Responsefic

Responsefic (another term is "creative response") is a fanwork created in part as a method of conversation, or argumentation, sparked from the creation of someone else's fanwork, or an entire trend of fanwork. Sometimes the line is very blurry between casually sharing someone's universe, a trend in fandom where a number of stories seem to share traits (see: fanon), and a story that is specially responding to another fanwork. 
The odds that a fanwork would be given the label responsefic seem to be higher if the response appears to be negative. Sometimes those stories are also called rebuttals. 
A 2008 conversation about the term responseficThread in sherrold's LJ asking for a label other than "Reaction fic? Answer fic? Piss-on-you fic?" showed that while some fans could think of examples of it, most weren't familiar with the specific term.
Responsefic created in response to a specific fanwork could be considered a type of recursive fic, which is the name given to fanfic of fanfic.
See also Unauthorized Sequels.
==Reactions to Themes or Trends in Fandom==
Responsefic has a long history in fandom. 
In the 70s, as K/S was publicly appearing in Star Trek zines, many people feared that The Premise was tearing Star Trek fandom apart. J. Emily Vance (a pseudonym for Nancy Kippax, April Valentine and Beverly Volker), wrote The Rack to show how completely implausible the premise was. In The Rack, Starfleet Command suspects Kirk and Spock of having an affair, and court-martials them. At the end of the story, Kirk attempts suicide. The authors wrote the story to show what, in their opinion, would "really" happen if Starfleet suspected, even erroneously, that Kirk and Spock were having an affair.
In Highlander, both in fiction and metaconversation, it wasn't uncommon for people to talk about Duncan, the protagonist of the series, as if he were a stuffy moralistic prude. Luminosity created the songvid Not a Virgin Anymore to have an excuse to use three minutes of clips of Duncan drinking, wenching and carousing, to show certain fans that their fanon had completely overwritten the readily available canon. 
In OZ fandom, Feochadn and Michelle Christian became annoyed by vids that seemed to reduce a richly complex (and violent) ensemble show to nothing but a twisted romance about two characters. To make a point about how OZ-the-show diverged from OZ-the-romance-about-two-guys, they made a vid to the theme music to The Love Boat, consisting of some of the most violent and bloody moments of the show up to that time.
There was a fair amount of fiction in The Sentinel fandom written in response to the number of Domestic Discipline stories posted.
==Response Fic in Zines vs Online==
Some fans feel that the migration of fic online has made rebuttal fic today a lost art. One fan writes that maybe this is, "...an Internet thing, because passing things you don't like is easier AND recommended, and you get so much more to read that one single story rarely steers the passion enough to push anyone in writing an explicit rebuttal?...Interestingly, I think a rebuttal of a story in story form would be seen as impolite today... At least that's my feeling about it and that what I got from discussions with other current authors about stories we disliked/would have liked to rewrite. The usual opinion seems to be that it would be an affront. Today, if you don't like a story, it's expected you skip it - and if you write something as rebuttal, not to mention what you rebut." CatalenaMara: Fan History and Rebuttal Fic 
== Reactions to Responsefic ==
Some people feel that responsefic is unfair. It can look like the responding author is bullying the original author. However, when the original author and the one responding are established authors with a readership of their own, it's not so much about authors bullying each other as it is about a perceived attack on the readers of the original; they liked it in the first place and are put on the defense by the reactions to the second story. Pitching readers against readers is rarely pleasant and a huge part of the controversy. This can be true when the fic is in response to a trend as well, not just a specific work.
==Does Responsefic Require Permission? (2013 Discussion) ==
Some fans feel that fic that is reacting to or incorporating any elements of another fan writer's work requires permission from the original fan writer even if there is proper credit and attribution. They hold this position even though fanfic is - at its core - a reaction or a response to the TV show or movie or book, and believe that because fandom communities are founded on relationships and fans are peers with equal standing, that we must seek permission before creating.
Others point out that the idea of equating a global, international and online fandom community with one-on-one personal relationships and that this peer relationship requires permission is overreaching, not reality based and controlling. Others point out that the history of responsefic is long and varied and cannot be easily summed up in a series of absolute norms.
See examples from a recent 2013 debate herereference link. and herereference link. at fail-fandomanon on the topic:
The original question:
In favor of requiring permission:
Against requiring permission 
Other fans take a more practical approach to the question:
And others take issue with the underlying theme that writing fanfic can somehow be "wrong":
==Examples of Responsefics==
===The Legend of Zelda===
* Unearnable by QueenieZ (2011) was written as a direct response to the sexist fandom convention that Zelda "owed" Link sex and affection for always coming to her rescue.
===The Professionals===
* Two-Up Truly Queered (1987) was a step-by-step response to the homophobia that Jane Carnall saw in Jane of Australia's story Two-Up (1986).
* The Pros circuit story Consequences (1980/1981) by Tarot and A.N. Other (online pseuds), a partner rape story, gave birth to over a dozen response fics, including a zine novel. Responses ranged from serious to satire to parody. 
* Velvet Underground (1990) by Sebastian is a BDSM story that upset another Pros author, Artemis, enough that Artemis wrote Dance With the Devil (a fan in 1993 referred to it as a "fisting stool story."). Artemis' author notes are explicit about her intent to counter the original story. Some fans thought that Artemis was one of Jane of Australia's pseuds. This was stated to be untrue by a fan in Strange Bedfellows #1 who'd corresponded with Jane for many years. 
* A responsefic to Sebastian's partner betrayal story Catharsis (1985 or before) resulted in heated discussion on Virgule-L which then spilled over to the CI5 List. See Alternate Ending to Catharsis (1996).
===Stargate Atlantis===
* The story Take Clothes Off As Directed (2006) by Helen was a response to Coming Home (2006) by Xanthe and perceived by some fans as a comment on the likeliness or unlikeliness of Xanthe's BDSM universe .
===Popslash===
* Helen's popslash story All I Ever Needed (2008)http://www.helenish.talkoncorners.net/aien.shtml was a response to All I Ever Wanted (2008) by NSyncGrrl and was meant as a parody that was supposed to make fun of the soap-opera-like qualities of the originalhttp://web.archive.org/web/20080327063242/http://www.helenish.net/kerfuffle2.shtml, but some of NSyncGrrl's readers accused Helen of plagiarism and thought the response was in bad taste.http://web.archive.org/web/20080327063224/http://www.helenish.net/kerfuffle.shtml
===Beauty and the Beast===
* The Beauty & The Beast zine Black Cover (1990) so shocked B&TB fandom at the time that a response zine was created, White Cover (1993).
===Star Trek===
* The Star Trek Kraith series (begun in 1970) by Jacqueline Lichtenberg inspired others who disagreed with its premise to write rebuttals. (Examples?)
* The Star Trek: TOS story A Handful of Snowflakes (1976), by M.L. "Steve" Barnes, tells how Spock has suffered serious brain damage, and Christine Chapel is the only one who believes there's something of Spock's mind left that is still viable. A Touch Of Love by Jacqueline Bielowicz, published in 1976 in Tal-Shaya #3 (1976) was written explicitly as a rebuttal to M.L.'s story, and is one in which Christine makes a different choice.
* Leslye Lilker, author of a number of 1970s Star Trek: TOS stories wrote in a personal statement that another fan has used a name Lilker made up: "In this zine [-The Sensuous Vulcan (1977)-], appears a story... that used 'Valjn'd'jt,' the name of Sarek's home in the Sahaj universe, despite a request not to... I read the story before publication, and for my answer to 'The Way of the Warrior,' please read 'Nivar to a Desert Room' to appear in The Other Side [#3, 1978]." from a personal statement by Leslye Lilker in Scuttlebutt #5 
* The Etruscan Leotard by Gaylen Reiss, a 1979 responsefic to the 1978 Star Trek tie-in book The Procrustean Petard
* Beside the Wells (1996) by UKJess is a response to Star Trek: TOS stories in which Kirk is a slave to Spock in Ancient Vulcan. "The story is a reply to a lot of old-style K/S stories set in some form of unreformed Vulcan in which, after a brief and usually perfunctory resistance, Kirk settle down quite happily to a life of servitude, apparently forgiving the rape that tends to occur en route. I found this scenario superbly unlikely, whatever one thinks of the character he was the most determined individualist and I think you'd have to be a saint to forgive rape - so I wrote this story." Original Usenet posting
* An example of how a third party, in this case a casual statement by a reviewer, can muddy the waters: "[Name redacted] did a review of Mahko Root in which she mentions Jane Aumerle's story, 'Do Not Go Gentle (1977),' as the end of a 'trilogy of Kirk-with-a-fatal-illness stories started in Contact #3. [1977]' I'd like to correct that statement. The 'twin vignettes': 'When Time Comes' and 'Not Yet There.' were NOT written as part of a trilogy. I purposely left the end undefined so that the reader could supply his own, thus the speculation as to whether Kirk died or not was part of the effect. Jane decided that he did and wrote her excellent interpretation and published it in 'Mahko Root.' However, that ending is no more or less valid than anyone else's fantasy. I have no objection to anyone writing or ending or spin off of any of my stories, but I do not want them mistaken as part of the original author's intention." from a personal statement by Bev Volker in Scuttlebutt #6 
===The Sentinel===
* Never My Love by Candy Apple has the introduction, "These stories and the accompanying essay were written as a response to the genre of fanfiction known as "Domestic Discipline". The title for the series is inspired by what I would picture being Jim's reply to Blair's question: 'Would you ever hit me in the name of love?'" 
===Starsky & Hutch===
* Rebelcat's Starsky and Hutch story Denial is Not Just a River in Egypt is a response to the We're Not Gay; We Just Love Each Other trope.
===Harry Potter===
* In the Harry Potter Fandom, Amanuensis's And Just Plain Wrong is an exceptional example of responsefic, having inspired four sequels by different authors: http://hp-fictalk.livejournal.com/19836.html Accessed 12 January 2017
** Damage Control by Juxian Tang 
** Cut With Diamonds by Eodrakken
** To The Victors by Caesia
** At The Beginning by Arachnethe2
===Pokemon===
* Cori Falls was notorious for writing these in response to canon events she didn't like, or in response to fanfiction she found objectionable. Her most infamous examples are A Warm Place and The Power That's Inside.
===Sailor Moon===
* Two fanfics by Sailor Mac were written in response to infamously bad lemons:
** From the Moon to the Earth was a response to When All Else Fails and its misogynistic undertones.
** Reenie's REAL Seventh Birthday was a re-write of the premise behind ChibiUsa's Seventh Birthday, turning the rape orgy into something wholesome and saving the lemon content for the of-age parties.
==Further Reading/Meta==
* The Art of the Plagiarist by [J C] (1997)
* So, is there a term...; archive link by Sandy Herrold (October 2008) 
* , a Tumblr ask and a response by Copperbadge (March 2015)
==References==
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