Sta.sh
It's Hot "Can I / someone else write / complete / develop my / their own version of one of these unfinished tales ? (or any others)
The simple answer is NO.
You are of course free to do whatever you like for your own private enjoyment, but there is no question of any commercial exploitation of this form of "fan-fiction".
Also, in these days of the Internet, and privately produced collectors' items for sale on eBay, we must make it as clear as possible that the Tolkien Estate never has, and never will authorize the commercialisation or distribution of any works of this type.
That of course means that any attempt to sell or make money off fanfic is strictly against the Estates rules (though they seem to give tactic approval to fanfic in general).
One of the other issues I've run across reading various blogs about this is that the new owner is personally against NC-17 stories. I don't know how many people reading this would be affected by such a ban (probably nobody besides me.
I happen to like reading some of them.) but given that Fanfiction.net and LiveJournal have both banned and removed such content from their websites, it seems to be a growing issue. Here are three far better covers of the issue then I can do: [link] , [link] , [link] . Read them and the comments (which are very informative) if you want a better understanding then my ramblings.
Honestly, I rarely log into the site and only have two essays left on there. I'm seriously considering deleting them from the site and having my account deleted. I've had problems in the past with the rules suddenly changing, and I think this is the breaking point. I guess I'll see how I feel in the morning, after more reflection on it. The one essay, my thoughts have really changed a lot and the second...I can always try and find somewhere else to post it. From what I can tell around 3 dozen authors or a bit more have jumped ship already....
Anybody waiting for a response here or on CoE - I'll try and get it all done tonight. It's so hot here where I live though, that even at 10 pm (the time it is while I'm writing this) it's burning hot when the heat index is taken into account. Right now, it feels like 98F (37C), tomorrow the high will be 94F (34C) and feel 104F (40C). It's supposed to be the same Sunday...this heat was originally projected to last through tonight, then it was extended to tomorrow night, and now it's projected at least through Sunday night. Who knows when it'll end? Until it does, I'm going to be fighting a headache and upset stomach from the heat....and it's making me very lethargic. I have periods of great energy (like writing this) and then it stops....
