Annie Proulx's still pissed...

[louisev]

Heh. I remember the "ditto" machines the teachers used when I was in elementary school.

Loved the smell of those fresh copies. 

omg the smell of ethyl alcohol in the morning!

[serious crayons]

Of course, fanfic has been around since long before the Internet. I was told the idea of "slash" fanfic goes back at least as far as stories about Capt. Kirk and Mr. Spock in the Sixties.

That's what I'd always heard was the origin of the name "slash."

[Monika]

It was called Scarlett, and the author was Alexandra Ripley.

aaahh... I remember watching the TV adaptation of it and kind of actually liking it. But probably mostly because it had some hot scenes between Timothy Dalton and Joanne Vhalley Kilmer in it
It didn't bear much resemblance with its predecessor though.

[Monika]

You are right about Peter Jackson regarding LOTR fanfics, but not so J.K. Rowling.  In fact, Rowling was so belligerent about a tribute reference work entitled "The Harry Potter Lexicon" which was published with a claim of fair use, that she sued the publishers.  She won the action, in a finding in New York that the Lexicon used too much of Rowling's work in its reference; and she was awarded a grand total of $6,750 in statutory damages. The year she won that action she made $300 million.  Petty? You bet.

Woe be unto anyone who writes a Harry Potter fanfic.

Same with Anne Rice's works - she will sue anyone, at any time, under any circumstances, for daring to put about a fanfic about any of her works.

And Annie Proulx would also go into that category of aggressive pursuers of fanfic writers.  Her lawyers went after me and at least three authors I know of with cease and desist letters.  I dealt with it  (I don't have $100,000 to prove adequate transformative fair use, nor did I want to) by withdrawing all fanfic pages from the Web, and subsequently modified all of the stories to remove any and all references to Brokeback or its characters.  As far as I know, Anne Rice and Annie Proulx are among the top rank of aggressive pursuers of fanfic writers.

When it comes to The Harry Potter Lexicon, I think Rowlins had a point (especially as she was working on something similar herself), and to me the lexicon wasn't fan fiction. To me, fan fiction, by definition is noncommercial.
I think it's a matter of intent. If the intent is to pay tribute, to want to contribute to the fandom, it's fanfiction. If the intent is to make money, then it's something else.
What would the BBM fandom be without fanfiction?

[louisev]

When it comes to The Harry Potter Lexicon, I think Rowlins had a point (especially as she was working on something similar herself), and to me the lexicon wasn't fan fiction. To me, fan fiction, by definition is noncommercial.
I think it's a matter of intent. If the intent is to pay tribute, to want to contribute to the fandom, it's fanfiction. If the intent is to make money, then it's something else.
What would the BBM fandom be without fanfiction?

The intent of the Harry Potter Lexicon was to put into print a work that had developed online as the Harry Potter Lexicon Online, into a publishable form that those who did not have access to the online "Lexicon"could get to, and designed to pay tribute to the complex universe of Potterdom.  Rowling herself had complimented Vander Ark on his work on the online "Lexicon" and there was no reason to believe she would take unkindly to his putting the online system into print - in fact, the lawsuit was a shock.  It was said at the time she sued him, that she had gotten the idea of the Potter Encyclopedia FROM Vander Ark, and that her publishers pressed her into the lawsuit due to THEIR desire to capitalize on the work done on the "Lexicon."

There is very little merit in her stance in that suit considering her history of participation with and approval of the online website.

[Mikaela]

You are right about Peter Jackson regarding LOTR fanfics, but not so J.K. Rowling.  In fact, Rowling was so belligerent about a tribute reference work entitled "The Harry Potter Lexicon" which was published with a claim of fair use, that she sued the publishers.  She won the action, in a finding in New York that the Lexicon used too much of Rowling's work in its reference; and she was awarded a grand total of $6,750 in statutory damages. The year she won that action she made $300 million.  Petty? You bet.

Woe be unto anyone who writes a Harry Potter fanfic.

I am fully aware of the Potter Lexicon and the legal action. In my opinion, that wasn't fanfic - that was creating a book that Rowling very conceivably would have written herself, or had others write. AS such it was providing a product that people otherwise would have been willing to actually pay her for. I can see how she thought that was stepping too hard on her financial toes.

Since several of my online friends have been into Harry Potter, I have dabbled a bit in reading fansites (never posting, or writing fanfics, since I have not myself been very gripped by the HP universe). Rowling has given interviews directly and exclusively to fan sites, sites which host fan fiction - interviews in which she has deliberately fuelled the flames of the "shipper wars" that have raged in those very fictions, and so forth - there is no doubt she is aware of and has actively made use of the fandom *and* (indirectly) fanfiction and has tacitly considered it beneficial to maintain the huge and continuing interest for her series.

Same with Anne Rice's works - she will sue anyone, at any time, under any circumstances, for daring to put about a fanfic about any of her works.

Anne Rice is quite the anomaly among fantasy/SF writers, though - there is one other female Fantasy author known for a similar strict stance. (Can't recall her name now, but she was signing books at Forbidden Planet in London one time I was there, and I thought it tempting to have asked her about that, but I didn't dare....)

And Annie Proulx would also go into that category of aggressive pursuers of fanfic writers.  Her lawyers went after me and at least three authors I know of with cease and desist letters.  I dealt with it  (I don't have $100,000 to prove adequate transformative fair use, nor did I want to) by withdrawing all fanfic pages from the Web, and subsequently modified all of the stories to remove any and all references to Brokeback or its characters.  As far as I know, Anne Rice and Annie Proulx are among the top rank of aggressive pursuers of fanfic writers.

The C&D letters from Proulx's publishers came after they (correctly or incorrectly) believed that money was being made or would be made from those fics, as far as I know. When Jenna started selling her bound and illustrated cine I was very worried she might be crossing a line long before the C&D arrived.

The difference between Proulx and other fandom biggies is that she writes "literature" and they are mostly SF/Fantasy writers - there's a tradition for fanfic and fandom activities in that latter arena that the lovers of "War and Peace" and "The Brothers Karamazov" do not match (yet). I don't think Proulx and her publishers were at all expecting the fandom activities, and they proved awkward and incompetent at handling them IMO. Of course, I won't deny Proulx the right to bitch out all and any persons writing Brokeback fanfic. That's obviously her prerogative and her opinion. Mine as her reader happens to differ. We're both entitled to our views.

I stand by my previous posts - the internet has created new and much more accessible reader and consumer opportunities of digesting and enjoying and interpreting literature of any kind, and the publishers and authors had better get round to finding constructive means of building on that instead of chasing enthusiastic and imaginative readers with scowls and threats and lawyers. Their financial interests in the long run will be more at stake if they continue down that antagonistic path. I am pretty sure Anne Rice has lost out big time, both in revenue, interest and goodwill, for denying her readership the opportunity to write about Louis and Lestat till their hearts' content and till their fingers bled.

[louisev]

I stand by my previous posts - the internet chas created new and much more accessible reader and consumer opportunities of digesting and enjoying literature of any kind, and the publishers and authors had better get round to finding constructive means of building on that instad of chasing enthusiastic and imaginative readers with scowls and threats and lawyers. Their financial interests in the long run will be more at stake if they continue down that antagonistic path. I am pretty sure Anne Rice has lost out big time, both in revenue, interest and goodwill, for denying her readership the opportunity to write about Louis and Lestat till their hearts' content and till their fingers bled.

I definitely agree with what you write here, however, I don't believe Proulx or her lawyers were "awkward and incompetent to deal with fandom"- I think it was a deliberate and considered act to quash fandom, because they found it repugnant, specifically that Annie herself found it repugnant.

[Mikaela]

I definitely agree with what you write here, however, I don't believe Proulx or her lawyers were "incompetent to deal with fandom"- I think it was a deliberate and considered act to quash fandom, because they found it repugnant, specifically that Annie herself found it repugnant.

Yes, but interestingly that goes to prove that the opposition in such a case is *not* mainly based on the need to protect property/financial interests, which is the legal argument used. If financial issues were all that was at stake IMO she could potentially have made more money from being more "considerate" or deliberately blind to fandom activities. (Though less so than any Fantasy writer, certainly.)
But the woman has emotions and a temperament and I can't fault her for that, though she is ... cranky. To say no more. I loved her rant after the Oscars, I shall have to take it when her ire is directed at my own opinions, too.

Wow, Louise, you're fast! You reply before I even manage to read through my own post!  

[louisev]

Yes, but interestingly that goes to prove that the opposition in such a case is *not* mainly based on the need to protect property/financial interests, which is the legal argument used. If financial issues were all that was at stake IMO she could potentially have made more money from being more "considerate" or deliberately blind to fandom activities. (Though less so than any Fantasy writer, certainly.)
But the woman has emotions and a temperament and I can't fault her for that, though she is ... cranky. To say no more. I loved her rant after the Oscars, I shall have to take it when her ire is directed at my own opinions, too.

Wow, Louise, you're fast! You reply before I even manage to read through my own post!  

This is where the law is used to abuse.  You see, Annie Proulx in sending those cease and desist orders, was not "in the right" - because the case did not come before a court.  And it should not be presumed that she was in the right, because there is a counter-argument that has only been brought out a few times, the counter-argument that fan fiction, particularly that fan fiction which casts characters in situations or in roles that could not and would not be considered the same context - i.e. a homosexual erotic encounter between Captain Kirk and Spock, for example - Roddenberry would never have written that plot, because it was not part of the oeuvre - but does serve as a commentary on the original, and as such would fall under "fair use"- for which transformative original work that references a copyrighted work, is legitimately used by another creator in an entirely new fashion which could not be mistaken for the original.  This argument has been used - with success - in advertisements.  No one could confuse Andy Warhol's Campbell Soup can for a can of Campbell's soup.  Would he be constrained by copyright law to not paint the soup can?  That's what we're talking about here - fanfiction is new original work that is a reference and commentary on the original.  It is not, not has it ever been, a theft of property, nor plagiarism, because it is not passing off another's labor as one's own for gain.

So in pursuing fan fiction writers whose work may indeed have enhanced the sale of the original work and kept it in the public eye - which is what fandoms do, as you rightly pointed out - and exerting the power of their millions and their lawyers to threaten and cow the less financially well off with fines they cannot afford to pay, they are abusing the law for their own sense of ownership; an ownership which is not proven, and not to be presumed.  They do not own the works that sprang from the imaginations of those whom they inspired - they never will.  They will, however, win their ill opinion.

[Jeff Wrangler]

I think it was a deliberate and considered act to quash fandom, because they found it repugnant, specifically that Annie herself found it repugnant.

Tell you what, in view of some of the "slashier" stuff I've seen, I can't say as I blame her.    But let be, let be. ...