Saw the first foreign-language translation of something I wrote today. It’s the Daily Dragon article “Q&A with James Marsters” I wrote about Marster’s Friday panel at Dragon*Con, at this Italian fan site: Bloody Love. My article’s about halfway down the page. Do a FIND on my name and it’ll pop up.
Okay, I’m amused. Yes, they violated my copyright, but they did credit me with the article (and spelled my name right), which significantly defuses any indignation I might otherwise be experiencing. And it’s in Italian. I’ve never had something of mine translated before. Another milestone, even if it is without my explicit approval.
It’s also not the first time an article of mine has been pirated. The Andrew Hallett article I wrote two years ago for the Daily Dragon (“What is it About the Green Ones?”) was also swiped by another fan site. These folks also credited me as the writer, so again, I’m not particularly upset. And they also provided the URL to the Daily Dragon even if they didn’t have the courtesy to link to it. Although they appear to have renamed “Dragon*Con” to the “Daily Dragon Con.” Heh.
I should probably fire off a note to both places and ask that they please request permission next time, and ask the Italian place to provide a link back to the DD–assuming they’ll be able to understand me since I don’t write Italian. Is there anyone on my Friend’s List who can do a quickie translation from English to Italian?
I just can’t bring myself to feeling too hard-assed about this. Don’t get me wrong, I’d be hopping mad and talking legal action if someone stole some of my fiction and posted it in violation of my copyright, but I’m just not as attached to my non-fiction. It sets a bad precedence if I don’t follow up with such incidents, I suppose. But I’m not angry at all. In fact I’m quite amused. Silly ravening Buffy/Angel fans.
All I want to know is how the heck did you find out about the article on the Italian fan site?
Hee. I was doing a vanity search on my name in Google. I wanted to see if there were any reviews for Pixeltown up yet and stumbled across it.
Actually, it’s recommended that authors periodically do vanity searches ’cause a lot of pirates leave the bylines on and it’s a good way to curb Internet piracy. It’s also recommended to do periodic searches for exact matches for distinctive lines of text.
Google is always good when it comes to search. Good thing they’ve credited you as the writer. 🙂
Oh, definitely! I would’ve been much more upset if they’d stripped off my byline!
I’d have to do the lines of text, my real name is pretty generic and I get a billion or so results all the time and always have. I used to be a unique Amokk online, too, but there’s some Swedish Satanic band or something with the name in a song and some other junk with it now. When I started on ICQ I had a 6 digit number and was the only amokk, now there’s like a few thousand amokks. 😉
Well, that and the original source where I got Amokk comes up if you know what to look for. 😉
No one’s ever figured it out…
Trend setter
heh.
In that thread they are talking about how great it would be if there was a “convention” in Europe… how they would LOVE to go. That it must be a blast!
🙂