Plagiarism community

[estepheia]

Okay, so there's been another case of plagiarism in our fandom. Every time this happens in a community the poor mod has to decide whether to go public or not, and every time the mod does, someone barges in and defends the plagiarist, or states that the case should have been handled discreetly, behind closed doors.

It is painfully obvious to me that we need safeguards and guidelines (and moral support). In short, we need a community to which we can take these cases. I kalready mentioned my intention to create such a community and I know there are others who already volunteered to help setting one up. So unless someone steps up and tell me we already have such a community for our fandom or unless someone beats me to it, I will create this community within the next two days or so.

What should be the purpose of such a community? IMHO it should

1. provide terminology for discussing similarites in fanfic, so that we can differentiate between cut & paste jobs, hommages, unauthorized Universe-borrowing, unauthorized sequel-writing, and downright theft


2. help community and list moderators decide what to do and how to approach the offender


3. maintain lists of known offenders (how public these lists are and whether offenders get off the hook or screened after a certain amount of time has elapsed, that has yet to be decided)


4. maintain "case files"


5. keep a "stable" of fast-reading google-ists, who help moderators and archivists track down originals of stories that have come under suspicion.


6. provide a place where plagiarism can be discussed (and where we can vent)

Maybe the community could even help remorseful offenders redeem themselves. (After all, many storylines in our fandom revolve around redemtion, don't they?)

I'm looking for names, oh and under no circumstances do I intend to turn into a bloodhound who spends all her days hunting down plagiarists. I believe after a bit of initial work this community can be quite dormant. It would only wake up and spring into action when needed...

As for names, here are a few suggestions:
no_plagiarism - stop_plagiarism - fandom_watch

The name anti_plagiarism is already taken (I found them because I just added 'stopping plagiarism' to my interests). The group shot down a handful of plagiarists in the anime fandom, but the community mod doesn't have a lot of time to devote to it, and besides, the main activity of the community was to warn off offenders, and, if necessary, inform archivists of the plagiarism. I hope that whaever we come up with will be more active. I also hope that many people volunteer to be mods of the new communtiy.

Suggestions would be most welcome.

ETA: kallysten just told me that quinara set up a community called stop_plagiarism already. So I guess that's where we should go and offer our help. :-)

Comments

[harmonyfb.livejournal.com]

My honest opinion? I would just ignore it. Life is too short to waste time on sad pathetic people who steal fanfic.

I say that my work - original fiction or fanfic - is too important to allow someone else to claim credit for it. In fact, allowing it to occur unchallenged can cause unpleasant legal repercussions later (if, say, the plagiarist decides to change character names and market the story, which has been known to happen.)

Not challenging it means you can legally lose the copyright (which, by the by, protects even fanfic.) Derivative works are definitely covered by US copyright from the moment of creation. In addition, it opens the door to questioning of your character, because it allows the plagiarist to possibly claim that you were the thief.

No, I think it always needs to be challenged loudly, and the theif exposed. If they don't mind stealing credit for something they didn't write, who knows what they'll steal next?

[spicklething.livejournal.com]

Totally agreeing with Harmony. Just because it is fanfiction doesn't make literary theft any more acceptable. It is the same heinous act if the victim in question is Estepheia, HarmonyFB or JRR Tolkien.

We need to take a zero tolerance approach to this behavior.

[estepheia.livejournal.com]

Thank you for clearing this up, Sheri. Well put.

[ketzel.livejournal.com]

Just my two cents :) But I can see where you are coming from too.