Whilst I have hd a few ideas in the past I am worried about plagarism as I have a lot of respect for the authors here (or most of them!).
Aroslav, in Double Take, recites the PC's dream of a space story - only a dozen lines or so, and later goes into a commentary effectively on the construction of a story (all as a part of his story about someone who has been reborn).
Is it plagarism, by taking his "advice" if I weave a story stemming from the dream he describes? Where does the line occur?
Plagiarism is about claiming or using another writer's work, or part of it, as yours.
When a writer sits down and writes a story, the plot was stimulated by an idea. You own your ideas regardless of what gave you the idea.
Now there are also rules relating to plagiarism. For example, the world of Harry Potter and its characters is not an idea. It is a story world created by the author, and the author owns that story world. So a story in that world may give you an idea and as long as you do not set your story in that world or use its characters in your story, your story is not plagiarism.
Not sure that's completely accurate, there was a Harry Potter fanfic site around for several years - http://www.fictionalley.org/ - although it's gone now, and not because J K Rowling unleashed the lawyers.
There have been HP fanfics here as well, https://storiesonline.net/s/56164/imogen springs to mind. I can't remember anyone accusing the respective authors of plagiarism, although things could have gone downhill fast if the authors had been charging money for their books.
From what I've read, J K Rowling is fairly open to fan fiction in general.
However there are two caveats to that.
1. Don't try to commercialize HP fan fiction.
2. The Harry Potter series was written as children's books. Rowling is not okay with fan fiction that puts her HP characters in sexual situations.
IIRC (and I'm not sure I do): The HP fan fiction site you mention got shut down because a significant percentage possibly most were sex stories.
IIRC (and I'm not sure I do): The HP fan fiction site you mention got shut down because a significant percentage possibly most were sex stories.
I don't think that was true of that particular site, and I'd have expected them to have deleted any stories posted where that applied - along with the respective author's accounts.
I had not visited that site for years, no longer having any family members in that age group.
Now some of the HP stories here (not the one I mentioned) definitely were sex stories.
Another site was http://www.harrypotterfanfiction.com/ although I don't remember anything about that one. Domain for sale.
Not sure that's completely accurate
What I posted is accurate. What you overlooked is, the existence of fanfic sites does not mean that the stories posted are not plagiarism. Fanfic sites containing stories based on an author's creations are plagiarism.
The problem the authors face is, the plagiarism is so extensive that they can't shut down the plagiarists. So, they generally tolerate the practice.
As REP stated it isn't plagiarism if you use your own ideas, characters and 'world', no matter what inspired you.
All 'fan-fic' is plagiarism, with the exception of works whose authors have explicitly stated in writing that others may use their work.
Just because nobody is prosecuted does not mean that copyright does not exist. Unfortunately copyright is normally only enforced when the result is commercially viable. Thus the law is flouted constantly. SoL is not immune. One one hand every story includes a copyright notice yet there is a fan-fic genre the existence of which openly acknowledges that copyright is being ignored.
How a court would deal with a copyright violation brought by a site that contains and could be said to encourage copyright violations has never been tested in court.
If an author writes a fan-fic "Barbie does Dallas" or "Harry Potters Homosexual Whorecrux" and then finds it has been copied and posted elsewhere on a bookstore, taking any action is basically a thief complaining of theft by another.
All 'fan-fic' is plagiarism, with the exception of works whose authors have explicitly stated in writing that others may use their work.
Per your own words, FanFic is copyright infringement. It's a permission issue.
It's NOT plagiarism.
Plagiarism is the use of the exact same words that another wrote pretending it's your own.
For example, taking JK Rawling's own HP books, changing the character names and publishing that is plagiarism (and copyright infringement).
Writing your own story about Harry Potter is not plagiarism, but copyright infringement on her copyright of her characters.
This is a legal matter and definitions really matter.
Ironically, if JK Rowling were to take HP fanfic and publishes it under her own name, it would be plagiarism.
Plagiarism is the use of the exact same words that another wrote pretending it's your own.
The law is different in other countries. In France, it's plagiarism if the characters and plot are too similar even if the words are different. If Dan Brown had been sued for plagiarism in France, he would probably have lost.
AJ
This is a legal matter and definitions really matter.
Then define the difference between plagiarism and copyright violation when you post a story based on another author's creation without that author's permission.
As far as I am concerned, they are the same - just different names for the same act.
Then define the difference between plagiarism and copyright violation when you post a story based on another author's creation without that author's permission.
I already did. Re-read my post.
As far as I am concerned, they are the same - just different names for the same act.
Your feelings about the matter or your opinion are of no consequence.
It's a legal matter and the definitions are available for you. The official definitions are what matter in the court of law.
Sue somebody for plagiarism for a story they wrote with their own ideas and their own words but based on a character of yours and your lawsuit would be dismissed; sue them for copyright and it's a different matter altogether.
I already did. Re-read my post.
I did but you just stated what the two terms mean. That does not explain why they are different.
The two terms are related but apply to different situations. In some cases, both terms apply.
For example: Copy a passage from one author's story and use it in your story without crediting the original author and you are guilty of plagiarism and copyright violation.
AFIK, US law doesn't recognize plagiarism at all.
Plagiarism is a term used primarily in academic circles in the US and refers to using someone else's work without citation.
When done properly and properly cited, it's not plagiarism.
On the other hand copyright is a strictly legal matter and when it comes to copyright, at least under US law, citation of sources is irrelevant.
Then define the difference between plagiarism and copyright violation when you post a story based on another author's creation without that author's permission.
Since JK Rowling explicitly permits Fan Fiction sites, that does not apply to Harry Potter.
btw, I looked up some of the old Fan Fiction sites and discovered they have been "archived", they are still available - mostly under https://archiveofourown.org/ - but nothing new can be posted. The reason was that virtually nothing new *was* being posted (or read) so it no longer made sense to keep the sites alive.
Specifically, most fan fiction writers have been converging to a couple large sites, rather than many smaller ones. Archive of Our Own (aka AO3) is one of the biggest (bigger and more active than even FanFiction.net).
Much of fanfiction is not copyright violation. There's a provision in copyright law that allows for works based on a copyrighted work provided that is is (sufficiently) transformative. This was made to allow parodies to be legal, not to mention literary novels like The Wind Done Gone and The Sargasso Sea, but it also covers fanfic. This has been tested several times in US case law, enough so that a guidelines for what counts as sufficiently transformational has largely been created.
Sources: Participation in fanfiction communities for almost two decades, and conversations with a former member of AO3's board and a copyright lawyer who's worked on relevant cases.
Ironically, if JK Rowling were to take HP fanfic and publishes it under her own name, it would be plagiarism.
Even more ironically, it's common knowledge that a certain series of books about fanged creatures two legged and four legged, set in the time between day and night, was originally posted as (NSFW) Harry Potter fan fiction....
Edited; to get day and night the right way round.
Harry Potter dealing with magical creatures in the modern world predates J.K.Rowlings
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_(film)
Not to mention Books of Magic, in which the greatest magician of the age has a pet owl and a series of magical adventures in Britain. Tim Hunter also has glasses and a curious scar.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Books_of_Magic
I would think it would be best just saying something like this, "This story is based on a idea I got from so & so's idea in one of his stories." or something like that.
Thanks, everyone. I can understand everyone's views though I would not wish to offend aroslav even if not technically plagarising his ideas.
Incidentally I have, thanks to him, just discovered Victorique do Blois - looks wow! Some education from a story!
I suggest you PM Aroslav and ask him if you can use his scenario. If he says yes then there is no problem.
If your Hairy Potter is bald and not going to school and not a magician, probably the story would not be plagiarism. If he has no hair he isn't hairy.
I know the paragraph you're asking about. It is an idea that I am almost certain has been used in SciFi literature before - the situation described could easily and logically occur, if FTL ever proves to be possible.
I would do the polite thing and credit him for the inspiration.
The characters, events, and how they respond to the events would be your own.
After all, if your story has a dead body, a murder weapon, and a police detective, that doesn't mean your story is plagiarism or a copyright violation.
Name your detective Lt.Columbo, and you may have problems.
The most important things to understand when contemplating these issues is that plagiarism is an academic standard, copyright is a legal standard.
For the most part, no one who isn't in an academic community cares about plagiarism. It simply doesn't matter. Oh, your community may think badly of you and it could cause bad press, but it doesn't matter in any real-world legal or economic sense except in very rare situations.
By rare situations I'm talking about things like someone plagiarising in their thesis to get a degree, using that degree to get a job, then being found out. The plagiarism leads to a court case where they retroactively lose their degree then get fired and sued. It's still all linked to academia, though; the employer isn't firing them for plagiarism, but for fraud.
Even where plagiarism does apply, it refers to using someone else's ideas or text without permission or credit. If you quote a short passage of an existing work and use is to make your own point, it's enough to reference the original author through a citation. If using a large portion of an original work it is sometimes necessary to get permission or give the originator a co-writing credit, even if they did no new work.
So unless you're a student, what matters is copyright, and copyright is exactly that: the legal right to control how and if copies are made. Specifically, copyright applies to "any creative work fixed in a tangible medium" (phrasing will vary by country).
Importantly, ideas cannot be copyrighted. What is copyrighted is the specific expression of an idea. Also, individual characters, recognisable names, elements of world design, etc. But not the underlying story, concept, plot, or characters arcs. You also can't copyright anything factual.
So what all this means for your question is that for aroslav to write a story based on someone else's idea is neither plagiarism nor copyright.
For plagiarism, if aroslav mentions the original author of the story then that's all that is required.
For copyright, the few lines describing the original story might be a copyright violation if quoted exactly, but not if described generally, and the underlying idea cannot be copyrighted. All of the original work done by aroslav, ie. the actual story, is also a new copyrightable work.
So it is theoretically possible that there could be a copyright violation involved, but it's not that part you think it is and it definitely isn't plagiarism.
The most important things to understand when contemplating these issues is that plagiarism is an academic standard, copyright is a legal standard.
If plagiarism is only an academic standard, you could not be sued for plagiarism.
You can be sued for just about anything, because civil cases are not about what is or is not criminal. Civil cases involve two parties with opposing views of a subject requesting that the legal system makes a pronouncement about who is right.
There are thousands of cases every day involving subjects which are not necessarily defined in the law.
Now, some jurisdictions do define plagiarism as a sub-type of copyright, and as such some laws do apply, but it's still generally civil, not criminal.
For example, in the US:
Plagiarism is not illegal in the United States in most situations. Instead it is considered a violation of honor or ethics codes and can result in disciplinary action from a person's school or workplace. However, plagiarism can warrant legal action if it infringes upon the original author's copyright, patent, or trademark. Plagiarism can also result in a lawsuit if it breaches a contract with terms that only original work is acceptable.
-- from Cornell Law School
So, the act of plagiarism itself is not illegal, but if that act crosses a line that is covered by copyright, trademark, or patent infringement then the act becomes illegal. The actor isn't sued/ charged with plagiarism, though; rather the act of plagiarism leads to a charge of copyright infringement.
On the other hand, Canada does have some legal protections against plagiarism (so do some European countries, notably Germany). The articles I found on the subject seem to be using plagiarism as a general term for the act of copying, though; the links to the copyright act itself do not use the word plagiarism ans the specific section referenced, 35(1), deals with liability for infringement under Civil Remedies.
If plagiarism is only an academic standard, you could not be sued for plagiarism.
According to findlaw.com, that is correct. (In the USA, other places have different laws.)
You have to sue for copyright infringement, or for other damages to your income or reputation or property rights, if you expect to get a hearing.
other places have different laws.
There are no laws to regulate academic standards that I am aware of. Since there are laws here in the US regarding plagiarism, plagiarism is more than just an academic standard.
Since there are laws here in the US regarding plagiarism, plagiarism is more than just an academic standard.
Where? Federal law only has copyright.
I did not limit my statement to Federal law. I also did not say the statutes were specifically about plagiarism.
Plagiarism is an act of fraud. So the laws relating to fraud are the laws sometimes used to bring legal action against the plagiarists.
I did not limit my statement to Federal law.
I didn't say you did. Hence the question of where?
Plagiarism is an act of fraud. So the laws relating to fraud are the laws sometimes used to bring legal action against the plagiarists.
So you are admitting that your statement that "Since there are laws here in the US regarding plagiarism" is false.
General fraud statutes are not laws "regarding plagiarism" even if they can be used to bring legal action against plagiarists.
Not exactly.
I knew there were laws used to sue plagiarists. I did not know what laws were used. So I said, "there are laws here in the US regarding plagiarism."
Now I know that in addition to the copyright infringement laws, people use the fraud laws. So the statement is not false, it is just not specific about which laws are used to sue for plagiarism.
So the statement is not false, it is just not specific about which laws are used to sue for plagiarism.
The statement is false. Neither copyright, nor general fraud statutes are laws "regarding plagiarism".
To bring a legal case against someone, they have to have violated a law. People get sued for plagiarism, in addition to copyright infringement.
So what law did they violate?
To bring a legal case against someone, they have to have violated a law.
This is not true.
1. People file frivolous lawsuits all the time.
2. A lot of civil actions are defined in common law, not statutory law.
People get sued for plagiarism, in addition to copyright infringement.
I'd want to see a specific case for that which went to a decision on the merits (not a settlement). The fact that such suits are filed doesn't mean that they are successful.
So what law did they violate?
You suggested that people were suing on a generic fraud theory. Fraud is a very generic tort. Just because the very generic laws around fraud can cover plagiarism in some cases (but not all cases) does not mean that fraud is a law about plagiarism, it's a very generic law that covers lots of things.
Successfully suing someone for fraud requires more than just a false statement, it requires that the plaintiff was induced to act in some way on the basis of the false statement such that the plaintiff suffered an injury (generally financial loss).
https://www.robertdmitchell.com/common-law-fraud
I'm skeptical that such a case could be made in the vast majority of plagiarism cases.
ETA: I would suspect that if in fact there are fraud cases filed over plagiarism in the US, most are settled for nuisance value.
Statutory fraud refers to fraudulent behavior that is protected against by the statute of frauds . . . 3. Fraud can also be committed by false representation, failing to disclose information, or abusing a position.
According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, to "plagiarize" means:
- to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own
- to use (another's production) without crediting the source
- to commit literary theft
- to present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source
In other words, plagiarism is an act of fraud. It involves both stealing someone else's work and lying about it afterward.
Your search link is not as useful as you think but from there, you can get to this:
https://www.wklaw.com/practice-areas/federal-crimes/federal-mail-wire-fraud-18-usc-1341-1343/
Put more simply, fraud is essentially the knowing or reckless misrepresentation of a material fact for the purpose of depriving someone of a valuable thing. This means that you knew that what you represented to the other person was not true, or that you represented to the other person something as true that you knew was potentially false or fraudulent.
The misrepresentation must concern a material fact, which means the fact must be something important that the victim would consider in making his or her decision. It also must be something that would fool a person of "ordinary prudence". This means that the misrepresentation cannot be something so outrageous that the average careful person would not believe to be true.
In plagiarism, the original author is not deprived of anything not better covered by copyright law. Nor is the author deprived of that something by misrepresentations made to the original author.
that may be true in some cases but not all cases.
you left out: "of anything not better covered by copyright law".
Also, fraud requires that the plaintiff was deprived of something of value by misrepresentations made to the plaintiff.
Looking at plagiarism as fraud against the original author:
1. What value was the original author deprived of that isn't covered by copyright(copyright violation being a simpler case to make)?
2. What misrepresentation did the plagiarist make to the original author that was material to #1?
A fraud case involving plagiarism would be more likely to be by someone who bought the plagiarized work from the plagiarist.
FWIW,
I went to google scholar and searched for legal cases using the term "plagiarism."
The first two pages of results are all cases involving professional or student discipline in academic settings. The only other one involved an action concerning a movie script by a studio.
As findlaw.com clearly states, plagiarism isn't illegal in the USA. I think USA includes all 50 states.
What is illegal is plagiarising someone's work, and then using that to obtain a job, a scholarship, a writing contract, and similar things. IOW, you have broken a law (copyright) in order to defraud the employer, college, publisher. That's going to be the charge. Fraud and maybe copyright infringement.
