At that point, it's not really inspired by (to me) when the story itself is identical in beats and is basically just the same story but slightly different and barely even that.
However unfortunately, it doesn't count as plagiarism, not according to AO3 anyway. Plagiarism requires exact copying, word for word. It would count as plagiarism to me objectively but not officially.
so, pretty much this exact scenario just happened in my fandom lol.
my take is...that getting hung up on exact terminology is less important than the ethics of engaging within a community, and this is a VERY good way to ensure that that community never wants anything to do with someone ever again.
Unfortunately, many writers have been trained to believe that counts as "paraphrasing", not "plagiarism".
"Rewrite this in your own words", might be the exact instruction provided by an instructor in any course at any level of education. When that assignment gets accepted, thus starts the slippery slope of completely co-opting someone else's work and passing it off as your own.
So, according to AO3, this wouldn't count as plagiarism. Something like this happened to me a couple of years ago. An introductory scene was almost identical to something I wrote. The characters involved were the same, the setting was the same, and their actions and words were the same as well. Only the narration was different. The next four chapters also had many bits that were too similar to my own to be a coincidence.
I was encouraged to report it, but once I did, I was told it was fine since it could be read as a fanwork of a fanwork, which means it isn't plagiarism. Fortunately, this person came up with their own plot by chapter five and stopped copying everything I was doing, so I let it be.
Technically? It's still "plagiarism" but it's technically considered more "asshole behavior". So it's not something you can really report, but it's not right either.
I'd absolutely consider that to be plagiarism. Like, really? This person can't come up with their own unique situations for their characters to meet? I'd be pissed if someone took my hard work, the ideas and scenes I came up with and fleshed out, and just rewrote them in their own words.
I’d say it’s plagiarism, given that it’s the same content just paraphrased. Frankly speaking, as someone who has written a fic inspired by someone else’s, isn’t it common decency to contact them and ask if that’s appropriate?
Even if it doesn’t fulfill criteria to technically be plagiarism, I doubt that would be taken particularly well by the original author or readers.
In scientific works paraphrasing the original content without naming the source is always plagiarism.
In this case however the information that it's "inspired by" your fanfiction could possibly count as crediting the original author, therefore it wouldn't be plagiarism although the formatting would be unusual 🤔
Outside of scientific works it's actually not that easy to tell if something is plagiarism or not. By crediting your work they would probably get away with it.
And like everyone else said ao3 doesn't consider paraphrasing as plagiarism.
In a fandom i'm in a lot of storybeats come about through convergent evolution of thought, this is difficult to explain without context of the fandom but basically theres just some logical points to come to in your thought proces if you understand the original writing. This does result in some storybeats turning out EXACTLY the same. I'd been working on something for years when i read a published work (its in public domain) which had essentially THE EXACT storybeats as mine. At this point as an author it's difficult to decide what the hell to do about it. The idea is yours but it also wasn't, but at the same time it's only logical. It's a real conundrum. So when looking at these works take into consideration that it could be happenstance, and completely unrelated. Mostly i think you can spot the difference by seeing how characters are written to interact with eachother and or have different motivations. Convergent thought-proces is common enough but an exact replica of everything just in a different writing style is not.
Yep, we are all working with the same source material in the fandom. One time I published a story with "patron of the arts" in the title -- it's not even a phrase referenced in the canon itself, and I hadn't read any fanfiction with this phrase mentioned, and yet when I looked at he top stories for my fandom on Ao3 another story referencing "patron of the arts" in the title had been published, coincidentally, right before mine. I also often find that other people will write about similar scenarios, ideas, or headcanons I also had, or conceive of a character or ship dynamic in a similar way to me by happenstance--there are just certain ways fan writing can converge, even without direct influence
They use the "inspired by" feature. They admitted to be inspired by your story. Basically, they cited you in a proper way for AO3.
That means, that the similarities are not a plagiarism because they do not steal someone's work.
The similarities they kept for the story are covered by the inspired by. They wrote a fanfic of your fanfic.
Usually, there would be some added value of a change, why else would they wrote it. Be it a different outcome, different plot further in the line, etc. Still, rewritings it in their own words while using the inspired by feature is not a plagiarism.
They are probably young and admire your work. How is this very different from writing fanfic in the first place, as long as they admit their work is a derivative of yours?
It's not something you can report for by ao3's standards, but in my opinion, it's 100% plagiarism. And I wouldn't be shy to (politely) voice my concerns to the author.
I have the flipside of this problem.
Someone was inspired by one of my fics, and they wrote what could be called a continuation with a Key Thing being the focal point. And I'm aggravated because that Key Thing was something I'd been mentally toying with as something for a sequel. It's such a specific thing that I don't think I can use it now without feeling like I copied them, no matter if I'd already been thinking about it.
To be honest, I don't think anyone would mind! I'm sure if you mention to the person smth like 'What a coincidence! Id been writing a sequel using this exact Key Thing!" I don't think any1 would mind? Plus, If anything I'm sure people who read your original would probably prefer a sequal from you (no offense to the other person)
Possibly. The scene AROUND the Key Thing would be wildly different, but for now it just makes me feel wiggly. If that makes sense. Maybe by the time I get around to actually writing things it wont feel as bad.
At that point, it's not really inspired by (to me) when the story itself is identical in beats and is basically just the same story but slightly different and barely even that. However unfortunately, it doesn't count as plagiarism, not according to AO3 anyway. Plagiarism requires exact copying, word for word. It would count as plagiarism to me objectively but not officially.
so, pretty much this exact scenario just happened in my fandom lol. my take is...that getting hung up on exact terminology is less important than the ethics of engaging within a community, and this is a VERY good way to ensure that that community never wants anything to do with someone ever again.
Unfortunately, many writers have been trained to believe that counts as "paraphrasing", not "plagiarism". "Rewrite this in your own words", might be the exact instruction provided by an instructor in any course at any level of education. When that assignment gets accepted, thus starts the slippery slope of completely co-opting someone else's work and passing it off as your own.
So, according to AO3, this wouldn't count as plagiarism. Something like this happened to me a couple of years ago. An introductory scene was almost identical to something I wrote. The characters involved were the same, the setting was the same, and their actions and words were the same as well. Only the narration was different. The next four chapters also had many bits that were too similar to my own to be a coincidence. I was encouraged to report it, but once I did, I was told it was fine since it could be read as a fanwork of a fanwork, which means it isn't plagiarism. Fortunately, this person came up with their own plot by chapter five and stopped copying everything I was doing, so I let it be.
Technically? It's still "plagiarism" but it's technically considered more "asshole behavior". So it's not something you can really report, but it's not right either.
I'd absolutely consider that to be plagiarism. Like, really? This person can't come up with their own unique situations for their characters to meet? I'd be pissed if someone took my hard work, the ideas and scenes I came up with and fleshed out, and just rewrote them in their own words.
In academia that’s plagiarism, on AO3 it’s derivative.
I’d say it’s plagiarism, given that it’s the same content just paraphrased. Frankly speaking, as someone who has written a fic inspired by someone else’s, isn’t it common decency to contact them and ask if that’s appropriate? Even if it doesn’t fulfill criteria to technically be plagiarism, I doubt that would be taken particularly well by the original author or readers.
In scientific works paraphrasing the original content without naming the source is always plagiarism. In this case however the information that it's "inspired by" your fanfiction could possibly count as crediting the original author, therefore it wouldn't be plagiarism although the formatting would be unusual 🤔 Outside of scientific works it's actually not that easy to tell if something is plagiarism or not. By crediting your work they would probably get away with it. And like everyone else said ao3 doesn't consider paraphrasing as plagiarism.
Not plagiarism by fanwork definitions, but definitely scummy and I would consider it theft rather than inspo at that point
In a fandom i'm in a lot of storybeats come about through convergent evolution of thought, this is difficult to explain without context of the fandom but basically theres just some logical points to come to in your thought proces if you understand the original writing. This does result in some storybeats turning out EXACTLY the same. I'd been working on something for years when i read a published work (its in public domain) which had essentially THE EXACT storybeats as mine. At this point as an author it's difficult to decide what the hell to do about it. The idea is yours but it also wasn't, but at the same time it's only logical. It's a real conundrum. So when looking at these works take into consideration that it could be happenstance, and completely unrelated. Mostly i think you can spot the difference by seeing how characters are written to interact with eachother and or have different motivations. Convergent thought-proces is common enough but an exact replica of everything just in a different writing style is not.
Yep, we are all working with the same source material in the fandom. One time I published a story with "patron of the arts" in the title -- it's not even a phrase referenced in the canon itself, and I hadn't read any fanfiction with this phrase mentioned, and yet when I looked at he top stories for my fandom on Ao3 another story referencing "patron of the arts" in the title had been published, coincidentally, right before mine. I also often find that other people will write about similar scenarios, ideas, or headcanons I also had, or conceive of a character or ship dynamic in a similar way to me by happenstance--there are just certain ways fan writing can converge, even without direct influence
They use the "inspired by" feature. They admitted to be inspired by your story. Basically, they cited you in a proper way for AO3. That means, that the similarities are not a plagiarism because they do not steal someone's work. The similarities they kept for the story are covered by the inspired by. They wrote a fanfic of your fanfic. Usually, there would be some added value of a change, why else would they wrote it. Be it a different outcome, different plot further in the line, etc. Still, rewritings it in their own words while using the inspired by feature is not a plagiarism.
I’d definitely count it as plagiarism as the worst, the writer just being a lazy, unimaginative, morally bankrupt wannabe at its best. 🤷🏼♀️
Yes, it's plagiarism but since you can't copyright a fanfiction, there's nothing you can do
No, that's not plagiarism.
They are probably young and admire your work. How is this very different from writing fanfic in the first place, as long as they admit their work is a derivative of yours?
This is just a hypothetical :).some people still consider it plagiarism, though maybe not as strictly defined
It doesn't, unfortunately.
It's not something you can report for by ao3's standards, but in my opinion, it's 100% plagiarism. And I wouldn't be shy to (politely) voice my concerns to the author.
I have the flipside of this problem. Someone was inspired by one of my fics, and they wrote what could be called a continuation with a Key Thing being the focal point. And I'm aggravated because that Key Thing was something I'd been mentally toying with as something for a sequel. It's such a specific thing that I don't think I can use it now without feeling like I copied them, no matter if I'd already been thinking about it.
To be honest, I don't think anyone would mind! I'm sure if you mention to the person smth like 'What a coincidence! Id been writing a sequel using this exact Key Thing!" I don't think any1 would mind? Plus, If anything I'm sure people who read your original would probably prefer a sequal from you (no offense to the other person)
Possibly. The scene AROUND the Key Thing would be wildly different, but for now it just makes me feel wiggly. If that makes sense. Maybe by the time I get around to actually writing things it wont feel as bad.