Have you had a story idea preempted by another author?

[SimonDoom]

Have you ever had a story idea or written part of a story only to discover that another Literotica author "preempted" you by publishing a story based on a similar idea?

I've had it happen twice, most recently in the last 24 hours.

I was working on a story about a young male model hired to perform for a small group of well-heeled women in a backyard when TarnishedPenny published her story A Model Garden, which was remarkably similar to mine in concept, albeit with a lot of specific differences. I shelved the story idea until I could satisfy myself I could do something that showed sufficient creative originality. That was two years ago, and I haven't written a lick of that story since.

In the last 24 hours Silkstockingslover published The Adventures of Buttgirl, about a female superhero who gets her stressed relieved through anal sex. I had been working on a story with the working title of "Slutgirl," also about a female superhero with a need to be sexually serviced to keep her superhero powers going. I was a few pages into the story, and it was completely independently developed, but the title similarities alone might make one think my story was based on hers.

Has anybody encountered something similar? How, and what decisions did you make?

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

Not as you describe, but my fantasy novel has a scene where one character throws the main character onto the back of a troll.

When I saw the first episode of Rings of Power where Galadriel does the blade launch to attack the snow troll, I literally screamed at the TV, 'I wrote that first!!!"

Not sure anyone is going to believe me if/when I ever finish the book, but, it sort of makes a good story.

 

[Bamagan]

Several times, depending on how generously one defines similarity. I usually just plow on ahead; there are piles of highly derivative works in the archives here. If the work is small/short enough, I'd consider the possibility of incorporating it as part of a longer tale to add some diversity (or excising it and publishing it as a standalone, if it's initially a scene or character from a longer work).

 

[Omenainen]

I mostly avoid this by not reading what others write, so that I wouldn’t know if it happened

Once we were brainstorming premise for a story with AMD, I think it was an author retreating to a remote farm to write a book, and then SisterJezabel wrote that. So then we just wrote about something else, because it’s not like we’re starved of ideas. But it happens, great minds and all that.

 

[HeyAll]

Yes, a long time ago.

I remember many years ago I posted a story and then another author DM'd me saying 'damn, I had the same idea' with his story coming out soon, to preempt copying accusations, I'm assuming.

It happens and that's the way it goes.

In the grand scheme of things, readers won't complain. Most won't even know unless it's blatant.

 

[Small_Island]

I'll go you one better. I've had a story in my idea list since 2018 that I've tinkered with, but determined to finish and put into this year's Summer contest. What's A Mother To Do?
https://www.literotica.com/s/whats-a-mother-to-do-2

So, while I'm working to finish it this past spring, Silkstockingslover asks me to work on her dual-POV mother-son series, Forever Incest for the Nude Day contest.
https://www.literotica.com/s/forever-incest-a-sons-story
https://www.literotica.com/s/forever-incest-a-moms-story
So I start happily editing her mirrored stories, looking for the typo here, the grammar there, and double-checking the continuity between them. Zoinks! A mother is heartbroken by a cheating husband and goes into deep depression, which her wonderful teenage son helps her through - in a non-sexual manner. Move forward a couple of sexless years for Mom, bringing son to adulthood, and an incestuous relationship develops.
All elements in my own story! Then to make things weirder, I do find a continuity error that shows that she started with the idea of a widow, but changed to a divorcee during her writing process. Well, I made the same change in my story - back in 2020!
Now, overall the stories were significantly different, so I felt like I could still go ahead. But I did write her and explain and sent a copy that showed how long I'd been working on mine so she wouldn't think one of her editors was lifting her ideas for their own use. LoL! She agreed that the similarities were vague enough and the differences great enough that people wouldn't link them.
So, for your situation I'd say, read Buttgirl and if the stories are far enough apart and just share some elements, go for it, though perhaps with a title change. Maybe drop her a line if you want, but I'm sure Jasmine's as aware as any of us that there are just some things you're going to find in plenty of erotica stories and it's how you put those common pieces together that proves the originality of your story.

 

[TheLobster]

Premises are dime a dozen; I wouldn’t think twice about “reusing” them since you inevitably make the resulting story different in some substantial aspect anyway.

For example, yours:

a female superhero with a need to be sexually serviced to keep her superhero powers going

is similar to an idea I have in the drawer, about extradimensional/incorporeal alien who’s interested in researching Earthlings, notices we place much more importance on this thing called “sex” than we like to admit, and so xe conducts a field study by inhabiting an outwardly female human body that needs frequent orgasms to “sync up” with the rest of her being outside our universe.

But if you are really worried that your story would be seen as copycat, you can always delay its publication until after the “original” is no longer in the recent memory.

 

[AchtungNight]

Happened with my first erotic story. Someone posted another take of Scarlett Johansson & Keira Knightley getting lustful with each other and Rachel McAdams after their Vanity Fair photoshoot in February 2006. Their sex scenes weren’t written in the same style as mine and there was no car chase. Different character angst drama too. I shrugged it off at the time- I was publishing on a site that was exclusively Celebrity content and it was a pretty famous event. I had no claim to it and both our stories were fictional. People could decide whose was better for themselves. I was vindicated in that a) most fans picked “Fear, Lust, & Vanity” and b) far as I know, the other person didn’t post their story anywhere but the now defunct C.S.S.A. Later I published enough unique stories to make myself further relax.

 

[THBGato]

I recently read Unspoken Love and decided I was very pleased I hadn't read it before writing my own story The Third Date, as there are some similarities. I get that quite a lot, but then I do read a ton.

Sometimes I just don't worry about it, though I'll always give credit to stories that particularly inspired me.

 

[AllenWoody]

CJ McCormick and I were chatting since he had some success with longer works and I was curious if he had any advice.

Later I was working on my short series Lost Ark when I saw him begin to publish his series My Four Girlfriends. Both feature cloning as a central plot element. Fortunately the two stories are vastly different, as are our styles. I just found it to be an interesting coincidence.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

I'd started a story for the Ogg heroism event this year, about carrying on after a homophobic attack on a pub, thinking of the nailbomb attack on the Admiral Duncan 25 years ago. Only got as far as about three paragraphs and wasn't happy with them.

Then @TheRedChamber asked if I'd beta read a short story, which I happily did. His story did everything I'd wanted mine to do, and did it beautifully succinctly. So I recommend people read Re-Opening - it's only 1500 words.

I've got plenty of other stories to tell.

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Not that I remember, but I’ve had a couple of comments along the lines of, “I’d dropped a story like this, but see I should restart it.”

 

[lovecraft68]

I can see it being frustrating, but as has often been said here, what is really 100% original anymore? I would not let a similar story stop me from publishing mine. We all know readers will read the same trope over and over, and I always see it as it may have been done before, but this will have my stamp on it, and it will be different because of that.

 

[Mastered_again]

Can't say I've actually read a story that beats me to the punch. That said, I can't imagine that another author hasn't already had similar story lines. My scenes aren't that imaginative, but I try to make the characters worth the read

 

[Bramblethorn]

In the last 24 hours Silkstockingslover published The Adventures of Buttgirl, about a female superhero who gets her stressed relieved through anal sex. I had been working on a story with the working title of "Slutgirl," also about a female superhero with a need to be sexually serviced to keep her superhero powers going.

There's a similar concept (male superhero) in Kim Newman's "Pitbull Brittan". His body is made of erectile tissue and if he stays hard too long he'll explode; masturbation is out of the question so after every action scene somebody needs to give him relief.

It's all been done before, somewhere.

 

[mirafrida]

Honestly, it's really hard for me to imagine this ever happening.
(But I also fall into the "don't read a lot since I started writing" category, so there is that.)

 

[oneagainst]

I had this idea for a story with two women in a bath. Turns out that'd been done... had to scrap it entirely. I even had some great dialogue:

A: "Where's the soap?"
B: "Yes, it does, doesn't it."

 

[pink_silk_glove]

Zoinks! A mother is heartbroken by a cheating husband and goes into deep depression, which her wonderful teenage son helps her through - in a non-sexual manner. Move forward a couple of sexless years for Mom, bringing son to adulthood, and an incestuous relationship develops.

I'm sure that there are about 27,663 stories with that plot on lit. : P

 

[pink_silk_glove]

There's a similar concept (male superhero) in Kim Newman's "Pitbull Brittan". His body is made of erectile tissue and if he stays hard too long he'll explode;

Continuity and plausibility error: for erectile tissue to erectile itself it needs to be filled with blood from a part of the body that is not erectile. Even if we assume that he does in fact have one part of his body that is not erectile: his brain, the amount of blood needed to leave the brain to erect the entire body with leave him brain dead before he ever exploded.

 

[SimonDoom]

I appreciate the feedback. To be clear I wouldn't feel wrong going ahead and publishing my stories, because I'm sure the details will be quite different. But it takes the wind a bit out of the sails. It's nice to flatter (or maybe fool) yourself that you're being original.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I appreciate the feedback. To be clear I wouldn't feel wrong going ahead and publishing my stories, because I'm sure the details will be quite different. But it takes the wind a bit out of the sails. It's nice to flatter (or maybe fool) yourself that you're being original.

You chose the wrong category of choice to ever argue that. Does this mean I need to strike everything from No. 47 onwards from your list?

 

[SimonDoom]

You chose the wrong category of choice to ever argue that. Does this mean I need to strike everything from No. 47 onwards from your list?

I carve out an exception for IT stories. With those stories I go for fun, not originality.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Continuity and plausibility error: for erectile tissue to erectile itself it needs to be filled with blood from a part of the body that is not erectile. Even if we assume that he does in fact have one part of his body that is not erectile: his brain, the amount of blood needed to leave the brain to erect the entire body with leave him brain dead before he ever exploded.

I think one of the villains actually makes a quip along those lines. But that's probably the least implausible part of the story; it begins with the premise that everything printed in the Daily Express is true, and ends with the hero shagging Margaret Thatcher after his patriotic feelings have been duly aroused.

 

[pink_silk_glove]

I think one of the villains actually makes a quip along those lines. But that's probably the least implausible part of the story; it begins with the premise that everything printed in the Daily Express is true, and ends with the hero shagging Margaret Thatcher after his patriotic feelings have been duly aroused.

Oh ... my ... goo-goo. :0

 

[Rob_Royale]

Not yet. But I wouldn't let it stop me. Even if Joe Author and I both decided to do a Visiting My Lusty Aunt story, they would end up being completely different just based on our writing styles, experiences and interests.