THE CAREER NOVELIST
It is possible that someday the law will be revised to disallow cer-
tain of the more abusive forms of work-for-hire contracts. Indeed, an
attempt was made in Congress in 1993 to strike the work-for-hire
provisions from the copyright law. (The effort died when the con-
gressional term ended.) The next year Senator Thad Cochran of
Mississippi tried to reform the work-for-hire provisions to curb
specific abuses. For example, magazines might demand work-for-
hire status for articles after they had been written, often with a waiv-
er stamped on the back of the writer's check exactly where the writer
would endorse it.
Reform is certainly needed, but on what legal basis will it be
built? One remote possibility is a concept in European law called
droit moral, meaning "moral right." Droit moral says that authors have
the right to be credited as creators of their work (or not, at their
election), and further, that they have the right to prevent work from
being altered in ways that compromise its artistic integrity. Moral
rights are weak under American law, but the concept gained some
strength when the U.S. in 1988 became a signatory to the Berne
Convention, an international copyright treaty. True reform, though,
is still in the future.
Naturally, as weak as it is, packagers have noticed droit moral, and
so you will find in nearly all work-for-hire contracts language in
which the author waives all her possible rights and future claims to
her work, including droit moral. Once signed, such agreements will be
impossible to break no matter what Congress may do.
Should authors fight the terms of work-for-hire contracts? Should
they insist, for example, that the copyright transfer to them after a
certain period of time?
That depends. In most cases, packagers simply will not agree to
let writers keep copyright control. Why should they? Too many
authors are willing to sell it. The project may also involve licensors
or others who have their own interests to protect. Disney would be
foolish to cede any control of its character Mickey Mouse, for
instance. However, in cases where an author's novel is wholly origi-
nal to the author, and is merely being included in a product line
trademarked to the packager or publisher—certain romance
imprints have fallen into this category—then it is entirely reason-