Business and Legal Forms for Authors and Self-Publishers (Business & Legal Forms for Authors & Self-Publishers) [Paperback]

Tad Crawford (Author)

Book Description

Series: Business & Legal Forms for Authors & Self-Publishers | Publication Date: December 1, 1999

Professional and aspiring writers will find indispensable tools in this practical, complete, and time-saving popular resource, now updated to include a CD-ROM.

Twenty essential forms include estimates, invoices, releases, copyright applications, and licenses covering authors' and self-publishers' every need, plus contracts between author and agent, publisher, designer, printer, sales representative, book distributor, and more. The collection provides a second set of forms perforated for easy removal, leaving the book intact for ongoing reference, and a CD-ROM contains the forms in Adobe Acrobat and the most popular word-processing formats for both PC and Mac platforms.

Tad Crawford, an attorney, publisher, and author of many successful guides to assist artists in managing their careers, lives in New York.

Editorial Reviews

Review

A handy guide offering advice on how to negotiate and how to contact volunteer lawyers for the arts -- Library Journal

A helpful compilation of basic forms and tear-out forms for actual use, plus an intelligent index. This is a very useful addition to the professional writer's library -- ASJA Newsletter

An all-in-one handy book, authors and self-publishers will find every contract and business form they'll need at every step of the writing/publishing process -- The Pulse

Business and Legal Forms for Authors and Self-publishers by Tad Crawford is an indispensable reference that contains samples of every kind of contract and business form you may ever need. Accompanying this material is some no-nonsense advice about how to negotiate winning contracts, use the forms to your advantage, and generally make the best deals possible -- The Weigand Report

If you're mystifies by contracts, estimates, expense reports, and the myriad other forms and agreements that keep cropping up in your writing career, you may want to get the revised Business and Legal Forms for Authors and Self-publishers, by Tad Crawford. This 191-page book could save you time and keep you from having to learn firsthand some unpleasant lessons -- Writer's Connection

Provides important details not to be found elsewhere. An important success kit' of practical examples -- Reviewer's Bookwatch

Revised edition of a reference we've referred to often to assist with Hotline questions -- Freelance Writer's Report

This book is a value. Not a legal treatise or a panacea but a solid, capable job. The forms are written in legal style without being filled with jargon -- The Editorial Eye --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Tad Crawford, Publisher for Allworth Press in New York City, graduated from Columbia Law School, clerked on New York State’s highest court, and served as general counsel for the Graphic Artists Guild when he practiced as an attorney. He originated the course titled “Law and the Visual Artist” at the School of Visual Arts and wrote Legal Guide for the Visual Artist (now in its fifth edition) to serve as the text. He is the author or coauthor of more than a dozen books, including Starting Your Career as a Freelance Photographer, The Graphic Design Business Book, Business and Legal Forms for Fine Artists, and Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers. He lives in New York City. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 192 pages
• Publisher: Allworth Press; Revised edition (December 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1581150393
• ISBN-13: 978-1581150391
• Product Dimensions: 11 x 8.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,093,458 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Allworth Press publisher and founder Tad Crawford is an author, attorney, and artists' rights advocate.

Born in New York City, Crawford grew up in the artists colony of Woodstock, New York. Interested in writing both fiction and nonfiction, he majored in economics at Tufts College and graduated from Columbia Law School in February 1971. ("That explains the unusual amalgam of my activities," Crawford says. "A lot of legal skills are crucial for helping the artist and for running a publishing company. Of course, writing is an excellent background for publishing. So it's come together very well.")

Crawford clerked for a judge of the New York Court of Appeals, the state's highest court, then went to work for a small general law firm in New York City while writing and teaching writing and literature at the School of Visual Arts. Until he took the teaching assignment at the School of Visual Arts and learned of the need for materials to help artists understand their rights, he had not envisioned being an advocate of artists' rights.

"I found nothing in print to help artists deal with such legal matters as copyrights, contracts, income taxes, the 'hobby loss' problem, estate planning, or even how to get grants," recalls Crawford. And so, responding to what he saw as "an extreme need," he wrote a book dealing with those and other relevant issues, titling it Legal Guide for the Visual Artist and using it as a text for the "Law and the Visual Artist" course that he taught at the School of Visual Arts. Published in 1977, Legal Guide for the Visual Artist is now in its fourth edition and has one hundred thousand copies in print.

He followed this with The Writer's Legal Guide in 1978 (which has been updated and reissued with The Authors Guild as co-publisher and Kay Murray, the General Counsel for the Authors Guild, as co-author). With Arie Kopelman he wrote Selling Your Photography in 1980 and Selling Your Graphic Design and Illustration in 1981. At the same time Crawford served as Chairman of the Board for the Foundation for the Community of Artists, legislative counsel for the Copyright Justice Coalition (which had many arts groups as members), and general counsel for the Graphic Artists Guild. In 1982 Crawford was asked to help publish books for some of the organizations that he had represented as an attorney. In response, he became publisher of Madison Square Press, which issued annuals for such artists'organizations as the Society of Illustrators, the Society of Publication Designers, the Art Directors Club of New York, and the Art Directors Club of Los Angeles.

In 1988 he decided to strike out in a new direction, "to create a press that would offer the kind of information that was more like what I had taught, written about, and lobbied for." Crawford saw the need for a publishing company that would provide practical information to creative professionals, such as artists, photographers, designers, and authors. He knew first hand the issues faced every day by such creative people and could envision a spectrum of books to help them survive and prosper professionally.

In the Fall of 1989, Crawford published Allworth Press's first book, a revised edition of his classic Legal Guide for the Visual Artist. Ten more titles followed in 1990, offering information about marketing, promotion, pricing, copyright, contracts, health and safety, and much more. The first edition of Business and Legal Forms for Photographers was published in 1991. "The information in these books,"Crawford says, "can make all the difference in terms of success and prosperity." Today Allworth Press has a backlist of more than 250 books, publishes 12-15 books annually, and employs a staff of six very talented people.

Crawford's last involvement as an active lobbyist was in 1986, and he's given up active practice of the law to devote his energies to his publishing and his writing. The full list of books that he has authored follows:

AIGA Professional Practices in Graphic Design (editor)
The Artist-Gallery Partnership (with Susan Mellon)
Business and Legal Forms for Crafts
Business and Legal Forms for Fine Artists
Business and Legal Forms for Graphic Designers (with Eva Doman Bruck)
Business and Legal Forms for Illustrators
Business and Legal Forms for Interior Designers (with Eva Doman Bruck)
Business and Legal Forms for Industrial Designers (with Eva Doman Bruck and Carl W. Battle)
Business and Legal Forms for Photographers
Legal Guide for the Visual Artist
The Money Mentor
The Secret Life of Money
Selling Your Photography (with Arie Kopelman)
Selling Your Graphic Design and Illustration (with Arie Kopelman)
Starting Your Career as a Freelance Photographer
The Writer's Legal Guide (with Kay Murray)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Fill-in Test?, October 2, 2000

By 

Dan Poynter "Author-Publisher-Speaker" (Santa Barbara, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Business and Legal Forms for Authors and Self-Publishers (Business & Legal Forms for Authors & Self-Publishers) (Paperback)

The most difficult part of filling-in forms is understanding the questions. Attorney Tad Crawford not only provides the forms you need, he explains your choices for each line. He begins with a discussion of contracting. Then he provides each contract with a discussion of that agreement and a negotiation checklist.

As an author and a publisher, who has run his own business for over 30 years, I highly recommend this valuable book. [e-mail].

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An invaluable resource for authors and self-publishers., May 3, 2000

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Business and Legal Forms for Authors and Self-Publishers (Business & Legal Forms for Authors & Self-Publishers) (Paperback)

Tad Crawford's instruction manual, Business and Legal Forms for Authors and Self-Publishers, provides over twenty blank forms and clear checklists and explanations for their use, appearing in a revised edition and including the forms on a handy cd-rom. The sample contracts are particularly useful in this business guide.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Easy to use, espec. with CD, February 2, 2003

By 

Kat Spring "BookKat" (CO United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Business and Legal Forms for Authors and Self-Publishers (Business & Legal Forms for Authors & Self-Publishers) (Paperback)

This has all the basic forms you need. I had them on the CD and was able to "fix" them up to fit my needs more precisely. It was quick and user friendly. When you give a person a contract to sign, you want it to look professional. When done, I removed everything from my computer, and thereby, didn't use up memory.