How to Tell if Somebody is fandom!old
- They use terms like lemons, smut, or UST to talk about the genre of their fic.
- They have squicks.
- They want you to have squicks. Which isn’t to say that they want to squick you, just that it’s a useful term.
- *glomps*
- They leave long comments on everything the read. Possibly not in the tags. They might do something super bizarre like send a message or put their thoughts on the end of your post.
- They write disclaimers on everything. Or on literally anything, since nobody does that anymore.
- They write about orbs, and those orbs are cerulean.
- Or literally anything else is cerulean. Cerulean is an outdated term. I’m calling it.
- The tongues of their characters are still battling for dominance, even though it’s 2017, and really a winner should have been declared by now.
- They have a fear of Mary Sue.
- Characters in their modern AU are chatting on AIM instant messenger, and calling each other on landlines. There are references to Ceiling Cat, because the characters are hip to meme culture. This AU is ~modern~ after all.
- Their fic is interlaced with slightly relevant song lyrics (disclaimer, they didn’t write the song.)
- They don’t do any of above, because they are New Fandom Savy, but they write or reblog nostalgic posts about these things.
- They had a livejournal.
- They still have a livejournal.
- They ended up on tumblr only after getting into a new fandom, searching livejournal for content and fellow fans, and suddenly coming to the startling realization that livejournal has become a barren wasteland of tumbleweeds and chirping crickets.
- They miss their geocities site.
- They wrote fic for the X-Files while the original nine seasons were still airing.
- Bonus, they wrote fic for the original Star Trek and published it in a zine, before the Internet was a thing. That’s like super mega fandom old.
- They might be less inclined to call themselves “trash”, but they are totally out there, reading all the things.
As a person who is fandom!old, which judging from this list means anyone old enough to rent a car, a number of the things on this list are actually just signs of being a shitty writer and have nothing to do with age.
Remember, kids: you owe your terrible fanfiction to all the terrible fanfiction that came before it.
