Although he has been getting better sleep and resting well ever
since he started sharing his bed with one Petra Ral, there were still
nights when sleep would not come easy and any slight noise he hears
would rouse him from his slumber.
And tonight was one of those nights.
It started with Petra accidentally kicking him on the shin in her sleep.
Levi’s eyes fluttered open, turning on his side to look at her under the low lamplight in his room.
Petra was wearing nothing but her underwear and one of his old
thin shirts that were nearly translucent due to its age, she was also on
her side facing him but her eyes were closed and soft deep breaths came
from her parted lips, signifying her deep slumber. Half her body was
covered with his sheets, which she started pulling away from him in her
sleep with a twist of her leg, bunching up the fabric around and in
between them.
Curious, Levi kept his eyes trained on her face. She was still
fast asleep. And dreaming. The movement of her eyes beneath her lids was
proof enough.
The corner of his lips quirks to a smile, wondering what on earth she was dreaming about. Perhaps she’s dreaming of killing titans.
Levi inched closer, brushing stray strands of her hair away from
her face and moving to plant a kiss on her forehead but pauses when he
hears it.
(Non-authors, please RB to signal boost to your author friends!)
An astute reader informed me this morning that one of my fics (Children of the Future Age) had been pirated and was being sold as a novel on Amazon:
(And they werenât even creative with their cover design. If youâre going to pirate something that I spent a full year of my life writing, at least give me a pretty screenshot to brag about later. Seriously.)
I promptly filed a DMCA complaint to have it removed, but I checked out the company that put it up â Plush Books â and it looks like A LOT of their books are pirated fic. They are by no means the only ones doing this, either â the fact that âââpublishersâââ can download stories from AO3 in ebook format and then reupload them to Amazon in just a few clicks makes fic piracy a common problem. There are a whole host of reasons why letting this continue is bad â including actual legal risk to fanfiction archives â but basically:
IF YOU ARE A FANFIC AUTHOR WITH LONG AND/OR POPULAR WORKS, PLEASE CHECK AMAZON TO SEE IF YOUR STORIES HAVE BEEN PIRATED.
You can search for your fics by title, or by text from the description (which is often just copied wholesale from AO3 as well). If you find that someone has stolen your work and is selling it as their own, you can lodge a DMCA complaint (Amazon.com/USA site; other countries have different systems). If you havenât done this before, itâs easy! Hereâs a tutorial:
HOW TO FILE A COPYRIGHT COMPLAINT FOR STOLEN WORK ON AMAZON.COM:
First, go to this form. Youâll need to be signed into your Amazon account.
Select the radio buttons/dropdown options (shown below) to indicate that you are the legal Rights Owner, you have a copyright concern, and it is about a pirated product.
Enter the name of your story in the Name of Brand field.
In the Link to the Copyrighted Work box, enter a link to the story on AO3 or whatever site your work is posted on.
In the Additional Information box, explain that you are the author of the work and it is being sold without your permission. Thatâs all you really need. If you want, you can include additional information that might be helpful in establishing the validity of your claim, but you donât have to go into great detail. You can simply write something like this:
I am the author of this work, which is being sold by [publisher] without my permission. I originally published this story in [date/year] on [name of site], and have provided a link to the original above. On request, I can provide documentation proving that I am the owner of the account that originally posted this story.
In the ASIN/ISBN-10 field, copy and paste the ID number from the pirated copyâs URL. Youâll find this ten-digit number in the Amazon URL after the word âproduct,â as in the screenshot below. (If the URL extends beyond this number, you can ignore everything from the question mark on.) Once this number has been added, Amazon will pull the product information automatically and add it to the complaint form, so you can check the listing title and make sure itâs correct.
Finally, add your contact information to the relevant fields, check the âI have read and accept the statementsâ box, and then click Submit. You should receive an email confirmation that Amazon has received the form.
Please share this information with your writer friends, keep an eye out for/report pirated works, and help us keep fanfiction free and legally protected!
NOTE: All of the above also applies to Amazon products featuring stolen artwork, etc., so fan artists should check too!
HAVE Z AND ALPHA NOT BEEN MADE AWARE? HAVE WE FAILED AT CONTINUING TO MEME THE HELL OUT OF IT? ARE WE, IN FACT, THE GRANDMAS BECAUSE WE ARE THE ANCIENT KEEPERS OF THE INCEST COFFEE KNOWLEDGE???
