very insightful. Thanks! I hope that other screenwriters who may have sold their specs through InkTip, will chime in here.

cheers.

I used to be repped by Abrams, and while they have offices in LA, they don't have literary offices in LA, just for acting ... Lit was mainly a nyc office ... though that may have changed since I left them (they brought on a lot of new agents, both Amy and Ron weren't at Abrams when I was there ... ironically enough, Ron repped me as a playwright when he was with Rosenstone-Wender, before I moved to Abrams) ...

If I know this issue, Scott - this thread is going to get really interesting.

Just to throw in my hat before everybody else does, I think these services can be a real lose-lose for writers. The only value the service has is in the value of the work you bring to it. And even then there's still a lot of ambiguity. If the service stinks, it's not that the service actually doesn't work, it's that your work sucks. If your work is brilliant and (as brilliant work would in any other method) it brings you some kind of industry attention - the service works. I don't see how that's any different than those agencies that want cash up front.

There are other "query" services that provide greater transparency if you're looking to drop fifty to a hundred dollars, and they don't make you sign a two-page contract giving them explicit rights to use you as a marketing tool should your work ever snag a sale.

...and just fyi, from someone who has worked in data mining; if you want to know the real dirt on any service, try what I call the "fuck or sucks" method. Go into Google and in quotes search "Fuck Inktip" or "inktip sucks". You'd be amazed at what you can floating around the web this way.

It's like everything else, it won't work for most people, but it will for some. That's life. I know a guy who had some luck with it and got a really cool horror produced. I think there short scripts section is great. I sold a short horror through there to a promising filmmaker. Got nothing bad to say about inktip. There's no silver bullets in this industry only werewolves.

People can familiarise themselves with the kind of business inktip does by signing up to their free newsletter which sends out usually around 6-8 leads per issue in the form of "Company A is looking for a family-oriented holiday film..." etc etc. You have to pay to subscribe to the version that tells you who Company A is. Most of the stuff that passes through seems pretty low grade, more options than actual deals etc., but there do seem to be people making useful contacts and getting paid work out of it. I subscribed one time to find out about one of the leads, only to discover that the producer had two credits both of which were critical duds. The leads never seem to match up with what I'm working on (and a lot are for Canadian writers only for tax reasons), and so I haven't renewed. Waste of money for me, but not necessarily for others I'm sure, and I don't doubt their 'legitimacy'.

I'll echo what terraling says. I still receive Inktip's free newsletter, but most of the opportunities don't apply to what I'm writing. But, on the other hand, I've been inspired to try other genres based on some of the requests I've seen.

I did subscribe to the paid newsletter for three months. I found a couple of opportunities that matched what I was doing, but I didn't receive any script requests.

I would recommend the free newsletter, which is a snapshot of what's going on with smaller and indie production companies.

If you see a lot of requests in the free newsletter for the type of scripts you've written (or are writing), then maybe try out the paid newsletter.

Remember, any time money is requested... do your homework.

I also get the free e-newsletter and I would reiterate what's already been said -- far too many requests for Canadian writers, for female leads, for scripts with less than 6 characters or limited to just one or two locations...

Clearly, most of the leads in the Inktip e-newsletter are for independent driven screenplays or for independent producers looking to throw out a very small amount of cash with the hope of making a little more back.

With that said, I just won the Creative World Awards screenplay contest and one of the many prizes is a free 12-month subscription to Inkip. So I guess I'll be discovering the what they really have to offer in the coming months. Hopefully, something will come of it. Either way, I'll update here.

I have some experience from InkTip.

I have listed one of my feature scripts there and it wasn't asked for even once. This was observed by their admins and they tried to help me find more fitting categories. But that particular listing ended up as a waste of money.

They have a service for short scripts as well and what I listed here (three short scripts) was asked for several times, although nothing sold (but that isn't InkTips fault).

Old thread now, but worth mentioning greenwriter.org has now gone public and has the opposite business model to inktip: they charge industry access to screenplays which writers get to upload for free.

The site will doubtless be flooded with content, but will professionals want to pay for access to the slush pile?

Check out their terms of service if thinking of using them, esp #9 which for all the materials (screenplay, loglines etc etc) you upload to the site "you automatically grant to Greenwriter and its affiliates an irrevocable, royalty-free, perpetual, fully paid non-exclusive right (including moral rights) and worldwide license to use, copy, reproduce, modify, adapt, publish, translate, communicate to the public, perform, display, and distribute such Content (in whole or in part) on the Site."

That's enough to put me off for the time being at least. At least inktip makes no claims on your work.