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BGonline.org Forums
My turn
Posted By: mamabear In Response To: My turn (Matt Cohn-Geier)
Date: Thursday, 9 August 2007, at 12:31 a.m.
Forfeiting privacy can cost you when you are doing something that should be kept quiet at least for a time, even if it isn't wrong at all.
For example, suppose I am speaking with a literary agent or publisher about a book I'm in the process of writing. A government agent listening in has a relative in the publishing business, or one who is a wannabe writer. He finds out I just landed a contract for a book on a particular subject to be published next May. They put their heads together and figure they can get a competing book, with a few corners cut and a chapter or two omitted, out by March, in time to scoop mine and steal a lot of its sales potential. James Thurber parodies this situation in one of his "Fables for our time", which ends with the moral, "Don't get it right, just get it written."
This kind of thing can happen even without any leaks...just bad luck, same concept occurred to two people at the same time. But this is just one more reason that if you're writing a book, I strongly recommend you have at least half of it done before you send the proposal out anywhere at all! This means even if someone gets hold of the info, and decides to try to scoop you (BTW a relatively rare occurrence--they still have to write the book, and that's work!) chances are your book will not only be better, it will also get to the marketplace first.
But I digress...back to the main point: there are plenty of good reasons to keep private communications private, even when nothing criminal or otherwise "actionable" is being done. I'm sure others here can come up with specific examples besides the one I presented above.
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