Ethical Questions

WildLynx

Virgin
Joined
Jul 22, 2001
Posts
18
I have recently read several true sexual experience accounts on another bulletin board site. These were shared on an open board, ie. anyone, registered or unregistered, could read or post there.

I tried to contact the people sharing their experience to ask
permission to write a fictional account, but none of them had e-mails or profiles listed.

My intention is to use the situations, not names or places. However the experiences were rather unique; it might be possible for these folks to recognize their story.

Is it ethical to write a story based on these posts?
Is this different than sitting in a cafe and overhearing a similar story?
 
My first questions would be:

1. Is the site these stories are posted on a privately held site? (Something like a paid members only?)

2. Are the pieces copywrited?

I am inclined to say "no" if you are unable to reach the individuals. But that is just an opinion.

Is there absolutely no way that you can use the basic premise, but add your own twists to it to make it uniquely yours?
 
Actually, the situations I read were only a few sentences, more like teasers, that made me think of a number of possible stories.

The general form of both of these was:
--- I and (person) went to (location) with (person/people/object) and (fill in sexual exploit).

The sexual exploit was the interesting part.

The entire setting, people involved, conversations, reactions, physical descriptions etc were not posted and would be made up.
Even the sexual exploit could be changed -- such as switching a bet made on a game of poker, to a bet made over a game of billiards or??

Perhaps I am making too much out of this. But I tend to be very cautious.
 
I'll have to check on the BB to see if there is any assumed or actual copyright protection. It is a paid membership site.
 
It is my understanding of the copywrite law that one can not copywrite an idea, but one can copywrite the work dealing with that idea. For instance, I could copywrite a story about a two pregnant women having oral sex in a hayloft while being watched by a squad of pom-pom girls wearing bubble-wrap bikinis, but the idea of this happening would not be protected. You would be free to create your own work based on this idea as long as you didn't use my words.

I'm no lawyer, but this interpretation makes sense to me, because otherwise, there could be no romance novels, movie knockoffs, etc. If my interpretation is incorrect, could some lawyer type enlighten me?
 
legal question

The real legal question here is whether the use of the actual exploit would violate any privacy concerns the original posters might have.

The reality here is that the words posted if used in the way you describe them is not copyright protected. If you would use same names and locations you might run into trouble because the persons involved might have wished to keep the audience restricted to the private members forum.

Since you are going to give a fictional account without using the names and places, you can stay very close to the idea as it was originally presented.

If you could reach them, they might even be flattered by your effort. Since you can't = go ahead.

Sweetwood:p
 
Oh come on, this question is a give-me. Any writer worth their salt should be able to take any experience from anywhere and change it just enough to make it their own. If you don't have the imagination to create your own world from an idea of another and can only regurgitate what is there in front of your face, you need to strongly ask yourself: am I really a writer?
 
These people were sharing their experience on an open bulletin board, so they can't be that shy about what happened. Morally I don't see a problem. There's no legal responsibility for you not to write as you're using different names and removing anything that could identify them. The only people who could identify that story are the people involved and those who have been told, so I don't think there's a problem there.

Go forth and create a story full of wonder :D.

The Earl
 
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