Plagiarism and reviewing
Jul. 12th, 2004 02:51 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
louiseluxI see the plagiarism argument has resurfaced on the old flist.
There's this idea that people who write fanfic are not only breaking the law but are somehow wasting their talent/time/precious souls to boot. I delight in using someone else's characters and derive vast amounts of entertainment from it, as long as the author doesn't mind. If they did mind, then I think I'd stop. Which brings me to a point - would you stop writing fanfic if the author asked you to stop? What would you consider as 'stopping'? Stopping distributing or posting it, or stopping writing altogether?
Another hoary old chestnut that nonetheless bothers me, because you really can't get away from it, is the idea that by attacking someone's fic you're attacking them as a person. I don't believe this is true, but I can see why some people feel it. It's hard receiving criticism, as hard as it is to give pain-free criticism. I think the same general rule applies to this as to any social interaction - practise common decency in reviews and LoCs. Personally, I try and be honest, think about the language I use, and think about my own motives.
There's this idea that people who write fanfic are not only breaking the law but are somehow wasting their talent/time/precious souls to boot. I delight in using someone else's characters and derive vast amounts of entertainment from it, as long as the author doesn't mind. If they did mind, then I think I'd stop. Which brings me to a point - would you stop writing fanfic if the author asked you to stop? What would you consider as 'stopping'? Stopping distributing or posting it, or stopping writing altogether?
Another hoary old chestnut that nonetheless bothers me, because you really can't get away from it, is the idea that by attacking someone's fic you're attacking them as a person. I don't believe this is true, but I can see why some people feel it. It's hard receiving criticism, as hard as it is to give pain-free criticism. I think the same general rule applies to this as to any social interaction - practise common decency in reviews and LoCs. Personally, I try and be honest, think about the language I use, and think about my own motives.
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no subject
Date: 2004-07-13 05:48 pm (UTC)If they did mind, I might think a little less of them for it, depending on their opinion. I can respect the ones who say "I don't want to see it," because they're just turning a blind eye so that there's no ridiculous issues of plagiarism. (I've always wondered about the ones who do have a look, because they then can't write anything about it.)
I would stop, though, at least publicly. Privately, I might still tinker with a few characters, just for my own amusement.
Sometimes people do confuse attacking the fic with attacking the person. Young writers with unfortunate Mary Sues (and who probably don't know any better) are attacked as people. I've seen it. That's no reason for taking the defensive every time, though.
People should be nice in their reviews. I don't mean that they should be loading the praise on in every sentence, but they should be truthful, if not honest. And people who recieve good criticism should take a step back, ignore it until they can cope with it, and then consider it properly.