Fan fiction in general (was: MOVED from MAIN - "sequels" to the classics)

[sistermagpie]

> Magpie wrote:
> > <snip>
> > But whatever it is, it's not plagiarism, because I think that's 
very
> specific. Plagiarism requires you to use a certain amount of 
actual 
> text--and there also has to be an intention to deceive. Fanfic 
> doesn't attempt to deceive anyone. On the contrary, the whole 
point is
> that you know the source material--and it starts with warnings and 
> disclaimers which not legally saying anything pretty much say that 
the
> characters and world belong to the original creator. 
> 
> Carol responds:
> 
> First, please note that I said "akin to plagiarism," not plagiarism
> per se. Also, plagiarism, unlike copyright violation, *does* cover 
the
> use of other people's ideas even if you don't use their exact 
words.
> If you use another person's ideas without crediting your source, 
for
> example, you're plagiarizing whether or not you intended to 
deceive. A
> bad paraphrase that retains vestiges of the original wording can 
also
> be regarded as plagiarism, depending on the policies of the 
particular
> university (or scholarly publisher).

Magpie:
Sorry about the "akin to plagiarism"--I didn't think you thought it 
was exactly the same thing. I still think, though, that fanfic is 
missing the all-important intent to deceive. The fanfic author isn't 
intending for anyone to think that Harry Potter or Sirius Black is 
his/her original character. On the contrary, the story is written 
for people who know that source material well and doesn't work as 
well if you're outside that group. Fanfic is generally written by 
and for fans of the original story. The vestiges of the original 
story are the basis of the fanfic and intended to be recognized for 
what they are. 

That's different from writing a paper and taking ideas and passing 
them off as your own or not crediting them--especially when you add 
to it the fact that fanfic is usually part of an on-going 
conversation between fans that's a combination of analysis and play. 
Fanfics are often not even referencing the source material but 
outside material, fandom discussions and of course other fanfics. 
(Or sometimes also challenges and story requirements or requests.)

Carol:
> Teachers can fail students for plagiarism and universities can 
expel
> them, but it's unclear (to me) what an author can do to protect
> herself from having her titles, characters, and ideas borrowed or
> stolen since copyright law applies only to the work as a whole 
(with
> "fair use" as a protection for those who wish to discuss and quote
> from the work without copyright infringement; in a published work,
> even "fair use" generally requires permission from the copyright
> owner). And no reputable publisher will knowingly publish 
fanfiction
> based on the works of a living author unless the author permits it.
> (IIRC, there are authorized "Star Wars" sequels, and I'm aware of 
one
> author who writes authorized "Monk" novels--"Monk" being a TV 
series
> about a detective with OCD, for anyone unfamiliar with it.) But 
submit
> "Severus Snape and the Marauders" to any reputable publishing house
> and see how far you get.

Magpie:
Right. I have written tie-in novels and they are approved every step 
of the way by the owners of the franchise. And of course most fanfic 
is unpublishable even if it didn't have copyright problems.:-) There 
are fanfic writers who also write original fic, of course, and they 
know the difference between the two very well. They're not trying to 
get their fanfic published.

Carol: 
> Ho wall this applies to Internet fanfic, I'm still not sure. Fanfic
> writers, as you say, generally include a disclaimer stating that 
the
> characters belong to the author or owner of the 
copyright/trademark,
> and most fanfic writers, I would hope, have sense enough not to use
> exact wording from the books whose characters and settings they're
> using. But you don't have to violate copyright law to commit
> plagiarism (intellectual dishonesty), which is probably why an 
author
> can sue fanfic writers (and, sadly, vice versa). 

Magpie:
In general, there's little fear that a fanfic author is going to be 
able to be intellectually dishonest in terms of stealing ideas from 
the author (other fanfic writers are a different story, of course, 
though fanficcers also freely reference each other) since his/her 
audience knows the source material. Often far better than the 
average person. They could attempt to sue and author claiming the 
author stole an idea--but so could anybody, really. That Larry 
Trotter lady, for instance.

The question of what an author could or couldn't do is a grey area. 
>From what I've seen, authors who are very anti-fanfic are usually 
vocal about it and as a result they don't get fanfic much written 
about their stuff. I admit the arguments I've heard from some 
authors about how much they hate fanfic are very unconvincing and 
odd to me--Robin Hobbs wrote an impassioned piece that said, among 
other things, that when she left a scene off-page she wanted the 
reader to imagine what happened in that space and that fanfic 
writers ruined this by writing a story about it. Seemed a bit odd to 
me since the fanfic writer was in fact doing just what Hobbs 
expected--they were imagining what happened in that space--with the 
understanding that this was not what "really" happened, just that 
author's idea of what could have happened. 

Anti-fanfic arguments also sometimes jump back and forth between 
aesthetics and money--fanfic writers are pathetic because they can't 
make up their own characters, but when many tie-in novels are 
brought in that's different because you're being paid to do it 
(which would indicate at least that there's nothing inherently 
pathetic about writing about characters you didn't create).

That's why fanfic always seems so natural to me. I may never have 
written it down besides a few stories written with friends when I 
was a kid, but I've written fanfic in my head as long as I can 
remember.

Carol:
The fanfic writer who
> sued what's her name wasn't suing over exact words but over a 
concept
> or plot development, right? An author who borrows another person's
> words is, of course, risking a lawsuit. But ideas and characters?
> That's where it gets shaky. (Didn't someone try to sue JKR for
> "stealing" the word "Muggle" from her books? Why wouldn't it work 
the
> other way around? And if ideas, titles, and characters aren't
> protected by copyright law, what grounds does JKR have for suing 
the
> Lexicon, which properly cites all of its quoted material?) 

Magpie:
Yes, someone tried to sue her for stealing a number of things 
including the word Muggle--this was in a book that was written 
before HP. But there was also money involved. A fanfic author isn't 
making money off the work. And the Muggle lawsuit also implied that 
JKR was passing off the word Muggle as her own creation.

I guess we'll see what grounds JKR has against the Lexicon. I was 
reading an article on Slate today that said that what she claimed 
was preventing the publication of her own encyclopedia was actually 
just competition.

Then there's also the fact that nowadays fan power is getting more 
respected. In reality fanfic doesn't take away from the original 
source or author, it feeds it (and certainly at least some 
corporations have started to look for a way that they can make money 
off fanfic even if they fanfic writers don't!).

To me it seems like it's really just a question of the creator and 
the fans getting shoved together so things fans have always done are 
now being heard. So you get creators arguing with disgruntled fans 
on-line or producers listening to conversations hoping to get more 
success. And fanfic is now getting referenced in the shows itself. 
TV writers might add moments they know will play into certain fan 
ideas. Or they'll just reference it flat-out--a few weeks ago on 
Ugly Betty guest star Betty White said, "I love my fans. Except for 
those sickos that write lesbian fanfiction about me and Bea Arthur!"

-m