As both publishers and booksellers we get a lot of books (or to be frank, “books”) that people would like us either to publish or sell. The quality varies (understatement), but what I find most astonishing is that sometimes I open a book to find that it seems….familiar. There’s a fine line between “influenced by” and “flagrant breach of copyright”, and it’s one I obviously see differently to the person who sent me a near-perfect rendition of a Spike Milligan poem. Copyright has been a controversial issue in the sphere of printed books – the Ian McEwan debacle and the numerous Harry Potter trials spring to mind – but social media and self-publishing has knotted it into a morass of confusion.

People have written whole books on this subject, but it strikes me that a number of salient points seem clear:

1.       Whilst there is no copyright on ideas, as soon as you write something down, it’s yours, and no one else should be able to use it without permission;

2.       Unless someone else has already written it down, obviously;

3.       In which case: if you didn’t know that someone else had written it first, then tough, the copyright still isn’t yours;

4.       There are some exceptions, such as fair use;

5.       If you are going to send me a picture book with really, really ugly illustrations, at least make sure you aren’t sullying Spike Milligan’s poetry in the process.

The reaction to Judith Griggs and Cooks Source has been extraordinarily vitriolic and I think it’s partly because of the unspoken recognition that writing is both personal and powerful. I am neither a novelist nor poet, but even in this blog post I am writing down part of myself – this is what I think, and my writing testifies to that. No one else should be able to steal it, or twist my words into something I didn’t intend. Authors have spurred political movements; made and destroyed figureheads; put into words that feeling you have always had but never knew how to describe, and the law acknowledges their achievement, courage and right to be compensated when their work is reproduced by someone else. Copyright recognises that writing has value, and for that, I am grateful.

Since early February I have been organising the Scottish book launch for a new title by an award-winning and very popular author who writes books for teenagers. It’s going to be a schools event and when the publisher phoned us up to talk about it we were extremely excited. We were asked whether slightly less than three months would be too short a time to plan a large schools event and we said no, because what a great opportunity for teenagers readers to hear a high-profile, critically-acclaimed author talk about their new book (for free, by the way!). Surely any sane school would email me back before you could say “gold-plated extra-curricular activity”?

Well, you can see where this one is going. Granted, there are a few schools who have been great: they’ve replied promptly with enthusiasm with an awareness of that free author events are quite rare and are of educational value. However, the experience in general has left me frustrated, disillusioned and not a little angry. Firstly, getting past school secretaries seems to require the cunning of Frank Abagnale Jr. and the hurdling skills of Kriss Akabusi: why is not alright to give me a teacher’s work email address? They are – like me – at work. It does not give me access to children and when you cannot transfer me by phone I’m lacking in options. You may claim to be able to forward the email but past experience demonstrates that you will not.

When I’ve eventually made radio contact with teachers (“Houston..[crackle]…are you there?”) I’ve been taken aback with the ennui. Responses have included: “An event ending at 12 may not give the children time enough to get back for lunch” (the school is 30 mins away and they’re teenagers not four-year-olds), “the children only get back from their holidays on the Monday, so they may be too tired” (from what?) and “they’ve got a lot on that term”. This last may be true, but we’ve specifically invited the year before serious exams so as not to clash with that, and surely three hours out of one school day to enrich a child’s literary education is something no parent is going to object to.

There’s been a lot said about how children stop reading in their teenage years and after this adventure all I can say is no wonder when the people the people in charge of enthusing them are quite so laissez-faire about the whole matter. I know schools are judged on their exam results, but through sheer pride I would have thought they would also like to produce adults who are enthusiastic and life-long readers. I’m sure that they have enormous pressures with timetables and government targets, but I found it significant that some people were immediately thrilled and others I rang off the phone wondering whether I had to stand on the school field with a pointy stick and visual aid featuring Very Good Author as illustration. When I was seven, Humphrey Carpenter came to my school and did all the voices in his newest book. And I can remember today the laughter in my stomach – far better, in fact, than whatever lessons I had that day.

I made my own LOLcat: the only time bad grammar is funny...

In fact, someone could probably do an interesting anthropological study on the types of bookshop customers. For example:

1. Those who do not know the difference between a bookshop and a library: we don’t mind parents and children reading a few picture books to see which ones they like. We don’t even mind if they do that and come back a different day/week to buy one. We do mind when they a) read a pile of books bigger than their child, b) let him or her roughly bend the pages and make the books grubby and c) come in every single week and never buy anything.

2. The phone detectives: we have number of people calling to ask for book recommendations. Which we are more than happy to provide, but not when they use the phrase, “thanks, I can order that from Amazon now”. Amazon are cheaper for a reason: they don’t have shop overheads. We do.

3. Amazon listers: the same ilk as above, but who come in with a pen and paper. None of us came to bookselling by way of a turnip truck, yet they don’t seem to realise we know what they are doing!

4. Free stuff magpies: on our Birthday, we gave out balloons to all the children, and goody bags to children whose parent spent over £10. You would not believe the number of people aggressively demanding a goody bag (which included at least 4 free books, stickers, bookmarks, a whoopee cushion, pens, etc) when they had spent £1 on a bookmark. It’s obviously up everyone individually to decide how best to spend their own money, but it’s amazing the number of people who agonise over a £4.99 book for their child, when we see them spending £15 in Starbucks three times a week. 

5. Charity prize hunters with an air of entitlement: we are in a nexus of schools, nurseries, churches and universities. We are in general happy to give out prizes for raffles, tombolas, etc, not only because giving to charity is A Good Thing, but because we are part of the local community and should support community projects. However, there is a polite way and downright rude way to ask. For example, threatening to tell all your friends to “never, ever shop here” unless we give a good prize is most definitely a rude way.

As Vanessa mentioned in a previous post on the Fidra blog, we are knowledgeable: we are, in effect, a resource. People seem blissfully unaware we are a resource they will lose unless they are willing to spend money with us - they cheerfully write down titles then head off for their computer. I’d be willing to bet that if we didn’t exist they’d bemoan the lack of us, but wouldn’t twig the connection. Maybe it’s partly our fault – we need to market the value of what we offer better. But there does seem to be a culture – perhaps started by the ability to get a lot of things free online – of entitlement. The attitude that as long as someone does x or y, I don’t need to bother, I can reap the benefits anyway.

On the upside, we were talking only the other day about how we could all write a Black Books-style programme, but more about the customers than the staff. Frankly, the daily business of an indie bookshop could provide more than enough material…