<"Dream big, kids! Starts at two bucks a pop...>
<quickmemes.com>
<i.>
<quickmemes.com>
<i.>
Once upon a time in Rock 'n' Rollville, life moved at a straightforward clip. Bands played shows, "X number of sets for X dollars," for fees that the club owner or promoter adjusted up or down, depending on how drinks sold, and how many punters turned up. If you'd built up a big enough audience, and managed to put out a record or two, you might manage to wangle a guarantee out of the guy. (This being the '70s, it typically was a guy.) Or you might end up with a deal that guaranteed X amount of money upfront.
If your star was really hot, you could play two or three weekends a month, which might make enough -- after paying the band, booking agent/manager (if you'd landed one), and incidentals like food, gas, guitar strings -- to avoid working at the loading dock or the mall, God forbid. Theoretically, it meant your dream had enough legs to move up the ecosystem of small halls, then mid-sized theaters, maybe even arenas, who knows?
By the 1980s, though, a different business model slowly took hold, starting in the Los Angeles, CA area. Club owners and promoters began requiring bands to buy X number of tickets, to guarantee X number of attendees. Or it might mean paying (a hefty) X amount of dollars upfront to rent a venue, or enter some Battle of the Bands, for those hoping to work that angle.
No matter angle they worked, though, the powers that be pushing it made out. They covered all their costs. Hopefully, the musicians might sell enough tickets to make the arrangement pay off, before they'd earn a nickel from their night's work. These practices are commonly called "pay to play," which invokes a sports analogy, as its name suggests: Wanna get in the game, kid? Here's what it'll cost ya. What's it gonna be?
If your star was really hot, you could play two or three weekends a month, which might make enough -- after paying the band, booking agent/manager (if you'd landed one), and incidentals like food, gas, guitar strings -- to avoid working at the loading dock or the mall, God forbid. Theoretically, it meant your dream had enough legs to move up the ecosystem of small halls, then mid-sized theaters, maybe even arenas, who knows?
By the 1980s, though, a different business model slowly took hold, starting in the Los Angeles, CA area. Club owners and promoters began requiring bands to buy X number of tickets, to guarantee X number of attendees. Or it might mean paying (a hefty) X amount of dollars upfront to rent a venue, or enter some Battle of the Bands, for those hoping to work that angle.
No matter angle they worked, though, the powers that be pushing it made out. They covered all their costs. Hopefully, the musicians might sell enough tickets to make the arrangement pay off, before they'd earn a nickel from their night's work. These practices are commonly called "pay to play," which invokes a sports analogy, as its name suggests: Wanna get in the game, kid? Here's what it'll cost ya. What's it gonna be?
Just Say No...
<The Reckoner>
<ii.>
Nowadays, there are no shortage of pay to play schemes, and variations to capitalize on them. Search online, and you'll find everything from corporate-co-opted film and music festivals, where you pay to get considered for a shot at playing there, or showing your work. Much of this model focused on SonicBids, though its hipness quotient and relevance seems to have cooled off markedly, judging by the research that I've done.
Got a competitive spirit? There's plenty of film, literary or music-related contests, promising some moon shot or other -- a publication here, a $1,000 prize there -- once you fork over the relevant fee. Hoping to become the next Hans Zimmer? New platforms are popping up all the time to serve that fix. Just submit Tracks XYZ to Middlemouth ABC. If he or she finds a buyer, they get a cut. Everybody wins, right?
Think you're the next Bukowski in waiting? That's the focus of Submittable, which major and minor rags -- from the Harvard Review, to Playboy, Debt-Ridden U. Review, and beyond -- are using. Think of it as SonicBids for the literary set. Click the relevant listing, cut and paste your bio, contact details and submission into the box, shell out whatever "reading fee" they want. Hit "Send," and you're done.
Quick and painless, right? Beats pounding out your latest masterpiece on a typewriter -- for those who came of age in the pre-digital day -- and shelling out the postage, including self-addressed stamped envelope, and then (at last!) schlepping it off to the post office. But is it really?
I remember Writer's Market advising, back in the '80s, to submit at least 50 poems at any given time. If you check the Submission Fee Blacklist (see below), $2-5 seems the going rate (though some charge way more). At five poems per outlet, that's $10 to $25 a pop. When you consider that many journals pay only in copies, or a token amount -- as little as ten bucks, in some cases -- the deal stinks even higher to Heaven. Especially if submission fees become the new normal.
Got a competitive spirit? There's plenty of film, literary or music-related contests, promising some moon shot or other -- a publication here, a $1,000 prize there -- once you fork over the relevant fee. Hoping to become the next Hans Zimmer? New platforms are popping up all the time to serve that fix. Just submit Tracks XYZ to Middlemouth ABC. If he or she finds a buyer, they get a cut. Everybody wins, right?
Think you're the next Bukowski in waiting? That's the focus of Submittable, which major and minor rags -- from the Harvard Review, to Playboy, Debt-Ridden U. Review, and beyond -- are using. Think of it as SonicBids for the literary set. Click the relevant listing, cut and paste your bio, contact details and submission into the box, shell out whatever "reading fee" they want. Hit "Send," and you're done.
Quick and painless, right? Beats pounding out your latest masterpiece on a typewriter -- for those who came of age in the pre-digital day -- and shelling out the postage, including self-addressed stamped envelope, and then (at last!) schlepping it off to the post office. But is it really?
I remember Writer's Market advising, back in the '80s, to submit at least 50 poems at any given time. If you check the Submission Fee Blacklist (see below), $2-5 seems the going rate (though some charge way more). At five poems per outlet, that's $10 to $25 a pop. When you consider that many journals pay only in copies, or a token amount -- as little as ten bucks, in some cases -- the deal stinks even higher to Heaven. Especially if submission fees become the new normal.
<iii.>
So what's wrong with submission fees, exactly? Let's count the ways, shall we:
1. "We need them to keep people in check." Actually, I've seen the opposite happen, on the music side. Slapping fees on anything doesn't discourage the rich kid-fronted band -- or the hobbyist who's got a great corporate job -- from plugging away, when they really should throw in the towel.
They'll grumble, but they'll pony up the money, because that's what our reality show-driven culture teaches them, and us (Success trumps self-satisfaction). The mom juggling multiple jobs with the Great American Novel is less likely to peck away, especially if she's faced with constantly choosing creativity over food and medicine.
2. "We need them to keep our contest/festival/publication afloat." There are better business models out there than treating talent like a revenue stream -- such as GoFundMe, Kickstarter or Patreon, for openers. Those platforms have their issues, too, but appealing directly to a potential audience sounds better than joining pay to play culture, doesn't it? At least, I think so, anyhow.
1. "We need them to keep people in check." Actually, I've seen the opposite happen, on the music side. Slapping fees on anything doesn't discourage the rich kid-fronted band -- or the hobbyist who's got a great corporate job -- from plugging away, when they really should throw in the towel.
They'll grumble, but they'll pony up the money, because that's what our reality show-driven culture teaches them, and us (Success trumps self-satisfaction). The mom juggling multiple jobs with the Great American Novel is less likely to peck away, especially if she's faced with constantly choosing creativity over food and medicine.
2. "We need them to keep our contest/festival/publication afloat." There are better business models out there than treating talent like a revenue stream -- such as GoFundMe, Kickstarter or Patreon, for openers. Those platforms have their issues, too, but appealing directly to a potential audience sounds better than joining pay to play culture, doesn't it? At least, I think so, anyhow.
3. "We need them to raise credibility and professionalism." I might believe that one more, if everybody actually rushed to tell what us what they do with the money. All outlets, I feel, should disclose their acceptance rates. What percentage of those submissions make it off the slush pile? And if they split those fees with somebody, they should come clean there, too. That way, if you still plunk down the money, you're at least making an informed decision, not just pissing in the dark.
4. "We need them to reduce the slush pile." A lot of editors fall back on this chestnut as their "get out clause." But the slush pile is usually the last rock that anybody turns. Most filmmakers, musicians or writers with any kind of profile often got there via the side door -- as in, a connection or relationship with so-and-so, that enabled them to bypass the fees, and the plebs who pay them.
And honestly, most gatekeepers aren't exactly toiling at the salt mines. I learned this lesson back in the '90s, after submitting a proposal on a friend's behalf to some cooler-than-thou-indie-or-other (think: bastard son of Loompanics). When it came back, I could see the decision maker's thumb and forefinger imprinted firmly in our pitch letter. There were no imprints anywhere else in our proposal. Such is life.
And honestly, most gatekeepers aren't exactly toiling at the salt mines. I learned this lesson back in the '90s, after submitting a proposal on a friend's behalf to some cooler-than-thou-indie-or-other (think: bastard son of Loompanics). When it came back, I could see the decision maker's thumb and forefinger imprinted firmly in our pitch letter. There were no imprints anywhere else in our proposal. Such is life.
<iv.>
I've had mixed experiences, at best, in the play to pay arena. As I've documented in the "Jobs To Nowhere" series, I played overseas in a band, and we actually made that system work -- to some degree -- by vigorously pushing our co-workers, significant others, and whoever else we could round up at our gigs. On the other hand, I've rolled the dice on a couple of tries in the Submittable pond, without any returns.
Those scenarios fall under pay to play culture, which means that you're never in charge of your own destiny, because the ball is always in someone else's court -- in this case, somebody who ruled out sharing the proceeds with you, at least initially (and only if they like you). Somebody who can stack the deck as they please, without having to tell you how they cut the cards. And somebody who doesn't have to tell you where the wealth is actually going.
"But wait," I hear you say. "What's the problem? Submission fees are just a means to an end." Just remember, though: once the "new normal" takes hold, it doesn't take long to get seriously abnormal. As Atlantic notes in its article, the indie mags that hoped Submittable would remain free -- as its founders initially promised -- are now pondering fees just so they can afford to use it. (The resident wise guy is tempted to jibe: "You've heard of email, right? It's free.")
And that's my biggest problem. Pay to play culture is corporate culture, with all the baggage that implies. By nature, it can't coexist with DIY culture, which has no use for fees, let alone the gatekeeping systems that become addicted to them. To ignore it is to allow the long term devaluation of our work, and the swapping of creativity for convenience and corporate control. Still, it's never too late to draw your own conclusions, as one of my friends wryly about writing contests: "I stopped doing them when I realized that the favored local writer always seemed to win." --The Reckoner
Links To Go (Hurry, Hurry,
Before The Cost Of Your Dream Shoots Up):
Fear-Free-Film Fundraising Blog:
http://fearfreefilmfundraising.com/2014/05/fees-chumps-dont-pay-hit-submit/
Lit Reactor: Publishing: Submission Fees:
https://litreactor.com/discuss/submission-fees
Medium.com:
Why I Don't Use Pay-to-Submit Music Sites:
https://medium.com/@GoGirlsMusic/why-i-dont-use-pay-to-submit-music-sites-and-5-better-ways-to-invest-in-your-career-47eaa3aa2dcc
Tech Crunch: Submission Management Startup
Submittable Raises $5 Million:
https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/13/submittable-series-a/
Tech Crunch: YC-Backed Submittable
Makes It Easy For Writers To Manage Submissions:
https://techcrunch.com/2012/06/18/submittable/
The Atlantic Monthly: Should Literary Journals
https://litreactor.com/discuss/submission-fees
Medium.com:
Why I Don't Use Pay-to-Submit Music Sites:
https://medium.com/@GoGirlsMusic/why-i-dont-use-pay-to-submit-music-sites-and-5-better-ways-to-invest-in-your-career-47eaa3aa2dcc
Tech Crunch: Submission Management Startup
Submittable Raises $5 Million:
https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/13/submittable-series-a/
Tech Crunch: YC-Backed Submittable
Makes It Easy For Writers To Manage Submissions:
https://techcrunch.com/2012/06/18/submittable/
The Atlantic Monthly: Should Literary Journals
Charge Fees For Their Submissions?:
https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/10/why-writers-are-paying-to-get-published/411274/
https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2015/10/why-writers-are-paying-to-get-published/411274/
The Submission Fee Blacklist:
https://englishkillsreview.tumblr.com/post/102013807776/the-submission-fee-blacklist
Wikipedia.com: Pay to Play:
https://medium.com/@GoGirlsMusic/why-i-dont-use-pay-to-submit-music-sites-and-5-better-ways-to-invest-in-your-career-47eaa3aa2dcc
https://englishkillsreview.tumblr.com/post/102013807776/the-submission-fee-blacklist
Wikipedia.com: Pay to Play:
https://medium.com/@GoGirlsMusic/why-i-dont-use-pay-to-submit-music-sites-and-5-better-ways-to-invest-in-your-career-47eaa3aa2dcc
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