Subject: I'd like to see an answer for this.
Author:
Posted on: 2014-03-18 15:49:00 UTC

The Wiki claims the crossover'd elements count as original fiction, but I don't like that; it leaves open the chance for PPC writers to argue that, since it's not really a crossover any more, they can mission it and kill all the quarantined canon characters as OCs who don't fit the setting.

I'm also not sure it stands up to precedent, specifically the Anne McCaffrey precedent. Brown DragonRider of Pern was PPC'd as Pern fanfic after the quarantine was lifted - but it was written beforehand. So did lifting the quarantine suddenly turn OCs into canon characters?

It looks like the 'author generates a Creativity Shield' explanation is generally accepted (sigh... I remember when Fanfic Land actually impacted the real PPC... those were the days. Given that it's canonically known to have happened, I guess we set a CS up in around '06. Wonder where we got it?). So what would a fanfic become when it hit a creativity shield?

Well, we claim that 'The PPC itself is a semi-quarantined continuum, with prospective authors requiring Permission and no unauthorized spinoffs allowed.' So what status does an unauthorised PPC story have? We certainly wouldn't claim it was 'just' plagiarised original fiction - we'd claim it was, well, unauthorised PPC fiction. It doesn't impact the real PPC because its effect bounces off the shield. There's never been any hint that you can actually go into those stories (unlike actually plagiarised change-all-the-names stories).

So my guess is, attempts to breach quarantine actually fail to resolve. If you point a portal at one, it simply fails. There's no destination: fanfiction relies on pulling the canons (or the essence of the canons, or something from the canons) across to reify its world; with a creativity shield in place, it has nothing to draw on, and is just words on a page.

So what happens if you have a story that will 'load' half its canons, but not the others? Sounds like a recipe for a total system crash to me. One minute an agent is listening to Legolas expound on the beauty of trees, the next minute they're shunted out of existence as the story becomes straight text for a quarantined character's lines. And scenes where they interact would be even worse. I'm pretty sure it would be unwritable, at any rate, even if it weren't forbidden.

hS

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