As a person who's kind of accidentally gotten involved in the "fanart for profit" culture, I don't feel comfortable making the for profit/not for profit distinction. I know fandom has a strong ethic against selling fic for profit, and a lot of people who've done it historically have done it unethically and/or wankily, but it's not a distinction that's really important to me anymore (except in the not-causing-wank way.)
As an example that maybe would skim the fan-ethics and legality issues: if you wrote a Star Trek fic as a fic, and then got an opportunity to sell it to a for-profit, authorized Star Trek fan anthology while leaving it online, should that then be excluded from AO3? (Maybe? I don't know?)
In fan-ethically grayer areas, I certainly don't think someone selling her self-published Pride & Prejudice fic at cons and community fairs is suddenly no longer a fan author just because she's priced it high enough to cover her budget for the whole con weekend as well as the cost of printing. Or even if she puts a display in a local gift shop at the same markup. Or even, honestly, gets it listed on Amazon; as long as she's still allowing free distribution of e-copies, I view it as selling particular physical copies, not as selling the story itself.
I guess I make the distinction at the point where the right-to-publish itself is being given a monetary value, as opposed to individual copies of the books: the point at which copyright itself is being sold or leased. (Which, incidentally, would still leave the authorized fan anthology in limbo.)
no subject
As an example that maybe would skim the fan-ethics and legality issues: if you wrote a Star Trek fic as a fic, and then got an opportunity to sell it to a for-profit, authorized Star Trek fan anthology while leaving it online, should that then be excluded from AO3? (Maybe? I don't know?)
In fan-ethically grayer areas, I certainly don't think someone selling her self-published Pride & Prejudice fic at cons and community fairs is suddenly no longer a fan author just because she's priced it high enough to cover her budget for the whole con weekend as well as the cost of printing. Or even if she puts a display in a local gift shop at the same markup. Or even, honestly, gets it listed on Amazon; as long as she's still allowing free distribution of e-copies, I view it as selling particular physical copies, not as selling the story itself.
I guess I make the distinction at the point where the right-to-publish itself is being given a monetary value, as opposed to individual copies of the books: the point at which copyright itself is being sold or leased. (Which, incidentally, would still leave the authorized fan anthology in limbo.)