"Where have I read that before?" or The Dangers of Social Writing Groups Online

Plagiarism has been around far longer than the Internet. In fact, I had a poem published in 'Seventeen' magazine when I was 15 years old. About a year later I was informed that there was a girl who used that same poem to win a statewide poetry competition in Alabama. It took months for people to put together that this had happened. - Megan McCafferty

If you've been writing for any length of time and you've been in the online community, it can be reasonably assumed that you've at least heard of, if not participated in, the great November writing escapade known colloquially as NaNoWriMo, or more formally as National Novel Writing Month. For the uninitiated, it's an all out write-fest, where you as the writer pledge to write at least 50,000 words in a single month. Yes, 50,000. That's the size of a small novel!

Participants of NaNoWriMo are near fanatical about this. Preparations are made, sometimes months beforehand, to ensure a successful NaNoWriMo. You'll find forums on their website, blogs written about all aspects of the event, and you can even find groups on Facebook and Google+ dedicated to helping their members with all things literary. I'm personally a member of the Facebook group, and in the short time I've been a part of it I've learned many things. Some of the things are directly related to my writing, but other things I've learned are less tangible, albeit no less important.

An interesting development occurred last week. A fellow member discovered that some of her writings that she had posted on a website had been stolen and then resold in many places, Amazon included, as an original of the thief's work. In fact, it was discovered that this "author" had stolen eleven different stories by seven different writers. It is currently unknown how much money she's made of her thievery, but the theft has cost the original writers so much more than money. Reputations were on the line. Some of the stories weren't ready for release. They were posted online to writing websites as an attempt to get input from fellow writers to help perfect their story and make it marketable. Now, the story is out there and there's no getting it back. The NaNoWriMo crew has fought back admirably. They've contacted the places that were selling the on-line books and most have responded by taking down the stolen articles. They've contacted the thief herself, but so far there hasn't been a response.

It's a frightening, depressing thing that happened, but a very important lesson was learned by many, including me. That lesson is to never put your entire story online. This may seem self-obvious, but many writers use the websites in the hopes of getting help they may not be able to get otherwise. It's very important that you, the author, limit what you put out in the open. If you do put something out there, limit how long it's out there. Even that won't help as much as you'd like, however. Remember the cardinal rule: Once it's out on the Internet, it's always out on the Internet. There's no taking it back! Try to rely instead of the input of friends and family. Join a writers group. Go to writing conferences if you have the time (and the means, they're rarely cheap). If you must, put some of your work online for critique. Just be careful -- The work you post could be someone else's idea of a great way to get "published."