I think that depends on the situation. Given the crazy economy and the way many businesses (especially publishing) are sitting on the knife-edge, authors who cause trouble for publishing houses aren't invited back for a second try. Would there be legal ramifications of a fanfic? Depends on who holds the copyright, and whether they're willing to fuss. But I don't think an editor would necessarily ignore angry fan letters about someone ripping off their favorite story.
The exception to this and where I don't have a problem is when the original fic was so AU, that calling it fanfic was a bit of a cheat.
It's true that AU requires you do more effort on world-building that's unaligned with the original, but the problem is that you still do have, many times, just as much undoing anyway. Frex, the protagonist has a fear of cows in the original story, which is related to X in the world-setting/backstory. It's a defining feature of the character, and most fanfic authors in AUs do tend to pay a nod to a characteristic like this, often coming up with an elaborate backstory to explain fear-of-cows (or whatever characteristic we're discussing). The problem is that this elaborate backstory is, without the trappings of fandom in there, suddenly a whole lotta not-needed. I frequently see AU stories that could not, in fact, be so easily converted, because the author took so much time to incorporate and elucidate on specific characteristics that have original-story background or environmental roots, for AUs that lack those roots.
Regardless, I read plenty where the world is remarkably like that-ninja-story or that-space-opera or that-action-movie -- but the characters are definitely distinct, and aren't littered with inorganic shorthands that scream "I couldn't be bothered to actually formulate my own character, so just picked up this character at a major discount". Enjoying the premise (independent of the specifics) is much of the reason we have sub-genres such as vampires, werewolves, girl-with-gun, and so on: because these basic premises are all derivative/similar enough that you can be fairly certain you'll get the same basic grounding as any other, just as though all of them were fanfic of the lost Q-story, or ur-story. It's reading the exact same character over and over that bores me.
no subject
Date: 8 Feb 2010 09:47 pm (UTC)I think that depends on the situation. Given the crazy economy and the way many businesses (especially publishing) are sitting on the knife-edge, authors who cause trouble for publishing houses aren't invited back for a second try. Would there be legal ramifications of a fanfic? Depends on who holds the copyright, and whether they're willing to fuss. But I don't think an editor would necessarily ignore angry fan letters about someone ripping off their favorite story.
The exception to this and where I don't have a problem is when the original fic was so AU, that calling it fanfic was a bit of a cheat.
It's true that AU requires you do more effort on world-building that's unaligned with the original, but the problem is that you still do have, many times, just as much undoing anyway. Frex, the protagonist has a fear of cows in the original story, which is related to X in the world-setting/backstory. It's a defining feature of the character, and most fanfic authors in AUs do tend to pay a nod to a characteristic like this, often coming up with an elaborate backstory to explain fear-of-cows (or whatever characteristic we're discussing). The problem is that this elaborate backstory is, without the trappings of fandom in there, suddenly a whole lotta not-needed. I frequently see AU stories that could not, in fact, be so easily converted, because the author took so much time to incorporate and elucidate on specific characteristics that have original-story background or environmental roots, for AUs that lack those roots.
Regardless, I read plenty where the world is remarkably like that-ninja-story or that-space-opera or that-action-movie -- but the characters are definitely distinct, and aren't littered with inorganic shorthands that scream "I couldn't be bothered to actually formulate my own character, so just picked up this character at a major discount". Enjoying the premise (independent of the specifics) is much of the reason we have sub-genres such as vampires, werewolves, girl-with-gun, and so on: because these basic premises are all derivative/similar enough that you can be fairly certain you'll get the same basic grounding as any other, just as though all of them were fanfic of the lost Q-story, or ur-story. It's reading the exact same character over and over that bores me.