Post History

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/36489
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/36489
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

There are two obvious concerns: One is being a plagiarist; the second is being derivative.

Plagiarism has heavier consequences, but it's much easier to avoid. If your magic school is called Hugworts and people without magic are called Miggles, then yeah, you're going to have a problem -- but if you aren't quite as blatant as that, then you've got some pretty strong protections. In general, **ideas cannot be copyrighted.** So unless you're copying a system that's fairly unique, and goes into substantial detail, and you're copying all that detail with no real modification -- unless you're _that_ blatant, then it's hard to make a case that you're plagiarizing, rather than simply, say, being inspired by the previous work, or coming up with similar ideas on your own.

Being derivative is a more subtle thing. It's the sense that you've read this story before; that this has already been done and done again; that the story is uninspired and just going through familiar territory. It's more subjective -- and some people _love_ reading something that's obviously a kind of spin-off of something else they really enjoyed. Some people will read your martial-arts-with-elemental-magic and go "How awesome, this is just like what I saw on _Avatar_!", while others will go "YAWN, this is just like what I saw on _Avatar_."

Some points to consider about being derivative are:

- How close are you, really, to the work you're imitating? Can you put in some major distinction?
- Are your tone, style, genre the same as the original? (A horror story with vampires is a very different thing from a love story with vampires.)
- How do you actually feel about people associating you with the original piece; with people judging you as "similar", for good and for ill? Does that sound awesome or awful?
- How popular is the original work? Is it something everybody knows, or is it something really obscure, and most people won't even make the connection?

These sound to me like the major considerations to take into account. And, if _you_ feel like your writing is "too similar" (no matter what, precisely, that means for you), or if beta readers feel your writing is "too familiar" (whatever that means to them), then the thing to do isn't necessarily to toss the whole idea. Instead, start looking for ways you can keep some of the foundation, but also make the mechanism different, unique, special for your particular story. That'll usually do the trick!

Original score: 9