You are much more of an expert on the subject of writing and protocols than me, so I doubt I can be of much help to you but you have got me a little worried.
I have only just started writing, but have been reading fanfic and nfanfic for a long time. When I wrote my first nfic I didn't really think twice about using direct quotes from the show in places, as I thought I had seen it done many times before.
Well... until this issue on plagiarism, I never used to credit the actual authors of the screenplay dialog in case I borrowed one. (Oh, I did use a disclaimer in case of other sources like in TMWAK for the title; just sorta ignored the ones from the show)
The pathetic excuse is, being a first time writer, I didn't think of it, either! I know, I know, the horrible excuse a plagiarist usually gives!
But then, the FoLCs here pretty much know which dialogs are mine and which are from the show...
Yet, I've started using a general disclaimer crediting the entire show for the dialogs since my dialogs don't usually come from a single episode. Maybe you should just do that, too, Em.
The journalist in me is pretty paranoid, so the only time I have referenced lines from the show (in a series of flashbacks in "Inside Out), I tweaked the lines I was using just slightly enough that they weren't the verbatim words from the show.
Looking back, I see that I've done that a lot, too, but according to -
Statement on Plagiarism by Charles Darling - (which Labby was so good enough to direct me to) that requires a disclaimer, too, I believe.
