Subject: If I take them down now ...
Author:
Posted on: 2008-07-09 23:23:00 UTC
... and wait several years before attempting any publication at all, do you think it'll be safe? The pics were just scraps, I don't think many people see them.
Hiya, everybody! *waves* It's been ages, I'm afraid. And as much as I hoped I'd never do this, I've got a reason for turning up on this board after so long.
The problem is, I loved PPCing. .... Ing. Loved. It. But while I was PPCing, I was writing a novel, and now that novel is in the process of being sold. I posted the name and pieces of my novel while I was working on it, on the same LJ that I posted my PPCings. And if I want to avoid legal issues once the book is published, I can't continue sporking other peoples' work.
:( I've missed you all, guys. Board snowfights and tearing the hell out of badfic were wonderful. I met a lot of awesome people on this board, even if I haven't been able to keep up with you.
The reason I'm posting here is that I need to transfer ownership of my agents, Diocletian and Suicide, as well as their minis Narnia No-Longerfled and Thiranduil. This would also mean asking their new writer to complete the unfinished first portion of the "Subjugations" mission, a killer in and of itself. But even if they just continue for that one mission, I'd like to see the end of it. And I'm hoping one of you guys can help.
The PPCings themselves are going to be transferred from my Livejournal to the website at http://www.geocities.com/sixtyofnine2138. The new writer could, if they liked, take over this site, or do as they pleased with the characters and the writings.
*shakes a tin cup* Don't leave these agents homeless! Alms! Alms!
Probably there's something about changing guards that could be said here, but I've never been very up on military history, it'd probably sound a bit silly coming from me at any rate, and I'm not convinced it would be accurate.
Best of luck to you! *offers a commemorative mug*
Oh, I hope I didn't get here too late...
Hey! You don't know me (why should you?) but Suicide and Diocletian are one of my favorite Agent pairs (though not 'ship-wise). I'm definitely going to miss you and your fantastic writing, and wish you good luck with your novel (which I'm planning on buying XD).
I gift you with an egg whisk to protect yourself from spambots and all things unholy in the Real World. It's gold-plated...oh, and it may also be used to whisk eggs.
Come back and visit? Please? You will be sorely missed.
*huggles her new carnivorous rubber pet* Gorsh, I feel like an Oscar winner. You love me! You really, really love me! *teary eyes, blows kisses*
In answer to a few questions . . .
Neshomeh, I would be delighted if you would like to take stewardship of Dio and Su for "Subjugations." They don't make too much of a mess, I promise. And they come with a bonus of Ithalond and Mithiriel, the latter of which is a house-cleaning demon. Of course, I'd help any way I could. There's no way I'm condemning anybody else to PPCing that turkey alone.
Araeph, it's not necessary to have read "Gates of Fire" to get all of Suicide's personality; he actually appears only peripherally in the novel, and the version I'm using of him is more of an uncanonical fanon approximation than the genuine article. Wikipedia et al should give you the info you need on his novelized appearances.
If you want to borrow or cameo Suicide and Dio anywhere, that's fine with me, though if Neshomeh is their primary steward then you'd have to clear it with her. This would apply to anybody wanting to use them, cameo or otherwise. I'd like to think that they got out and about occasionally
OFUFF is dead as the proverbial doornail, I'm afraid. If anybody wants to use anyone/anything from there, they're more than welcome. It was pretty much doomed when my student files got wiped out in my last drive crash. Miss J and all students are free to good homes, though in the case of the students, I'd recommend disinfecting them first.
I'm not vanishing entirely; I'll continue to lurk and read PPC, and I'm available at sixtyofnine2138@yahoo.com if anybody wants a beta or just to chat.
Thank you to everyone for your help and friendship over the years. *pours a jug of Pan-Galactic Gargle Blaster* Have an e-one on me. More than one, if you like. You're all fabulous, and you'd better know it!
Like I said, I don't know when I'll get around to "Subjugation," but it's definitely on my list now. And I'll be steward and permission-giver for Dio, Su, Ithalond, Mithiriel, and assorted minis and paraphernalia. {= )
*hugs* I'll be in touch. Sporadically as usual, but even so. ^_^;
~Neshomeh
We'll miss you! Congratulations on your novel!
In fact, we have missed you. *hugs* Take care and good luck with life and the writing.
That was a fun time. I will be reading the new book once it is released to the masses. Hopefully we will get to kill some Sues from your work!
Leto
I've always loved your missions, so I'm sad to see you go. But you can still visit, right? And yay, published! *squees*
Actually, that's something I've been worried about. My solution has been to not post any of the stories I might want to submit, keep my name out of online activities, and wait until there's actually some chance of getting published before I worry too much.
I haven't really been able to get to know you very well, but I wish you all the best. I hope you will not abandon the Board completely.
...of what to do if that happens to me. And the answer I came up with is: the Department of Intelligence. See, if you're careful about it, as an Untangler you don't actually have to interact with the canon characters. All you're doing is analyzing what's going on in a bad fanfic and why it's deleterious to canon. Doing just an Intelligence brief is even better: it's really like a badfic review, and there's nothing legally wrong with that. (There's internal PPC history, too, but I think hS has kind of cornered the market on that one.)
Just out of curiosity...would someone have to be very familiar with the book Suicide is from, or just very familiar with the history of Ancient Greece? (I'm the latter, not the former.) I know Neshomeh has already offered to take care of them, but I like adding other agent cameos into my missions, and not just the "pop-in-to-make-an-appearance" kind. *has been known to co-write missions with other agents*
Good luck with the novel and with RL. I'm sure your agents and minis will be taken care of here. *sadly hands over carnivorous rubber zebra* Maybe you could take this as one of (certainly many) mementos of the board and the Boarders?
It's a shame that this has to happen - it's exactly why I'm trying so hard to keep my penname and my real name separate, though I don't plan to actually publish anything... much.
*hugs* I wish you could stay. But on the other hand, congratulations on being published!
- Sedri
I'll be truly sorry to see you go - it's been great having you around the board, and I'll miss both you and your writings. (I've become a fan of Steven Pressfield, thanks to your influence, actually!)
I wish you the best of luck in your future wanderings as a published writer! Bonne chance, and hope you might be able to drop back in from time to time.
Namarie!
Elcalion
*blows nose loudly* As a fan of your work, I wish you many happy returns.
Now, could you maybe lend me a bit of help, it seems to concern this whole "fire-king" thing.
*zoom out to see Beige tied up and being carried by mini-sloths to the edge of a volcano.*
It was not the badfic alert siren that went off this time. Instead, it was an ordinary bedside alarm clock, conveniently shaped like a jolly smiling hamster. Its cheerful chimes were greeted with less than enthusiastic response by the occupant of the bed, one Diocletian Astreth, who opened one bleary eye, considered the clock, and then swatted it hard enough to put a crack right down the jolly hamster's jolly abdomen.
"Su," Diocletian said, rolling over. "It's the OTHER alarm."
This was addressed to a large hammock hung up near the roof of the small room. In it reposed two hundred and ten pounds of groaning Scythian, who had drunk far too much everything at the "Our Writer's Retiring, We Can Finally Get Some Sleep" party of the night before.
"Mnrgh," was his response.
"Su!" Diocletian repeated.
"Gnraaargh!" the Scythian responded, punctuating his statement with a thrown bottle of Kahlua. Diocletian took a deep breath and silently begged forgiveness for what she was about to do.
"WRITER KIDNAPPING!" she screamed, putting just enough of her Sueish soprano into it for maximum pain. Suicide jerked upright in a humorous fashion and promptly bashed his head on the ceiling, which sent the bundled hammock swinging like the cocoon of a gleeful caterpillar just about to move out into his own set of wings. Indeterminate swearing drifted down to Diocletian, who was scrambling out of bed and looking wildly for a pair of non-crusty socks.
"Dio, I will ----in' KILL YOU," Suicide said, when he had managed to stop swinging. His face was slightly green under its heavy tan. "Ugh. My mouth tastes like tin and mini-Balrog."
"No time!" his partner responded. Since the sock graveyard of the floor had yielded nothing usable, she clambered over the lower laundry foothills in search of the lost washing basket. It was around there somewhere, she knew. "A writer's been kidnapped. Get dressed, Su!"
"Good," Suicide responded.
"No, not good. Writers control our existence, you dolt!" Diocletian yelled.
"Yours, maybe. I'm a published OC, thankyouverymuch."
"Not right now, Su--you're a fanfic character! And if a writer gets kidnapped by ravenous minis, it could throw our entire existence out of whack! Are these boots yours? They've got something crusty and black on them."
"Oh, yeah. Don't ask." Suicide was suddenly a lot more alert. "Which one was it?"
"Gandalf the Beige." There was no washing basket to be found. In despair, Diocletian just shoved her sockless feet into her sneakers.
Suicide rolled over. "No worries, then."
A second sneaker beaned the hungover Scythian upside the head. "Care to rephrase that, soon-to-be-deleted-and-relying-on-the-charity-of-fellow-Board-members-for-continued-existence boy?"
"Okay, okay, okay! What kind of minis?"
"Mini-sloths."
"What, the sin?"
"No, the animal. I think. It's hard to tell in a text-based medium."
Suicide clambered awkwardly out of his hammock, revealing a pair of official HFA boxers with the Tootsitramp crest on the hip pocket. Diocletian, not interested in starting a fight, valiantly suppressed the urge to snicker like a fangirl and instead tossed him a pair of somewhat clean jeans. (They had celebrated their supposed freedom by burning their uniforms, along with an effigy of the Sunflower Official. That would be an interesting Departmental Memo.)
"Suit up, Su."
"Shotgun?" Suicide said.
"Shotgun."
"Needles?"
"Needles."
"Hitchhiker's Guide to the Continuum?"
"Check."
"Why didn't you repeat that one?"
"Too long."
"Um . . ."
"Yes?"
"A shirt would be nice, too."
"After appearing in that tabloid, you're not allowed to have shame. Let's go!"
They're actually canonical creatures from the second Ice Age movie, miniature, multi-coloured versions of Sid the Sloth who, despite having advanced knowledge of geology and volcanic tectonics, still insist on sacrificing said Slothto keep the ice from melting.
And conga rats!
We'll miss you in the PPC.
Well, on the one hand, it's wonderful that you've finished and published your novel. Kudos!
I would consider taking them, but my Orientation Month is not quite up yet and I am unsure if you'd want someone you don't even know taking your agents.
Best of luck with everything, though, and I shall look at the website.
I'd wondered if you were going to be back here or not. The Real World is kind of a slap in the face, isn't it? Suddenly all the stuff you've been doing for simple entertainment could result in Legal Issues, and not the fun Legal that we have. {= P
Not that getting published isn't awesome. I believe I've already gushed over that on dA. {= ) But still... real life is a little scary.
As for "Subjugation," I'd been thinking of possibly tackling the whole thing myself, since it isn't really getting done like it was supposed to. I'd be glad to pick up Dio and Suicide for the purpose. (I could consult with you for characterization, right?) On the other hand, I don't know how long it will be until I can get to it, or at what point (I hope) I'll find myself in your situation and simply have to quit altogether. So... consider me if no one else steps up, I guess, but only if. I still plan to do my part, though. I think it was the part after yours...?
~Neshomeh,
Exactly what kind of internet housekeeping are you having to do? Did your agent lay down some guidelines, or what?
~Neshomeh, who has a fair bit of stuff about her OCs in various places, not to mention having RPed with some of them.
Anything potentially litigious (such as PPCing, which falls under parody but could still be the cause of trouble from butthurt fanbrats) has to go. And no, the agent didn't lay down rules as such . . . I'm taking the hint and doing it on my own. He doesn't know much about my OL activities; he's an old-fashioned pro, and probably isn't really familiar with the world of online fanfiction.
I think any work you've done with your own OCs should be fairly kosher; that's your intellectual property. When they become associated with a specific project that's being optioned, for money, then trouble begins as far as housecleaning.
And if you could take care of Dio and Suicide, that would be awesome. I'd help out as much as required, of course . . . but as far as authoring new sporkings, I'm kind of on shaky ground. :(
Well, hopefully the fanbrats are and will be lazy or grown up enough not to hunt us down. It isn't as though they have a leg to stand on, really. What would the suit be, do you suppose? I don't think they could prove intent to cause emotional distress or something like that, particularly since there isn't any such intent. Not that a lawsuit wouldn't be a bad thing anyway, even if you won.
Meh. I'm nowhere near ready to worry about it anyway. It remains to be seen whether or not I actually have the stamina to write a novel.
~Neshomeh
... and didn't put my real name up anywhere, and/or (assuming I ever actually write this book) had it published under a pseudonym?
It's the trouble that once you've said "these are my original characters," and those original characters are associated with an online name that also does PPCing, and then a book is publishing featuring those OCs--fanbrats can connect the dots and see a lawsuit for compensation for pain and suffering. It's not so much your real name, but your online name having both PPCing and OCs-which-go-pro associated with it. I don't think a pseudonym will be necessary.
... and wait several years before attempting any publication at all, do you think it'll be safe? The pics were just scraps, I don't think many people see them.
I already have four agents and two child characters to handle, so I can't take them, but they may feature in the background in a few places. Maybe you could just leave them free for anyone to use, like Jay and Acacia now seem to be?
I should take down the doodles of my OCs on my devArt page, if it could lead to legal issues if I try to get it published ... at least I haven't actually written any of their story yet.
Will you still read here even if not spork?
I wouldn't mind leaving Dio and Su as free-floaters, as long as people remember that Su is actually a Stephen Pressfield character.
I don't know what DeviantArt's policy re OC doodles is . . . I haven't addressed that. There's a load of my character art on there. Maybe I should take that down, too . . . hmmm.
Yes, I still follow PPCings, even if I don't spork. I'm not comPLETEly soulless, after all. And if my work inspires badfic, I'd want to know about it! :D
Is it just that you need to avoid people associating your sporkings with your published work and linking them to the same person?
I don't use my real name on any of my pages anymore, but on one or two review pages in the depths of ff.net there's anon reviews with my username and my old email address which incorporated my real name, but A) they're buried in the depths of ff.net, B) my name isn't all THAT unusual and I can always make another email address. I have photos of me in friendslocked LJ posts and on the Gathering Report, and people who've received direct email from me know my real name because it's on the "X Y using Insert Email Address" (stupid Yahoo) but I've only directly emailed about four Net-met people in total. If I take down my OC pics, will there still be a problem there?
I think there are a few writers (actual published writers) who still write fanfiction. And not just novelists, but people in the video game industry and stuff who've worked on the game canon who've done fanfic for the game they worked on...
Like Laburnum said, tis all a matter of separating published work from fanfic.
Also, I don't think anyone would be surprised at a newbie showing up referred by an old inactive member. *coughs discreetly*
This isn't my contingency plan at all if I get published, myself. No sirree.
To be safe? Or what?
Nah. A lot of professional artists do both their original work and stuff that would basically be fanart and display both; there's a lot of derivative art work that's professionally shown and sold, along side completely original stuff.
However, that doesn't really work with novels, since the two can get mixed, but from what I've seen so long as the two are kept separated (EG, don't stick the fanfic right smack in the same place as your original work if it's prominent) it's not really troublesome (after all, regular fanfic writers who aren't published are subject to the same problems of legality as the published writers who do fanfic), but can be occasionally weird.
Maybe if I ever seriously start work on the novel I'll take them down ...
Still sad because if I do get published and try to keep the novel and my fanfic separate that means I can't plug it here or on my LJ when it does get published. *sigh*
Just use the name you get published under.
And then let everyone wonder whodunnit. XD
I'm afraid I can't really take on another pair of Agents, but I'm sure someone will. I would be willing to do a cowrite to finish Subjugation with someone, but taking it on by myself would basically mean it would never get finished.
That said. Oh. My. God. A PPCer is getting PUBLISHED! We wantsss names and titles and release dates, yess precioussss, we doessss!
Er. Please?
I wouldn't ask you to take on another pair of agents if you're already booked full.
And yes, published. *bright red face* The book is "The Hairy Man and the Sack." The hardback rights have been optioned by Five Star, but my agent thinks he can get a paperback deal with DAW Publishing, too. I'm currently living in the limbo of Editor Time, waiting to hear back from them. If the PPCers are interested, I'll post more info when I get it.
And really, I owe a lot to the PPC. It was my writing apprenticeship . . . working with a Boardful of awesome writers, practicing sporking. :D
You had all those monsters like the boogeyman and stuff. Is that the story? If it is I can't wait to read it...
My writing has improved immeasurably since I started sporking things with this bunch of nutters :) I only hope that I can get my Proto-Novel to drop its prefix sometime soon.
Anyway, my sincerest congratulations. This is an amazing achievement.
Sorry you can;t ppc any more. guess tha tis why also you can;t do an ofu, right?
hopefully your agents will find a new home.
Hence the death of OFUFF. Granted, that was dying anyway, but it looks like this is kaputski for most of my fandom activities.
If it was, can we still borrow her for brief appearances at OFUR? Mister Kit may want to see her there.
*holds a funeral for the ofu*
sorry to hear that. but these things do happen.