"Plagiarism"

[Kamenjin]

I see people talking about plagiarism a lot, when one person takes major ideas and puts them into their own work.

In a situation where we are all fanauthors here, is it really fair to call something plagiarism unless it is taken in it's entirety?

I mean, I'm primarily a Harry Potter fanfic reader. And its normal for whole scenes in fics being taken straight from the books, with minute changes, if any. People don't consider it plagiarizing because while certain scenes are being taken and used as is, the author isn't just reposting the orignal story with their name on it.

How is that really any different from taking whole parts of fanfics, and modifying them to suit the purposes of one's own fanfic? I know a lot of things in the Harry Potter fanworks get used a lot, and while I haven't seen it in a long time, I can remember, in the past, when people used to claim plagiarism in stories where Harry goes shopping, buys holsters, dragonhide clothing/armour, etc etc, AND a Moody-esque trunk, with an apartment, and dueling chamber that acts as a training room of requirement. Or if Harry has a time turner, and uses it excessively so there are 5+ Harry's running around all summer (usually in the aforementioned trunk) people used to say "Hey, that idea came from "original person to think of that" (I forget who, perhaps it was RossRock or somesuch?

Basically what I am getting at is, as there are plenty of scenes taken straight from canon and dressed up certain ways to fit a fanfic (or in some cases, scenes taken directly from canon, unchanged, under the assumption that there is original content around it making the story into a fanwork, and not a carbon copy); Can we really call anything EXCEPT for posting someone else's story in it's entirity with your name plagiarism?

I mean, I can understand an author getting peeved or ticked off that someone is taking their scene (almost) exactly, and putting it in their own story. But it's the same for canon in a lot of situations.

So what do you think?

[Keith Inc.]

I think the essence of plagiarism is presenting another person's work as your own. There's no real upper or lower limit to the amount that must be stolen to be plagiarism, just an issue of credit where due.

In fanfic, it's a given that the fan isn't the creator of Harry Potter, NCIS, Atlantis or the USS Enterprise. Any canon characters, settings, plot points, plot devices or even entire scenes of dialogue are used, often depending rather heavily on the readership recognizing the original for where it comes from. It's not plagiarism if no one would reasonably assume, from your story, that you invented the concept of Warp Drive or the Force. It might be a copyright violation, but that's a different issue.

But if, for example, you take a scene from someone else's story, say Luke and Leia having whoopie smoochies on the Millenium Falcon, and just replace the names so it's Aragorn and Eowyn getting down in Helm's Deep, without any sort of credit to the original author, it's plagiarism, even if it's onlyone scene.

[Kamenjin]

What if say Tolkienfan78 did that, but put in the disclaimer something very vague, like "Not all situations in this story are 100% original. Credit to all authors this work has been inspired by."

Even though it doesn't cite anyone by name, is that enough to discount any claims of plagiarism?

Or what if Tolkienfan78 maybe read ForceMaster's fic a year or two ago, and without realizing it, copied the scene almost exactly. Maybe different words, definitely different names and places, but same sequence of events exactly? Would it still be plagiarism if the person did so unintentionally. or without their own knowledge? This happens a lot more than I would have thought, before hearing about it many times, even in published work.

Star Wars is just a sci-fi version of an Akira Kurosawa Samurai flick, if I recall correctly, but it was different /enough/ to escape copyright violation. (Although I'm fairly certain that wasn't unintentional.)

I just think the concept of plagiarism in an art form that heavily relies on borrowing from others is very interesting. Obviously, like you said, for people who appropriate complete paragraphs etc from the core work are disclaiming those situations, and the fanbase knows for the most part whats canon and fanon (although for awhile I was reading so much fanfiction, and it was so long since I read the books, I had actually incorporated some fanon into what I thought was canon, very odd...)

If a vague disclaimer like that could work, and was put into general use, we may see more derivative works, which would make fiction that made use of it kind of samey, but at the same time, if something like that was mainstream, and such a movement of ideas become standard, it could open doors for some writers to take things that have already been done in fanfiction and put a spin on it much more easily, like programmers using open source code in their own programs to speed things up.

Like I said, I'm mainly a Harry Potter reader. and as such, I see a lot of "Book 1 - 7 with a different twist" stories, where Harry is a Ravenclaw, or a Slytherin, or sends his consciousness back in time so he's 30 in an 11 year old's body etc etc. and these all make heavy use of the source fiction. Essentially rewrites of the canon story with different plot bunnies. And what struck me, before I posted that, was:

What if instead of doing a rewrite of one of the canon books, someone did a rewrite of fan novels? I don't know if it's ever been done, and I don't plan on it myself, I just think the concept of a "second generation" fanfic was interesting, which started an internal dialogue on plagiarism in fanworks.

Edited November 24, 2008 by Kamenjin

[Keith Inc.]

What if say Tolkienfan78 did that, but put in the disclaimer something very vague, like "Not all situations in this story are 100% original. Credit to all authors this work has been inspired by."

Even though it doesn't cite anyone by name, is that enough to discount any claims of plagiarism?

Well, no, unless they put in a footnote at every line to show what was 'inspired' and what was original to Tolkinefan78. They're still presenting a story that the reader can't tell what was copied without permission and what was theirs.

Or what if Tolkienfan78 maybe read ForceMaster's fic a year or two ago, and without realizing it, copied the scene almost exactly.

Maybe different words, definitely different names and places, but same sequence of events exactly? Would it still be plagiarism if the person did so unintentionally. or without their own knowledge?

that may be their DEFENSE for plagiarism, accidental mimicry, or honest confusion about what they wrote vs. what they remembered.

But it's still someone else's work being presented as their own.

This happens a lot more than I would have thought, before hearing about it many times, even in published work.

Yes, there are long legal battles, especially in music, that work to show that Artist A holds the copyright to the backbeat on Artist Bs album.

Intent is an important part of 'fair use' in copyright law, but not on the basic charge of plagiarism. Is it your work or someone else's? Kinda binary.

If a vague disclaimer like that could work, and was put into general use, we may see more derivative works, which would make fiction that made use of it kind of samey, but at the same time, if something like that was mainstream, and such a movement of ideas become standard, it could open doors for some writers to take things that have already been done in fanfiction and put a spin on it much more easily, like programmers using open source code in their own programs to speed things up.

But open sourcing in software is meant to make it easier to write software units that work on specific hardware platforms.

The only analogy to writing would be that we have standardized spelling in a common language. makes it easier to get ideas across.

I appreciate fan, fandom and fanfic. if someone said that they got the idea from my story, or got some scenes from my story, and identified it, anyone reading THEIR work could find mine and compare. THEN it isn't plagiarism. They could call it fanning the fanfic. More power to them.

A generic 'this isn't original to me' disclaimer without those specifics would not clearly specify what they got from where.

Or, i suppose, they could post in different colored inks... This is mine, this part you'll have to google or something to see if you can find who wrote it.

[greenwizard]

I've thought about this before. Sometimes when I read a fanfic I really like I get inspired. Is it still plagiarism if you use the same idea but put your own spin on it? Like say someone wrote a really good story about Harry as an adult going back in time in his own body. What if I really like the idea and write a story where Harry goes back, but different stuff happens?

[MorbidFantasy]

Unless it is an obvious copy/paste job with minute edits, I think it's okay. A good idea is best shared and improved upon. I borrow aspects of other authors work and make them work for my own stories. It's not plagarism. Otherwise we'd all be guilty of abusing the single most used idea (fictional) in the AFF world: inaccurate sex. Seriously. Multiple Orgasms for men, quick successive orgasms for women. Come on...

When I do Copy&Paste tho I make sure it is for a good reason, like if I'm basing an entire story on a scene of a book/movie I include a note at the beginning or the end of the story giving credit to the original author of the C&P job.

[Keith Inc.]

I've thought about this before. Sometimes when I read a fanfic I really like I get inspired. Is it still plagiarism if you use the same idea but put your own spin on it?

Well, that's pretty much essential fanfic. Playing with someone else's characters, settings, plots, universes... As long as 'something different' happens, it's an original (enough) story using, adapting or skewing someone else's. That might still be a copyright issue, but not plagiarism.

[DemonGoddess]

You know, there are several different things being addressed here.

For example, when one writer inspires another's work, and the readers can CLEARLY see the similarity, it wouldn't hurt that person to contact the other writer and tell them, and then ask for permission would it? Particularly where it's close enough that you KNOW that someone will accuse you of plagiarism.

Then you have the instance cited above for copy/pasting. Let's take the LotR fandom as an example. There is a wealth of written material for that fandom that authors do indeed take from, and then cite the source with footnotes.

A third example is translated work. If the user has permission to translate and then post it, then it's NOT plagiarism.

Keith answered this very well from an author's standpoint you know.

Opensource software and writing are comparing APPLES and ORANGES. Opensource is out there FOR coders to use to help enhance their own code. Aside from that, where something is open source, there is always a licensing statement included in the source code which shows where it came from and that it is indeed OPEN SOURCE and covered by the GNU General License.

Java, for example is free to use, but trademarked by Sun Microsystems. So is not technically opensource. Then you have Python and PHP, which ARE opensource and also free to use. (all are languages, not opensource coding that's written with the languages).

This board (Invisionboard) for example, is NOT opensource. Whereas phpBB IS.

The thing to remember with coding, is that regardless of the software, there is a HUGE modding community. The software writers of the original programs know this. Most of them encourage it.

Finally, I'm going to say my opinion as an artist, where someone has indeed taken my own work and passed it off as their own. I have no problems sharing my work files if asked, so that the person asking to USE my stuff has the core file to work from. Never have. As long as I'm ASKED. Where it steams me, and where it steams you fanfic writers who've been plagiarized is where permission to use it is not asked. I don't really CARE if I'm credited so much (although that's always nice ), when it comes to the graphics as long as the other person asks to use my work. Obviously, if that person has been given my .psd files and other core files, they HAVE my permission and have been in extensive contact with me as that is where the files would come from.