WIP Challenge Checkin, Day 22, Monday

[jagnikjen]

How the writing going today, everyone??

~ 1 - 250 words
~ 251 - 500 words
~ 501 - to 1000 words
~ 1001 to 5000 words

Not writing? Then what??

~ editing
~ researching
~ procrastinating giving the muse a holiday
~ cleaning house
~ other


Discussion question: Do you feel that writing fan fiction is an illegal act of copying someone's else's characters or world? (Even though we're all doing it.)

How do you feel when big name authors or 'creators' bad mouth fan fic in general or ban fan fiction based on their creations?

Do you respect the creator's right to establish parameters? (For example, J.K. Rowling who, generally speaking, thinks fan fiction is flattering, but would rather people didn't write sexually explicit scenarios for her characters.)

Comments

[lacygrey]

Managed a couple of hundred filling in a blank in my story made apparent by yesterday's organisation.

I think that if a favorite author/creator was against fanfic of their work, it might make me think twice before writing it (because it would be like hurting someone I love), even though I feel that fanfic overall is a great medium for publicity, discussion and evolution of an original work.

[jagnikjen]

I'm glad the tool worked and that you were able fill in that blank. :)

[katzenjamming]

After IRL stuff had me sidetracked all weekend, I've got at least 1K words (and going!) on a side-project I haven't had the inspiration to work on in weeks.

I could go on and on about my personal feelings on fanfiction's status, but tl;dr though I understand a lot of the arguments about the legality, I'd guess that 99.99+% of the time fanfiction is harmless to the original work's status. I tend to side-eye the emotional arguments against fandom even more; having your work open to criticism and alternate interpretations just seems part of the game, media creator! Still, it really bums me out when an author/creator I admire decries fic, though now I'm not in any fandoms where that's the case.

[jagnikjen]

Awesome. So glad some inspiration re-emerged.

[bay_alexison]

Able to get more betaing done of my friend's story and 500 more words of the fic I started last night. I'm thinking another 500-1000 words should do it before I'm able to finish that one shot, which could be tomorrow or Wednesday depending if I want to get that story over with or work a little more of my Big Bang first.

Hm, I don't really think too much of the legal stuff when it comes to fanfiction. It's a little sad to me the original creator would badmouth fanfic. Even though it makes sense they don't feel comfortable having other people use their characters in the sandbox, like everyone else I believe fanfic is a great way to express your love for the original work and your takes on it.

[jagnikjen]

Good luck on finishing your fic. :)

[meridian_rose]

First up, I adore the phrase 'giving the muse a holiday' :D It sounds rather more productive than 'procrastinating' :D

As to the discussion; I don't believe fanfic is, nor should be considered to be, illegal. We are not passing off the characters or worlds as our own creations, not plagiarising as I understand it to mean, and we are not taking away revenue nor audience from the original works [sometimes quite the opposite].

The level of hypocrisy amazes me. Some of the authors yelling the loudest about how fanfic is molesting their characters/fanfic authors are lazy and unimaginative are the ones most guilty of writing fannish and/or transformative works.
For example those writing tie-in novels [Lee Goldberg], using real historical personages in their work [Diana Gabaldon], re-telling fairy tales [Robin McKinley] or religious texts [Anne Rice], and borrowing recognisable elements from other works [Jasper Fforde]. The arguments they give in their defence, that it's ok if you're getting paid for it' and 'it's okay if it's out of copyright' just don't cut it.