If you've got a gem of an idea and start writing...

[ResearchScholar]

It would be wise not to disclose the tentative title, let alone the contents, to anyone.

If anyone asks what you are doing, just say: "Writing a book."
If they ask, "What on?"
Just reply: "Once it's done you'll know."
That will probably make them even more curious,. But that is their problem, not yours.

Theft of ideas -- intellectual property -- appears to be breathtakingly common. The only way to avoid such problems is to keep tight-lipped during the writing process.

[brownnataly21]

Of course it's iilegal to steal some ideas, that's why many writers prefer to work alone and not to see any friends or minimum friends in the working places.

[lagym888]

Well thats right.. If you got a good idea, you should write it down before it goes out of your mind..

[Rancher]

(The only way to avoid such problems is to keep tight-lipped during the writing process.)

I agree whole heartidly!!!!!!

As a published author myself I have learned that even your closest friend can be you biggest blabber while writing.

I keep my stories close to my heart and home until they go to the shelves.

[ResearchScholar]

You would think that people would know that theft of intellectual property is equivalent to theft of material property, but obviously that is not always the case. The problem is that intellectual property is a less easy idea to grasp, and is a grayer and slithery concept.

Even after having published something, a major idea in one's book can be used or poached and no attribution given. That in fact happened to me most recently. When I mentioned this to friends over dinner, one of them said that obviously the person who used the idea without attribiution felt that I did not have an "exclusive" on it. Go figure!

[Rancher]

It always ticks me off when someone will give a famous quote with the name that spoke it but will turn around and steal an idea from a book without a thought in the world.

Hold on let me step off my soapbox.....

[lukebodell]

I think there will be more stringent laws regarding intellectual property, especially that on that internet, as it is in concrete form; ideas in our world, communicated through speech, is a lot more difficult issue to police.

[Perrywinkle47]

Yeah so true and even its our right to keep it to ourselves even if someone persists to disclose the story a bit. Unless you get it published, its never a good time to share. Only if you want a viewpoint on a certain point, then its up to your talent as to how smartly you put the whole thing that the person wouldn't know that its for your own book.