PenTwist

I was mulling over one of my collection of non-precious and semi-precious stones just the other day. I’ve collected them for years from all my travels across the southern portion of the US and Mexico. Their total combined value is most likely far less than what it cost me to purchase or travel to dig them up from mother earth.
Nevertheless, I am a crow at heart and one of the shiny objects had caught my fancy this particular day. I had accidentally left this brightly amber stone with it’s pepper-speckled inclusions in a place where the sun regularly creases the room it was in.
I also noticed that the side where the sun hit, had begun to bleach the color from one of the facets and quickly nabbed it into my hand.
I gave it a repentant rinse of water (as if to console my blunder) and a glance before I put it away with its fellow companions.
What I noticed reminded me of our craft of writing.
This particular gem had six facets, wide and flat, all sloping up to a sharp point. It was then I remembered why I’d left this stone out of the collection; the tip was somewhat chipped and I saw it as somehow damaged goods. I also remembered watching a time-lapse journey of the growth of a typical crystal which is nothing less than amazing in itself.
At the time I happened to be writing a story with six divergent characters, trying to carefully knit their unique perspectives together into the apex of my tale. I compared each facet to one of my characters; none of the facets were perfect although one was close. On closer inspection, the others weren’t nearly as perfect as I’d thought. One was jagged and wide, coarse with wavy lines; the others also had their particular misfortunes. However, it was then I noticed three things in particular.

• First, each side in particular may not have been perfect, but the whole of the sum was magnificent.
• Secondly, every facet was knitted firmly to two of the other facets on either side.
• Third, together they formed the ending, the perfect apex for how they were grown, no matter how imperfect the chip at the end.

I saw a correlation to my story, saw the next phase of where my tale was headed and buried myself in fourteen hours of writing fury.  However it wasn’t the trite simile of comparison that fuelled my next several hours, it was when I saw the coarse, gritty, gouged, base of gemstone.
In my hand, I was holding the most important piece of the stone – the base, the place from which it was formed.

Happy writing.

David Pyle

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Has someone been squirrelling with your written content?

Have you spent untold hours of research and editing costs only to find that entire pieces or concepts of your published work suddenly appears (verbatim) in a television series or HBO special?

–If you believe that your copyright has been infringed and you anticipate a legal dispute, if you have not yet done so, it is advisable that a registration be made as soon as possible in order to secure the opportunity for valuable remedies and litigation advantages available for timely registration under the Copyright Act. If a work is registered prior to infringement or within three months of publication, statutory damages will be available as an option for monetary relief, and the recovery for attorney’s fees may be available. In addition, a registration made before or within five years of publication of the work provides a presumption of the validity of the copyright and the facts stated within the registration certificate. A certificate of registration (or a rejection of an application for copyright) is a prerequisite for U.S. authors seeking to initiate a suit for copyright infringement in federal district court.*

If you believe that a criminal infringement of copyright has occurred, you may contact the Intellectual Property (IP) Program of the Financial Institution Fraud Unit of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Two main FBI divisions investigate intellectual property crimes:
Cyber Division  -investigates intellectual property crimes involving all digital and electronic works (including Internet, CDs, DVDs, etc) www.fbi.gov/ipr

Financial Institution Fraud Unit  – all other intellectual property crimes

There are three ways a complaint made be filed:

• Complainants may contact their local FBI field office, and the complaint will be properly referred.
• A complaint may be filed online at the Internet Crime Complaint Center www.ic3.gov and, again, it will be properly routed.
• Suspected criminal activity of any nature may be reported online at https://tips.fbi.gov and will be routed accordingly.

 Other resources:

*http://www.copyright.gov/help/faq/faq-infringement.html

Did someone steal “Scenes” or “Orphan Pieces” of your work?

http://www.copyright.gov/docs/regstat032906.html

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