[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Because the fan fiction writer is a leech, a parasite, a blood-sucker, feeding from the creativity of someone else. If somebody wants to be an author, let them create their own worlds, not steal somebody else's.

Was Wide Sargasso Sea written by a "leech and bloodsucker?" Are costumers who dress up like jedi parasites, or is that limited to textual imitators? Is Wicked feeding off the creativity of Baum, and having none of its own?

Harry, I am disappointed in your response. It shows a willingness to pass judgment on an entire genre of literature without any experience of it, based on a passing knowledge of a few examples. You sound as dismissive as the people who declare "there's no literary value in romance; it's all just feelgood escapism for stay-at-home moms."

Originally Posted by carpetmojo

Quite apart from the fact that I agree with Harry, (but he's more eloquent about it) the court's view is that it is illegal.

Name the court that's found not-for-profit fanfic illegal.

As far as I've been able to track, fanfic not being published for profit has never even *gone* to court, much less been found illegal. (Fanfic published for profit is almost never labeled "fanfic." In those cases, some is found infringing; some is not.)

If you want to encourage intellectual theft, that's, as they say, your bag. But there's no doubt about what it is.

So all those teachers who tell students, "write what you think happens next in the story" are encouraging intellectual theft?

And the stuff I've seen would have the opposite effect from making anyone eager to read the original works !

I'm sorry you haven't found the good stuff. Most of my interest in new TV shows comes from fanfic; I don't bother seeking out shows, and fanfic is how I find ones I might be interested in.

However, your limited personal poor experiences don't mean that thousands of fans who write and read at Fanfiction.net and AO3 and other archives are exchanging mindless drivel.

If you like this genre, well, there you go. But please don't try to elevate it beyond, to be charitable, perhaps well-meaning plagiarism.

Admire and support those who create the original, not the passengers on the band-wagon.

Wouldn't want anyone admiring Shakespeare, given all the ripping-off of Marlowe that he did. And let's remember to ignore the plagiaristic My Fair Lady and appreciate Pygmalion instead. Don't give credit to Twain for Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court; after all, he didn't do the real creative work of inventing Arthur and the Round Table. He just made up a story in someone else's setting with someone else's characters, and it doesn't take creativity to do that.

The idea that all work that builds on someone else's is "plagiarism" is a ludicrous denial of human creativity.