Fan Fiction: Against
Thursday, June 23rd, 2005 09:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rolanniRobin Hobb has posted a cogent rant here. Link from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
pegkerr
I know that some folks on my friends list write fan fic, and may thus not agree with Robin's points. If you feel compelled to disagree with them here, please be polite and rational. Posts deemed impolite, irrational, or both, by Eagles Over the Kennebec Management will be deleted.
In the service of Full Disclosure and Fair Warning, I do agree with Robin's points. Scott Lynch (link also frompegkerr) does not.
pegkerrI know that some folks on my friends list write fan fic, and may thus not agree with Robin's points. If you feel compelled to disagree with them here, please be polite and rational. Posts deemed impolite, irrational, or both, by Eagles Over the Kennebec Management will be deleted.
In the service of Full Disclosure and Fair Warning, I do agree with Robin's points. Scott Lynch (link also from
pegkerr) does not.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
I'm on the fence
Date: 2005-06-23 06:55 pm (UTC)If someone's going to go to all the trouble to write a fanfic story, they can just as easily take the inspiration they got from the original, plus whatever they wanted to change, and create their own worlds and stories. Writing is still writing.
But I'm not as sold that fanfiction of media properties is as bad an idea. Obviously, this doesn't include franchises like Star Trek and Star Wars, that pump out plenty of books. But cancelled television shows? Even if there was a sudden windfall of money allowing the show to be reconstituted, hiring producers, directors, costumers, set designers, lighting crew, camera crew, and all the zillions of other people required, they'd never be able to get the actors back, and even if they did, they'd probably have aged out of the show's timeline. So to all intents and purposes, there will be no more stories in that world.
In that case, I think fan fiction keeps shows alive, building a market for the DVD releases, and peripheral fan souveniers. Where's the bad in that?
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 06:56 pm (UTC)Er, I agree with everything she said too. :)
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Date: 2005-06-23 06:56 pm (UTC)I do have to say that the argument that fanfic compromises the recognizable identity of the original work is not one that impresses me a whole lot. Anyone who would claim to be unable to tell the difference between Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and (to make up an unfortunately not-atypical example) an internet-archived story entitled "Harry Potter and the American Exchange Student at Hogwarts" by a writer bylining herself as TheMissingWeasleyChick, is . . . being a trifle disingenuous, in my opinion anyhow.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 06:57 pm (UTC)It makes me wonder what the core issue is beneath fan fiction. I've often speculated about it, but all the possibilities are uncomfortable and generate Great Hate.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 07:11 pm (UTC)Go paint your own picture, folks.
But that's just my opinion.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 07:16 pm (UTC)This is a bit like saying "gay sex is sex between two males, without the consent of either male." Quite a lot of fanfiction is written with the consent of the author. If you begin from this definition, you've assumed much of the evil you intend to prove.
"If this is true, then karaoke is the path to become a singer, coloring books produce great artists, and all great chefs have a shelf of cake mixes."
It is true because various competent artists (notably Lois McMaster Bujold and Rachel Caine) have said, in so many words, that their first fiction was fanfiction. It doesn't matter whether you consider an outcome hypothetically likely if it has actually happened, and in this case it has.
Re: I'm on the fence
Date: 2005-06-23 07:27 pm (UTC)OK -- point. Cancelled television shows is a personal blindspot because, um, I don't watch television. I have no idea what the dynamic is there, and it may well be as you say, that the fan's fiction keeps interest in the show alive.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 07:38 pm (UTC)This may be true. However, it is equally true that not all fan fiction is written with the author's permission. I, for instance, make a practice of saying "No," when asked if someone may write and publish (see definition below) Liaden Universe(R) fan fic. Note the (R), here, which means Registered Trademark.
And honestly? I don't really care if somebody writes Liaden Universe(R) fan fiction -- as long as they don't publish them. "Publish" in this case includes such things as posting it to a website, or including it in a clubzine/fanzine/etc. The second you (general "you") publish, you've violated not only my copyright, but my trademark, and the Law requires me to Act. Very poor, that Acting; takes up 'way too much of everyone's time and energy.
It is true because various competent artists (notably Lois McMaster Bujold and Rachel Caine) have said, in so many words, that their first fiction was fanfiction
Fan fiction, using someone else's characters and world, which was published wholesale in violation of the original creator's wishes? Or fan fiction that they wrote privately, for practice, like someone who wants to learn calligraphy traces over the letters until their muscles understand the movement?
And, not to let my own personal blindspot unfocus the discussion -- are we talking media fan fiction, or print? As noted upstream, I don't know enough about the culture and/or dynamics of media fan fiction ot have a competent opinion.
I'm not on the fence.
Date: 2005-06-23 07:45 pm (UTC)Even dead television shows are intellectual property. I certainly don't want the good ones corrupted by an infestation of fanfic, and I'm not willing to assign anyone the authority to distinguish between "good enough to protect" and "not good enough to protect".
At any rate, even when it isn't *monetary* theft, it still looks to me like the literary equivalent of breaking into someone's home and wearing their scanties. Not an admirable practice, even if you think you look better in 'em than their owners do, and refrain from selling them on Ebay.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 07:58 pm (UTC)Fan fiction, using someone else's characters and world, which was published wholesale in violation of the original creator's wishes? You've added "in violation of the original creator's wishes" to the definition. I don't know if Bujold ever circulated her fanfic; Caine did and does. Bujold has described her early work as Star-Trek-based, as did Caine; Gene Roddenberry was fic-friendly.
But the statement was that it's impossible for a published writer to begin writing with fanfic, and that's demonstrably false.
When you say "fan fiction", unmodified, you cover both media-based and print-based fiction. Before Harry Potter, most fanfiction was media-based; I don't know what the distribution looks like now.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 08:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 09:03 pm (UTC)There's a web page here (http://www.sff.net/people/thyme/main.htp) that might be of interest, in that case. It's a 2005 Bryn Mawr undergrad thesis that goes into the culture and dynamic of media fanfiction, as well as into the process by which the substance of a story can sometimes move from uncopyrighted source material to copyrighted fictional form to uncopyrighted fanfic to a different copyrighted fictional form.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 10:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-06-23 11:24 pm (UTC)The author does omit mention of one particularly striking example of "Miami Universe" borrowing, the novel Mad Maudlin by Mercedes Lackey and Rosemary Edghill, fusing the "Bloody Mary" story with Lackey's "urban elves" shared universe.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 12:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 01:53 am (UTC)I think part of the problem is that the body of literature classifiable as "fanfic" is much less amenable to generalizations than most people -- on all sides of the debates -- realize. Also, most definitions of "fanfic" promulgated to date are not qualitative (that is, derived from characteristics of the works themselves); rather, they're formulaic (that is, derived from a logic-equation that tries to map relationships between creators and works). This leads to several problems:
Problem #1: Crafting a qualitative, content-driven definition that reliably distinguishes fanfic from profic is impossible -- just about any generalization that attempts to draw such a distinction is easily disprovable by counterexample. I could cite a long series of examples, but it's easier to argue from Sturgeon's Law: "90% of everything is crud". Qualitatively, this is equally true of fanfic and profic alike -- but so is its corollary, that 10% of everything is NOT crud. (I'll get to examples eventually, but I want to get the full analysis out of the way first.)
Problem #2: The logic-equations that drive formulaic definitions of fanfic rely on questionable premises. One is that "fanfic authors" and "pro authors" are mutually exclusive sets. In fact, authors cross back and forth over the border -- it's easy to name fanfic authors who've gone pro; what isn't acknowledged openly is that not all of them stop writing fanfic after becoming pros; they just take the fanfic underground. (In almost all cases, the fanfic involved is mediafic; in the very few cases I know of relative to printfic, the creators of the parent works have at least tacitly granted approval to fanfic creators.)
Problem #3: While modern fanfic and the associated debates originated with respect to original-series Star Trek, and continue to focus mostly on SF/F genre works, fanfic has been around much longer than that. Notably, Sherlock Holmes "pastiches" have circulated openly since before Conan Doyle's death, first arising in publications almost exactly equivalent to the 1970s Trek-derived mediazines.
Problem #4: Ultimately, the present fanfic/profic distinction is the wrong distinction -- a better model would distinguish between individually created works (most prose fiction) and collectively created milieus (dramatic/performed media, RPG-derived settings, prose "shared-world" universes).
The Hobb essay is a solid, morally and legally sound defense of the sanctity of individual creations; as such, I agree with its case. But it falls apart on two levels when it attempts to go farther: it fails to acknowledge the unique characteristics of collective creations, and wrongly concludes that flaws arguably endemic to fanfic based on individual creations must also apply to fanfic based on collectively created settings. It doesn't help that today's profic is blurring the lines significantly. The advent of the 'Net has caused shared-universe fiction to evolve -- with MUDs and MUCKs on the gaming side, and things like Eric Flint's 1632 shared universe in the prosefic world.
I'll close with a handful of pointers to fanfic I consider of excellent to extraordinary quality.
Doctor Who
Two short, loosely connected pieces, interpreting material from the new BBC season.
The Terminus of Prayer
Look Upon This Sky
Gargoyles
Originally a respected animated series produced by Disney; parts of the series might be regarded as Shakespearean fanfic. Though long, this story is accessible even to those not familiar with the show.
The Scottish Play
Veronica Mars
A fragment extrapolated from the current UPN series. This is just astonishing....
The Tragedy of Lillian Kane -- Epilogue
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 05:30 am (UTC)I also don't see any harm in it in cases where the original creator has given permission -- as for example apparently Rowling and Gaiman and Whedon have.
Her other arguments, I'm right behind.
I'd never give permission for my work, because I also feel very much what Hobb says there about the photoshopping of the family photograph.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 05:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 05:58 am (UTC)Isn't there a well-established tradition in painting, that one learns first to paint like the master? I'm remembering Don Maitz telling us of a visit to Donato's studio where he also saw the work of several of Donato's students, one of whom had just completed a painting which was, according to Don, indistinguishable from a Donato.
This feels like a different situation to me: Obviously one's apprenticed students have one's permission -- even insistence -- to copy their technique and, sometimes, their work.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 06:08 am (UTC)Fair enough. I happen to remember when Robin came across a cache of unauthorized fan fic based on her work, and the difficulty of communicating to the writer why she (Robing) found this objectionable.
To clarify: The fan fic I object to is that which is written and published in violation of the original creator's wishes, without asking (and honoring) the permission of the original creator.
I realize that some writers do give permission -- I can't fathom it, myself (obviously), but there you are.
Personally, were I a beginning writer (as I once was), and if I am wishing to be a careful craftsperson (as most beginning writers very much wish to be), I'd much rather build my own world and play there (which is, by the way, exactly what I did -- some of which became the Liaden Universe(R)), than have the added burden of making certain that I'm not violating the rules of a borrowed universe/relationship structure/&c.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 06:39 am (UTC)I think it is vandalism, and it's often willful, gleeful, rather than simply ignorant vandalism. In one case (involving one of my stories) someone took a carefully built, multifacted empath and turned him into a bullying, power-mad rapist. For fun.
That's vandalism, that's abuse, that's copyright infringement -- and if ever there'd been a chance I'd go for more or less open attitude toward Liaden fanfic it was shot down right there.
Oh, thank the gods, I'm not alone
Date: 2005-06-24 06:54 am (UTC)I have friends who write fan fiction and it has confused me every day of my life for this one simple fact. They put all this energy into it and like others here have said previously, wouldn't it just be easier to writer your own work?
My own observation is that most of them live in a state of fear. If they step out on their own, they're not sure they'll be liked and for them, writing is a form of popularity, a way to win friends, even the virtual ones off the internet.
I could go on, but all of you have stated what I would say far more cogently than I can this early in the morning without coffee.
Just thank you. For a while, I've felt like the lone voice in the wilderness when it comes to fan fiction. Thank goodness, I'm apparently not. I just wish there was a way to really encourage all these people to write for themselves.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 07:04 am (UTC)I don't agree. The original is not untouched in the case of fanfic, in my opinion.
The difference is in ubiquity. If I paint a moustache on my personal copy of the Mona Lisa, there's no harm done. If I flood the web with moustached Monas, and enough people see mine, I have corrupted the collective image of the painting. The more successful I am in getting people to look at what I've done, the more harm I've done.
As an analogy, I think of something I discovered as an amateur classical musician working with professionals. One of the things that drove some of them crazy was the tendency for people to write lyrics to classical tunes -- whether it be "in earnest" ("I'm Always Chasing Rainbows", "Whiter Shade of Pale", various hymns, songs from Kismet, etc.) or fun (Flanders and Swann's version of the Mozart 2nd horn concerto, or the little ditty to the tune of Schubert's Unfinished). The problem is, once you've heard the song enough, you can't ever go back. Your ear is compromised; you can't hear just the original music anymore. It will always be tainted by the association.
Similarly, fanfic steals mindshare. You can't go back, and view the original as if you'd never been exposed to the derivative. Sometimes, the effect is so small as to be unnoticeable -- but not always, and not for everyone. To me, that's vandalism, pure and simple, just like painting moustaches on other people's copies of famous portraits.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 07:18 am (UTC)*Why* would you do it?
Date: 2005-06-24 07:31 am (UTC)Let me expand. My husband does crossword puzzles. It's a reasonably challenging intellectual exercise. When he's done, he throws the marked-up paper away; its use is over. I do counted cross-stitch embroidery. When it's through, I rarely get around to framing or using it; the pleasure is in the process, not in the completed work.
People write fanfic because they enjoy doing so. Some of them are unsatisfied by explanations in the existing universe, so they dovetail information between the existing episodes to explain character behavior. Some of them want to give the universe a 90-degree twist and see what happens. Some of them just enjoy the process. And some of them are professional authors who also love writing fanfic.
Consider, for instance, the drabble. It's a writing exercise: precisely 100 words on a subject, no more, no less. It's a five-finger exercise; the question is whether you can say anything intriguing or interesting in that space. Fanficcers trade drabble challenges for pleasure. Write 100 words about Spike. Write 100 words containing the word "rose". Write 100 words set during Season 4.
Why drabble in fanfic? Because with an existing set of characters and situations, you've got more scope. Conveying a new character in 100 words is supremely difficult. Conveying an aspect of an existing character is possible. It's a game, and some people prefer to play it by the fanfic rules.
Let me make it clear: Some people who write fanfic are jerks. Some people in any human endeavor are jerks. Fandom has the problem that a friend of mine calls "the naked man at the Gay Pride parade". There's always one naked man at the parade, and he's frequently the only part of the parade that the media covers, even though there's much more going on. Similarly, the idiot who sued Marion Zimmer Bradley; the idiot who asked permission to write a St. Germain story, was denied, and then went on to write and publish anyway; and the idiots who harass Anne Rice are indeed fanfic writers, but they don't represent the entire body of the population.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 08:39 am (UTC)Re: *Why* would you do it?
Date: 2005-06-24 08:44 am (UTC)This is where we get into the effect/harm/backlash onto the original work. Surely, if the original author wishes to give their universe a 90-degree twist as an exercise in what-if, or to create an intriguing story-line, that is the right and prerogative of the original author and not of an outside agency?
And some of them are professional authors who also love writing fanfic
I'm very sorry, but the fact that some professional authors write fanfic is ...not compelling as an explanation. This may be, I acknowledge, because I've met and dealt with so many professional authors *G*.
The answer is the same as for any other human endeavor: Because it's fun.
Yes, but. Not all things that all people think are fun to do themselves are harmless to others. And simply saying that there's no harm done doesn't prove that this is so -- no more, I admit, than saying harm is done proves that *that* is so.
Similarly, the idiot who sued Marion Zimmer Bradley; the idiot who asked permission to write a St. Germain story, was denied, and then went on to write and publish anyway; and the idiots who harass Anne Rice are indeed fanfic writers, but they don't represent the entire body of the population.
Right. And I will say that those people who have asked -- and been denied -- permission to write Liaden Universe(R) fanfic have been respectful and more or less understanding of our position, if disappointed. (
Re: *Why* would you do it?
Date: 2005-06-24 09:09 am (UTC)We now return to the intent of the original author. Joss Whedon, for one, has spoken repeatedly and lovingly about fanfic. His intent is not being subverted if you write an alternate universe in which Buffy loses -- in point of fact, he did so himself. Who is being harmed when you work in a universe whose creator consents? Fanfic doesn't overwrite canon. We all know that the real Buffy eventually triumphed, and no quantity of apocalyptic fic changes that in the minds of Buffy fans.
I do not deny that there are incompetent fanficcers, rude fanficcers, plagiaristic fanficcers. I do deny that all fanficcers are one or more of the above, and that fanfic is inevitably harmful. It's the sweeping generalizations that bring me out to argue.
I'm very sorry, but the fact that some professional authors write fanfic is ...not compelling as an explanation.
No. But it is an effective refutation of the argument that fanfic can be a step on the pathway to professional writing, as well as a refutation of the argument that no serious writer could ever write fanfic.
Re: *Why* would you do it?
Date: 2005-06-24 09:55 am (UTC)Me, too.
Who is being harmed when you work in a universe whose creator consents?
When creator consent is present, then there's no problem for him/her/it, their universe, or the fans who chose to write in that universe.
The problem comes when people begin to think that any work of fiction is fair game for their re-interpretation and publication, and that by the act of publishing, the original creator has relinquished all control over his/her/its work.
(Note: No one here has argued this; I have seen this argument made elsewhere by fanfic writers, and I can't begin, holding to my own rules of polite and rational discourse, to describe how offensive that viewpoint is.)
To be clear: The difficulty on both sides of the question arises in part from inconsistency: It's OK to fanfic Gaiman; it's not OK to fanfic Lee & Miller -- add a unsophisticated (or entitled) fan writer and you have a problem. Lee & Miller have to get ugly; the fan's bewildered; people get mad and little the landscape with sweeping generalizations.
It might -- perhaps -- help matters if people who wrote and published approved fanfic included a disclaimer. Something on the lines of: Neil Gaiman has given his permission for fan writers to write in the X universe he created; here's the link to the permission, check it out. This would, IMHO, be much more honest -- and useful -- than the mistaken, but oft-repeated, "Because we make no money from the publication of this unauthorized story, the author's copyright has not been placed in jeopardy."
This may solve nothing; or it may alert would-be fanfic writers that there's a level of potential unpleasantness present in the use of another person's intellectual property, and that it's best to check before writing.
Re: *Why* would you do it?
Date: 2005-06-24 09:57 am (UTC)That would of course be "litter the landscape."
Gah.
Re: *Why* would you do it?
Date: 2005-06-24 09:58 am (UTC)Re: *Why* would you do it?
Date: 2005-06-24 10:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 10:20 am (UTC)This depends on whether one is using "most" in its narrow sense of "a plurality", or the broad colloquial sense of "the preponderance".
There was a significant strata of print-driven fanfic prior to the Harry Potter phenomenon, and it was notable for being strongly associated with what have sometimes been called "mimetic" fandoms, wherein readers of a particular series expend considerable time and effort in reproducing elements of the fictional setting in real life -- producing craftwork and costumes, forming organized fan clubs, putting on exhibitions or convention parties, establishing organizations that mirror those found in the source novels. And for a good while, authors whose works spawned mimetic fandoms actively encouraged (and supervised, to varying degrees) the writing of fanfic based in those settings.
Specific examples: MZB's Darkover, McCaffrey's Pern, Lackey's Valdemar, Katherine Kurtz's "Deryni" series. There are likely others, but these were dominant. Mercedes Lackey no longer sanctions fanfic (though I believe that some of the stories in the first Valdemar shared-world anthology from DAW originated via fanfic channels); I believe Kurtz still does (and persuaded one of her publishers to issue a book consisting in part of some of that "authorized" fanfic), and I'm not sure about McCaffrey.
The mimetic fandoms seem, for the most part, to have sharply diminished with the advent of the Internet, though greater concern with legal liability issues is also clearly a factor; the reasons for that are probably worth discussing, but not necessarily in this thread.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 10:30 am (UTC)Well, yes -- except that not all fanfic is inherently replicative. (See my long post below regarding individual vs. collective creation.) And on the flip side, at least a percentage of officially licensed tie-in fiction is replicative, sometimes deliberately so.
Re: Oh, thank the gods, I'm not alone
Date: 2005-06-24 11:02 am (UTC)Ah, but therein lies part of the complexity -- because a great many fanfic writers are not, in fact, writing "for themselves". Rather, they are writing for a community of like-minded readers/writers, and part of their reward lies in the responses they receive from other members of that community. Those responses can consist of critiques (from "beta readers"), reviews, or even other stories that incorporate elements of their work, thereby reinforcing the "vibe" associated with participating in a shared creative endeavor.
And the thing is, that "vibe" isn't unique to fanfic communities. It's the exact same jones that professional writers feed when they participate in shared-world series (see particularly the Wild Cards project or the "Bordertown" cycle overseen by Terri Windling). It's the jones that some professional writers cite as the "fun" of playing in the Star Trek sandbox. And it's the jones that drives Sherlock Holmes fans to try and reconcile all of the editorial inconsistencies in the Conan Doyle canon, or to produce nineteen different versions of the "Giant Rat of Sumatra" story (including several different and mutually exclusive professionally published accounts).
The shared-creation muse and the individual-creation muse are qualitatively different entities -- neither is better nor worse than the other. It's the same sort of quasi-religious dichotomy that divides Mac and Windows users; most of the genuine problems between fanfic and profic writers seem to arise over inability of one practitioner to recognize the validity of the competing muse.
As Hobb and others note, it really is a Bad Thing for collective-creation practitioners to appropriate an individual-creation universe for their own purposes. OTOH, it's an equally Bad Thing for individual-creation practitioners to try and judge collective-creation universes by the standards and models of individual creation.
(It is probably worth observing that even the collectivists acknowledge points of divergence and "alternate universe" concepts -- I note particularly a trio of recent licensed Buffy novels postulating a Buffyverse in which Evil Willow actually stayed evil....)
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 01:33 pm (UTC)The rest ... I'm surprised to find I disagree, mostly. People begin learning to write from a lot of different directions. I think fanfic can be one of them.
I mean, making cakes from mixes can be the first step to becoming a professional chef, too. You just can't continue making cakes from mixes; if that's your goal, eventually you have to move on.
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Date: 2005-06-24 01:34 pm (UTC)"that" being "to become a professional chef."
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 03:09 pm (UTC)I agree that there are many ways to learn to write -- and I even agree that writing in the style of an author you admire may be one of those things.
Where I start to get bent out of shape is when that work is published (which means, posting it on a website, printing it in a fanzine and the ever-popular etc.).
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 03:09 pm (UTC)Got it *g*
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 03:17 pm (UTC)The problem with the online world--and this doesn't affect the legality--is that it feels like you're quietly sharing with a few friends, when really you're shouting to the whole wide world, or that portion of the wide world that goes looking.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 03:22 pm (UTC)There was for a time a (moderated) section for Pern fanfic on Anne's official website. She has also in the past vigorously acted to protect the Dragonriders of Pern trademark and her copyright. My sense was that the fanfic section was something on the order of a controlled experiment.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 05:28 pm (UTC)Djonn, that's elegant, and it probably would let people talk to each other (as opposed to shouting at each other), if there could be some general understanding that the two processes are similar-but-not-exact, with not-very-similar desired payoffs. I'm likening the "collective creations" to open-source programming -- community creativity in service of one project -- for my ease of thought.
Re: Oh, thank the gods, I'm not alone
Date: 2005-06-24 08:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-06-24 10:04 pm (UTC)I'm not trying to be difficult. I merely seem to have missed a step in your argument.
no subject
Date: 2005-06-25 05:35 am (UTC)And now I'm confused. I'm reading the above to imply that Low Port (edited by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller, Meisha Merlin, 2003), is a work of fanfic. If you read and enjoyed the book, (rather than simply enjoying ownership of it) then you know that Low Port was a collection of original short stories written to a theme, that theme being: Tell a story in which the hero/es is/are someone who lives on the wrong side of the spaceport's (or castle's) tracks. There were no Liaden stories included (not even mine); we said specifically in our guidelines (and in our foreword) that Low Port was not a Liaden Universe(R) shared-world antho. If that's the step you're missing, I'm very sorry, but I don't know how a careful reader could have missed this, or formed the opinion that the stories included had anything to do with the Liaden Universe(R).
To answer your other question -- at least, I think it was a question... Low Port was an open anthology (that means we accepted submissions from anyone who read the guidelines and sent us a story -- and a number of people who apparently hadn't read the guidelines, but sent us a story anyway). We did buy stories from a few "young" writers (meaning that, at the time we bought the stories, those authors hadn't yet seen much published), but I don't think we bought anyone's first pro sale. Of course folks like Lee Modesitt, Ru Emerson, eluki bes shahar, Jody Lynn Nye, Mark Tiedemann -- to name a few -- are well-seasoned authors. While Lee, eluki, and Mark specifically wrote stories set in their own on-going universes, every story appearing in Low Port is, to the best of my knowledge, an original work.
Low Port and Anthologies
Date: 2005-06-25 07:21 am (UTC)Since I brought up the topic, may I inquire about what you think of shared-world anthologies which are based on the universe of a single writer? I've always been curious as to why pro writers do or don't get involved with such projects.
re: fanfiction:against
Date: 2005-06-25 09:11 pm (UTC)has to do with copyright issues, esp. those surrounding fanfic.
Another opinion is posted on Lynn Flewellings LJ, downloadable from her Files.
The results of the Discussion? I came out Against , with my main arguement that it is theft, pure and simple; my husband came out For, but he believes that all created work is fair game, once it goes public---some more details to this, but that is the gist of it.
Penny in Virginia
Just my .02.... (Hoping it's coherent)
Date: 2005-06-27 11:11 am (UTC)And here lies one of the major stumbling blocks I have with fanfic. I understand that there are novels of Bradley and a few others we will never see--because someone wrote a fanfic piece, a short story, and it was tossed up on the Internet at approximately the same time as the author submitted the novel. The author had never seen the short story--but the publisher would not take a chance that the fan would sue over the "idea" being stolen, once the novel hit print.
If the author lives, there may be another story--in the exact same playpen where you want to write a fanfic story. How long do we have to wait? Well, Canticle for Liebowitz didn't have a sequel for over a decade, at a minimum.
Second point. It's not exactly fanfic, but playing free and loose with the world can lead people to think they have the right to play free and loose with A PUBLISHED NOVEL. I know a writer who got an irate fan letter about something the fan had read in an e-book copy of her story. The writer had to point out that A) she didn't write the scene that way and B) there was as yet no e-book, and where did the fan read it? Turns out someone took it upon themselves to scan, change things, and UPLOAD their version of the novel to be free! Free, little story!
Crap. And a nightmare, because like Robin, I choose my words carefully, thanks. As all of us here do, I think. But seriously....what if the day comes when there is no longer a definitive version? When we can't find the definitive story?
And third...in my opinion, all good fiction has a unique voice. I write one series in first person--can someone else do this? Frankly, I can't imagine anyone else writing Val Con and Meri, although if something dire happened and rolanni and kinzel wanted someone to finish a book, I'd do my damnedest to do it right. But I read the last fragmented book of Dorothy Sayers...and I bet I can tell, within tolerances, which sections were hers, and which done by the person who finished the book--although the finishing author did a very decent job. I've been warned not to read the follow up book.
So--A) Copyright nightmare for living author still working at writing, B)Fanfic can really give people the wrong idea about what they can do to a book, and a world, and C)It's not the author's vision. You want to change the vision, have monkeys play the roles in your head, fair game--I never tell fans who I visualize for a character, if someone's face inspired the character. It can really spoil it for them, because anything brought in from outside changes the dynamic
But I have no problem with writing fanfic for practice and fun, and handing a printout to a friend at a coffeehouse get-together. I have problems with Internet posting, printing and distributing at a convention, SELLING fanfic. I had a strong idea for a couple of good B5 novels--even did several large scenes, and wrote coherent synopses to send to Del Rey. But they knew what they wanted written, and hired a Del Rey writer to do them. Del Rey and Warner's legal right. So the stuff is stashed in a drawer, I got it out of my system--and someday, with the B5 stripped away, it will make a decent SF adventure novel. I tried to sell three BattleStar Galactica scripts, back in the first pass (they needed help, if they wanted real SF. But of course Larson didn't want real SF...) They're in a drawer, too, although my sister asked to see them again, years later. She'd enjoyed them.
But they $%$#@ aren't up on the Internet, or for sale in the dealer's room.
I think Robin is right--the faster you start writing your own stuff, the faster you'll become a Writer--someone who digests the myths and the 6 or 7 plots, and creates a new twist of the kaleidoscope.