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Nov. 23rd, 2002
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A rant on the unforgivable sin that is Evil Plagiarism TM
Having listened to all this bitching to and fro over the last couple of hours I feel like I just have to say something about this plagiarizing panic. I really don't know where the fanfiction writing world is heading. Ever since this deplorable incident where a certain BNF got caught copying three whole pages of a book and put it into her own work, later claiming this was meant as an homage to this author, the whole community is in a total frenzy.
I just would like to say, plagiarizing does not equal plagiarizing. You can copy whole passages from someone else, be it a professional writer or a fanwriter and incorporate it into your own work. That's definitely plagiarizing. You can use someone else's ideas or theories in your academic paper and pass it off as your own. That too is plagiarizing, but on a different level. And you can be inspired by a song, poem etc. and use it as a basis of your fic. That is NOT plagiarizing, IMO. Granted, you're advised to say in your header that you're using a song or poem as the basis of your story, but still, it's not like you're using someone else's words or ideas to upgrade your own story, you rather build your own creative content around someone else's inspiring words. This has a long tradition in the fanwriting history, it's called filking or songfics.
In those good old days you could just write a story called "Your Song" and have Character A say all these romantic things to Character B and make a nice story of it and nobody would have leapt at you with pointed finger and yelled " DIRTY PLAGIARIZER!!!!!!" No, everybody would have had the same fanfiction experience as anybody else and they would have understood it as a songfic. Nobody would have honestly believed that you actually intended to make anybody think you wrote the words of "Your Song".
I really don't understand how all this witch-burning came about. Suddenly the slightest failure to cite a source results in people condemning you to the darkest realms of hell, cursing you to all eternity and ensuring you that you will never be forgiven under any circumstances whatsoever. Where is your common sense, people? Don't you see that there is a huge difference between copying whole passages and incorporating a song or poem into your story and even calling the story after it?
I'm not apologizing plagiarism. I'm not saying plagiarists should be forgiven merely on the account of their nice face / talent / sweetness / popularity. I'd be just as pissed if somebody stole parts of my stories and put them into theirs, even though they're not making any money from it and neither am I. It doesn't make it any better. And yet I have enough common sense not to equate this with an act of plagiarism that you could commit when writing an academic paper. A fanfiction has no academic claim whatsoever. What you're stealing when plagiarizing a story is someone else's creative talent. When you plagiarize in an academic paper, you actually steal someone else's research or ideas, trying to upgrade the academic content of your own research. It has a lot more impact on your life than some story does. It's not the same.
So yes, you really should state the song or poem you used for your filk and not assume everybody would be able to tell just by the title. It's just a precaution to prevent all this witch-burning. But really, isn't this just going over the top? It really makes me weep for the future. What will happen? Will some day people come rushing up to me and call me a plagiarizer because I didn't quote the exact page and line complete with bibliographical information when I used a line from a Petronius poem as the title of my story?
So yeah, this is MY opinion. Feel free to disagree, I don't care much either way.
/rant.
Having listened to all this bitching to and fro over the last couple of hours I feel like I just have to say something about this plagiarizing panic. I really don't know where the fanfiction writing world is heading. Ever since this deplorable incident where a certain BNF got caught copying three whole pages of a book and put it into her own work, later claiming this was meant as an homage to this author, the whole community is in a total frenzy.
I just would like to say, plagiarizing does not equal plagiarizing. You can copy whole passages from someone else, be it a professional writer or a fanwriter and incorporate it into your own work. That's definitely plagiarizing. You can use someone else's ideas or theories in your academic paper and pass it off as your own. That too is plagiarizing, but on a different level. And you can be inspired by a song, poem etc. and use it as a basis of your fic. That is NOT plagiarizing, IMO. Granted, you're advised to say in your header that you're using a song or poem as the basis of your story, but still, it's not like you're using someone else's words or ideas to upgrade your own story, you rather build your own creative content around someone else's inspiring words. This has a long tradition in the fanwriting history, it's called filking or songfics.
In those good old days you could just write a story called "Your Song" and have Character A say all these romantic things to Character B and make a nice story of it and nobody would have leapt at you with pointed finger and yelled " DIRTY PLAGIARIZER!!!!!!" No, everybody would have had the same fanfiction experience as anybody else and they would have understood it as a songfic. Nobody would have honestly believed that you actually intended to make anybody think you wrote the words of "Your Song".
I really don't understand how all this witch-burning came about. Suddenly the slightest failure to cite a source results in people condemning you to the darkest realms of hell, cursing you to all eternity and ensuring you that you will never be forgiven under any circumstances whatsoever. Where is your common sense, people? Don't you see that there is a huge difference between copying whole passages and incorporating a song or poem into your story and even calling the story after it?
I'm not apologizing plagiarism. I'm not saying plagiarists should be forgiven merely on the account of their nice face / talent / sweetness / popularity. I'd be just as pissed if somebody stole parts of my stories and put them into theirs, even though they're not making any money from it and neither am I. It doesn't make it any better. And yet I have enough common sense not to equate this with an act of plagiarism that you could commit when writing an academic paper. A fanfiction has no academic claim whatsoever. What you're stealing when plagiarizing a story is someone else's creative talent. When you plagiarize in an academic paper, you actually steal someone else's research or ideas, trying to upgrade the academic content of your own research. It has a lot more impact on your life than some story does. It's not the same.
So yes, you really should state the song or poem you used for your filk and not assume everybody would be able to tell just by the title. It's just a precaution to prevent all this witch-burning. But really, isn't this just going over the top? It really makes me weep for the future. What will happen? Will some day people come rushing up to me and call me a plagiarizer because I didn't quote the exact page and line complete with bibliographical information when I used a line from a Petronius poem as the title of my story?
So yeah, this is MY opinion. Feel free to disagree, I don't care much either way.
/rant.
Yay! New Layout!
Nov. 23rd, 2002 04:50 pmI finally launched my new LJ layout! While talking with my tiger about LJ designs I remembered that I had this one still on hold that I had kinda forgotten about. So I messed with it a bit more and now it's there! *is pleased* I might make some minor adjustments, but so far, meesa like it!
Looky?
Looky?
