NWU member Calvin Ramsey staged a reading of his latest play Damaged Virtues, November 28 at Harlem’s National Black Theater. Based on a true story about J. Marion Sims, a 19th-century physician, the drama explored the doctor’s sadistic penchant for performing experimental gynecological surgery on enslaved women. Despite the pain and suffering he visited upon them, […]
Archives for November 2017
How High Must Prospective Employees Jump?
I wrote an article in 1998 about questionable “tests” employers were requesting of prospective employees. I was asked, under the guise of recruitment, to produce feature-length articles, conference proposals, health columns, and a 38-page editing “test;” all of it live work. Almost 20 years later, these exploitive practices are still occurring. Over the past year […]
French Law Favoring Publishers Repealed
The French government earlier this year repealed a terrible law giving the country’s publishers the “right” to issue or license new editions of “out of print” books and pocket the revenues. The law, which was overturned last June, allowed print publishers to profit from these newly issued digital editions, regardless of the availability of previous versions of […]
NWU Endorses U.S. Copyright Reform Bills
The NWU has endorsed two bipartisan proposals introduced in the current Congress for reform of U.S. copyright law. Neither of these proposed laws would adequately address the fundamental problems for writers with current copyright law, but each of them would be a step in the right direction. One of these bills, H.R. 3495, would create […]
DONATING BOOKS TO SCHOOL AND PUBLIC LIBRARIES HIT BY VIOLENT WEATHER AND FIRES
If you’re a member of the National Writers Union you probably love books as much as I do…and have probably done so all your life. Currently I’m concerned about US libraries and schools that have been struck by violent weather and fires…perhaps the National Writers Union could spear head a movement to donate books to […]
U.S. Copyright Office Ends Push for ECL for Mass Digitization
In a victory for the National Writers Union and allied writers, the U.S. Copyright Office has closed out its two-year-old study of “Extended Collective Licensing” (ECL) as a legal framework for mass digitization by deciding not to recommend that Congress enact any such law.
Growing Coalition of Writers Renews Call for Reform of Copyright Registration
Back in January of 2017, the National Writers Union was joined by three other national organizations of writers in a variety of genres, media, and formats –– the American Society of Journalists and Authors (ASJA), Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), and Horror Writers Association (HWA) — in a formal Petition for Rulemaking asking […]
NWU Welcomes Guangzhou Cultural Delegation to NYC
On November 17, NWU hosted six members from a Guangzhou Chinese Cultural Delegation in New York City. The delegation included Wu Dongsheng, Liu Shengqing and Li Xueli from the Guangzhou Federataion of Literary and Art Circles, Goa Heping from the Federation of Trade Unions of Guangzhou, Fang Tu, Dean of the Guangzhou Art Academy and […]
Brothers of Another Union
Yusef Salaam, Co-Chairman of the NYC Steering Committee of the National Writers Union, and Andy Schwartz, Recording Vice President of the Associated Musicians of Greater New York, pose for a meet and greet photo at the November 2nd Jewish Labor Committee’s 2017 Human Rights Award Dinner at the Sheraton New York Times Square Hotel. Dennis Williams, […]
Rally to Support Writers Fired at DNAinfo and Gothamist
NEW YORK, NY (November 6, 2017) – “We come not to mourn, but to organize.” That’s how Writers Guild of America East (WGAE) Executive Director, Lowell Peterson kicked off today’s rally in support of DNAinfo and Gothamist writers who were fired after voting to join the union. Right-wing billionaire-owner Joe Ricketts announced that he was shutting down […]
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