How did you guys go about writing in Dovil Feathertin? I heard it was rouge's oc, and originally wanted her in my own fanfic, but was urged against it due to the characters relations to the creator. (i also hope to make an official copy of the fic and make it into a readable book like other fic authors do with fanfictions, so i have no clue about the copyright for that since she isn't mine. None of them are, but it feels different with ocs...)
I write her like I do Bendy and Cuphead and any of the other characters I don’t own. It’s a fanfic from a fan comic. I started it before the scandals and the freaky stuff came out or I wasn’t aware of it. And I decided to continue the fic after too because the og creators mess isn’t my mess. Rouge is far from the first creator’s media I’ve liked that’s turned out to not be a great person. Coraline, Sandman, and Good Omens would fall under that category. Anything Lovecraftian. Harry Potter too. I don’t fault the fans. The creators did bad. Their reputations should be marked. The fans didn’t do anything. They just liked a story. I liked quest, I had ideas, I wrote them. That’s about it. As for the OC stuff, the entire concept of the quest was rouge’s. I acknowledge that. I took it. I had different ideas and wanted to explore them with that same concept. Just like Myth of the Machine is doing. I don’t separate characters like Dovil from the story since the concept of an ink machine quest is also rouge’s. Now I did ask permission for other OCs from other artists that gifted them to the comic like Finley and Sammy since they hadn’t been gifted to me. Dovil I didn’t since she and the idea of the quest were one and the same to me. That being said I feel like I need to give a warning here.
The fact of the matter is this: if you share something online, it’s now something others are aware of. You can’t own an idea but you can own making money from that idea. If an OC gets super popular, other people will draw or write about that OC. Sometimes it doesn’t go well. Harpy Hare and Welcome Home! are examples of that. Something getting too popular too fast and the creators suffering from what their fans are putting them through. That’s the risk of sharing something online. Anyone can see it. Some will run with it. If you aren’t ready for that risk with your characters, don’t share them with the open public. I’ve seen it happen a number of times.
Now one last thing. The line between books and fanfics. I can do what I do with my fanfic because I don’t make a dime off it. AO3 has a team to protect my fanworks as long as I don’t try to monetize it. We have edited the first ‘book’ so people can print it for themselves if they want a physical copy of it but again I don’t make ANY money from that. Those that are selling book copies of fanfic are breaking the law and endangering those of us that just want to share our stories and further explore our favorite worlds outside of canon. This is different than the others that decide to change their works into og stories and then sell them. A few folks have done that and changed their stories enough that it obviously isn’t fanfic it once was. But still—it’s iffy.
Ancient fic history, Anne Rice went of a witch hunt for fic writers touching her vampires and a lot of fics were deleted because of it. A number of fics would disappear because of pressure from authors, companies, and even governments before AO3 and the few laws we have to protect fanon spaces stopped it. You’ll still see arguments spring up over whether one fic or another deserves to be deleted or not. It’s a slippery slope. My advice, if you want a physical copy of a fic, print it, bind it, have it on your shelf but DON’T BUY IT OR SELL IT! And if you want to sell a story, make it an original work. No one can come after you if you do.
Okay. That’s it. I’ll get off my soapbox now.
I hope this didn’t come across as harsh. That is not my intention. I understand wanting to distance yourself from controversy and problematic people. Sadly those people can tell amazing stories or have a good idea like anyone else can. I consider IM as my fixit fic. It’s so far removed from the source at this point too, so is Myth honestly, but the roots are there.
