By Harrison Meyers
The idea behind fan fiction is cute to say the least. It is meant to inspire the inspired. The basic premise is to take an idea formed from a popular media idea, and then extend it. Its scope is not too overbearing as to hurt the large corporations who bought and control the rights of the original content, or so they say. In reality this is a huge issue. It brings many different dilemmas to both the legal and creative world. To prove my earlier point of this being an issue, look no further than the copyright contract that the number one Harry Potter Fan Fiction site posts. “
4 Comments
September 18, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Having read the chapter Quentin Tarantino’s Star Wars? in Convergence Culture we can see that fan fiction is a widely popular form of writing that can be found mainly online and somewhat in print. However popular these renditions of an even more popular series are, the writers of fan fiction get to maintain minimal individual claim. At the same time, the creators of Star Wars such as George Lucas allow fans to infringe upon material that could be protected under copyright. In doing so, we see a sort of trade off between the original author and the subsequent additional “authors.” The creator may decide to open up their ideas to editing, but at the same time, maintain most of the power by getting the final say about what sorts of material are allowed to be posted. Also, in the case of Star Wars, the people that write these fan fictions do so not in hopes of obtaining money (something Lucas has blocked as the creator), but instead they write these fan fictions in order to be part of the bigger picture. With fan fiction, we see that legal limitations are always present, but other prospects such as ambition and imagination help most to see past those. That is the reason why most fan fiction writers allow themselves to be limited. At the same time, these limitations must exist in order to preserve the integrity of personal property.
September 18, 2008 at 6:47 pm
A lot of the time things like this can be beneficial to the original author. They are able to see others thoughts and ideas concerning their original idea, even though it takes some of their power away, it lets them see how many people are really fans, fans enough to create their own version of it! The writers of fan fictions are aware that they aren’t going to ged paid and aren’t going to really get any say in what happens to the big picture, but they get their own word and opinion out, and who knows, maybe the author will be intrigued and use the idea. That’s good enough for some people.
September 18, 2008 at 7:34 pm
With the large amount of fan fiction sites that exist, I seriously doubt that the book/movie’s author or producer is watching and reading the posts on the site. Even if some of the posts are being read, the majority are not simply because of the large amount of posts that exist across the internet. I doubt that the people writing the fan fiction are expecting recognition or credit for what they contribute, but they still post in on the blog or website, most likely for the comments and responses it will get from other users. People love to be praised, and love attention, so contributing to these sites, even if they don’t own their material in the end, is worth it to them if they are getting comments on their posts. Few writers on the internet would continue to blog or write if they question that their material is being read or appreciated.
September 22, 2008 at 2:36 pm
Personally, I believe that the fan fiction writers do not partake in this type of writing to become famous or help inspire the creator. These writers contribute to fan fiction because it is something that they enjoy. I believe that in this age of technology many pastimes that cultivate learning are lost. However, this is a fun and exciting way to further develop one’s writing skills. I think that fan fiction is especially great in young children. The chapter about the Harry Potter fan fiction in Convergence Culture describes how some children use the fan fiction as an outlet to deal with some of the problems in their own lives. I believe that more good is generated from these fan fiction sites and such issues over copyrights should not prevent this type of harmless pastime.