Huh? Sooo your point is that there are no good fanfic stories because they would get sued? Or that the proof of fanfic being non-existent is that there are no lawsuits on fans writing stories?

Like JMich said a good fan-fic depends on the author's ability to tell a story. I have read some bad fan-fiction and I do mean BAD. Many fan-fics are also never completed as the author simply looses interest and most of the fan-fics I've seen are just crap. However sometimes if you are lucky you might find a gem.

P.S. - I did write a fan-fic once but it's best to forget that it even existed.

Most things are utter crud for all forms of entertainment. Just being fanfiction doesn't automatically make it bad because it is fanfiction, but because it is media. As ever, you just need a discerning eye and be willing to spend some time finding the gems.

As an avid writer I can't stand the thought of someone taking one of my characters and toying with them without my input. If it turned out bad I get pissed for ruining the character and if it turned out good I get pissed for making me jelouse for making the character way better than I ever could have. It's the whole "do unto others as you would want done onto you" thing, thus I avoid doing it to others; even if the originator opens their arms to the idea. I would imagine George Lucas has no problem with it, in fact I know full well he encourages it, but even if I was to sit down and work on a SW fanfic (just an example) I'd feel somehow awkward and out of place. Once I feel the slightest bit uncomfortable handling a character or their surroundings it's GAME OVER. I can't totally open up, explore every option, which quickly kills the flow of imagination which quickly kills any chance in hell the story had of being even remotley fun or interesting.

Before anyone ask, YES I do have a spell check on my word processor and I do check for grammer mistakes. I don't want people looking at my post and thinking that this "avid writer" is borderline illiterate! :D

In general, I'm not interested in fan fiction. It's bound to be unoriginal and derivative (duh) and of course writing quality isn't any better than that of any other kind of fiction done by amateur writers. I do like some well-written pastiches -- Elemental, querido Chaplin by Rafael Marín comes to mind.

It's twofold.

"Things" exist. Saying that if we can't be bothered to place an Aristotelian border between two categories, then the categories do not exist and everything is the same, is extremely unproductive.

What fandom generates for its own internal consumption has an extremely high likelihood of being shit. 100% if it's written for an even smaller "community" of other fanfiction writers. Conversely, the more the work is aimed at the general audience outside the "fandom", the more likely it is to be good, up to the maximum chance of 10% (Sturgeon's law). It transcends the requirements of fandom specialty interest (when you need to be familiar with other works of art to know who Sonic and Pikachu are and why it's so heartwarming that they're screwing each other) and becomes an independent product that can compete with official offerings on the open market.

Legtal problems is not a requirement, it's a criterion for me personally. Fantasy Flight Games released a custom Arkham Horror card generator to the public, to be used in making new cards for game mods. And then they slapped a mod author with a cease and desist for using copyrighted card layouts, because the mod was better than Arkham Horror itself. The C&D didn't retroactively make the mod even better - but if I hadn't been aware of it, it'd have made me pay attention.

You could have just said 'No, but I personally wouldn't bother with it otherwise' :-P I'm just not entirely sure what did you mean by
in this particular context.

"It's hard to formulate a difference between tie-in fiction and fanfiction, except one is authorized and the other is not (but we know authorization is not a guarantee of quality anyway), so everything except the work that launched the franchise is fanfiction". <- unproductive

I read alot of fanfiction, but sadly for the stories based on shows I like ends up mostly like this:

1 good well written M rated Danny Phantom story is surrounded by 100s of Male Homosexual porn fantasies written by women and read by mostly Fangirls.

(And Danny Phantom is not the only, look at Harry Potter and Most animes this alone showcases women are just as dirty as men)

Can anyone out there point to a really awe inspiring piece of FanFic that became really popular almost to the point of transending it's source material? I worked in a book store for 10 years when the SW FanFic really started to hit its peak; I saw it all, but nothing jumps to mind. I'm really curious if anyone here can point out anything.

Anyone here like Crossover Fanfics? I read those more than normal fanfics

I mostly read Danny Phantom X Teen Titans Fics because they blend perfectly.

I like the Super Robot Wars series, as I enjoy seeing the Big O, Gundam, Getter Robo, Macross, Gurren Tengen Lagann. Evangelion, and many other anime series share the same universe. You can't get a much bigger crossover than that. :)

Super Robot Wars Z2 trailer

If there is something I hate, then it's crossover. :-) And not even fanfic, even "normal" crossover.


I don't read fanfic, but I don't care if they exist. Most of them is badly written and even those well written usually take the story in a way I don't like and I fell it's not the way author would intend for story and it doesn't make me happy.
What about erotic fanfiction? :-) I read few and they are still giving me nightmares. :-)

FTFY