Moments of delicious irony: when fanfic writers object to fanfic of their fanfic

[lesbiassparrow]

Look it's wank about Stargate fic on fandom wank! (I have no idea why so many people actually think there is a subtext to any of the Stargates. Digging for deeper nuances in any of them seems to me like looking for subtlety in a hammer to the head.)

I get objections to outright plagiarism but deciding that no one else should have a right to play in your fanfic universe and that to read fic (or hear of it presumably) that messes with it hurts YES HURTS AND THUS PEOPLE SHOULD HAVE RESPECT FOR YOUR CREATION can not but make me boggle at the lack of self-awareness. For added delight one of the people involved IS ONE OF THE PEOPLE BEHIND DREAMWIDTH. You know, the place where fandom can be safe against, er, people not wanting them to write fanfic.

Comments

[doyle_sb4.livejournal.com]

It's even odder than that; people were encouraged to write fic in this AU, until someone filled a comment-fic meme prompt that made the neither-groundbreaking-or-unreasonable-point that this super-close family might not look so perfect to someone outside it. You'd think that fic turning some element of canon on its head would be familiar to anyone with even passing knowledge of fandom, but in this case...

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

*boggles like a mad boggling thing* So basically it was some mad control freak exercise? With only authorized fanfic of fanfic? What a very odd thing to be doing and how very bizarre to think it would not one day develop a life of its own.

[lage-nom-ai.livejournal.com]

This has been bringing me joy ALL WEEK. Come to Dreamwidth, where we'll GO TO THE WALL FOR YOUR FANFIC RIGHTS VS PRO AUTHORS. But if you mess with MY FANFIC? YOU GO TO HELL. YOU GO TO HELL AND YOU DIE.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

MY FANFIC IS PURE. AND SHOULD STAY UNTAINTED BY YOUR GRUBBY HANDS. NOW GO AND WRITE SOME PORN ABOUT HARRY AND THE SQUID.

[raffaella.livejournal.com]

This has made me deliriously happy! So, so happy! For real, I want to send a link to Diana Gabaldon, George R.R. Martin, and every writer who has been the target of fandom rage for having the UTTER GALL to say, however clumsily: "I don't like it when people do disturbing things -- well, disturbinger than what I've done, but then I've created them, assholes, and did the actual worldbuilding work, so I actually have the right-- to my characters, really." This is a thing of beauty.

Fandom, you never disappoint.

[ancarett]

Yes, that was a delicious wank. Not just because of the whole "missed the boat on transformative works" issue, but also because you are also UNAMERICAN if you don't bow down and worship their fanfic paradigm.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

It's sort of beautiful in its complete lack of introspection. It even has the apology that's not an apology to cap it off! Next thing someone will claim it was all a social experiment and the wank will be complete.

[ancarett]

Remember, we're interrogating them from the wrong perspective, anyways!

[robotjen.livejournal.com]

UNBELIEVABLE

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I am ashamed to say that this wank made me rather delighted. Coming after Gabaldon it was a refreshing dessert.

[robotjen.livejournal.com]

I was not prepared for the intense OUTRAGE that one fic writer exhibited. Like, wat? NO ONE IS RAPING YOUR CHILDREN.

[sucrelefey.livejournal.com]

Hypocrisy doesn't help endear fandom towards undecided authors that's for sure.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

Or to anyone, really. This was a delightful wank, though.

[raffaella.livejournal.com]

I'm cackling with glee. I remember the OUTRAGE when Gabaldon and George RR Martin had the audacity to say that they didn't like people writing fics of their works. I didn't say anything because I genuinely don't care, but while I think that raging about fanfic is futile, and that comparisons to rape, home invasion and somesuch were overwrought, I wasn't actually shocked to see professional writers feel proprietary about their work. They certainly were wasting their time and I think it's probably preferable, if only for one's peace of mind, to go the Neil Gaiman route, ignore the whole thing, and say "do whatever you want, I'm not particularly interested in it and don't send me your fic, plz" but hey, I didn't think that they were horrible people for not liking it. And I chortled when fandom called them "entitled authors", because I'm pretty sure that they're legally entitled to their intellectual property. Or something.

HANYWAY. This is hilarious. Transformative works are the new face of creativity and published writers are dinosaurs who refuse to admit that they've lost, etc, etc...until someone has the audacity to write a mildly critical interpretation of your beloved derivative universe whose main character actually belongs to an entertainment corporation, and then they'll be drawned and quartered! I love this. LOVE. I expect mass combustion if someone does to them what fanfic writers do to characters created by someone else, i.e. incest, orgies, rape and god knows what.

I need a "points and laughs" icon.

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

It's those double standards that make me laugh too. It's easy enough to point and LOL when an author has a fit over fan fic being written with their characters, but if someone in fandom writes a sequel using someone elses storyverse and original characters, or decides to do a remix of someone elses fic without asking for permission first, well then it's pearl-clutching all round.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I've never got the whole remix/don't touch my fanfic paranoia and the support people get for insisting their stories MUST NEVER EVER BE TAINTED BY ANOTHER.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

This wank is so entertaining. I am only sorry it seems to have fizzled out now. *sigh* But I fully expect it to keep flaring up in various circles when more people ARE DEEPLY OFFENDED THAT THEIR FANFIC VISION IS NOT RESPECTED. As they happily do god knows what with the original characters, of course! :)

[nutmeg3.livejournal.com]

So basically, fanfic writers are, in their delightful hypocrisy, the family-values and gay is Godless Republicans of the literary world. (I'm so going to get pilloried for saying that, but it's twu, dammit, it's twu!)

Seriously, this whole thing is just so happy-making.

[lesbiassparrow.livejournal.com]

I wait agog for the next round of this, because there is no way this is over not with how some people over invest in this stuff.