FanLib contests and author's rights

[tikatu]

Crossposting from FanNation's forums.

This is for my fellow FanLibbers mostly, but anyone can weigh in on it.

Someone is researching author's rights after a contest, and they're interested in what happened to the stories that were part of FanLib's contests like KvP. Did you lose your rights to your story if you didn't make the cut? For other contests, did you retain your rights to post the story you wrote elsewhere? I'm not talking about the member contests, but the official tie-in contests, like with Weeds and Dexter.

Reason is that Britney Spears's label is running a fanfiction contest, and the rules are - to my mind anyway - pretty scary. All entries are considered "work for hire" and not only do the authors lose all rights to their stories, they also lose their rights to privacy. Someone is writing a blog entry about it, and wanted to know some details.

Please reply ASAP, either here or by email.

Thanks!

Comments

[astridv.livejournal.com]

My opinion as a freelance artist: run like hell whenever you hear the words "work for hire". I'd need more details to say whether participating in this case would be worth it - if the prices are breathtaking, it might be - but these rules sounds rather prohibitive.

(btw, I'd be interested in reading this blog entry when it's done; a link would be much appreciated. :)