That was what Scattercat found with some quick research on average pay for comic scripts. It's pretty much what I found, too. Sure, it might be what writers at Marvel and DC are getting, and there's going to be a difference in payscale between big huge comic book companies and fledgling webcomics, but it's still payment up front, not "have some shiny beads, then we'll talk in a year."
It taking 1.6 minutes per word to write a comic script.
Hey, you know, it might. Again, it's not just a matter of slapping some words down on paper and calling it good. Writing means planning and editing, revising and re-revising. So the actual process of typing out 300 words might take a half hour, but tweaking those words to make the best script possible might take more than the half hour you allot to it.
That competitive rates of 1.5 cents per word (I did goof and say 1.5 cents per page but that was a typo) and 3 cents per word are not acceptable because I didn't have the right tone. This stuff kind of impresses me as a bit crazy, sorry if you are insulted by that but it does. The fact that no one is willing to back down on these point really did make me feel like I wandered into a mad house.
It's not unacceptable because of your tone. It's unacceptable because that's not what you initially offered. 1.5 to 3 cents would be considered semi-pro rates if you're submitting a short story. 5 cents per word and up is the standard minimum rate for professional pay. (And, again to clarify: EA's 1.5 cents/word is, as Anarkey stated, aimed at the
reprint market, which means ideally the writers have received 5 cents/word already elsewhere.)
Not being a webcomic writer, I'd say 1.5 to 3 cents a word for a webcomic just starting out sounds fair.
Sounds. But again, I don't write for webcomics.
Something else to consider: you talk about paying per word, but then discuss the amount of
time the artists spend drawing. Those really aren't the same thing. I'd suggest you pick one: if you're paying the artist per page of artwork, pay the writer per word. If your artists are billing you an hourly rate, let your writers do the same, and pay them both a
fair hourly wage.
But pay them both up front, and don't let either of their payments hinge on where the comic is in a year and how much it's bringing in.
Seeing that advice will not be forthcoming (except of the slight bizarre pay $100 for 300 words)
Actually, advice is
all over thread. You're choosing to stuff your fingers in your ears and shout LALALALA rather than processing it. Take a step back. Breathe. You asked what we'd consider professional. We answered. It's there, if you can stop being offended and see it.
and that I have become the strawman of this thread I guess it's best I just cut my loses at this point. Best of luck in your writing careers.
Oh man, "everyone's being meeeean to me" AND a flounce. Drink twice!
When you come out with guns blazing, people are going to shoot back. However, there's also a lot of calm, rational discussion here, and I'd bet you could glean a lot of good stuff from it.