Twenty-five years ago I read a story on another website and the story of a TG romance has never entirely left me. I decide to look up the story again and it is still listed on a small TG part of a story site for gay men. It is a story that has nothing to do with being gay and there are no characters in the book that are gay.
I read the story again and it still appeals to me. It is called Skin-deep. It is really a novella, and although the author says that it was edited. I see very little sign of any active editing.
Not unreasonably, the author claims copyright. It appears to be his only published work on any searches I can do.
I would like to edit and refresh the story, but the email listed by the author in 1999 no longer works and the only person on Big Closet with a similar name says that he is not the author. A search on Amazon, Abebooks etc brings up an author with the same name, but all the books listed are non-fiction.
The alterations I envisage would be sufficiently major to avoid any legal breach of copyright.
I would welcome the opinions of other authors and readers over the idea of refreshing another author's work with a proper acknowledgement of the original idea.
Comments please.
Regards
Columbine
Comments
Disclaimer
Unless the author specifically said that the work may not be reposted elsewhere without permission, I'd say that there are ways that you could do that.
The criteria that I would follow is:
Here's how I handled it when I finished Jeremy Chandler's "My Summer in Pantyhose"
This is an unauthorized continuation of Jeremy Chandler’s, “My Summer in Pantyhose,” last added to by Jeremy 04/07/2023. The story line and characters belong to Jeremy Chandler and are used without express permission. What follows is intended as fan fiction with the greatest of admiration for Jeremy and appreciation for the original work.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin ein femininer Mann
Sounds like you are trying to put me out of business here
Under Erin's Janglewood LLC. and hence through her, I am authorized to repost back to the front page any works posted here. That includes up to a very light spell checking only. If this is not enough, all I have to say is that maybe you should find another tg writing site to visit.
I have been reposting for years and have never changed a work or had this issue before. Whomever is bringing this up needs to understand that and deal with it.
As for trying to obtain author permission to post from another source site, I also do that and handle it gently. I even faced massive criticism from many when I started posting Clara's works here after obtaining her permission. It ranged from altering her works to everything. In truth, her works went untouched at first, then a very slight spell check there after. It is NOT up to me to change them. It is totally up to the author who wrote it to do that. The author's wording is sacred to me.
Columbine, you need to face up to the fact the author does not want his work touched. If that is so, you need to leave it. It hurts, it is sad, but you need to. There are many authors I have asked that declined to post here. You have to respect their decision.
Sephrena