This is a SF story from the 1960s. It is very dated in its speech and terminology.
It cpuld however be the basis of a GREAT NEW rewrite, along similar lines. The theme is great.
It is free from Gutenberg.
Regards, Chris
This is a SF story from the 1960s. It is very dated in its speech and terminology.
It cpuld however be the basis of a GREAT NEW rewrite, along similar lines. The theme is great.
It is free from Gutenberg.
Regards, Chris
If someone absolutely, positively had to set a different story in a similar setting, it could be handled as fan fiction, with credit to the original. Ideally the original author could be contacted to give permission. People are still writing Sherlock Holmes stories, or other detective fiction using "relatives" of Mr. Holmes or Dr. Watson. Karen Wagner gave explicit permission for other writers to play in the Naked in School universe. Perhaps the same authorization exists for Damsels in Distress universe(s) stories, there sure are plenty of them. Probably other adaptations of other novels and stories are being written. There is always the example of Harry Potter and his schoolmates.
It doesn't have to be plagiarism if you do it right. Not taking a profit from another persons work also helps. Particularly if you get sued.
it could be handled as fan fiction, with credit to the original
First, the suggestion read to me like a case of taking the other story and revising it - plagiarism. It wasn't clear if the story is public domain or just free to read. Some authors give the Gutenberg Project approval to let people read their stories for free while not giving up any copyright aspects to the stories. Which is what I do with the stories I post at SOL, I retain all copyright entitlement while allowing the SOL readers to read the story for free.
Fan fiction is illegal, despite a lot of authors not worrying about it. You can't use another author's characters or setting unless you have their permission or the story and characters are now public domain characters - which is the case with Sherlock Holmes. There is a bit of freedom allowed with very common names if the story universe is different - eg. If I have a 1800s naval story with a non-magical character named Harry Potter I won't get into trouble; but make it magic and I'm in deep trouble.
With the Damsels in Distress universe the creator made a public statement allowing other authors to use the universe, the people, and the places in it; which is what we've done _ I've written four stories in it. The same is true for the Naked in School universe stories - creator approval for others to use was given.
BTW Profit is not a factor in plagiarism law suits.
Fan fiction is illegal, despite a lot of authors not worrying about it. You can't use another author's characters or setting unless you have their permission or the story and characters are now public domain characters
I can't speak to other countries, but at least under US copyright law (The US does not have a cause of action for plagiarism absent copyright) the setting would be protected only if the setting was entirely fictional.
BTW Profit is not a factor in plagiarism law suits.
Under US law there are two different types of damages; statutory damages and actual damages. You can not claim both for a single violation, it's one or the other and statutory damages are available only if the copyright was registered prior to the lawsuit being filed.
Profit is certainly a factor if you are claiming actual damages.
Because of the first amendment to the US constitution injunctions are extremely difficult to obtain in copyright cases.
I can't speak to other countries, but at least under US copyright law (The US does not have a cause of action for plagiarism absent copyright) the setting would be protected only if the setting was entirely fictional.
There are two issues here, one is plagiarism and the other is copyright. Plagiarism is where I take your words and use them as is or almost as is and put a book or article out as my own. that's a slam dunk breach of the law with no leeway at all. The way the original post was written I saw the person as saying someone should take the story and do an updated revision - straight plagiarism.
The other is the copyright of an universe or world or working area a person has created. It is in this area that the fan fiction people break the law. You use my environment without my permission and you're violating my copyright. You can sail close to the wind without violating the copyright, but if you do it doesn't qualify as fan fiction because it's in a variant world.
For example: Harry Potter is a mix of normal Earth and a Magical Earth with a school called Hogwarts in it and certain character names used.
If I use some of those same character names in a non-magical story set in modern Australia it's not a copyright violation or fan fiction.
If I set up a normal Earth and Magical Earth society with different character names and at a school in Australia called Lassiters, it's not fan fiction or a copyright violation.
But setting story in the Harry Potter universe at Hogwarts with different character names is a copyright violation and fan fiction.
Now, as to the damages depending on where you take the case to court you will have different rules applying. However, you raise the US laws. Past US court cases on copyright and trademark protection make it clear that in the USA you must actively protect your copyright and trademarks because failure to do so in any one case weakens your ability to do so in every other case. Also you can claim damages for dilution of your trademark or copyright and need not have to prove a financial loss in doing so.
In most countries you do not have to lodge an official registration of copyright like you are supposed to in the USA. Also, the International agreements requires the USA to recognise items copyrighted under the laws of the other countries they have the agreements with. I publish a story here in Australia and I automatically get full copyright entitlements in the USA because I'm entitled under Aust law, thus I don't need to register with the US system.
To further mess this discussion up, we don't know what terms the original is copyrighted under or what country's laws.
There are two issues here, one is plagiarism and the other is copyright. Plagiarism is where I take your words and use them as is or almost as is and put a book or article out as my own. that's a slam dunk breach of the law with no leeway at all.
In the US, if there is no copyright on the work plagiarized, there is no breach of the law.
In the US, if there is no copyright on the work plagiarized, there is no breach of the law.
Stealing is stealing regardless of the law or any other label. I don't want to read something that is clearly a stolen story.
The base ideas/themes are usually okay as long as the story itself is original with new characters. Historical figures and other commonly used characters are okay in a supporting role.
Stealing is stealing regardless of the law or any other label.
True, plagiarism is wrong whether it's illegal or not. (I don't agree with calling it stealing. "Intellectual Property" is a misnomer. Patents, copyrights and trademark rights are very different than ownership rights in physical property)
However, I was responding to EB who said that plagiarism even in the absence of copyright was a slam dunk breach of the law.
In the US, if there is no copyright on the work plagiarized, there is no breach of the law.
However, the copyright exists as soon as it's first published. Copyright exists without having been registered, even in the crazy US laws on copyright. Having something fall into the Public Domain does not eliminate or negate copyright or ownership, it just ends certain legal aspects in regards to it's use.
Having something fall into the Public Domain does not eliminate or negate copyright or ownership, it just ends certain legal aspects in regards to it's use.
Edited
Wrong. Under US law, falling into the public domain very much does eliminate or negate copyright or ownership. Most works that are in the public domain are in the public domain because the copyright expired.
US law does not recognize any right or ownership in books or art apart from copyright.
Copyright expires, and once it has expired, the former copyright owner has zero rights or ownership in the work.
However, the copyright exists as soon as it's first published.
Actually, this is also wrong. Technically it doesn't even have to be published. Copyright attaches as soon as the work is fixed in a tangible form. (computer data files are considered a tangible form for purposes of copyright law.).
Copyright attaches as soon as the work is fixed in a tangible form.
Once it's fixed in a tangible form it's published, as against printed by a publishing house which is what I think you see as being published.
Once it's fixed in a tangible form it's published, as against printed by a publishing house which is what I think you see as being published.
Um no. In addition to writing I am an amateur photographer. A photograph is fixed in tangible form as soon as the shutter snaps. The copyright has attached even if I never show it to another person.
To be published, it must be made available to others, to the public in some form.
I am aware of no definition of "published" that would be applicable to a manuscript that has never even been submitted to a publisher.
ETA:
Publish: "to make information available to people, especially in a book, magazine, or newspaper, or to produce and sell a book, magazine, or newspaper:"
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/publish
To be published, it must be made available to others, to the public in some form.
From Wikipedia:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright
quote
The 1886 Berne Convention first established recognition of copyrights among sovereign nations, rather than merely bilaterally. Under the Berne Convention, copyrights for creative works do not have to be asserted or declared, as they are automatically in force at creation: an author need not "register" or "apply for" a copyright in countries adhering to the Berne Convention. As soon as a work is "fixed", that is, written or recorded on some physical medium, its author is automatically entitled to all copyrights in the work, and to any derivative works unless and until the author explicitly disclaims them, or until the copyright expires. The Berne Convention also resulted in foreign authors being treated equivalently to domestic authors, in any country signed onto the Convention.
end quote
Derived from the references listed at the end of the article.
Many dictionary definitions of publish are to prepare and issue - handing a written manuscript (or text file) to someone read or edit is to issue a prepared document. Some even include to communicate as a definition of publish.
It doesn't have to go through a publishing house and be distributed in large quantity to be published. In many countries you can be arrested and charged for publishing certain types of document or images, even if the only copy in existence is the one you just finished typing or creating.
Many dictionary definitions of publish are to prepare and issue - handing a written manuscript (or text file) to someone read or edit is to issue a prepared document. Some even include to communicate as a definition of publish.
All true, but all involve showing the work to someone else.
As soon as a work is "fixed", that is, written or recorded on some physical medium, its author is automatically entitled to all copyrights in the work, and to any derivative works unless and until the author explicitly disclaims them
Yes, you quote the proper language, but you still miss the point.
Copyright attaches earlier than you are suggesting. Under US law at least, as soon as you first save your first draft of a story copyright has attached. Copyright has attached before you have even attempted to publish it.
For a photographer, copyright attaches the instant he takes the photo, it doesn't even have to be taken off the camera.
However, the copyright exists as soon as it's first published.
My understanding is that under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act copyright attaches as soon as the work is produced (not as soon as it's published).
My understanding is that under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act copyright attaches as soon as the work is produced (not as soon as it's published).
This is a part of the issue of the difference is the meanings of the same word in different countries. Words can vary in meaning within the general community, and again in what they mean in laws. Under the analysis of the Berne Convention on Copyright I saw, about ten years ago, an item is published when it is in a form that can be used. For a written document that means the hand written words on the page, with an electronic one it's the electronic file of the item - be it text, image or sound. While Dominions Son seems to use published as to mean only when it goes out for public distribution. In your example the Berne convention sees it as published when the written code is saved, while you call it produced.
Where things get tricky is the short span between creation and publish within the meaning above. To be published and protected you need to have a copy in a format you can provide to someone else, so an e-file, a printed page, or a written page are published forms despite not yet having been publicly distributed. To take an extreme example: In photography the image is created the moment the photographer clicks the shutter and he has copyright at that point. However, the item is not published as per the convention and protected until such time as they make an effort to prepare it for distribution. With a digital camera I take an image, technically I have copyright at that moment (depending on the contract for the work) but it can also be deleted and totally removed from existence, if that happens the copyright also ceases to exist. I copy it from the camera to my hard-drive, and thus publish it and ensure protection of the copyright, or I can remove the card and put it in my pocket and thus publish it.
With a types story I can write the story and as soon as I start to write it I have copyright to that story and those words, but when I go in and revise it the copyright transfers to the new version unless I've have a copy of the earlier version around somewhere. In that case I have two documents very much the same, each with their own copyright.
It's an odd area that between the creative idea and the published product ready to distribute, but it's there. Another extreme example is I can document an idea for a movie as a book or a screenplay and I have the copyright on that, but the moment a company makes the movie (after paying me for permission to use my idea) they own the copyright on the finished movie, even if all they do is the use a camera to record each page of the book. You see this all the time in the music industry; Fred writes a song (music and lyrics) he's paid by John to let him sing it, anyone else has to pay Fred if they want to sing it, but John owns the copyright of the recording he made of the song and gets paid when it's played in public.
The example given when I first heard the rule was "when the [typed] page is pulled from the typewriter."
My understanding is that this was partially to differentiate it from the previous copyright law under which the copyright had to be registered (still a good idea for settling disputes). So the DMCA both extended the duration of copyright (life plus 70 years vs. life plus 50 years (or some set number of years after production*) and the starting date (production (vs. registration or publication))
*I've read part one of Mark Twain's autobiography, and he talks about fighting to extend copyright from 6 to 12 years from first publication.
My understanding is that this was partially to differentiate it from the previous copyright law under which the copyright had to be registered
That's mainly an issue for the way the US set up their copyright laws. The Berne convention set it as 50 years from the date of the death of the created and then it ceases, but the Us wanted to restrict the time frame, then they set up all sorts of changes to extend it. In the countries where it's still controlled by the Bern Convention it matter not who is the current legal copyright owner, 50 years after the death of the created and it's public domain, while in the US you can renew well past the death of the creator. All the Sherlock Holmes stories are public domain around the world, except for a few stories published in a single volume issued in the US to commemorate his visit there at one time. The publishers have extended those copyrights, so the few stories in that one volume are still copyrighted in the US and only the US. Make a film on them in the US and you got to pay, make it in Canada and you don't got to pay.
The US is the only place where they approved a man to copyright the invention of penicillin over a decade after it was created by two others outside of the US.
while in the US you can renew well past the death of the creator.
Not quite. Copyrights on works created pre-1978 can be renewed once and once only. Post 1978 copyrights can't be renewed.
But there is worse. Under the work for hire doctrine, corporate entities are considered the author for many copyrighted works, and a corporation is potentially immortal.
To adjust for this, and the fact that the US constitution doesn't allow for eternal copyrights the current terms of copyright in the US are: author's life + 70 years; for corporate authored works, 95 years for unpublished works and 120 years for published works.
https://copyright.cornell.edu/resources/publicdomain.cfm
Under the work for hire doctrine, corporate entities are considered the author for many copyrighted works, and a corporation is potentially immortal.
And that's why Berne Convention saw only the human creator as the creator. Under the BC a company can not create something, only a person can. The rights can be passed to and controlled by a company, but it's still created by a person and the date goes from them.
And that's why Berne Convention saw only the human creator as the creator. Under the BC a company can not create something, only a person can. The rights can be passed to and controlled by a company, but it's still created by a person and the date goes from them.
Yes, and for movies and books and music that generally works fine.
However, the Bern Convention automatic copyright doesn't just apply to those kinds of things. It also applies to letters, emails, reports and other documents that the employees of a corporation generates every day through the normal course of business.
Under US law, copyright ownership must be transferred in writing and the writing must be specific about what copyrights are transferred.
This creates a problem for a corporation, because under the Bern convention rules, employees could assert copyright against the company over internal company documents. Not only that, but the company must keep track of who wrote what for decades to know what is still under copyright or not.
This is why the work for hire doctrine exists in the first place.
The way the entertainment industries are organized, authors, composers, screenplay writers etc are rarely ever covered by the work for hire doctrine.
This is why the work for hire doctrine exists in the first place.
The work for hire doctrine was originally intended to be only about what you got hired for and things as part of that work. Thus, any documents I write as part of my work I'm paid for belong to the company unless specifically excluded prior to my hire - as happens with some contractors. However, the way the work for hire doctrine is applied in the US the company claims ownership of what you do at home in your own time because you spent five minutes during your lunch break telling a workmate what you did at night. That is right outside the work for hire doctrine.
A classic and simple example of the work for hire doctrine:
I hire a model to pose for me while I take photographs, I get them to sign a release and I don't pay them until they do. Someone hires me to take photos of them for their portfolio, they don't pay me until I sign a release. The basic in both cases is the one who pays owns the work. Sadly, there's now some very unscrupulous photographers out there today. A friend was looking to hire a photographer for their daughter's wedding, the guy wanted a few thousand bucks and the contract gave him control of the photos. He wasn't happy when I insisted she try a photographer and not a shyster, he can either have the copyright or the money, but not both.
However, the way the work for hire doctrine is applied in the US the company claims ownership of what you do at home in your own time because you spent five minutes during your lunch break telling a workmate what you did at night.
Yes, some companies have pulled things like that, but those cases have generally not ended well for the company
However, employees have also tried to push the boundaries going the other way, doing personal projects that they intended to profit from on company time and equipment.
This is why the courts have settled on the current standard of absent specific contract terms otherwise, if the work is developed on company time or using company owned resources then it counts as a work for hire.
Simply telling a co-worker about it at work wouldn't be enough.
ETA: There is one other piece to this you need to understand. That is the at will employment doctrine. The vast majority of US workers, even salaried professionals doing copyrightable work are working without an actual contract, not even a union contract. I work in IT, I am making $100K per year and I am an at will employee.
But setting story in the Harry Potter universe at Hogwarts with different character names is a copyright violation and fan fiction.
True but Hogwarts is a specific fictional setting. This would not be true with a fictional story set in a real world setting.
Past US court cases on copyright and trademark protection make it clear that in the USA you must actively protect your copyright and trademarks because failure to do so in any one case weakens your ability to do so in every other case. Also you can claim damages for dilution of your trademark or copyright and need not have to prove a financial loss in doing so.
You are mistaken. The requirement to defend and dilution claims are only for trademark, they do not apply to copyright. And with the duty to defend a trademark, this does more than weaken your ability to defend it in future cases, it can actually void the trademark.
In most countries you do not have to lodge an official registration of copyright like you are supposed to in the USA. Also, the International agreements requires the USA to recognise items copyrighted under the laws of the other countries they have the agreements with. I publish a story here in Australia and I automatically get full copyright entitlements in the USA because I'm entitled under Aust law, thus I don't need to register with the US system.
Under US law, registration is only required to obtain statutory damages which in most cases are much higher than actual damages. I forget the exact amount, but it's several thousand dollars per copy distributed.
Edited to add: You only have to register before filing suit, you don't have to register the copyright before the violation occurs.
No, you don't have to register with the US copyright office, but if you were to sue in US courts without that registration you would only be entitled to actual damages.
To further mess this discussion up, we don't know what terms the original is copyrighted under or what country's laws.
If you are suing in US courts, this matters only to the extent of whether a copyright exists (and is still valid) or not. The US courts will apply US law when determining damages.
If The Lani People is in the pubic domain, and according to Gutenberg it is, you can use it however you like. There is no copyright infringement.
Plagiarism would be publishing the work (or large pieces of it) and claiming you wrote it. A different act, and, depending on circumstances and jurisdiction, may or may not be illegal. It's certainly unethical.
Which is why it's often safer to use a real world setting, as long as it isn't Kentucky, USA or Batman, Turkey who have both taken people to court for using their names.
Which is why it's often safer to use a real world setting, as long as it isn't Kentucky, USA or Batman, Turkey who have both taken people to court for using their names.
Kentucky, USA has lost every case it has brought. US law simply doesn't allow for these kinds of claims by government entities.
Kentucky, USA has lost every case it has brought. US law simply doesn't allow for these kinds of claims by government entities.
That may be the case, but it still cost those who went to court to defend themselves a lot of money to do so.
If you have a character named Ken, do you get in trouble if his last name is Tucky? How about Tuck?
If you have another character call Batman a Turkey, perhaps a thanksgiving story, can you get in trouble? Or only if you use Ken Tucky or Batman the Turkey as geographical names?
Hi, this is Chris, who made the initial post.
If you have read the story, you would see that it is SF, and actually touches on genetics, mutations due to radiation, space travel, and has just a hint of eroticism and no sex (from memory). It was written in the 1960's!
I guess by making the original post, it would get some people to read the novel, and to understand what I was saying.
What everyone is saying is a very good commentary on my poorly worded post.
I guess what I really meant was this theme (read the story before replying), is one I have never read in any modern SF, and worth developing in other areas.
Regards, Chris
genetics, mutations due to radiation, space travel,
Just on this line alone, I can tell you the themes mentioned have been covered before, several times, by major mainstream sci-fi authors during the 1930s to 1950s - I've read some in the past, despite never having heard of the story or author you mention. There's one significant book by Pournelle or Niven which deals with the effects of radiation based mutation of the people on a multi-generation spaceship that dates from the 1950s.
Here is a review of the story taken from "Manybooks"
"A bit oldfashioned Scifi novel about humanoid aliens, bred for work and pleasure of the humans. A vet is offered a job to care for them and discovered an unwanted truth. Its maybe a little bit sexist from this times point of view, but wellwritten. "
and:
"Summary: An ambitious animal vet takes a sketchy job with a ruthless businessman on a distant planet, only to discover that his female livestock charges are all-too-human."
Not sure if Pournelle or Niven wrote about these, Chris.
EB, I don't think you've read anything written by either Niven or Pournelle in the 1950s considering Niven's first published work was "The Coldest Place" in 1969, and Pournelle's was Stability and National Security (Air Force Directorate of Doctrines, Concepts and Objectives) (1968), and his first fiction was Red Heroin (as Wade Curtis) (1969), though, of course, there are his theses, "Behavioural observations of the effects of personality needs and leadership in small discussion groups", and is dated 1957 and "The American political continuum; an examination of the validity of the left-right model as an instrument for studying contemporary American political 'isms'" and is dated 1964, but I don't think either of those fit your description.
I looked up permissions and license requirements at Project Gutenberg. LOOK HERE and see what they say:
http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Gutenberg:Permission_How-To
Does anyone have anything worthy to say about my original post.
I really do appreciate the time and effort and time spent replying.
However does anyone else actually think the original st0ry can be adapted for modern times?
By this, I (clearly) mean, if it was a 1960's story about Jurassic dinosaurs, then the story could be updated to be a story like Jurassic Park.
Not plagiarism or anything else, just a story line, adapted to modern (SEXUALLY EXPLICIT) erotic story themes. That's all folks!
I looked up permissions and license requirements at Project Gutenberg.
I exchanged emails with the PG people last year. A few things came out.
1. US PG only allows copyrighted material where the copyright owner has given them written permission to put the item on PG. However, they prefer the person puts it in the public domain.
1.a. At the time I spoke to them they were not interested in any copyrighted material unless the primary copyright was under US copyright law - and preferably from a US citizen or resident.
2. The Australian version of PG does not allow any copyrighted material at all because they can't be bothered with keeping track of the approvals.
As to the original question, there are court cases going on about things based on very similar story lines, so I, for one, am not interested in trying to do an updated rewrite of someone else's story.
I guess what you are talking about is a remake or a reboot, taking an old story or series and redoing it with varying amounts of changes for a modern audience. There are many, many examples of this being done in film, television, and comics.
However, generally the people doing the remake/reboot own or are licensing the rights to the original work. However again, if the story is "free from Gutenberg" if you say, then there's a strong chance it's in public domain. I just looked it up there, and according to them I was correct.
As long as you make it explicit that your story is a remake or reboot of the original story and credit the original author, then your plan would be no different than Peter Jackson's King Kong or Ronald D. Moore's Battlestar Galactica.
Has anyone at all done as I asked and actually read the story so they know what I am talking about? most people seem well into the yes/no of legality without understanding the basic concepts of what I am putting forward.
An updated story based on a concept, that's all.
Perhaps like a Superman story, but we call him Captain America. Hmm?
Perhaps a story about Dinosaurs. Surely dinosaurs are not within a bull's roar of what you guys are talking about. A few are into what I am saying I think. But gee, it's not that intellectual. A story about neanderthals doesn't necessarily have anything to do about the Neander Valley, or any other story in the universe. It is just a story line I am talking about. A thread, an idea.