Quote Originally Posted by Mad Lews
Just a question that might be plaguing some of us " Not ready for prime time writers", When we post stories on sites such as this one, Literotica, and similar places are we giving up our " intellectual property" and how would it effect latter use of revised, expanded, and edited copies of such stories. Any insight from the experienced writers would be appreciated

Mad Lews
Mad Lews, excellent questions.

Are you giving up your intellectual property by posting it to sites for "free"?
No. However, please, please, please, put copyright information on your work.

Copyright (c) 2005 Your Name or the Name of your Pub House. All rights reserved.

For example:
Copyright (c) 2005 Spice and Sugar Publications. All rights reserved.
or
Copyright (c) 2005 Ruby Bloodstone. All rights reserved.

This is your claim of ownership and creates a legal trail that can be followed.

How does it effect latter use of revised, expanded, and edited copies of such stories when they are placed on site like Literotica or the BDSM Library?

It affects the potential sales price and ability to publish.

Many publishers will not publish work that has been given away for free.
Many on-line book stores will not sell books that were previously given away for free.

But it's not the same book? Honest!

Okay - great. Then make sure all previous copies have been removed from free sites. Ensure that the work is substantially better, revised, enhanced, etc. from what you placed out there before.

Jaeangel's work Hell to Heaven is a great example of this.
She took down the free story, did a complete editing refresh and
added new chapters. Afterwards, she sent it out for another edit from her publisher. Then the publisher packaged it for sale.
(I know, because we share the same publisher.)

A good rule of thumb is to not post more than 3 chapters of any full length novel that you plan to publish. Many book sellers will decline to sell a book if they find the book on the web for free and more than 3 chapters available. In fact, many prefer to limit you to two chapters.

Who will read and critique my book/story while it's in progress?

Hopefully a group of people that you can trust. Both Alura and I use www.writing.com, but we use it in different ways. She can comment how she gets story feedback.

I post mostly finished work. She posts work in progress. Since you have control of your account, you can lock it so only select people can read what you've posted and you can remove your material at any time.

Other writers, publishers, editors out there - Comments? Suggestions? We'd like to hear from you. Who's next?