Plagiarism, credit etc.

[wantsunicorns.livejournal.com]

I've asked if it's okay to post this and got the okay, so here goes:

I know we all get inspired by the things we read or watch or listen to, be it books, films or songs. How do you deal with that, if you get inspired by other people's fic?

As an author:

• Do you think it's alright if other people reuse an idea you had?
  (like a spell, a gadget, a magical ability, magical theory etc.)
• Do you think it's necessary to be credited in the author's notes, if they used your idea?
  (as in, the part where "..." got inspired by "so and so")
• Would you like to be asked, before someone uses something of yours?
  (like, send a pm, or email asking whether it's alright, e.g. detailing what want to use it for)

What are your thoughts on this?

I personally am a bit undecided. I would love it, if people asked me permission, simply because I think it would be lovely to know that someone else got inspired by something I created. I would however not hold people to this. What I think would be common curtesy though would be to credit the creator of a work in the author's notes with something like "the idea for "..." comes from "author's name"" or something similar, if one was so inclined one could also link to the fic the idea was inspired/taken from.

I'm fairly new to stuff like this, so I don't know what's considered the right approach to this, so I figured I might as well ask my go-to-people in such matters, i.e. ALL OF YOU BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE! ♥

PS: I'm sorry mods, I don't know how to tag this.

ETA: Thank you so much for everyone who has shared their opinion on this with me. I've definitely received some food for thought. ♥

Comments

[skriftlig.livejournal.com]

This is such an interesting point. Thanks for raising it!

I basically agree with what you wrote in your post. I wouldn't be too upset if someone took something from a fic of mine without asking (I've never asked JKR) but I would expect a little comment in their author's notes saying where it came from.

Of course, it's possible to take someone else's ideas without realising, which is tricky. So I think we have to use our common sense to a certain extent - we're obviously not going to go around crediting people for Draco being a potions master or Snape being in portrait form or any other very prevalent ideas, but I do think we should ackowledge other people's specific ideas/creations.

[wantsunicorns.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I think that as long as you realise that it's not your idea, even if you don't remember where you got it from, you can simply go "not mine either". In the past I credited several authors in my author's notes, if I remembered that what I used was their idea.

The idea that made me ask this question in the first place was so vague though and so essential to the other author's fic that I wasn't sure how to go about it and ended up asking her whether taking that part and using it was alright. I did get permission so I'm really glad I took the time to ask.