General Fandom Meta
brown_betty: Characterization, Canon, and Comics - Your characterization and mine may be mutually exclusive. That doesn't mean I think you're wrong. It may mean I can't wrap my brain around it, or enjoy it, or that you're writing from a piece of canon I've invested a lot of mental energy into pretending doesn't exist: it doesn't mean I think you're wrong.

tammy212: Moore/Gebbie--LOST GIRLS - I write books for teenagers. When I was told there was a fanfic out there in which my hero Daine was raped, I cried. The thought that someone might come along, years from now, and take my characters, and turn them out, gives me the psychedelic crawls.

jeddy83: In which Jeddy makes a fannish analogy and then starts talking complete and utter bull - I'm sure there are some people who are happy to read, write and discuss the same fandom for twenty years, but for most of us it's of a slightly shorter duration. The trouble (if multi-fannishness could be said to be trouble, which in a way for me it is since I have not enough time for one fandom let alone two, or three, or more) comes because when people change their drug of choice they don't all move in the same direction.

thelana: femnist guilt, identification and all that jazz - I barely ever got attached to any girl books. I read some my mother gave me [blablabla grows up type of things. Hanni & Nanny], but they never were particularly gripping to me. Didn't particularly care about Pippi Longstocking either (and I think there I totally would have favored Anika; Pippi was annoying). I think a big problem was that I never liked horses so all the books and magazines that went along those lines were lost on me

carmarthen: On narrow genre tastes, female characters, and the wider - I think that a lot of--maybe even most--characters on TV are flat or cliched or annoying or stereotypical. As long as the majority of TV writers are men* and the majority of TV characters are men, probability says there will be fewer female characters who don't suck--and just because a character doesn't suck doesn't mean every fan will find that character interesting.

telesilla: When is Gen not Gen? - Those experiences of mine were over 10 years ago and I know some fandoms define "gen" differently now. I've had to grudgingly admit that my definition of "slash" is outdated, and perhaps the old definition of "gen" is too.

wychwood: Three Things I Wish People Would Bear In Mind When Writing - One of the hot issues of the moment in SGA fandom seems to be genderswap. It's something that turns up in fic all over the place (almost always men turning into women, interestingly), and while it can be totally fascinating to read (if done well), it's also a subject that often gets mired in horrible out-dated stereotypes.

On Reading, Writing and Criticism
fictualities: Reading against the story - Possibly this kind of misidentification is heretical, but it certainly makes the reading/viewing experience very interesting and much more active a process than ordinary reading. Your mind is simultaneously taking in the narrative-as-it's-being presented and the counter-narrative as your character experiences it. It's a bit like writing a highly critical fanfic in your head as you go.

tazlet: Too Much Information and the (Reader’s) Creative Process - My intention is always to construct word webs (matrixes) in which I lure readers. [A web by its nature has gaps. The reader becomes actively engaged in the story by filling in the gaps. Unconsciously? Semiconsciously? With total clarity? I don’t know, I’ve been all those kinds of reader myself and your mileage may vary.] But what I write in the privacy of my room and mind is read in the privacy of someone else’s room and mind.

Specific Fandom Meta ( cut for possible spoilers in the Office )

Polls, Quizzes, Questions etc.
accioslash: Original Fic vs Fan Fic: A Poll on the Rights of Author - I am very intrigued by the results since the majority don't seem to care what the authors/owners/actors want and indicate they would write fan fiction and post it the same way they do anything else. This made me wonder what would happen if cereta added some additional questions. However, since they are my questions I figured that I should probably be the one to ask.

phantom_hpuff: i'll just wait without saying a word... - Let's say that in your story, Bob has a crush on Fred, but feelings are never returned. Unrequited if you will.
When you finally post it, what would you write next to that little header that says "Pairing"?

morchades: Automatic Self-Insertion - Has anyone else ever automatically "Mary Sued" (Autosued, perhaps?) a story as they read it? Not after they finish, I mean as they read it.