But, cereally...
First: Steerpike, I'm not a hater. I love your posts. Your straight line was simply too good to resist.
But, back to the topic at hand:
I am, among many other things, a business man. I am also a writer, who has sold both news stories to the AP and fiction to a few pro market anthologies, etc., etc. On any given day, I can find myself on either side of the performer/intellectual-property-generator versus business-owner/publisher fence.
In reading the clipping of the post attributed to DG (and which I will, for the sake of argument, accept as being genuinely his, until I see evidence to the contrary), I immediately recognize both his position and that of E's as being entirely reasonable. DG prepared a product a couple of years ago that he is no longer comfortable with (as has happened to me several times), and his publisher, with whom he may already have some other disagreements (if I read the other posts her correctly), has no doubt had to deal with business concerns of their own that either delayed production, resulted in mistakes slipping through quality control, or both.
I was unaware that so many artists (as mentioned in a previous post to this thread) have been leaving the E train, and I am certainly curious as to why, but the point is not relevant to this discussion. I will, however, draw upon another alleged ex-Ellusionista to illustrate my point.
Wayne Houchin (sp?), who has also been mentioned as someone who has likewise left the E-fold, also straddles the line between performer and producer. I have enjoyed the two releases of his that I've purchased so far (Ultragaff, also with DG, and Indecent, both of which are distributed by E). As a former radio guy (yes, I've done many, many things in my long and varied career), I am always paying attention to the audio quality of what I'm listening to, and I have to say that the audio mixing on both of those products is, well, less than excellent.
I'll bet WH knows it, and is painfully aware of it. As a performer, he must be concerned about it. But as a producer, he had deadlines to meet, and a budget to watch. This is the nature of the beast. You can't re-shoot or re-loop every clip from your video project, no matter how much you might like to, in order to get every image or sound perfect in time for release. That's the way it goes. Known mistakes make it into the final edit of every video/print project. And, for all the quality control you may try to exert, unknown mistakes slip through, as well.
On a good day, any performer or producer, when an earlier project is mentioned, will recall with pride the things that went well with that release. On a bad day, that person is as likely to dwell upon the flaws. I'm sure the producers at E can point to any of their products and list any number of regrets about that release, as well as any number of matters of pride.
Forgetting to rename a trick on your DVD? An easy detail to miss, even if later on you think you made a bigger deal about it at the time. Or -- and I think this is very likely -- they (the folks at E) may have even decided to rename the trick on the DVD, and then noticed that someone else has already released a trick with the proposed new name, so they stuck with the previous name. That's how it goes.
In my long and weird career, I've been quoted out of context, had my name misspelled, and had important chunks of my writing/performance butchered... even by people with whom I had an excellent working relationship. There was a major article I'd written for one magazine where they actually dropped my byline from the article. The editors claimed that the byline "fell off the flats" (this was back in the days when magazines were literally pasted up, not computer generated). On good days, I chose to believe that story. On bad days, I chose to think someone pulled that byline off on purpose, just 'cause. (Like DG and E, I had already left the magazine by the time my article was published.) It's been years since it happened, and now I only think about it when I write responses to Theory11 threads.
I am personally familiar with neither DG nor E (although I'd love a chance to meet either or both; DG seems like a real cool cat on Ultragaff, and the folks at E run an interesting business*). That said, it is entirely plausible that DG's issues with E regarding this release are completely, 100% reasonable... and that E's position on the release is also entirely reasonable. When it comes to shipping product, it is an undeniable fact that delays happen and mistakes slip through. Every product, every release.
That said, if I should ever spend enough time with my magic to actually come up with a cool effect that I'd like to share with (read, "sell to") the world, it helps to know the reputation that is being earned by the publishers out there. In this regard, DG's post is certainly an interesting data point.
--Allan
* I'd also very much like to meet WH and the folks at Theory11. Insofar as I live in the great Northwest, I'm hoping that I'll eventually get to at least see Lee Asher in action, or attend one of his lectures.
