[ SECRET POST #5044 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5044 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 31 secrets from Secret Submission Post #722.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

04. https://i.imgur.com/UASPu1G.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

Is your AU idea very unique? Because I do sometimes get the feeling fanfiction in any big fandom is just the same 10 AUs written over and over by different people, so it can be hard to establish ownership over these things.

[(Anonymous)]

+1

[(Anonymous)]

Yup. It's hard to be truly unique in any creative space and fandom really is no different at all in this regard.

[(Anonymous)]

This. Unless your AU idea is extremely unique, chances are good the other person just happened to come up with a similar idea.

As an example, I once read a book that turned out to have a character that was very, very similar to a character from a story I'd been working on on-and-off for years. I'd never posted anything about it anywhere so obviously the writer didn't borrow the idea from me, and I'd never read the book before so my writing wasn't influenced by theirs at all. We just coincidentally came up with very similar character concepts.

[(Anonymous)]

Unfortunately, you can't own ideas. That is true.

However, I know authors on AO3 do have the ability to put in A/N's and go "this work was inspired by so and so." So, maybe you can contact the author's privately and sort it out. Find out if they were inspired by you and ask them to credit?

Decent people will credit.

It's tough writing small ships in huge fandoms with big pairings. Hopefully, you can get this resolved without drama.

[(Anonymous)]

I know exactly what you mean. It is maddening. I know everyone will tell you ideas can't be stolen, but I don't see how that makes it right for people to basically read a fic and decide to rewrite it without credit. Just admit you wrote something based on someone else's work. It's fic, that's kind of the idea. And yeah, you have to be careful because sometimes it can just be a coincidence, but sometimes it obviously isn't.

[(Anonymous)]

A fandom osmosis, that's what is it.
I swear two people started fics with the same general premise after I started mine. It's still a WIP and unpblished. I bet those writers will think that it was inspired by their fairly popular fics.

[(Anonymous)]

On the other side of things, I'm always worried that someone will post something similar to what I'm writing before I have a chance to finish and post.

It's happened before, down to some very specific details. It was a bit mind-blowing and very disappointing because I had no proof we came up with the same things independently. Had to scrap that one.

[(Anonymous)]

So who is your rare pairing in Harry Potter? After all this time it's hard to find an AU that hasn't been done to death.

[meadowphoenix]

unfortunately, that is the nature of writing, and especially the nature of non-copyrightable writing/fandom. that's one way you get fanon. i mean how do you think a/b/o became a thing?

[(Anonymous)]

As others have noted, there are no new/fresh ideas in fandom. It's possible they "stole" from you, sure, but it's also possible that they just decided to write something similar enough to seem like it. And if they're OTP-y about their fandoms (or like me, they rarely read other people's fic even for their preferred pairing because they're too busy writing their own), it's very likely that they haven't read or even seen your fic.

It's definitely annoying, and I hate when it happens to me, but I also acknowledge that I might unknowingly do it to someone else too. Certainly the rare times I do get inspired by someone else, I will credit it or even ask for "permission" out of courtesy, but usually any similarity is just a coincidence. Or because I've been in fandom for 20+ years and have seen just about every kind of AU imaginable because, as mentioned, no new ideas.

Plus...it just seems ultimately fruitless and hypocritical to complain about someone stealing from us when, as creators of fanworks, we're just playing around in someone else's sandbox, anyway.