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vulgarweedI feel guilty writing such a long meta post when I still owe so many emails and comments, but ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
metafandom was rich today. I particularly liked this post by ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bottle_of_shine about picking up ideas from reading like lint on Velcro, and this post by owlmoose on fanfic, ownership, and Creative Commons.
I have seen a lot of wibbling in a lot of different fandoms about what does and does constitute plagiarism…A lot of people seem to think it’s much grayer and murkier than I do.
I’ve been plagiarized exactly once that I know of, and it was a case with no shading at all. It wasn’t a matter of similar plot elements, or some dialogue that was familiar, or a description that, shall we say, showed strong influence. It was literally a copy-and-paste job, with someone else’s name on it. And yeah, I got angry. Very angry. Fortunately, I belonged to several yahoogroups in LOTR fandom at the time, and it wasn’t hard to call up a horde of Furies to flame the fucker crispy. But the anger didn’t last very long, because it was just so pathetic. The excuses added to the comedy, and eventually I just laughed a lot harder than I raged. I hang on to the memory now as more of an initiation rite into fandom and a can-you-believe-this-shit? anecdote than as a real grudge – I don’t even remember the username involved.
The funny thing, though, was that the story in particular was one I remember writing specifically because there was a particular dirty darkfic scenario I wanted very much to read, and months of searching convinced me that this story just didn’t exist, and if I wanted it to, I was going to have to do the heavy lifting myself. So I did. And the way I found out about it? I was cruising FF.net, and I saw a summary for a story with this pairing and this theme, and I thought, “YAY!! Someone else tried it – I can’t wait to see what they did with it! Will it be kind of like mine or totally different?” (Either would have been fine.) Aside from the shock of discovering that “their approach” was, well, very much like mine, I was also totally disappointed that once again, no one else had taken up the challenge really. If someone had told the same plot but in their own words, I probably would have loved the story, recruited them for my Nazgûl –centric mailing list, and wanted to be their BFF for having the same freaky kink as me. If they’d been obviously riffing off my story but saying something new with it…well, even better, because then I get the ego-stroke of being influential. (Which, for a NNF in a tiny niche, would have been BIG.) Even if it wasn’t all that good, I’m still always up for Tolkien villain smut.
Anything less clear-cut than that, I have a hard time seeing as plagiarism. Here’s where I admit to something that should be perfectly obvious: I’ve never had a truly original idea in my life. No, this isn’t me being low-self-esteemy, or hair-shirty. I think very few people ever have truly original ideas. Maybe Leonardo had one or two. What most good writers are is gifted synthesists; people who are good at absorbing wildly disparate ideas from vast and diverse sources and integrating them in a way that’s fresh and says something worth saying about the themes and characters. (Example: Morbid memories of sickly childhood + vampire tales popular at the time + Victorian xenophobia and sexual anxieties + random fascination with a figure from Romanian history = something indelible from Bram Stoker’s talent for synthesis.) Re-tellers and re-contextualizers of stories. Re-interpreters of culture. This, for me, is what fanwriting in particular is all about. Whether with serial numbers filed off or not: I know the writing of people I emulate in fanfic, your Tolkiens and Rowlings and Gaimans and Pratchetts, will cheerfully admit that what they write has sources galore—they will show you their sources with geeky glee--that it is engaged in a dialogue with other texts across centuries, that someone from Planet Xdfth with no knowledge of earth culture or mythology or literature or history will miss 9/10s of the allusions in their tapestries, because they all play with intertextuality. The box of crayons we all play with is vast, but I’m not sure it’s infinite. That doesn’t matter, because a great artist can make a masterpiece with just red, yellow, and blue—it’s all in how you mix them. And any two artists’ work is instantly distinguishable from each other, even though they might all be painting the exact same scene from the Bible, say, or classical mythology.
And when we write fanfic, stands to reason that other people’s fanfic is part of the intertextual conversation. Hell, I wish more of “my” stuff got into the trope machine. (Here’s where I confess that a small part of me wanted, for example, John Dee to become a recurring character in GO historical fic. Would I have felt “ripped off”? Hell no – I nicked the idea of using him and Kelley and Bruno that way from John Crowley (no relation, one presumes) anyway, and I said so in my writer’s notes. Of course my Dee isn’t the same as Crowley’s and neither of those is the long-dead real one; and someone else’s would have been someone different still. I confess, I have a selfish desire to read things perfectly suited to my quirks and kinks and geekeries without having to do all the work. And what better way to get that than to have people rip me off, er, I mean, be inspired by me? It should happen MORE often, as far as I’m concerned. (And I could never get all stompy-foot about it and still look at myself in the mirror…hello, fanfic.)
And if I want to riff off someone else’s tale, it’s for the same reason I write fanfic in the first place: because I want more of the story, because I want to zig where the original writer zagged just to see what happens then, because this story starts a fascinating conversation and I want to add to it, because I think this story is almost perfect but just doesn’t have enough sex in it, etc.
In rock and roll, the lifting of a riff wholesale is noted with a winknudge, and sometimes an acknowledgement of the lifter’s good (or bad) taste, or taken as a clever homage. (It’s often assumed the audience knows the source material, or should.) Almost nobody gets too up in a wad over it; the high-profile, expensive lawsuit is the exception, not the rule—that’s why they make the news. Granted, a band who does this chronically from only one or two sources is derided as someone who ought to just form an honest tribute band, the same way I’d respect Terry Brooks a lot more if he wrote honest Tolkien fanfic. It is assumed, though, that there is a finite number of notes. And that music is made in a conversation with other music. And that every generation can do a bit of stealing, but is also karmically obligated to come up with enough fresh re-arrangements for the next generation to have something to steal in their turn. There’s no dishonor in it. Everybody learns by imitating the masters, and they learned by ripping off the blues. (Which is made dishonorable by the way many white rock musicians got filthy rich stealing from very poor black artists, but indeed, money changes everything.)
So in short? (Yeah, right.) Creative Commons, baby. I’m a public utility and proud of it. My username endorses both meanings of "vulgar." (But if you write something riffing—or ripping—off something I wrote, I want to see it, because I might really really like it. And I might riff back, and there’s a reason circle jerks are popular—they’re fun. Fanfic may be masturbatory, but that doesn’t mean it should necessarily be done in isolation.)
And another thing: I don’t talk about RL work here, but I do have journalism experience. Accidental plagiarism definitely does happen. All the time. Usually in a small, inoffensive way—but people who read a lot, which is most writers, do on occasion absorb things in such a way that they cannot remember the source, and it might pop up weeks—or decades--later as if he or she thought of it herself. In fanfic, where everyone is working out of the same small crayon box with the same characters and themes, it is all but inevitable—and that’s without even getting into the fandom hive-mind and quasi-Jungian manifestations of collective unconscious and synchronicity that happen all over the place. That’s why I also believe in erring on the side of ‘benefit of the doubt’ for pretty much anything that isn’t straight up copy-and-paste.
That was slightly Aquarian of me, wasn't it? (With a spicing of Aries grandiosity. I put it on everything, like Tabasco.) Thoughts?
metafandom was rich today. I particularly liked this post by bottle_of_shine about picking up ideas from reading like lint on Velcro, and this post by owlmoose on fanfic, ownership, and Creative Commons.I have seen a lot of wibbling in a lot of different fandoms about what does and does constitute plagiarism…A lot of people seem to think it’s much grayer and murkier than I do.
I’ve been plagiarized exactly once that I know of, and it was a case with no shading at all. It wasn’t a matter of similar plot elements, or some dialogue that was familiar, or a description that, shall we say, showed strong influence. It was literally a copy-and-paste job, with someone else’s name on it. And yeah, I got angry. Very angry. Fortunately, I belonged to several yahoogroups in LOTR fandom at the time, and it wasn’t hard to call up a horde of Furies to flame the fucker crispy. But the anger didn’t last very long, because it was just so pathetic. The excuses added to the comedy, and eventually I just laughed a lot harder than I raged. I hang on to the memory now as more of an initiation rite into fandom and a can-you-believe-this-shit? anecdote than as a real grudge – I don’t even remember the username involved.
The funny thing, though, was that the story in particular was one I remember writing specifically because there was a particular dirty darkfic scenario I wanted very much to read, and months of searching convinced me that this story just didn’t exist, and if I wanted it to, I was going to have to do the heavy lifting myself. So I did. And the way I found out about it? I was cruising FF.net, and I saw a summary for a story with this pairing and this theme, and I thought, “YAY!! Someone else tried it – I can’t wait to see what they did with it! Will it be kind of like mine or totally different?” (Either would have been fine.) Aside from the shock of discovering that “their approach” was, well, very much like mine, I was also totally disappointed that once again, no one else had taken up the challenge really. If someone had told the same plot but in their own words, I probably would have loved the story, recruited them for my Nazgûl –centric mailing list, and wanted to be their BFF for having the same freaky kink as me. If they’d been obviously riffing off my story but saying something new with it…well, even better, because then I get the ego-stroke of being influential. (Which, for a NNF in a tiny niche, would have been BIG.) Even if it wasn’t all that good, I’m still always up for Tolkien villain smut.
Anything less clear-cut than that, I have a hard time seeing as plagiarism. Here’s where I admit to something that should be perfectly obvious: I’ve never had a truly original idea in my life. No, this isn’t me being low-self-esteemy, or hair-shirty. I think very few people ever have truly original ideas. Maybe Leonardo had one or two. What most good writers are is gifted synthesists; people who are good at absorbing wildly disparate ideas from vast and diverse sources and integrating them in a way that’s fresh and says something worth saying about the themes and characters. (Example: Morbid memories of sickly childhood + vampire tales popular at the time + Victorian xenophobia and sexual anxieties + random fascination with a figure from Romanian history = something indelible from Bram Stoker’s talent for synthesis.) Re-tellers and re-contextualizers of stories. Re-interpreters of culture. This, for me, is what fanwriting in particular is all about. Whether with serial numbers filed off or not: I know the writing of people I emulate in fanfic, your Tolkiens and Rowlings and Gaimans and Pratchetts, will cheerfully admit that what they write has sources galore—they will show you their sources with geeky glee--that it is engaged in a dialogue with other texts across centuries, that someone from Planet Xdfth with no knowledge of earth culture or mythology or literature or history will miss 9/10s of the allusions in their tapestries, because they all play with intertextuality. The box of crayons we all play with is vast, but I’m not sure it’s infinite. That doesn’t matter, because a great artist can make a masterpiece with just red, yellow, and blue—it’s all in how you mix them. And any two artists’ work is instantly distinguishable from each other, even though they might all be painting the exact same scene from the Bible, say, or classical mythology.
And when we write fanfic, stands to reason that other people’s fanfic is part of the intertextual conversation. Hell, I wish more of “my” stuff got into the trope machine. (Here’s where I confess that a small part of me wanted, for example, John Dee to become a recurring character in GO historical fic. Would I have felt “ripped off”? Hell no – I nicked the idea of using him and Kelley and Bruno that way from John Crowley (no relation, one presumes) anyway, and I said so in my writer’s notes. Of course my Dee isn’t the same as Crowley’s and neither of those is the long-dead real one; and someone else’s would have been someone different still. I confess, I have a selfish desire to read things perfectly suited to my quirks and kinks and geekeries without having to do all the work. And what better way to get that than to have people rip me off, er, I mean, be inspired by me? It should happen MORE often, as far as I’m concerned. (And I could never get all stompy-foot about it and still look at myself in the mirror…hello, fanfic.)
And if I want to riff off someone else’s tale, it’s for the same reason I write fanfic in the first place: because I want more of the story, because I want to zig where the original writer zagged just to see what happens then, because this story starts a fascinating conversation and I want to add to it, because I think this story is almost perfect but just doesn’t have enough sex in it, etc.
In rock and roll, the lifting of a riff wholesale is noted with a winknudge, and sometimes an acknowledgement of the lifter’s good (or bad) taste, or taken as a clever homage. (It’s often assumed the audience knows the source material, or should.) Almost nobody gets too up in a wad over it; the high-profile, expensive lawsuit is the exception, not the rule—that’s why they make the news. Granted, a band who does this chronically from only one or two sources is derided as someone who ought to just form an honest tribute band, the same way I’d respect Terry Brooks a lot more if he wrote honest Tolkien fanfic. It is assumed, though, that there is a finite number of notes. And that music is made in a conversation with other music. And that every generation can do a bit of stealing, but is also karmically obligated to come up with enough fresh re-arrangements for the next generation to have something to steal in their turn. There’s no dishonor in it. Everybody learns by imitating the masters, and they learned by ripping off the blues. (Which is made dishonorable by the way many white rock musicians got filthy rich stealing from very poor black artists, but indeed, money changes everything.)
So in short? (Yeah, right.) Creative Commons, baby. I’m a public utility and proud of it. My username endorses both meanings of "vulgar." (But if you write something riffing—or ripping—off something I wrote, I want to see it, because I might really really like it. And I might riff back, and there’s a reason circle jerks are popular—they’re fun. Fanfic may be masturbatory, but that doesn’t mean it should necessarily be done in isolation.)
And another thing: I don’t talk about RL work here, but I do have journalism experience. Accidental plagiarism definitely does happen. All the time. Usually in a small, inoffensive way—but people who read a lot, which is most writers, do on occasion absorb things in such a way that they cannot remember the source, and it might pop up weeks—or decades--later as if he or she thought of it herself. In fanfic, where everyone is working out of the same small crayon box with the same characters and themes, it is all but inevitable—and that’s without even getting into the fandom hive-mind and quasi-Jungian manifestations of collective unconscious and synchronicity that happen all over the place. That’s why I also believe in erring on the side of ‘benefit of the doubt’ for pretty much anything that isn’t straight up copy-and-paste.
That was slightly Aquarian of me, wasn't it? (With a spicing of Aries grandiosity. I put it on everything, like Tabasco.) Thoughts?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 04:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 04:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 04:24 am (UTC)It is not plagiarism to take an idea and make it your own. You can't own ideas because there is always someone else in the world who can (and often will) have the same idea from the same context of the material, but without ever having any contact with you.
This does not excuse people from not citing the sources of their inspiration, however, you can't claim someone is plagiarizing you if they just take an idea and expand on it -- make it their own.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 04:38 am (UTC)You can't own ideas because there is always someone else in the world who can (and often will) have the same idea from the same context of the material, but without ever having any contact with you.
*nodsnods* Absolutely. It happens all the time.
I love citing sources. I've written some writers' notes to some stories that are as long as a chapter of the story itself - the synthesis of sources is so much fun to me. The recipe is not the cake, but some people geek out on recipes in their own right. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 05:45 am (UTC)Bravo!
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 06:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 09:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-11 04:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 08:25 am (UTC)That happened to me years ago, when I wrote an original story and thought I had a great name for one of the characters, only to find upon a reread of Tolkien tales, that I had taken it straight from there.
Later, some of my school essays contained sentences from the textbook that I liked but didn't consciously remember, but had read and committed to memory from where they popped up when I needed them and pretended to be my own.
Ever since those (numerous) incidents, I'm paranoid about somebody commenting on one of my stories with an annoyed, "You were aware that sentences 3, 21 and 47, in the exact wording, were mine, weren't you?"
Cosidering how often my paranoia comes true, I wouldn't even be very surprised. It depresses me, though.
With ideas, it's different, I think. There is only a limited number of things in this world and even fewer that humans can imagine at all and of those not all are interesting enough for books or stories. Of course some ideas are more popular than others. Some ideas are very plausible, so people get them independently. I remember writing about a species of non-humans destroying humanity, when I was a kid (yes, I was weird) and being very desillusioned when my dad laughed and handed me a "War of the Worlds" cassette tape. I thought they stole my idea, but then I realised that the show was made before I was even born and it depressed me more. Of course there were vast differences between my story and the other (of course, I was ten at most and the quality was accordingly), not the least that my aliens were flying horses (yes, *lol*) and the POV and style were a lot different. When I later found out that many people had similar ideas ('Independence Day' etc.)
The example also illustrates what you said about synthesis. (I loved that paragraph especially, by the way.)
Knowledge of human badness + childish anger issues + 'My Magic Pony' tapes = SV writes flying horses wiping out mankind.
"X-D
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 03:37 pm (UTC)Me too. Oh, me too. It could definitely happen so easily - which is why I'm big on amnesty for the accidental/unconscious liftings and why they really don't deserve the hostility that deliberate, malicious stealing does. If people going on a feeding frenzy about it don't think it could ever happen to them, they're wrong.
Ahahah, that's a great story. I think the vicious human-killing aliens story is part of the human racial psychological makeup, actually. It's pretty universal in all its forms. Hee, when I was that age I wrote SF epics that were, of course, thinly-veiled Mary Sue-ridden Star Wars ripoffs, and when this similarity was gently pointed out to me, I would adamantly deny it. Thank all the gods that this was pre-Internet days.
Acutally, I think your flying-horses story at least wins some points for unusualness.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 05:38 pm (UTC)The only original thing (at least I thought so and let it be my anchor in the time of I'm-not-creative depression) about /my/ aliens-destroying-mankind fantasy, was that it was written from the perspective of the queen of flying horses. *headdesks at this phrase* I was a sick puppy. ";-D
Slash (and fanfic in general, even years before I ever heard those terms) has channelled my writing into far more rational lanes. *g*
I still love "villain" POVs, though.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 10:04 am (UTC)Mind you, the person who lifted my work wholesale, did at least have the courtesy to mix it with someone else's work... remix, isn't it?
As long as people stop putting cream in tea in fics, I'm happy.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 03:40 pm (UTC)Remix, that's a nice way of putting it. Or mashup, maybe. Sampling (in the musical sense). :) Was the product any good? I admit, I cut talented people a lot more slack on this kind of thing than hacks.
You mean you don't? :P
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 03:52 pm (UTC)Heee.
Only when I have guests I don't like.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 11:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 03:43 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 03:08 pm (UTC)Fandom had gotten a little easier for me now that I'm part of something which is all but incestuous - everyone's ideas have slept with everyone's elses, and they seem to spawn in every direction. I really don't mind so long as one is remembered for their initial contribution, be it an idea or an entire scene. I've done it myself, since meeting you (argh! you've corrupted me!) And I found someone on LJ who started writing a spin-off to my epic Disney fic, focused on an OC of her own, only using my OC's in passing, and not only did I not mind, I was rather tickled :) She still hasn't officially told me about the fic, probably thinking I'll rip her head off. (Gee, where would she get that idea?)
I agree there's a Jungian Well at work in all creative endeavours, "original" or "fandom"; we can't avoid symbolism and ideas from spouting forth and taking on their own lives. But I still don't agree that absolutely everything we do in fandom should be given over to the entire world to play with. Sometimes there are very personal agendas at work, some of us are using it as a means of therapy. I think it's only polite to ASK FIRST about a specific thing, and post later. And if someone says "no" then it should be respected.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 04:17 pm (UTC)Fandom had gotten a little easier for me now that I'm part of something which is all but incestuous - everyone's ideas have slept with everyone's elses, and they seem to spawn in every direction.
Fandom as a whole is always like that, I think. If it's working properly, that is. :D
And I found someone on LJ who started writing a spin-off to my epic Disney fic, focused on an OC of her own, only using my OC's in passing, and not only did I not mind, I was rather tickled :) She still hasn't officially told me about the fic, probably thinking I'll rip her head off. (Gee, where would she get that idea?)
I see where she might get that idea. ;) But that's the best spirit to take it in, I think; it's a huge compliment, after all.
But I still don't agree that absolutely everything we do in fandom should be given over to the entire world to play with. Sometimes there are very personal agendas at work, some of us are using it as a means of therapy.
That's true, but still - regardless of the motivations for writing a specific story, once it's released to readers, we ultimately do lose complete control over how those ideas are used. I believe a story is never truly completed until someone else has read it, and that reader will have interpretations and motivations of her own. She may bring something entirely different to it, and transform it in her own mind. That's an essential part of the magic of stories--it's a bug, not a feature. But writing a riff off someone else's story doesn't change the "original" in any way, any more than my fanfic changes LOTR or GO or whatever--they're still there, just as they always were. I can never know what Tolkien's or Gaiman's deep motivations are for writing anything, completely. I can only know my own (But in the cases I do know about...I do know that Tolkien wrote LOTR in some part as therapy for his own traumatic experiences in WWI and concern for his son who was in WWII. Knowing that enriches the story for me, but the story itself transcends that. I've never experienced war directly, but I bring my own memories and experiences to my interpretation of Tolkien's story, and neither of us invalidate each other, I don't think.)
I think it's only polite to ASK FIRST about a specific thing, and post later. And if someone says "no" then it should be respected.
I agree, it's polite to do so, sure. But I've never asked any of the writers I fic for permission, and I don't feel right demanding a courtesy I didn't give them. (Granted if, say, JKR had to deal with all the requests from fic writers she'd never have time to write any of her own books, so it's not practical, but still, in principle.)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 04:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 04:49 pm (UTC)I know, I have no real control over anything I release to the world, which is why it took me until two years ago to release anything at all. It's been a constant struggle to let others see/enjoy/criticise any of it. But I don't think I'll ever be entirely un-possessive of my creations.
Maybe your Venus in Gemini allows you that freedom ;) Mine is in Cancer (pull it close, hang on tight, it's part of my heart). Can't destroy everything of my nature.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 05:12 pm (UTC)I know, I have no real control over anything I release to the world, which is why it took me until two years ago to release anything at all. It's been a constant struggle to let others see/enjoy/criticise any of it. But I don't think I'll ever be entirely un-possessive of my creations.
I understand that, I really do. And the struggle has been so rewarding for you, hasn't it? You've grown so much in so many ways through it.
Maybe your Venus in Gemini allows you that freedom ;) Mine is in Cancer (pull it close, hang on tight, it's part of my heart). Can't destroy everything of my nature.
I think when it comes to writing, it's that my Mercury is also in Gemini. :) (Venus in Gemini makes me a total logosexual. Also makes it very difficult to be content with just one partner, ever.)
The biggest advantage of Cancer in anything is the long memory and sense of historical perspective, IMO.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 06:50 pm (UTC)Whatever you have, V & QW, I enjoy it. Whatever I have, well, it's a tough job but someone has to do it .... ;P
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 07:33 pm (UTC)Hee. Life is a rough job no matter where you are, I think. But it sure beats the alternative. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 07:48 pm (UTC)Non trad explains so much, though!
Was just doing further analysis -- you've inspired me again! -- and found that a large portion of my chart clumps in the 3rd and 9th houses (communication and philosophy). Funny thing, that. ;]
So, what does it mean when you have empty houses? I have five of them, so it makes me wonder.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 08:02 pm (UTC)Also, I see it like this.
Date: 2007-06-09 07:38 pm (UTC)If you have three apples, and somebody else takes one, well then you only have two. That's a finite quantity. But if you have a story, and someone is inspired and uses an idea from it--you still have the story, and the borrowing hasn't changed a thing about it. The person has generated new ideas from yours, but it adds to the number of ideas in the world, not subtracts. It's not like it takes two paragraphs out of your story, never to be replaced. :D
Re: Also, I see it like this.
Date: 2007-06-09 08:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 05:16 pm (UTC)YES! It's just that, I just got off from an art history class, and I learned that improving/riffing on previous work/intergrating from other sources is exactly how the art world works. And so why can't it work here? Or rather, of course that's how it works in writing, original or fanfic. Thanks for the post. :)
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 05:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 07:34 pm (UTC)Here from Metafandom
Date: 2007-06-09 08:21 pm (UTC)In UK law the concept of Copyright (the fact that you own the right to say what is done with your own work - be it fiction or just a letter to a friend), and of 'passing off' (taking the work of someone else, and pretending that it's yours) are entirely separate - and the penalties for being convicted of passing off are much, much higher than for copyright violation (taking money for printing someone elses work with their name on it - Burrel could have been convicted of copyright violation for printing Princess Diana's letters because the copyright belonged to her heirs, not him, even though he may have been the recipient of the letters, but he couldn't be accused of passing them off as his own work).
I assume that US law conflates the two concepts. No wonder US fandom is paranoid.
Re: Here from Metafandom
Date: 2007-06-09 08:33 pm (UTC)Here I'm trying to delve more into the ethics of shared-world building than the legalities--just because something is illegal doesn't make it unethical, and vice versa. You're right- the distinction between mere use of copyrighted material and "passing off" is essential, and it's one that I think gets blurred in fandom way more than it should.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-09 08:33 pm (UTC)Word, definitely, on what plagiarism is and isn't. Grabbing a character trait or a story device or even a whole outline-level plot is not plagiarism and it's annoying to see the word misused to cover all sorts of things it doesn't apply to.
And same here -- I'd love to see someone's take on some of my fics. Which isn't to say I'd necessarily like it, since I was ficced once many years ago and I hated it for some specific reasons, but if a bunch of people did it I'm sure at least a few of them would come up with some awesome stuff. :) At the very least, it'd be interesting to see some other writers' takes on my universes.
Angie
no subject
Date: 2007-06-10 02:38 am (UTC)There's something deeply flattering about the attempt, whether you like the result or not--someone gave your story so much detailed attention. And some of us can't get enough of that. :)
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Date: 2007-06-10 09:25 am (UTC)Yes, it was very difficult to take. As I said, I was furious and that wasn't any kind of exaggeration. But that's what makes it such a good example -- that it was a pretty extreme example of someone's fic of my work coming about as close to ruining my work as it's possible to come without actually erasing it from the bulletin board, digging it off my hard drive and burning the backup disk [wry smile] and yet even then I was able to maintain and be polite and civil about it. Even after that kind of provocation I still don't think it's right or reasonable for a writer to expect to have any kind of control over how a reader responds to their creative work, or to have any kind of a veto power over that reader's creative response.
And yes, fanficcers do that to pros All The Time so griping when it's done to them just doesn't impress me. [sigh]
There's something deeply flattering about the attempt, whether you like the result or not--someone gave your story so much detailed attention.
Yes, exactly! That's exactly it -- that something I wrote affected a reader so strongly that it drove them to go out and write their own fic to explore the ideas that my story gave them. [nodnod] Even if I don't care for what they write, the fact that they wrote it Because Of Me is absolutely awesome! [beam] I can't deny that the girl who ficced my poem liked it very much and had an incredibly strong emotional response to it, and that's very cool even if I hated her response itself.
Angie
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Date: 2007-06-09 11:27 pm (UTC)It's nice to be credited, yeah, but the satisfaction for me comes more from knowing for myself that I influenced something and someone created as a result. The only thing you really get out of other people knowing is the fact that others will maybe realize that your ideas and contributions are also worthwhile. But good fandoms and fandom communities generally recognize that anyway.
Besides, if you're not copy-pasting word for word, then I would say it's near impossible to really rip someone off. You can't say it how they would. Your voice is your own. Even when I consciously try to mimic the style of an author on ocassion, I find that any attempt is marred because my own damn voice interferes. I can stylize, but I can't parrot.
So in short, your Aquarius and Aries are dead on. XD
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Date: 2007-06-10 02:42 am (UTC)There's no such thing as a flawless pastiche, is there? The hand is always tipped, sooner or later.
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Date: 2007-06-10 12:37 am (UTC)These days I write more original fiction than fanfic, but I see the influence of all the fanfic I read coming out in all my writing. I may create a character or write a line of dialog and realize that it bears similarity to something I've picked up in fanfic. Nothing can be completely original, and one of the benefits of reading so much is that I can find more ideas to draw on. Sometimes it's even fun for me to take a plot line or idea that I feel has been overdone and challenge myself to write it differently. I don't feel that that's plagarism at all.
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Date: 2007-06-10 02:45 am (UTC)That's a very important point. Often, the people we think are the most original are really the most widely-read, the most widely intellectually-travelled so they have a broader range of "raw materials" to bring together and collage with. It's something I aspire to a lot, to try to learn about all sorts of random things. You never know when it'll be useful, or when it'll come together in a story just right years down the road.
Sometimes it's even fun for me to take a plot line or idea that I feel has been overdone and challenge myself to write it differently. I don't feel that that's plagarism at all.
Definitely not. That's a lot of books written on that principle right there.
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Date: 2007-06-12 03:14 am (UTC)