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Fanfiction Authors: HEADS UP

(Non-authors, please RB to signal boost to your author friends!)

An astute reader informed me this morning that one of my fics (Children of the Future Age) had been pirated and was being sold as a novel on Amazon:

(And they weren't even creative with their cover design. If you're going to pirate something that I spent a full year of my life writing, at least give me a pretty screenshot to brag about later. Seriously.)

I promptly filed a DMCA complaint to have it removed, but I checked out the company that put it up -- Plush Books -- and it looks like A LOT of their books are pirated fic. They are by no means the only ones doing this, either -- the fact that """publishers""" can download stories from AO3 in ebook format and then reupload them to Amazon in just a few clicks makes fic piracy a common problem. There are a whole host of reasons why letting this continue is bad -- including actual legal risk to fanfiction archives -- but basically:

IF YOU ARE A FANFIC AUTHOR WITH LONG AND/OR POPULAR WORKS, PLEASE CHECK AMAZON TO SEE IF YOUR STORIES HAVE BEEN PIRATED.

You can search for your fics by title, or by text from the description (which is often just copied wholesale from AO3 as well). If you find that someone has stolen your work and is selling it as their own, you can lodge a DMCA complaint (Amazon.com/USA site; other countries have different systems). If you haven't done this before, it's easy! Here's a tutorial:

HOW TO FILE A COPYRIGHT COMPLAINT FOR STOLEN WORK ON AMAZON.COM:

First, go to this form. You'll need to be signed into your Amazon account.

Select the radio buttons/dropdown options (shown below) to indicate that you are the legal Rights Owner, you have a copyright concern, and it is about a pirated product.

Enter the name of your story in the Name of Brand field.

In the Link to the Copyrighted Work box, enter a link to the story on AO3 or whatever site your work is posted on.

In the Additional Information box, explain that you are the author of the work and it is being sold without your permission. That's all you really need. If you want, you can include additional information that might be helpful in establishing the validity of your claim, but you don't have to go into great detail. You can simply write something like this:

I am the author of this work, which is being sold by [publisher] without my permission. I originally published this story in [date/year] on [name of site], and have provided a link to the original above. On request, I can provide documentation proving that I am the owner of the account that originally posted this story.

In the ASIN/ISBN-10 field, copy and paste the ID number from the pirated copy's URL. You'll find this ten-digit number in the Amazon URL after the word "product," as in the screenshot below. (If the URL extends beyond this number, you can ignore everything from the question mark on.) Once this number has been added, Amazon will pull the product information automatically and add it to the complaint form, so you can check the listing title and make sure it's correct.

Finally, add your contact information to the relevant fields, check the "I have read and accept the statements" box, and then click Submit. You should receive an email confirmation that Amazon has received the form.

Please share this information with your writer friends, keep an eye out for/report pirated works, and help us keep fanfiction free and legally protected!

NOTE: All of the above also applies to Amazon products featuring stolen artwork, etc., so fan artists should check too!

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Scissor Wizard and Paper Wizard

It’s probably fine to leave them alone together.

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Things that People Forget About When Writing Sword Fights

You don’t have to dodge by a foot. You only have to dodge by an inch.

Not all swords are made the same way. You wouldn’t fight with a katana the same way you would fight with a broadsword.

You don’t need to aim for the heart or the head. Get the vein in wrist, and you could incapacitate that hand.

Small cuts matter. If you’re cut up enough, you’re going to start suffering from blood loss, and that’ll put you at a disadvantage.

The blade isn’t the only thing that matters. There isn’t some set of rules in sword fighting where you can only stick the stabby end into the other person. Hit them in the head with the hilt, and they’ll feel it.

If there are multiple attackers, you want to incapacitate or kill each one as quickly as possible. Endurance matters, especially when you’re not only swinging/stabbing/aiming something that is 2-5 lbs (ceremonial ones were a lot heavier, but wouldn’t be generally fought with) but also taking/blocking heavy blows from at least one opponent.

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POV: you're walking through The Wayreth Forest and come across a tea party of some dark elves.

Happy (late) Halloween, everyone.

You can see my timelaspe here.

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ok here it is

the last trial except only the parts where raistlin is on the floor :)

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req’d by @not-your-housekeeper98

…. mary toft, that you?

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The Last Trial gifs

Was bored. Made some Raistlin gifs. Enjoy.

Bonus one of Rostislav Kolpakov as Caramon from one of the newest live shows:

Watch the 2017 touring version of the Russian Dragonlance Musical “The Last Trial” free on YouTube with subtitles HERE

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Рейстлин пытается соблазнить Крисанию

Тем временем Даламар в кустах

Raistlin trying to seduce Crysania and meanwhile Dalamar in the bushes

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ФанАрт Даламара и Рейстлина из мюзикла "Последнее Испытание"

Fan Art of Dalamar and Raistlin from the DragonLance musical "The Last Trial"

Dalamar: "Will it explode?"

Raistlin: "It shouldn't"

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Winning the villain over to your side is a power fantasy.

Like, a really big one, too.

Social emphasis has it that men should value strength, aggression, and violence, and women should value kindness, empathy, and community. But really, anyone who has learned to prefer social success to might/aggression is going to favour a strategy where you can make your enemies into allies of some kind, over one where you just kill them. As a display of dominance, killing is overly simplistic. And it’s also hard to ignore the reality that luck usually has more to do with most fights than actual strength.

So, many people vastly prefer stories where the villains don’t die, but instead, get won over by the hero. It’s also a much more prevalent power fantasy among women than it is among men, because women are often taught that violence on our parts is inherently distasteful and ignoble. If you can’t defeat your enemies by putting a bullet in their heads, then what could be more satisfying than convincing that enemy to come and fight other people on your behalf instead?

This is a major component to why villains end up as popular shipping material. I honestly don’t think it’s the ‘bad boy’ impulse, or some branch of misogyny, or at least, not in a majority of cases. It’s a total and sincere power fantasy. Someone going ‘all I care about is myself and all I want to do is DESTROY THE WORLD MWAHAHAHA’ meeting you and then being like ‘oh no wait I also want to please you and spend time with you and I want that so much that I will now give up those other things’ implies an intoxicating level of charisma.

Of course, like most power fantasies, it pays to tread carefully with it. Because real life rarely accommodates such things, and as with some muscle-bound hero easily lifting a house over his head, being able to take a wholly selfish being and convert them into a devoted companion is… unlikely to happen outside of fiction. For a lot of reasons.

However, I bring it up because I am C O N S T A N T L Y seeing the compulsion to ship characters with villains misattributed to A) agreeing with the villains, B) some form of self-hatred, C) a noble impulse towards compassion and understanding, or D) sheer stupidity, and really… it’s just another power fantasy. Wonder Woman punches a tank. Tony Stark buys an entire island. Storm calls down a lightning strike. Batman outwits all his clever foes. And some seemingly random, ordinary human woman convinces Lex Luthor to chill out and stop trying to kill Superman. It’s all power, displayed in fantastical proportions.

(Which isn’t to say that you have to like it or think that every such relationship is good and healthy, gods no, but once you realize that everyone’s just pretending to be the Superman of relationships, it’s easier to just go ‘oh that’s what you’re after’ and… y’know… fret less.)

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Sturm be like... welp. Come back. Pls?

Sturm

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Corvids are just the best

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Raistlin Majere: is it Odin?

No, Raistlin Majere is not Odin.

Yes Odin:

Wise

Magic powers

Immortal??

Favours certain mortals

Jerk

Manipulative bastard

Proud

No Odin:

Shiny

Well-groomed

Young

Evil

Submitted by anonymous.

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ACTUALLY HAVE A POST FOR TAS’ BIRTHDAY IM SO HAPPY

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Another set of old pictures, this time Raistlin Majere and Crysania. They had kinda twisted relationship, but hey, who’s perfect in this world?

[2018] & [2014]