thoughts on derivative works and filing off the serial numbers.

[taraljc]

So I'd originally written this back in March 2008, at my pro blog. When I moved that blog to a different location, in an effort to segregate my pro work from my fannish life, I deleted it. But in light of certain meta recently, I decided to republish it here on my fannish LJ.

Comments

[syredronning]

Word.

I once tried to file off the serial number, and it doesn't work at all for me, no matter how much of an AU the fanfic was.

I have moments where I wish I'd get paid in money for all this writing work, but it's my hobby and if I changed that, started writing fic for money, I would pay in losing the fun with it :/

[boosette]

Okay so the part where I love your brain and how it explains things so eloquently and put-togetherly and stuff.

Makes me go ♥

[rubynye]

I cannot possibly agree more. I could write a thousand words but really, they'd all just boil down to "I AGREE SO MUCH."

[dotfic]

This is a terrific essay.

[rj_anderson]

Wonderful essay; I've just posted a link on Twitter.

I believe that filing off the serial numbers can be (and has been, in some notable cases) effectively done, but it takes a lot of time and distance away from the original work. Not everybody is going to want to do that, nor is every story well suited to such adaptation. Only when the fic has a large percentage of original ideas and characters to begin with (say, a Harry Potter story heavily populated with OC's and AU elements) is it likely to make the transition successfully -- and sometimes not even then.