Do Fan Fiction Authors Own Their Stories?
Nothing thrills me more than a good story. A story that I can involve myself with. Because that’s what a good story does to me. I become part of it. I know the characters like my friends and family. They become real as does their world.
Whether it be a FF author or a published author. A good story is a good story.
So when a story is plagiarized, I am truly stunned.
Plagiarizing has always been part of the Fandom sad to say. It happens more than we care to admit. It’s become part of the “we don’t like it, but it happens attitude”, and this is basically because most believe fan fiction fundamentally is plagiarism in itself. So what’s a FF author to do? Do they even have rights? I started researching this subject and the amount of information I came across was astounding.
Fan fiction is one of the most popular forms of writing on the Web. The combination of popular story lines, familiar characters and never ending hunger for more material makes it an easy form of writing to get into, both as an author and as a reader. Many new writers take up fan fiction before moving on to create stories of their own while other, more experienced, writers enjoy the tight-knit community and instant connection shared in their groups. There has been a recent wave of fan fiction stories being published as well as original works by many a FF author I personally follow.
However, fan fiction is also a genre that can be very prone to plagiarism. Fan fiction is very tempting targets for plagiarists and those looking for content to scrape. After all, such works are loaded with popular search phrases like “Twilight”, “Harry Potter” and “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” but also offer the promise of near-instant readership, especially with so many popular fan fiction destinations on the Web such as FF.net and Twilighted.
Nonetheless, plagiarism of fan fiction remains one of the hardest forms to detect and to stop. It’s a form of plagiarism where the rules have been changed drastically and what was once cut and dry is no longer so simple.
In short, it’s a whole new world when it comes to story telling. Many a well known published author has come out against fan fiction. On FF.net, there is a large listing of writers who do not allow their characters and story lines to be used. These authors enforce their copyrights.
Most instances of plagiarism are handled through copyright law. Since plagiarism implies that a duplicate work was created, thus creating a violation of copyright law, one can use the regular tools of copyright enforcement (IE: Cease and desist letters, DMCA notices, etc.) to bring about an end of the situation.
However, with fan fiction, the FF author doesn’t actually hold the copyright to the work they create, in fact, the work itself is technically a violation of copyright law. Since copyright law grants the copyright holder the exclusive right to create derivative works based on an original one, which is precisely what a fan fiction is, the original copyright holder, whoever owns the rights to the original work(s) owns the fan fiction regardless of who wrote it. I found this most surprising. Even though many a fan fiction story I have read are original and not “Twilight” stories at all, the FF author does not own the story. They aren’t theirs. Definitely makes you think.
With that in mind, you don’t have a claim of copyright infringement when fan fiction work is plagiarized. Since a DMCA notice requires you to be a copyright holder or an agent authorized to act on that person’s behalf, you can not legally use one of those to have works taken down and a cease and desist letter, though legal to send, is nothing more than empty wind. Anyone with a solid understanding of copyright law would discard it immediately.
When it comes to copyright law, the fan fiction author has no rights. From a purely legal standpoint, they are completely powerless to stop someone from plagiarizing their work. Again, very surprising to read that bit of info. No claim, no rights to a story they created and posted.
What has led me to this post when I know technically and legally there is no true plagiarism in fan fiction? Two very well known stories that I personally love were “plagiarized”. These were stories written by well known FF authors. Authors with very unique writing styles. You recognize their stories immediately. Truly gifted story tellers.
Needless to say, people were outraged and the complaints flew. Both plagiarized stories were since removed and things have calmed. But it still makes me think, why? Was it because they are FF authors and their characters are borrowed making it acceptable to steal from them? Though the characters are borrowed, it is still their story line, their creation. That was always my view. Borrowed characters yes, story line, no. My view, but obviously I was wrong about that.
The one thing that a fan fiction author has that most other copyright holders lack is a very strong community base. Fan fiction authors and readers tend to band together in small, but very tightly-knit community, hence Twitter, ADF, and Live Journal. United by their love for a storyline and desire to see it continue, fan fiction groups more closely resemble a fan club than a traditional writing community.
Best of all though, fan fiction communities are notoriously united in their battle against plagiarism, we have seen this many a time. Plagiarism is, by in large, seen as a cardinal sin in the community and plagiarists are ostracized and dealt with harshly. Non violent, coordinated mob justice so to speak. In the end, it’s one of the few times that mob justice can be both civilized and effective. The Web based sites will also remove “plagiarized” stories as well if it can be proven that they duplicated someone else’s story already posted.
So yes, once again I am rambling and once again I am walking the fine line of right vs wrong when it comes to fan fiction. And even after all my research, will I stop reading fan fiction? No. I love fan fiction and the creativity it inspires. I am just a bit more quiet about voicing the plagiarism opinion.
One more thought. The publishing houses that publish fan fiction. Aren’t you curious what they have to say about all this? How are they publishing these fan fiction stories and not breaching the copyright laws?
And one final note, as if I haven’t blathered enough!
Happy Holidays and many wishes for a safe and joyous New Year!
It is a great .02! When I started researching copyright re fanfic I was stunned that “technically” the fanfic writers do not own the stories they create, vamp or human. And if fanfic writers are publishing their fanfic stories, how is that possible if copyright states the stories are derivative based on the original? I’ve read a few “published fanfic” and they are the fanfic stories with name changes basically. How far does a fanfic need to be changed to stay clear of copyright infringement? Out of curiosities sake, that’s what I want to know. I believe my next mission is to ask the publishers of fanfic to explain how it works :)) Just for my own understanding.
However, I do completely agree plagiarism is wrong on any level and amazed how much it happens in the fandom. The plagiarizers think nothing of it and move from one site to another until they are completely booted. And they are never apologetic about it either.
My opinion is that, if a story is writtenas fan fiction, regardless of the plot, etc…and posted onto a fic archive site under a twilight (or any other series or book title) and the story contains the names of the characters, then that story is fan fiction. I don’t agree with the “original story with twi-names argument because of the author intended to write an original peice they shouldn’t put it on ffn or wherever under a twi category using the twi names.
IMO once that decision has been made, its fan fic. Truly outstanding, unique, well written? Yes. But still fan fic. In that argument it belongs to the holder of the copyright.
However. If someone put work a creation, they are the ones who should get to say, “I wrote this”. Just because something is written as fan fix doesn’t mean it should be plagiarised. There is still someone behind it who put in blood sweat and tears to write that piece of fan fiction.
Its a super fine line because in many of the AH fics, the.characters aren’t vampires, but the human characters of the same name still look the same as the original character and have many of the same characteristics (Edward is over protective, Alice is a shopping fiends, etc). While its true that at the core, those characters aren’t the exact same as in the book, they were still written to *be* those characters in a different setting.
I think its a slippery slope, honestly. But regardless of the legal ramifications on writing fan fic, it is still ethically wrong to copy/paste someone else’s work word for word and claim it as one’s own.
Just my, $.02
My personal opinion based on what I’ve read up on the subject and based on Twilight because that’s what I read:
It’s pretty simple really. Fanfiction is a form of copyright infringement but not plagiarism. Plagiarism is taking the work or ideas of another and passing them off as your own. Fanfiction writers don’t claim any part of Twilight as their own. Obviously same universe, cannon stories cut closer to the bone.
As for AH stories, they are not plagiarism, they are copyright infringement because they use copyrighted elements in a completely different setting. If the characters as individuals are so different from the original Twi characters, they are not even that, since a name can not be copyrighted. Even Edward and Bella living in Forks can’t be copyright infringement if they are both adult, Edward is a builder and Bella is a slut with a drink problem since they are clearly not the same characters.
As copyright infringement, once the infringing elements are removed the remaining story belongs to the fanfiction writer. Again, this would be difficult with stories using the actual characters, sparkly vampires, but not so with Builder Edward since he is basically not remotely the same character at all.
I think in some cases, it comes down to if some AH AU stories posted on fanfiction.net are fanfiction at all and not simply stories inspired by a book in a similar way many artists take their inspiration from other books, movies, plays, music, life…
My personal opinion is, although I love AU/AH Twi,many of the stories don’t belong on a fanfiction site at all.
Happy Holidays.
Great point! So much of the copyright law is interpretive with so much grey area. Me, I still love the fan fiction stories and will keep reading as long as they are posting!
Thanks for commenting!