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Jul. 10th, 2001 12:26 pmHad a chat with Fire Ceremony yesterday wherein we discussed (briefly) the question of fanfic and why authors especially get their noses out of joint. I've been mulling that question over, just because it is a point of view that most authors seem to share. Fan fiction seems very harmless, really - it's not like Napster, where one can argue that artists are losing money (though have you ever noticed that the artists who make the biggest stink are the richest ones? unknown bands are happy for the publicity) or that fanfiction authors are trying to pass their work off as the artist's own. As long as money doesn't matter, why get upset?
The only viewpoint I can find online from an author comes from Patricia Kennealy-Morrison, and her essay about stealing identities is so rambling and full of self-importance that it's very hard to extract usable information about why published authors feel fanfic is wrong. In addition, one of her points is "why don't you guys go make up your own characters instead of stealing mine?" There is a valid point in there, but one also has to consider that there is an awful lot of fanfiction going on even in the bookstore! Consider the staggering amounts of Star Trek, Star Wars, Wing Commander, Buffy, etc. etc. that you can find by various authors.
I've pondered and pondered, and the only thing I can come up with is the question of sanctioning and consent. All that "fanfic" you see in the bookstore about Star Trek etc. has been approved by The Powers that Be as something that is OK and can be published. Since the Creator of the series has given the go-ahead, the author can write a story using the Creator's characters as long as the Creator likes the finished product. For example, all those Star Wars books are supposedly approved by Lucas. I don't know for sure.
Why might this red tape be important? Well, I think it might be offensive to an author if another author takes his/her charas and replaces that chara's personality, i.e. making them act out of character, out of place, you get the point. The author spent a lot of time developing their character's personality, traits, mannerisms, situation, etc. and when someone takes the idea and throws the rest out, they must get quite steamed. It's like standing on the shoulders of giants, so to speak. There are certainly many partnerships in writing where authors collaborate on a world together, but there you have the "approval" thing again. These authors seem to be okay with someone else expanding on their world as long as they have the final approval.
I can understand this to some degree; if someone took "my" characters from my fic and started axing their personalities to use for themselves without my consent, I'd probably be bugged. My story hardly smacks of originality, but I have thought about how to write the characters, and I'm quite fond of them. On the flip side, you have someone like Lumen, who showed me her art and found out whether I liked it before showing it off to the world. (thank you Lumen! That was very considerate of you.) She made a great effort to line up her visions with mine, and it worked out beautifully. I don't mind that Yahriel was "borrowed" one little bit.
It is a perplexing question, because one must ask why an author gets so upset and yet video game companies and TV shows don't give a rat's ass. Is it because the primary means of transmission for video games and TV is A/V rather than written? I imagine that if someone animated their own "Daria" cartoon and broadcast it (for example), MTV would be all over that for copyright infringement. But fanfic is so tiny and insignificant, it's still hard to see why authors get their feathers so ruffled. It's like a little fly biting a hippopotamus - sure, it's annoying, but is it really worth the effort to smack it?
As for myself, I plan to keep on writing fanfic, but I find myself very reluctant to ever consider writing fics based on a written series. Not sure why; perhaps because I, personally, feel that I'd be stealing. Other ppl don't think so, and that's what's right for them. I've got no moral ground to point fingers, since I have had a lot of fun writing fanfic.
End pondering.
The only viewpoint I can find online from an author comes from Patricia Kennealy-Morrison, and her essay about stealing identities is so rambling and full of self-importance that it's very hard to extract usable information about why published authors feel fanfic is wrong. In addition, one of her points is "why don't you guys go make up your own characters instead of stealing mine?" There is a valid point in there, but one also has to consider that there is an awful lot of fanfiction going on even in the bookstore! Consider the staggering amounts of Star Trek, Star Wars, Wing Commander, Buffy, etc. etc. that you can find by various authors.
I've pondered and pondered, and the only thing I can come up with is the question of sanctioning and consent. All that "fanfic" you see in the bookstore about Star Trek etc. has been approved by The Powers that Be as something that is OK and can be published. Since the Creator of the series has given the go-ahead, the author can write a story using the Creator's characters as long as the Creator likes the finished product. For example, all those Star Wars books are supposedly approved by Lucas. I don't know for sure.
Why might this red tape be important? Well, I think it might be offensive to an author if another author takes his/her charas and replaces that chara's personality, i.e. making them act out of character, out of place, you get the point. The author spent a lot of time developing their character's personality, traits, mannerisms, situation, etc. and when someone takes the idea and throws the rest out, they must get quite steamed. It's like standing on the shoulders of giants, so to speak. There are certainly many partnerships in writing where authors collaborate on a world together, but there you have the "approval" thing again. These authors seem to be okay with someone else expanding on their world as long as they have the final approval.
I can understand this to some degree; if someone took "my" characters from my fic and started axing their personalities to use for themselves without my consent, I'd probably be bugged. My story hardly smacks of originality, but I have thought about how to write the characters, and I'm quite fond of them. On the flip side, you have someone like Lumen, who showed me her art and found out whether I liked it before showing it off to the world. (thank you Lumen! That was very considerate of you.) She made a great effort to line up her visions with mine, and it worked out beautifully. I don't mind that Yahriel was "borrowed" one little bit.
It is a perplexing question, because one must ask why an author gets so upset and yet video game companies and TV shows don't give a rat's ass. Is it because the primary means of transmission for video games and TV is A/V rather than written? I imagine that if someone animated their own "Daria" cartoon and broadcast it (for example), MTV would be all over that for copyright infringement. But fanfic is so tiny and insignificant, it's still hard to see why authors get their feathers so ruffled. It's like a little fly biting a hippopotamus - sure, it's annoying, but is it really worth the effort to smack it?
As for myself, I plan to keep on writing fanfic, but I find myself very reluctant to ever consider writing fics based on a written series. Not sure why; perhaps because I, personally, feel that I'd be stealing. Other ppl don't think so, and that's what's right for them. I've got no moral ground to point fingers, since I have had a lot of fun writing fanfic.
End pondering.
