#state of fandom

[mythals-whore]

Some thoughts on fandom engagement

Post got long but TL;DR engagement is low, Never Ever Stop Creating! fandom is community and everyone needs to participate

extended thoughts and personal anecdote under the cut:

For writers:

I have turned off Kudos emails from ao3. I found myself checking my email and feeling discouraged when I didn't get them. So i turned the emails off so I wouldn't know I wasn't getting them. Even now when I go to my dashboard, I specifically do not look at the bottom of the work to see those numbers.

This is not me telling you to do the same thing. It is easier said than done, and I understand that. But that's what I had to do to have a good time.

Because for a little while, posting made it less fun. I felt like people didn't like it. I was being overly critical of myself, couldn't write more than three sentences without feeling like I was garbage and my work was garbage and I should just quit. I would post a chapter and then immediately want to take the whole thing down. But then I realized...

I have about four half-finished projects in my WIP folder. I have written like 500,000 words that no one has ever read. Because I had fun doing it! Because I enjoy writing!!

And the point of this isn't to say writers shouldn't want or expect engagement. That is not at all what I'm saying!

What I am saying is that if you enjoy writing and you find that posting your work is making you feel unmotivated, discouraged, and you're not having fun anymore it is okay to take it down. It’s okay to make your work private for a while. It's okay to turn off Kudos emails or even comments. Whatever you need to do to make it fun again, do that. If you enjoy creating, please do not let the lack of engagement stop you!

It's been really helpful for me to find a community of creators! Without the support of @thedissonantverses @flowersforthemachines and @basedonconjecture I may have deleted my work months ago!

And that said, if you want someone to read your work, there are so many people (including and especially me) who would love to read and promote you! Participate in WIP Wednesday and Writing Weekend! Promote your own work!! Promote other creators' work! This is how we build community!

For readers:

If you love fanfic, and fanart and fandom in general engage with it. The urge to take down your work is real! And not unique to me! If writers don't get kudos or comments or replies on tumblr, they will delete their work. If there's a fic you find, and you enjoy it but you don't engage with it do not be surprised if you log on one day and it isn't there anymore. Or if it gets orphaned. Or if they simply stop updating it.

Fandom is meant to be a community. The whole purpose of it is to enjoy the things you enjoy with other people. If you're consuming free work (be that fanfic, fan art or something else) and you're not liking or reblogging or commenting then those people will stop sharing it.

And my personal take, while we're here: I do not get it.

I do not understand why there are people out there who do not jump at the chance to directly engage with authors and artists who make things that you enjoy. You can tell them personally how much you like their work! You can ask them questions! You can send them your unhinged ramblings on The Character.

And before anyone comes to my replies and says: I never know what to say ))):

Here is a non-comprehensive list of 10 slightly unhinged things that I've actually commented on fics (some edited for brevity)

I am chewing on glass.

bye i’m putting my fist through the wall 😭

These two are consuming my every waking thought

That ruined me i fear. I have passed away

THIS IS LITERATURE. absolutely tore my heart out.

You are sick in the head my friend

Im gonna sip on this sentence a while.🤌🏻

how could you do this to them? writing about this in my burn book brb

A) You absolutely cooked here B) how fucking dare you?

 kicking my feet and giggling!!!!!

And this isn't just for ao3/fanfic writers. Fanartists deserve love too! Artists love feedback!! The more unhinged the better!! Tell us we're evil! Quote our work back to us! Tell us you're smashing through walls like the Kool-aid man! Tell us that our work is making you scream and cry and blush!

No one is expecting you to leave several long paragraphs with an actual annotated review (not that that wouldn't also be welcome). Comment! Engage! Community is the whole point!

This also goes for finding Tumblr mutuals, by the way. If you want to make friends with people on here engage with their content! Like their posts! Reply to them! Send asks and messages!

Stop being afraid to enjoy things! That is like...all we are doing here.

[vaultentity]

[EN] I often go to Paris in a yuri-yaoi convention. I am really appreciative of its existence. It's relatively small and it's cool to have a place where queer artistists can sell their stuff. This being said, I ust say I noticed it's hard to find anything about transfeminity. There are a few transmasc things (not that much though) but besides a few Spidergwen and Bridget keychains, there is almost nothing specifically about trans women/transfem. No prints, comics or other more original stuff around those characters. And a pet pieve of mine: there are writers and comic artists that sell their stuff and they put on them queer flags and they never use the transmasc or transfem ones only the generic trans one. You could say: "Yeah well if there is the lesbian one or the yuri label it does mean it's about at least a trans woman, right?" but I did look the backcover of these books and it's always about transmasc lesbians or some yuri between cis women featuring a token transmasc character. To wraps things up, I know this is for systemic reasons way beyond the control of the con planners but I can't fail to notice the lack of transfem artists. [PMO] I vouè soven â Pari den ana qonvençyon su le youri è le yaoï (homo-éro-fiqçyon). I l'apréçio veramen, c'è as ptè é ç'è qoul d'aveir an endrai ouè dèz ouatista qaraije pouan vendre leuz ôvrè. Çlenq ehtan dè c'è ben dur de li trova déz afèrè trahfenninè. Li ça ben qèqz ass trahmahlin (è enqouo ra bèqou) mâ foueu de do-trè pouota-qllar Bridget o Spidergwen on trove ra. Ra d'imprima, ra de bédé o dèz afèrè mî originau avoui sté persnaijez

Enqouo mi frodan : li ça déz éhqrivana o déz bédéista è ia mètan dé drapè qaraije pouo monhtra qaennèz identità son repésentay è iaz usan jamâ lé drapè tranhmahlin é tranhfrennin peirè le drapè simpllamen tranh. Te pori dire qe "oua mâ se te vè le drapè lezben avoui ça veu dire qe l'histoire è ben su u men ana fana trah, nan?" Mâ i ai dja gegni on cifre do qouatonz lo qatre é ç'è qazimen adai su dé trahmahlin lezben o on youri featuring on persnaije trahmahlin. Pouo fini, i savo qe ç'è pouaça qe des raison sistèmiqè qe qamban pllaennamen lèz ouoga mâ i peu pa m'sçtopâ de vè lo manq d'ouatistè trahfenninè.

[hitlikehammers]

Do baseless and defamatory accusations from bots, aimed at intimidating people into deleting their work, mean you’ve finally ‘made it’? 🥹 /s

[blackfemmejeanvaljean]

almost all of abbott elementary fanfiction is barbara/melissa

[fannishpodcast]

Our first ever episode! Listen now on Soundcloud (more platforms to come)!

Topic: State of fandom in social media post Tumblr fuckery

Podcast Notes:

Strikethrough purge on Live Journal

Transcript: Via Google Docs

What We're Reading links: @CharCubed meta thread

Homoerotic Subtext from the Bar Scene in CATFA by vulcansmirk

Saving Sergeant Barnes by vulcansmirk: 

THAT TIME STEVE AND BUCKY GOT MARRIED by ipoiledi

Personal Security by Kangofu_CB

dance with a ghost by crinklefries

[enigma731]

oh my GOD, the activity page has me listed as MY OWN BIGGEST FAN for reblogs in the past 24 hours and I’ve only made like 2

if that doesn’t say there’s a problem, idk what does

[cicaklah]

Let me tell you a story about fandom.

While I started off in x-files fandom, my current unending tide of fannishness comes from when my good friend got me into trigun, and from there, trigun fic. See, I lived in Indonesia at the time, and there was a strange sticking point in the counterfeit vcds we all relied on, that meant that though the series was finished, we were eternally stuck at Project Seeds, about half way through the series. Therefore, for my good friend and I, fanfic was it. This was pre-torrents, still in the age of dial up internet, or internet that was about as good as dial up. I remember when I finally got cable, and managed to get consistent, always on internet with download speeds of 5kbs. It was a great day.

The most popular fic at the time was Keyholes, by Princess of Pain. Princess of Pain was our bnf, and keyholes was a slapstick comedy par excellence. But she had other fics, one in particular never left me.

This was 2000. Maybe 1999. Most likely in and around there, anyway. I can tell the story of that fic endlessly in my head. I remember the jokes. I remember probably every line. But the fic itself is gone now. It was a massive part of Trigun fandom, a massive part of my life, really, but I went to look for it now its gone. Even her username is gone. 

But I have memory. And the internet has a memory, ghosts of dead links lying in odd corners. And the internet has an archive. So here. And here is her page. Here is the fic that I went looking for, unrelated to all this. And here's the first part of keyholes.

Our history of fandom is so fragile, at whims of memory and odd fragments of the old internet that still remain. How will this change with tumblr, which eats fics with static links and terrible search? With unindexed fic on the AO3. With robots.txt files and government agencies and that creeping paranoia that lies in the back of adult fangirls minds? How will all of this be remembered, when we don't want anything remembering?

[yixingstwin]

(brief) state of fandom update 08.02.13

this will be very, very brief compared to my usual fandom note. i'm just popping by on what fandoms i've delved in since last may. 

k-pop 

exo

lost interest in exo again. not even wolf's choreo can save it. but! on the bright side, i saw the leaked practice video for growl and hey. it's looking better. 

and tbf to exo, i bought their merch and their album and i'm going to see k in september. until i see considerable progress put in their music, i don't think my interest will ever be the same as it was before. i think the only reason i'm still floating in the fandom is because of the little tidbits we see about them during variety and radio shows. 

but right now, if exo were to debut again, i don't think i would've been submerged in the fandom as i've been before. 

f(x)

i will have a separate tumblr post regarding their comeback promotions. first--pink tape is awesome. i guarantee it. this is the second sm album where i've liked ALL of the songs, or at least, didn't have a song i disliked and wouldn't listen to again. 

second--their styling for this round sucks. i know they don't really have a fixed concept, they just have the typical hipster mess but this is the least consistent of all of their promotional styling. and wtf is up with those tacky plaid clothes?

third--i am not very happy with sm promoting them at the same time with exo since it's really unfair to both groups, but hey. you take what you can get. 

anime

for some reason, i've decided to watch free! one day. then i delved back to the animanga fandom. i decided to check out shingeki no kyojin or attack on titan because it is currently the shonen of the season. and i was not disappointed at all. i will have a separate post for this, i have so many feels for this series, this reminds me when i was severely addicted to fma. 

currently watching suisei no gargantia. my interest in mecha is also back!