On Other Blogs

Several blogs have weighed in, pro and con and somewhere in-between, on my "Another Day in Fanfic" posting and the ensuing controversy. Here’s a sampling of excerpts:

From Crankywriter:

Fanfic is not taking food out of your family’s mouths, and it’s not
plagiarism. To call it that is an insult to writers who have been
plagiarized, like Nora Roberts, who called her experience akin to mind
rape. And yes, she’s a real writer, and Janet Dailey cut-and-pasted
Nora’s words and claimed them as hers. That’s plagiarism and parasitism
for you.

Nora Roberts doesn’t approve of fanfiction based on her work,  either. For all I know, she calls that "mind rape" and plagiarism, too.

From Banana Oil (a tiny excerpt from a long, long post):

The upshot here is that using others’ characters has a long
tradition among Real Writers, even without explicit consent. This is
not meant as a defense of fan fiction in toto, but rather as a suggestion that even Real Writers do it, so the act itself does not seem to be tainted from the outset.

I think what really bothers Lee are the people who want something for nothing, those who only
write fan fiction, taking other people’s characters and backgrounds,
playing with them like pieces on a chess board, and then proclaiming
“See? I’m a Writer now!” And hey, I’m with him, such people are
parasites and best ridiculed and dispensed with. However, I severely
doubt that each and every writer of fan fiction is such a remora (even
if many or most are), because were I to accept that premise, I must
dismiss a number of my favorite Real Writers as well, something I am
wholly unwilling to do.

From the Creative Guy:

Plagiarism is a very dangerous word to throw around.  Certainly
it has its place, but does it really belong in a discussion (if that’s
the word) concerning fanfic?  According to media tie-in author Lee Goldberg, the answer is yes.
It’s hard to know where to start with this rant, considering how wrong-headed the entire thing is.  Having had some experience with plagiarism, I know there’s a vast gulf of difference between stealing someone else’s work and what fanfic authors do.

From Shannon Stacey:

As a reader, I don’t get it. Writing about the stuff you don’t get
to see—maybe Wonder Woman’s got a dirty old lady thing for the Boy
Wonder?—is not my cup of tea. Why? Because that has nothing to do with
the writer’s story. The actual writer who created those characters
has/had a vision for them, and that fanfic story ain’t it. For
example—the Star Wars movies. I’d have nothing to do with the three
prequels if they weren’t from George Lucas. I’m sure it’s entertaining
for many, it’s just not my cup of tea.

As a writer, I really don’t get it.  It’s copyright violation.  If you’re a writer, how is that not of huge
importance to you? If you write fanfic, and then get published with an
original work, how ironic would it be if you had to defend your
original work against copyright infringement?

Meljean Brook readily admits that her DC Comics-based  fanfic is a violation of copyright…but that she writes them anyway.

The first question is: isn’t it illegal?

Yes. There’s no
getting around that. I am using copyrighted characters, and using them
to write stories. The characters are owned by DC Comics, the copyrights
are current and valid….

And yet I wrote them anyway.

Don’t I have any sensibilities?
Any notion of right and wrong? Any inkling of what it is to own a
character? Why copyright infringement is a horrible thing to do?

The answer is: Yes. I do. Stealing ideas and claiming them as my own is the worst form of plagiarism.

I
don’t claim them as my own—I know exactly where the credit for their
creation lies. Did I write them? Yes. Do I own them? Nope. Anyone who
wants them can have them.

Does that little disclaimer at the
beginning of every fic that says "I don’t make any money from these"
absolve me of responsibility? No, I still violated copyrights.

So if she has so much respect for copyright, why did she do it? Because she simply couldn’t help herself.

Using someone else’s character and making that character behave in ways
the creator/copyright holder would never have condoned/conceived is
revolting. How dare I write about Batman and Wonder Woman becoming
romantically linked? How dare I write a slash fiction parody involving
Batman and Superman?

The answer is: I didn’t know what else to
do. I’m a writer—I may not be a very good one, but it is what I do.
When Batman and Wonder Woman grabbed a hold of me, they didn’t let go,
and I had to write it. There were stories in my head, and I told them
on paper like I do every other story in my head.

And because I’m a geek, and because I had no one else to talk to about this, I put it on the Internet.

I’ve heard a lot of inane justifications for writing fanfic, but this is the winner. She knows she’s using characters that aren’t her own, that she’s disrespecting the authors right to control their own creations, but none of that really matters… because she’s "a writer," so she had no other choice but to write the story and post it in the net.  She had to do it. It was an undeniable compulsion.

Because she’s "a writer."

No, Meljean, you’re not. You don’t have the slightest inking of what it means to be a writer or any respect for other writers.  A writer creates characters and stories  and respects the creative rights of his colleagues. You are a plagiarist. A creative parasite. To call yourself "a writer" to justify your creative theft and Internet publication of your work disrespects every real writer you steal from.

Now I know what you’re going to say…"I used fanfic to learn my craft. I am a writer now. A professional writer. I have a novella coming out from Berkley and I’m working on a novel.   So there!"

Uh-huh.

So why do you still proudly post all your fanfic on your site? A real writer would have more respect for her peers. A real writer — an adult —  would know better.

Grow up already.