(Untitled)

[moeyknight]

I've been reading John Scalzi's blog, Whatever, for a while now. If you had asked me before today, I would have told you that he rubbed me the wrong way although it was never something I could really put my finger on. It wasn't particular opinions he holds or ideas, just his overall attitude. I kept his blog on my RSS feeds and usually just

Comments

[scalzi]

Heh!

Yes, well. You wouldn't be the first to think I'm a prick, nor would I try to persuade your from your estimation. This is one of the things one has to understand when one writes, and particularly online: that people will have opinions of you from what you write, and sometimes they won't be positive ones.

Be that as it may, *I* am content with how I present myself online, so that means I have to accept a certain percentage of people thinking I'm a prick. I can live with that.

[moeyknight]

That was very quick. I'm glad you're content. It's important to be happy with what and who we are.

[scalzi]

"That was very quick."

I see all.

[frankieb_sq87]

Why yes. Yes, he is. And it is immensely weird to see that name up there.

[thewhiteowl]

Patrick Nielsen Hayden puts the case admirably succintly:

Kero writes:

"When you use characters someone else created you are infringing on the original author's copyright. When you lift someone elses text and use it in your own work without credit you are infringing on the original author's copyright."

When, without their permission, you use characters someone else created which are in copyright, you are infringing on the original author's copyright.

When you lift someone else's text and use it in your own work without credit you are infringing on the original author's copyright and lying to your readers about it.

The latter is the difference that seems to elude so many people posting here.

Oh noes! I just infringed Patrick's copyright! :-P

[moeyknight]

Word to that!

His wife Teresa also wrote great piece about fanfiction. Thanks for reminding me of it. It is perfect for this. I am reproducing it in it's entirety here:

Storytelling is basic to our species. It’s one of the ways we parse our experience of the universe. Whatever moves us or matters to us will show up in the stories we tell, whether or not we have a socially approved outlet for those stories. It might surprise you to find out how many writers have works of personal erotica tucked away in their unpublished-or-unpublishable manuscript trunks. There’s no good way to get those published, but they write them anyway, because they’re writers, and eroticism is an important part of our lives

[angua9]

I would have told you that he rubbed me the wrong way although it was never something I could really put my finger onMaybe it was the fact that he called his blog "Whatever

[moeyknight]

I have no idea why people would go to other authors for support because for the most part I think that authors just tend to ignore fanfic and don't want to be involved in any debate regarding it. However, since he puts himself out there as a "figure" in the scifi community, (at least that's the impression I get from his blog) I don't think it's strange for anyone to ask his opinion or want to discuss it with him. It's been spread among various comms and lists, I'm certain, so the chances that he was bound to come across it were probably high.

As for sending the future CC's his way, that might be a good idea since 1) I'm certain if there were fanfic for his books he'd pull an Anne Rice and 2) he's got the over-the-top witty dialogue they all crave.

And I would definitely rather be an honorable theif than a law-abiding person with no soul. ;)

[scalzi]

"As for sending the future CC's his way, that might be a good idea since 1) I'm certain if there were fanfic for his books he'd pull an Anne Rice and 2) he's got the over-the-top witty dialogue they all crave."

Someone's already done a fanfic of my stuff and sent it to me; I didn't have an issue with it. I find fanfic generally non-objectionable and often a positive thing for a media property. I've discussed it at length here:

http://www.scalzi.com/whatever/003496.html

[mrs_bombadil]

She wasn't referring to simple fic. ;)