Ask a Contracts Expert
Great news: Contracts expert Erik Sherman has offered to answer Renegade Writers’ contract questions here on the blog!
Erik Sherman is an award-winning writer who has written for such publications as the New York Times Magazine, Newsweek, Fortune, Inc, US News & World Report, USA Weekend, Saveur, Advertising Age, Newsweek Japan, the Financial Times, the American Journalism Review, the Columbia Journalism Review, and Continental. Mr. Sherman is also the author or co-author of seven books.
He’s a member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors and Investigative Reporters and Editors. He served five years as chair of the ASJA Contract Committee and has been asked to speak on the business of freelance writing to such groups as ASJA, the National Association of Science Writers, the Society of Professional Journalists, and the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism.
Mr. Sherman also teaches a six-week online course in understanding contracts, which addresses copyright basics, typical contract problems and how to fix them, and more.
If you have a question about writer contracts, please send them to questions [at] therenegadewriter [dot] com by Friday, May 4, 2007. I’ll send them to Erik Sherman and he’ll answer the ones he feels are the most helpful to the greatest number of writers. [lf]
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I must admit I’m a bit intimidated by the idea that a six-week course is required to explain contracts! Just shows you how complicated those things can be!
I did it once before in four weeks, but it was too much packed into too short a time. The rason it’s that long is that you need to learn some specialized language – legalize – as well as underlying concepts and then methods for breaking down contracts and reading them. A list of “things to look for” only works so long as what pops up matches those examples. But things change too rapidly, so you need more flexibility.