Board Thread:News and Announcements/@comment-265341-20150707210311/@comment-508329-20150708114148

Neeneko wrote:

Sunnydacat66 wrote: do you approve of all the fanmade gem OCs (Gemsonas) and do you think you could use their ideas in the show? That question is more intersting than you might be aware ^_~

Years ago there was a high profile lawsuit (or myth of one, the history is not clear) between an author and the creator of a fanwork. It happened in a community where authors and fans interacted, with a path for fan work to actually be published as part of anthologies and such.

The lawsuit left a really nasty taste in a lot of author's mouths and drove a wedge between fandom and scifi/fantasy authors for a generation. I have been seeing the effects of this slowly wear off and authors interacting with communities again.

I would love to see the process of including fanwork in official material again, so questions around a return to that back and forth are historically interesting. I found this on the Fanlore wiki:

http://fanlore.org/wiki/Marion_Zimmer_Bradley_Fanfiction_Controversy