: Re: How does one get Fanfiction "Published"? When the final chapter of "The Legend of the Sword of the Day and the Sword of the Night" was translated to English I kept hearing on the chatroom

@Turnbaugh521

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If the original work is still protected by an existing copyright, then the only way any form of fan fiction could be published would be with the permission of the original author or copyright owner. The reason for this is that fan fiction by its very nature is considered a derivative of the original, and a copyright protects the owner against any derivative works being created.

There are some authors who willingly accept the existence of fan fiction web sites where people can contribute their own stories told in the same setting or with the same characters, but even those authors would draw the line at having those stories "published" in the form of a book or an e-book. There are also certain fan fiction sites that exist without the knowledge or approval of the original author, and once they are discovered, they are often shut down. Quite simply, no author wants to end up competing with themselves!

As Lauren pointed out in her response, there are certain exceptions or situations where writing fan fiction would be considered perfectly acceptable (public domain, Kindle Worlds). The responsibility lies with the author of the new content to ensure that their works don't violate any existing copyrights.

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