Read on Twitter
So, I saw a tweet going around that reminded me of something I've been thinking a lot about lately: the line between plagiarism and transformative fiction.
The most recent tweet was along the lines of "if you need to copy someone to write fanfiction then don't write fic".
The most recent tweet was along the lines of "if you need to copy someone to write fanfiction then don't write fic".
I'm not QTing because hey, maybe in this case it was copy and paste plagiarism, but let's stop and talk about that sentiment for a second.
If you need to copy someone... don't write FANfiction.
This attitude around copying other people's ideas in fandom has always baffled me.
If you need to copy someone... don't write FANfiction.
This attitude around copying other people's ideas in fandom has always baffled me.
To produce the fanfiction, you literally were copying someone's characters, at the very least. Heck, if you're writing something that's canon-compliant, you're also copying, using, and transforming plot from someone else's work.
So why, once we all group up here to enjoy something together, is it somehow a grave sin to go "hey that's a really neat idea, I want to try my own hand at it". Let's be clear, copying whole passages from another work and claiming it as your own is plagiarism and it's wrong.
But the passing off ideas as your own is a key feature of plagiarism. Now, it's probably rude and bad form to conceptually copy a fanfiction without referencing or crediting the original--that is a fair complaint. And I get the line can be fine there (when is credit necessary?).
But if you're fine referencing your inspiration, then in my book it just falls under the umbrella of transformative fiction, which there's NO shame in. Authors have been doing it for thousands of years, retelling old stories in new ways--in small or huge ways (look at PPZ).
The sentiment "if you have to copy, don't write" is so deeply antithetical to how writers can start out and get better, and the concept of fan-generated content. If someone wanted to take a fic of mine and do the exact same "plot" with a different pairing, neat!
Heck, if they wanted to try a crazy exercise they could go the Midnight Sun route and rewrite the exact same story with flipped POVs. As long as they included a note "this was inspired by X story in Y way", more power to them.
In the end I just find it so funky that we all "copy" intellectual properties without a second thought and then lose our minds when someone dare copy our copied ideas. I honestly think the whole idea of transformative works is really cool and powerful, not something to shame.
I also say this because I've gotten the occasional message with people worried that I'll be "mad" that they took inspo for some work from my fics, which just speaks to that culture. At least with my works: go nuts, make something both new and the same. Just write and be polite.
