Amazon announces authorized fan fiction business

Anyone on here read fan fiction? Of those people, are any prepared to pay for fan fiction?

I'm intrigued, I haven't even read any official Buffy fiction (or any fiction based on a book or film) so I don't know how popular it is or isn't.
 
This basically seems to be a tactic of widening the author pool for fiction based on licensed properties. Properties like Star Wars and Buffy the Vampire Slayer already offer plenty of licensed novels and comics. In those two cases, the stories are written by established authors who were chosen on the strengths of their previous original works. In the case of Kindle Worlds, some of these new stories might be written by authors with little or no previous experience. That's not necessarily a bad thing (some people are natural writers, after all), but it's a financial risk to most publishers of licensed fiction. Given that current licensed fiction is a mixed bag, it will be interesting to see how this turns out.
 
Buffy Summers,
Any chance of getting someone from Amazon to state the facts of what they are offering?

What is written on here makes it seem that Amazon have a loaded gun. That they holding it and are pointing it at their own head and they are about to pull the trigger.

Most publishers want/expect a two year contract so that they can make money from the book (They don't want another publisher to release the same book).
When I get a contract from a publisher I'll take it to a solicitor who specializes in contract terminology. Most publishers will change the terminology of a contract if requested, as long as the change isn't to elaborate. But if they won't and I'd loose the characters I have created, I don't publish with them.
 
Vamp Jenny said:
I predict this to be a big flop, even among the biggest fanbase.
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You might be surprised. Something similar was done years before the internet with fan fiction from "Trek," a "Star Trek" fan publication. it went through a series of at least ten volumes and sold quite well. Point being, there's just no telling what people will buy.
 
As I said before, some fan fic is a story like you'd find in any book 'cept the names of the characters are those of the series. As such it adds a bit of impetus to those who liked the series when characters of those names are used. As I write a lot of vampire stuff anyway, converting any will just require a bit more thought and time. If I could type faster than eight words a minute (correctly spelt words that is, or twemty seven that arr misspelt) I could finish one this year.
 
I think this could be a marvelous way for the fanfiction writers who have huge followings and spend a lot of time on the writing to get some cash they deserve. If they keep publishing other fanfics for free, it wouldn't anger too many of their current readers either. I'm currently reading a fanfic with 141 chapters, and I really wish I could pay the author a small amount, even though they cleary need to edit it.

This way people would actually become professional fanfic writers, a mix between a fan and a professional author, something new all together. With the original creators permission and payment, it's a actual job.

The argument "fanfics should be free" sound a aweful lot like the argument "all entertainment should be free, and the creaters should be doing it for the honor".

Honor doesn't pay the bills. Think of the marvelous stories stuck in peoples or note pads heads because they can't justify spending so many hours writing for free. That's true for non-fanfiction writers as well. Writing is hard to make money from.

I doubt this will go anywhere though, too many restrictions and the really goof fanfiction writers would (and should) want to keep the rights for their plots for themselves. But it might be able to work, if enough people joined(and you could get the option of a subscription), and you would get to re-use your own ideas/plot/original characters and as a buyer you could sample fanfics.

But that's a lot of ifs.
 
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