16.12.20
2020 The Final Edit
This year has been tumultuous and challenging in so many ways, but it has also been an opportunity for us to come together as a community, find new ways to connect, and reimagine our future. Throughout it all the ASA has been working hard to support Australian writers and illustrators. We swiftly pivoted to digital events programming, and stepped up our advocacy campaigns to fight for positive change on your behalf.
Here are the 2020 numbers at a glance:
And…
4.5 FTEs ASA staff members (full-time equivalents)
ADVOCACY
RESPONSE TO COVID-19
In May 2020, we made a submission on Australia’s response to COVID-19 to the Senate Select Committee on COVID-19. We explained to Government that authors and illustrators were experiencing an immediate loss of income from cancelled appearances at schools, libraries and festivals; cancelled promotional tours and launches; cancelled or deferred workshops through the State and Territory Writers Centres (a significant employer of writers through their workshops); and the evaporation of casual work as teachers in schools and some universities which many authors use to supplement their income.
We also forecast that the fallout from COVID-19 for writers and illustrators would be slow and long, in contrast to the Government income assistance which is temporary.
In April, with the generous support of Nielsen Book Australia we arranged for ASA members to receive one-off reports on book sales, including a year to year comparison 2019 vs 2020, free of charge. This data was intended to assist members who are sole traders apply for JobKeeper support.
In October, we conducted the only national survey in Australia on the impact of COVID-19 on author earnings. There were 1,414 respondents to the survey in total, and these results were used to support our submission to the Federal Inquiry into the Creative and Cultural Industries which details the challenges authors face to earn a living in Australia, and makes recommendations to improve the sustainability of writing careers.
DIGITAL LENDING RIGHTS
For several years we have been in communication with the Office for the Arts, putting the case for an expansion of the PLR/ELR payment schemes to digital formats. This year the ASA has increased pressure on the Government to make this expansion a priority.
At a time when borrowing of ebooks and audiobooks is rapidly increasing, it makes no sense for an author or illustrator to receive PLR/ELR payments for a physical book, but nothing if the same book is loaned in digital format. Given that COVID-19 has resulted in substantially increased ebook and audiobook borrowing, the case for digital lending rights is compelling.
We wrote to the Minister for the Arts, Paul Fletcher, in April requesting for this issue to be made a priority, and received a response indicating the Government would only commit to monitoring the situation, with no timeline for change. We called on our members to join our campaign, and contact their local MPs, we included details of this expansion in our Submission to the Federal Inquiry into the Creative and Cultural Industries and will continue to ramp up campaign efforts in the coming year.
PIRACY
Piracy has continued to be an issue in 2020, with ebook piracy and website scams such as the Internet Archive’s ‘National Emergency Library’, which used the pandemic as a justification for making millions of copyright protected books freely available online without restriction. We condemned the ‘National Emergency Library’ and co-signed an Authors Guild letter calling for it to be shut down. A copyright infringement lawsuit was subsequently filed against the Internet Archive in the US, and we will keep our members updated on any developments.
COPYRIGHT REFORM
In August, the Minister for the Arts announced copyright access reforms which purport to conclude the Government’s response to copyright recommendations in the Productivity Commission’s 2016 Intellectual Property Arrangements report.
In the ASA’s view, these recommendations go considerably further than consultations that have taken place over the last two years, and we were most concerned about the proposed education exceptions which would undermine the operation of the educational statutory licence and substantially reduce the licence fees payable to Copyright Agency for distribution to publishers, authors, and illustrators. In roundtable discussions held this week, the ASA objected strongly to this reform, while supporting other reforms such as the introduction of a limited liability scheme for orphan works.
ASA EVENTS AND PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
Due to social-distancing restrictions, the great majority of our events were held online this year, making our professional development program more accessible than ever before!
Our 2020 program included new Talking Strategies seminars on branding and public speaking, Pitch Perfect sessions, a Money Matters workshop, and the enormously successful Authors Online free series instructing authors on how to pivot to online school, library and festival appearances. Workshop presenters throughout the year have included: Matthew Reilly, Vicki Laveau-Harvie, Isobelle Carmody, Kathryn Heyman, Martyn Waites, Nadine Davidoff, Erica Wagner, Dr. Emily Booth and many more. Our sincere thanks to all of our brilliant presenters.
Our Literary Speed Dating events in 2020 also went entirely virtual, with 47 publishers and agents attending, and 835 pitches by members across two separate events. From all of these pitches 45% of authors received an expression of interest from publishers/agents! Our participants joined us on Zoom from all over Australia, and even from Germany and Greece.
This year, 25 writers were granted a total of 30 hours of mentoring through the ASA/CA Award Mentorship Program, and 40 writers undertook mentoring ranging from 3 hours for the first 10 pages, to over 30 hours with ASA mentors.
We were delighted to have Tony Birch present the Colin Simpson Memorial Lecture this year, where he discussed the Power of Writing (and Reading): how a writer is made. The lecture was streamed online for the first time ever on November 24th, and is available to view here.
We were thrilled to be able to stream the Barbara Jefferis Award online this year on November 18, in a ceremony hosted by award-winning author Bri Lee, who delivered a thought-provoking speech on the representation of women in literature. At the ceremony it was our pleasure to announce Lucy Treloar as the 2020 winner for her magnificent novel, Wolfe Island. In case you missed it, you can watch the ceremony here.
In more awards news, we were pleased to announce Sally Bothroyd as the winner of the inaugural ASA / HQ Commercial Fiction Prize, Tim McGuire as the winner of the 2020 ASA / Varuna Ray Koppe Young Writers Residency, and Eleanor Limprecht as the winner of the 2020 Blake-Beckett Trust Scholarship.
Finally, this year we also published new recommended rates of pay for Online Appearances and Public appearances, following industry and author consultation. You can find the new rates of pay here.
Thank you for your loyalty. The ASA exists only because of your support; and we look forward to working even harder on your behalf in the coming year.
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