Stealing Writing

Charlie's Diary Rules for Stealing from Writers has mysteriously disappeared from author Charles Stross' blog, and he closed a forum on the topic on 6/28/05 after 870 lively posts. Why? Apparently some of the posts turned vituperous over Stross' suggestions that is perfectly O.K. to filch, oh, let's say, previously published notions. To be perfectly honest, his post was titled "Five rules for cold-bloodedly designing a fantasy series". The somewhat abbreviated rules:

1. don't steal from living authors
2. steal from the best
3. steal from at least two, and mix thoroughly
4. pick themes to pilfer that you find interesting
5. make sure it doesn't look stolen

I think Stross caused so much controversy because of the terms he chose (steal, pilfer) rather than "find inspiration" or "follow in the footsteps of" or even "use ideas (which aren't protected by copyrights) from". Let's face it, there really isn't anything new to write about in fiction. In nonfiction, anyone who's written a master's thesis or worked on a p.m. newspaper with a.m. competition knows about writing others' words in other words. We're always recreating, reinventing, and standing on the shoulders of, etc. [Tectags: writing plagiarism]

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