It's a controversial stance to take, and I've caught a lot of shit for it, but let me explain this opinion a bit before the crusades rush in.
I understand and appreciate some aspects of fan fiction's necessity, such as giving writers a chance to experiment with plot or character tools while operating within a comfortable paradigm. These writers take something built and reimagine it. If the original work is a set of blocks, their assembly will differ from the final product printed on the box in remarkably noticeable and enjoyable ways. The best fan fiction, I'd say, hinges on being a collaboration with the original artist. It complements and enriches the overall story by presenting a fresh take, even if wildly different from the original author's intent. It typically aims to boost the reach of the original work in some form.
And then, there is the bitch who was awarded for stealing my work under the guise of writing "fan fiction."
This is still my reservation with publishing online - I'm not looking to get robbed again. Fan fiction is one thing for J.K. Rowling, whose canon has inspired many of her fans to offer their takes on Harry Potter, but it's quite a bit different when you're a sixteen year old nobody posting online. Twelve years later, and I'm still terrified of plagiarism masked as "fan fiction."
I wrote a story that revolved around four girls, each of them getting their own separate voices. The series had over forty chapters to it. People offered praise and helpful feedback about my stories. I gained confidence as my views and followers went up. It felt really good to have people enjoy my writing.
One day, I received a message from a fan alerting me that a particularly zealous fan of mine had won an award from the site. I was excited for her. We'd interacted positively, we were in some of the same groups on the site, and I loved her poetry. That excitement drained when I read her lines, some of them directly lifted from my chapters without a syllable altered. What the hell was happening?
Opening my messages again, I asked him for advice as to handling this. He suggested I go to the admins about it, which I did. I pointed them to the chapters of mine from which she pulled characters, descriptions, and quotes. They told me they would get back to me after contacting her. It took everything to rein in my high school girl brain and keep from contacting her myself, telling her in no uncertain terms to get her own shit. It's one thing to be inspired, but to take my words, verbatim, and pass them off as if you thought of them is contemptible. I didn't care about the award - I wanted credit for my role in her poem.
The girl told them it was "fan fiction." Essentially, they shrugged and sent me on my merry way. She was told to recategorize the work as "fan fiction", but not required to link back to me or my work. Wasn't it important to show folks the comfortable paradigm she was operating within if it was truly fan fiction? Having your work stolen is not a compliment, it's not endearing, and it's not something you can draw a whole lot of pride from. It's hard enough to release your art, but to have that happen when you do? It's an incredibly deep cut.
I hate "fan fiction" used to defend plain plagiarism. It shouldn't truncate the scope of the original work, but she positively halted mine. The words stolen from me to shore up the quality of her poem received no truth to their origin. I promptly removed all of my work from the site. I haven't published online since. Blogging is my way of dipping a toe into the water and convincing myself to get all the way in (probably a bad metaphor choice as I still don't know how to swim.)
Don't refer to intellectual theft as "fan fiction." You're making fan fiction writers look bad.
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