Who owns my audiobook when someone else produces it?
You should own the finished recording outright, and the copyright in your book never moves. Two things are commonly taken from authors instead: ownership of the master under a royalty-share deal, and exclusivity that locks the recording to a single storefront. Neither is necessary.
Work it out yourself, free
The Rights Ledger →Write down what you own, what you licensed, and to whom — free, and kept in your own hands.
Three separate things
The copyright in the text is yours by authorship and does not transfer because someone reads it aloud. The master recording is a new copyright created by the production, and who owns it depends entirely on the contract. The distribution right is a third thing again — permission for a storefront to sell it, which should always be revocable.
Most disputes an author walks into are the second one. A royalty-share production is not paid up front; it is paid by taking a share of the recording's income, often for seven years, and in some arrangements the producer's name sits on the master.
What to refuse
Refuse exclusivity. A recording locked to one storefront cannot be sold on any other, cannot be sold from your own site, and cannot be licensed to a library. Exclusivity is convenient for the platform, never for the author.
Refuse a term you cannot end. If the arrangement cannot be exited, you have sold the edition, not commissioned it.
Refuse delivery without stems. Voice, effects and score as separate files are what make a later correction or a new edition possible. Without them your recording is a finished slab you cannot repair.
How this house does it
Work commissioned here is paid for, delivered, and owned by the author: the masters, the retail editions and the stems, laid in a sealed vault the author opens once the commission is settled. This house takes no royalty, claims no share of the recording, and asks for no exclusivity — from an author or an allied agency.
That is the reason the price is published as arithmetic rather than negotiated: a film book is 12% of the word count, an audio book 7.000000000000001%. Paid work, owned work.
Asked and answered
- Does producing an audiobook transfer my copyright?
- No. The copyright in your text stays with you. The master recording is a separate copyright, and its ownership is set by the contract you sign.
- Is a royalty-share audiobook deal a bad idea?
- It is a trade, not a scam: no money up front in exchange for years of shared income, usually with exclusivity attached. If you can pay for the production, owning the master outright is worth more.
- Should I ever accept exclusivity?
- There is no version of exclusivity that serves the author. It removes every storefront but one, including your own.
Also asked
Every answer in the hall
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- Should I use ACX or a professional audiobook producer?
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- What does an audiobook producer actually do?
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Strength and Solidarity LLC — 87 answers kept in this hall