Stuck on a scene? Just plagiarize!

[lovecraft68]

Personally, I took down my stories as an act of self-preservation, not self-harm. Clash of worlds and all that.

Understandable. I always find it sad that for whatever personal reasons they have, authors have to hide, or in a case like yours remove their stories to avoid some form of drama.

 

[jaF0]

The first and most important thing I'd like you to consider is that in none of those posts have you used the word 'sorry'. You've come close by saying you'd 'made a bad decision', but you've never actually apologised.

I won't get into how I found this thread. Not important. But of all the words in all the paragraphs in all the posts on all the pages, this one jumped out. I just gotta say, some folks ain't built that way. I know. I am one.

There was a scene in Hill Street Blues where Hill and Renko are called to one of the many tenement buildings on their beat. Somebody had led a cow up several flights of stairs with intent to slaughter it in their bathtub. In their attempt to rescue the cow, they planned to walk it back down the stairs. One of then old men living there said it wouldn't work, 'cows ain't got no down genes'.

Some people, like me for one, ain't got no apology genes. The words might be there in one way or another, but they just don't come out in ways others use them.

Doesn't matter if you don't understand. Some things just is the way they is.

I'll let myself out. No need to leave the light on for me.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I don't think apologizing comes easy for anyone.

I won't get into how I found this thread. Not important. But of all the words in all the paragraphs in all the posts on all the pages, this one jumped out. I just gotta say, some folks ain't built that way. I know. I am one.

There was a scene in Hill Street Blues where Hill and Renko are called to one of the many tenement buildings on their beat. Somebody had led a cow up several flights of stairs with intent to slaughter it in their bathtub. In their attempt to rescue the cow, they planned to walk it back down the stairs. One of then old men living there said it wouldn't work, 'cows ain't got no down genes'.

Some people, like me for one, ain't got no apology genes. The words might be there in one way or another, but they just don't come out in ways others use them.

Doesn't matter if you don't understand. Some things just is the way they is.

I'll let myself out. No need to leave the light on for me.

 

[Voboy]

I don't think apologizing comes easy for anyone.

It comes very easily for those who actually understand they've wronged someone, admit it to themselves, and seek to avoid doing it in the future.

 

[alohadave]

I have apologized for apologizing.

Canadian?

 

[ChloeTzang]

I don't think running from what he did, serves any purpose. He had plenty of good stuff to show for his efforts. Everyone makes mistakes. You own up to it and try to fix it. At least that's what I think you should do.

I missed all of this originally, but yeah, I agree. You own up, fix it, apologize if that's called for, and move on. I admit, when I started here, my first story was based on an existing Literotica story because I had no real idea on how to write something myself and I needed a starting point. It went up, did well, and then got rejected for plagiarizing, which, I make no bones about it, it was. This was about 6 months before I discovered the AH and I was figuring it all out by myself, and of course I read up on plagiarizing, neophyte that I was, and went "ohhhhhh, that's why it was rejected." I wrote and rewrite about 3 times until it actually was original, except for the stolen plot, and it got through. That was all to illustrate I understand people doing it as they learn. LOL.

Now, if its something I'm not sure how to write, I'll look for examples and I'll rewrite them for practice and as a learning exercise, but when I've done that, I'll go away and write my own scene. It's a useful way to learn, but after I write, I do run a s/w scan now on my stories to check for any inadvertent plagiarism too. Funny how things sneak through on you.

That said, I think deleting everything on Lit is a bit of an overreaction, but I can also understand that too. Sad, but a learning experience. IMHO all that was really needed was a cleanup and a bit of a further rewrite, and a mea culpa. I don't think it was particularly over the top myself, but I guess it's all done with now.

Now, I do have a question of my own. I'm working on my "Hammered" story for July, the Ode to Mickey Spillane one, and I've rather deliberately used a couple of very obvious Spillane lines, more as an in-joke that anything. I mention it in the intro, but I'm asking myself now if that's acceptable. There's allusions to noir novels and things all the way thru, and it's part of the wrap. Just wondered what everyone thinks about that.

 

[alohadave]

I wish.

Sorry.

 

[theWollstonecraftWoman]

No, Millie doesn't do Sorry well at all.

I don't think apologizing comes easy for anyone.

 

[MillieDynamite]

I missed all of this originally, but yeah, I agree. You own up, fix it, apologize if that's called for, and move on. I admit, when I started here, my first story was based on an existing Literotica story because I had no real idea on how to write something myself and I needed a starting point. It went up, did well, and then got rejected for plagiarizing, which, I make no bones about it, it was. This was about 6 months before I discovered the AH and I was figuring it all out by myself, and of course I read up on plagiarizing, neophyte that I was, and went "ohhhhhh, that's why it was rejected." I wrote and rewrite about 3 times until it actually was original, except for the stolen plot, and it got through. That was all to illustrate I understand people doing it as they learn. LOL.

Now, if its something I'm not sure how to write, I'll look for examples and I'll rewrite them for practice and as a learning exercise, but when I've done that, I'll go away and write my own scene. It's a useful way to learn, but after I write, I do run a s/w scan now on my stories to check for any inadvertent plagiarism too. Funny how things sneak through on you.

That said, I think deleting everything on Lit is a bit of an overreaction, but I can also understand that too. Sad, but a learning experience. IMHO all that was really needed was a cleanup and a bit of a further rewrite, and a mea culpa. I don't think it was particularly over the top myself, but I guess it's all done with now.

Now, I do have a question of my own. I'm working on my "Hammered" story for July, the Ode to Mickey Spillane one, and I've rather deliberately used a couple of very obvious Spillane lines, more as an in-joke that anything. I mention it in the intro, but I'm asking myself now if that's acceptable. There's allusions to noir novels and things all the way thru, and it's part of the wrap. Just wondered what everyone thinks about that.

Sounds fine to me.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Rat me out, why don't you? Mary dearest.

 

[Bramblethorn]

There's "bad at apologising" and then there's "doubling down".

 

[AwkwardlySet]

This thread totally needed resurrecting...

 

[ElectricBlue]

Now, I do have a question of my own. I'm working on my "Hammered" story for July, the Ode to Mickey Spillane one, and I've rather deliberately used a couple of very obvious Spillane lines, more as an in-joke that anything. I mention it in the intro, but I'm asking myself now if that's acceptable. There's allusions to noir novels and things all the way thru, and it's part of the wrap. Just wondered what everyone thinks about that.

That would be the same as using a line from a song lyric, I reckon, a fair citing because it would be an obvious homage. You wouldn't be lifting great chunks of Spillane text and passing it off as your own.

 

[SimonDoom]

This thread totally needed resurrecting...

No kidding.

Night of the Living Thread.

"They're coming to get you, Barbara . . . "

 

[ElectricBlue]

This thread totally needed resurrecting...

That's what I thought, but then Chloe asked a legitimate question.

 

[ChloeTzang]

That would be the same as using a line from a song lyric, I reckon, a fair citing because it would be an obvious homage. You wouldn't be lifting great chunks of Spillane text and passing it off as your own.

More or less, just a few lines, and I changed them just a little to suit the story, but they're recognizable. There's a few other lines scattered through - as well as calling streets and places after noir novel characters, and a couple of detective agencies. All meant to be kind of humor if you get the references.

 

[jaF0]

Purely goofing around in a story one time, just to see if anybody picked up on them, I threw in couple of lines like:

'Go ask Alice, I think she'll know.'

'Alice it's my turn to play'.

'Who stole the tarts, was it the King of Hearts?'

And no, the story in question had nothing at all to do with the Carroll story, but it did have a scene with a blonde named Alice in a blue and white dress.

 

[SimonDoom]

Now, I do have a question of my own. I'm working on my "Hammered" story for July, the Ode to Mickey Spillane one, and I've rather deliberately used a couple of very obvious Spillane lines, more as an in-joke that anything. I mention it in the intro, but I'm asking myself now if that's acceptable. There's allusions to noir novels and things all the way thru, and it's part of the wrap. Just wondered what everyone thinks about ththat.

I think the answer to this, as with so many things here, is very situation-specific. "It depends."

I think it makes a difference if you are quoting lines in dialogue or in narrative. If you do it in narrative, it may seem like you're trying to get away with passing off the lines as your own, which is the big no-no. But if you do it in dialogue it may seem more like a tongue-in-cheek nod to the original. For example, if you have a character say "It was easy," I wouldn't worry about it. My guess is that's what you're talking about, because the most quotable lines in Spillane usually are the absurdly hard-boiled things he has Mike Hammer say.

You might add an afterword that pays homage to portions of the originals that you used. As long as you don't overdo it, I don't see a problem from a copyright infringement standpoint. After all, nobody has exclusive proprietary rights in "It was easy," right? Even though it's such a famous line. It's too generic for anyone to "own," but some effort at attribution might be appropriate.

 

[theWollstonecraftWoman]

This thread totally needed resurrecting...

We Jews aren't very fond of resurrection talk.

 

[8letters]

As TheRedChamber tried to persuade me to his point of view, I thought I would use his post to respond.

Let's be clear about plagiarism.

Plagiarism is the worst thing that a writer can do.

I beg to differ. The worst thing a writer can do is be boring, but that is outside of this discussion.

In a professional setting plagiarising has ended the careers of many writers.
:
What you can't do, and what you did, is copy and paste other people's words into your own story. For academic English there are rules about citing, quoting and paraphrasing and it can be easy for inexperienced writers to slip up. In literary English, although its possible to make allusion to other writers works sometimes, there's rarely a reason why you need to be copying whole sentences from other writers, or paraphrasing their paragraphs, and if you do you need to be damn clear that's what you are doing (possibly in a forward) if there's any chance it could look like plagairism.

Is Literotica a professional setting? Do academic rules apply to stories posted here? No reader has shared with me that they are upset that I used some sentences from another story. Those readers who have reached out to me think that it’s all much ado about nothing.

I think posting re-writes off old Literotica stories is plagiarism. I think stealing a story premise from an older story is plagiarism. But I don’t get bent out of shape when I see such things as I don’t hold Literotica authors to the same standard as professional authors. This is a site for amateur authors to publish their works with their only compensation being making readers happy. I’m all for making readers happy.

Back to ChloeTzang’s deliberately using a couple of very obvious Spillane lines - go for it! Readers will love it. Spillane’s publishing house isn’t going to demand you take down your story. The only people who will get upset about it are sticks-in-the-mud.

Note: What I should have done when I started taking from JCMcNeilly’s story was to reach out to JCMcNeilly about it. That would have been the polite thing to do. For some reason when I was writing the story, I thought JCMcNeilly was long gone from the site. They aren't.

You say we should have had a discussion on what the rules are for copying from others works. You've been around the forums long enough to know that we do, in fact, regularly have discussions about how much its appropriate to adopt ideas from other stories. We don't really discuss it at a sentence level however because most of us know instinctively where boundaries are. You can say the amount you copied was minor. Possibly, but it hardly matters since most people are going to feel that you shouldn't be cutting and pasting that stuff across anyway. You outlined a working process by which you started with someone elses work and tried to make it minimally your own rather than start by writing something original. That is a big problem and people, including myself, are confused about why you don't seem to realize this. There may be good reasons why not - for example, maybe you were home schooled and never got the same lessons about not copying of your deskmates that the rest of us got. I don't know.

I went to a public high school and a public university. I took as few English/Writing classes as I could. When I posted my first story on Literotica in 2013, I was a horrible writer. I’ve learned to write as I’ve posted stories. So I didn’t “know instinctively where boundaries are”.

Fine. My opinion doesn’t matter. I’m an easy person. Whatever. That was the only story where I used another author’s words. I’ll not do it again.

The above paragraph is very close to what I said in my second post, which made absolutely no one happy. I have an opinion on plagiarism that’s different than other posters! That’s totally unacceptable! I must agree with everyone else! I must apologize for having had a different opinion!

 

[AwkwardlySet]

We Jews aren't very fond of resurrection talk.

Is there anything else you are fond of, besides gold?

 

[theWollstonecraftWoman]

Interracial sex, the Denver Nuggets, Colorado Avalanche, Colorado Rockies (The team and mountains), Denver Broncos. A romantic weekend with hubby in the mountains. A romantic weekend with hubby at the beach in California. Writing dirty stories. Reading dirty stories. Experimenting in self-gratification when hubby isn't around. Eating out, dancing, coming home and making love. Good good, good friends, and good times. UM, some other stuff I guess as well.

What about you? Any interest outside pestering me? I know, I'm the top. You realize, Cole Poter wrote that love song about me, right? You're the Top and I think him for it.

 

[joy_of_cooking]

Is there anything else you are fond of, besides gold?

Whoa. Is this a thing you two have going on?

 

[AwkwardlySet]

What about you? Any interest outside pestering me?

Hmm, nah... Pestering is my whole life

A romantic weekend with hubby in the mountains. A romantic weekend with hubby at the beach in California. Writing dirty stories. Reading dirty stories.

I've been told that I am surprisingly romantic for a guy, so I guess I find myself in plenty of these activities, well, except for the hubby part. Me, I would need a leggy brunette with big... eyes. All because I am so romantic, of course

I I know, I'm the top. You realize, Cole Poter wrote that love song about me, right? You're the Top and I think him for it.

I had to look that song up and I was surprised to see how old it was. I have never heard it before

 

[djrip]

As TheRedChamber tried to persuade me to his point of view, I thought I would use his post to respond.


I beg to differ. The worst thing a writer can do is be boring, but that is outside of this discussion.


Is Literotica a professional setting? Do academic rules apply to stories posted here? No reader has shared with me that they are upset that I used some sentences from another story. Those readers who have reached out to me think that it’s all much ado about nothing.

I think posting re-writes off old Literotica stories is plagiarism. I think stealing a story premise from an older story is plagiarism. But I don’t get bent out of shape when I see such things as I don’t hold Literotica authors to the same standard as professional authors. This is a site for amateur authors to publish their works with their only compensation being making readers happy. I’m all for making readers happy.

Back to ChloeTzang’s deliberately using a couple of very obvious Spillane lines - go for it! Readers will love it. Spillane’s publishing house isn’t going to demand you take down your story. The only people who will get upset about it are sticks-in-the-mud.

Note: What I should have done when I started taking from JCMcNeilly’s story was to reach out to JCMcNeilly about it. That would have been the polite thing to do. For some reason when I was writing the story, I thought JCMcNeilly was long gone from the site. They aren't.


I went to a public high school and a public university. I took as few English/Writing classes as I could. When I posted my first story on Literotica in 2013, I was a horrible writer. I’ve learned to write as I’ve posted stories. So I didn’t “know instinctively where boundaries are”.

Fine. My opinion doesn’t matter. I’m an easy person. Whatever. That was the only story where I used another author’s words. I’ll not do it again.

The above paragraph is very close to what I said in my second post, which made absolutely no one happy. I have an opinion on plagiarism that’s different than other posters! That’s totally unacceptable! I must agree with everyone else! I must apologize for having had a different opinion!

The man himself! Hi 8!

In my opinion, the whole kerfuffle should have been handled with one simple fix - edit the few copied lines so they aren't copies anymore, or reach out to the original author and get permission to use them. Either would have been all that was needed. The dramatic pulling of all stories because you were annoyed with a few posters here seems way over the top, unnecessary, and a slap in the face to the many readers who enjoyed your work, of which I was one, and the vast majority of whom never even heard of this forum. On the other hand it's your work and you gotta do what makes you happy.

Hope you read this. Hope you reconsider pulling everything sometime, too.