3 ms·
> The age of the rich celebrity authors like Isaac Asimov or Ernest Hemingway ended decades ago J. K. Rowling and George R. R. Martin are two well-known counte
by Zak 5y ago
> The age of the rich celebrity authors like Isaac Asimov or Ernest Hemingway ended decades ago
J. K. Rowling and George R. R. Martin are two well-known counterexamples. You'll likely counter that much of their wealth came from movies and TV, and while that's partly true, they only got those deals due to the success of their books.
I agree that aspects of traditional copyright law don't mesh well with modern technology, and that academic/scientific publishers are parasites, but I'm not convinced the concept has outlived its usefulness.
- kragen 5y agoI don't think that even the few rich authors kicking around nowadays enjoy the same kind of celebrity status that Hemingway did. His memorial monument has a bronze statue of his head on top of a column next to a reflecting pool, and the NYT devoted a 22-paragraph article to the news of his death: https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/99/07/04/specials/hemingway-services.html https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/99/07/04/s... https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-hemingway-memorial https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/the-hemingway-memorial Today, 60 years later, people write articles about going to visit it. I don't think anyone is going to build a monument to George R. R. Martin five years after his death.