Accidental Plagiarism

LOG · May 20, 2009

Anyone ever heard of it happening? Two or more random writers some how cook up the same noun(read: person, place, thing) and probably end up going at each other's throats.
(Infinite monkey theorem and what-not, although definitely on a smaller scale)

>.> I'm just kind of paranoid like this <.<

[Not sure if this belongs here]

Matera the Mad · May 20, 2009

If they do it independently, it isn't plagiarism.

sunandshadow · May 20, 2009

Most made-up terms are not copyrightable or trademarkable, thus even if two people use the same term they have nothing to fight over. For example if you make up a race of undead called revenants, and I make up a group of human minds put into alien bodies called revenants, and someone else makes up a rank of angels called revenants, none of us has any grounds on which to sue the others.

LOG · May 20, 2009

sunandshadow said:
Most made-up terms are not copyrightable or trademarkable, thus even if two people use the same term they have nothing to fight over. For example if you make up a race of undead called revenants, and I make up a group of human minds put into alien bodies called revenants, and someone else makes up a rank of angels called revenants, none of us has any grounds on which to sue the others.

But what if two people end up making two undead races called Revenants? Would that still be legally acceptable as long as they differ in one way or another? One is a ghost, the other is a zombie/vampire hybrid.

Shail · May 20, 2009

My knowlege of copyright law is rusty, but I think the races have to be significantly similar to qualify as 'plagerism'.

Example: If the vampire/zombie Revenant and the ghost Revenant both originated from a rift that opened into a fourth dimention . . . correct me if I'm wrong anyone.

Sam Stephens · May 20, 2009

In Joseph Finder's recent newsletter he mentioned that he doesn't read the same genre when he's actively writing, just to make sure he doesn't accidently "pinch" a plot twist, or idea, etc.

Interesting!

cheers
Sam

Birol · May 20, 2009

The term you're looking for is parallel development. Two people can have similar ideas independently of one another and be working on them at the same time with no knowledge of each other.

sunandshadow · May 20, 2009

JJM said:
But what if two people end up making two undead races called Revenants? Would that still be legally acceptable as long as they differ in one way or another? One is a ghost, the other is a zombie/vampire hybrid.

Yeah, it would still be fine. for one thing real words like revenant are not trademarkable, that's why you always see stuff like Lite and Brite, adding a spelled-weird word to a phrase makes it trademarkable. Also in order to sue someone you basically have to prove that they are making a profit from your intellectual property or damaging your ability to make a profit from it.

Izz · May 20, 2009

Matera the Mad said:
If they do it independently, it isn't plagiarism.

Birol said:
The term you're looking for is parallel development. Two people can have similar ideas independently of one another and be working on them at the same time with no knowledge of each other.

QFT

dgiharris · May 20, 2009

My understanding of plaguerism is that it pertains to copying someone else's written word almost verbatim.

There are many cases of this where you can hold up two books and see entire sections and paragraphs copied verbatim with maybe a change of location, name, and an adverb change here or there. But the two sections will be 95% identical.

Now, if two people write different stories about Count Dracula. Big deal, that isn't plaguerism.

Now, in terms of stealing someone else's concept and doing a re-write. That is more of a gray area that has some subjectivitity.

I know that Dan Brown was actually sued along these lines with The Davinci Code. Because the ideas behind the Davinci Code are nothing new. He was just the first to wrap them all together. There was another author who did something similar a few years prior to Dan Brown, but even in that case, the court ruled Dan Brown was o.k.

http://www.americasdebate.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=12286

In a nutshell, as long as you write the book without looking at another book while you write, you are going to be o.k.

Mel...

dpaterso · May 21, 2009

Sam Stephens said:
In Joseph Finder's recent newsletter he mentioned that he doesn't read the same genre when he's actively writing, just to make sure he doesn't accidently "pinch" a plot twist, or idea, etc.

Me too. Even if I'm doing a writing exercise thing here on AW, I try to avoid looking at other posted stories till I've finished mine -- which is sometimes difficult when folks are expecting feedback.

I've had readers mention that a couple of my stories have reminded them of other stories they've read. When I've checked this out, I can kinda squint my eyes and detect a faint trace of familiar common sources -- akin to re-using "revenant" in a story, or as quoted above, DaVinci Code material similarity -- but nothing beyond this (whew).

I've also had readers tell me (recently) that other writers have ripped off my story ideas and written novels around them! Again I can detect a whiff of familiarity but heck, don't they say there's nothing new under the sun?

-Derek

LOG · May 21, 2009

Thx for all the advice

veinglory · May 21, 2009

Plagiarism is generally a matter fo actually words in the same order. Revenant is a real word, anyone can use it. Ideas, for the most part, simply are not proetcted unless it is as a patent or trademark. For example you can use "Star Trek" because it is trademarked.

LOG · May 22, 2009

veinglory said:
For example you can't use "Star Trek" because it is trademarked.

cooeedownunder · May 22, 2009

You can't plagiarise someones writing if you have never read it.

defcon6000 · May 22, 2009

cooeedownunder said:
You can't plagiarise someones writing if you have never read it.

But couldn't you just say you never read it, yet you really did. Unless the courts now hand out lie detector tests.

ccv707 · May 23, 2009

Many words and terms commonly used on an everyday basis are considered fair game (if I'm not mistaken). Of course, the case in the past has been that some writers have written things similar to previously published works and learned about it after-the-fact, but rarely does this end in a lawsuit. Typically, that happens when plagiarism is clear and malicious, such as with Alex Haley's Roots.

Millicent M'Lady · May 23, 2009

I have almost accidentally plagiarised on occassion. I have been convinced that I have come up with a fantastic quotable line, only to discover later that I was reciting something from memory from another book. So depressing when you discover your little gems of brilliance aren't yours at all!

Kathleen42 · May 23, 2009

People have similar ideas. It just happens. Look at Battle Royale and The Hunger Games or Uglies and the Twilight Zone episode
"Number 12 Looks Just Like You". Same basic premise in each case. It could easily happen with names or terms as well - provided they are basing those names and terms on a common language.

Now if one makes it to market first with a super spiffy name that you also have, it might be worth changing.

spamwarrior · May 23, 2009

I heard of a girl who wrote a very good chick-lit book. It was going off the shelves like crazy. Then they found that she'd plagiarized from another chick-lit book. In the interview with her, she said that she hadn't even known that her thoughts weren't original. She had been quoting things from verbatim, and she claimed that she hadn't even known that they came from the other popular book.

In other words, she claimed that the plagiarism had been accidental.

The books were taken off the shelves. It was a while back, and I don't remember her name.

Cathy C · May 23, 2009

Sure. Happens all the time. "First to shelf" generally rules with parallel ideas. I remember one time that my co-author and I created a main character who was IDENTICAL to a NYT author's. Right down to the name, description and personality. Weird. We scrapped the character and started over, because NYT author got to the shelf first. We told her about it a few years later and she laughed and said she'd had to do the same thing more than once. :ROFL:

She was glad it hadn't been OUR book that hit first, because she would have hated to scrap hers. So yeah, it happens to most of us at least once.

Wayne K · May 23, 2009

My wife's brother was developing a drug free website and asked us for ideas.

He went to Georgia Tech, who are called The Yellowjackets, we went crazy with our "Bee drug free." we spent weeks on it.

He sent us a web address to the exact same idea--all of it. I guess it could happen with plots.

Ctairo · May 23, 2009

Not sure if this is the chick-lit author spamwarrior mentioned: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaavya_Viswanathan

I pretty sure "photographic memory" wouldn't hold up in court. The book was definitely pulled. Not sure what happened with the whopping advance though.

But yeah, it happens with films all the time. Parallel development (thanks Birol!) Similar concepts, similar terminology... The execution is usually what distinguishes the projects, and since we're not talking word-for-word, plagiarism wouldn't come up.

Kathleen42 · May 23, 2009

Ctairo said:
But yeah, it happens with films all the time. Parallel development (thanks Birol!) Similar concepts, similar terminology... The execution is usually what distinguishes the projects, and since we're not talking word-for-word, plagiarism wouldn't come up.

Joan of Arcadia and Wonderfalls.

BigWords · May 24, 2009

Kathleen42 said:
Joan of Arcadia and Wonderfalls.

And lets not forget Deep Impact and Armageddon hitting cinemas at nearly the same time.
The important thing in having an idea that is similar to anything else is the handling. Go watch both films, and you will see that one is very different from the other.
If you look closely at a large selection of seeming disparate novels, you will discover there are a finite number of possible plots from which to use, and it simply happens that people come along with related central ideas all the time.
There is no way of knowing how many people, at this very moment, are working on vampire / zombie / spy / alien scripts which are set in Cardiff thanks to the success of Torchwood. Or how many people are riffing on the works of Ian Rankin, or J K Rowling, or even P G Woodhouse.

Don't despair if you note similarities to another author's work, rejoice in the differences that seperate the projects.

Accidental Plagiarism

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