Thousands of freelance writers are due to receive a total of more than $9 million as compensation for copyright infringement by electronic database, newspaper, and magazine publishers, including Dow Jones, The New York Times, and Knight Ridder.
You will remember that, after strong lobbying by the SoA, legislation to extend PLR to ebooks was finally passed last year. However we are concerned that the Government has not taken the necessary action to implement the change. An additional piece of secondary legislation needs to be passed, which the Government committed to completing by 1 July 2018, so that the first in arrears payments could be made by February 2020.
Writers, illustrators and translators earning less than £6205 per year can currently make voluntary payments of £2.95 a week towards the state pension and other contributory benefits, in the form of Class 2 NICs.
Every 26 April, the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) marks a day to raise awareness of the role that intellectual property rights play in encouraging creativity.
Today is the 5 year anniversary of the Defamation Act 2013 receiving royal assent.
The popular adult literacy campaign, Quick Reads, is due to be shut down after a fruitless 18-month search for a new sponsor.
The Society of Authors has responded to Arts Council England’s ‘conversation’ about its strategic direction for the next ten years. This is the first stage of ACE’s consultation on its future strategy, with a more formal call for evidence due later this year.
The Society of Authors is delighted to announce the shortlist for the 2018 Elizabeth Longford Prize for Historical Biography.
The SoA has exchanged contracts on current and new properties, with plans to move in March 2019.
We were pleased with the overall message conveyed in the report and appreciate the understanding on display of the vital role our creative industries play in the national economy. The Report says that the creative industries are ‘at the heart of the nation’s competitive advantage’.
You are warmly invited to stand, or to propose fellow members stand, for election to the Management Committee.
This year’s Sunday Times/EFG Short Story Award shortlist includes six Americans, five of them women, making it the first time the international prize has had an all-American shortlist and only the second time that women have featured so heavily on the list.
