Metafandom

General Fandom Meta

carlanime - I have to ask... - Real Live Fakes // If you found out a person you had "friended" was a different age/gender/whatever than they'd said they were, how upset would you be? [Poll]

painless_j - The merits of sock-puppets - I don't care if you are not a 35-year old woman from Canada but a 20-year old one from Brazil as long as I like the fic you write or as long as what you say when we talk seems interesting (amusing, weird in a good sense) to me. I don't care if three people on my f-list are in fact one person as long as I enjoy all the three. If I don't, I'll stop reading the one I don't find interesting anymore. And if I don't like (or am not interested in) what you say on your LJ, I'll quit reading this LJ.

cursive - fandom weirdness - I get why it would be fascinating to try and see what your friends would think of you if you were someone else. I even get why it might be a very entrancing way to see if someone would love you... because really fanfic, fandom journals, and RPGs and so on are a bit like that anyway, aren't they? I don't think you have to be as sad and lonely as this girl represents herself as being to do that. In tiny ways we all adjust ourselves here, experimenting with what it might be like to be a little more X or whether we could be a bit more Y. What she did was a hyper-exaggerated version of that, wasn't it?

azdak - No comment - I read a fair amount of fanfic in three different fandoms, and unless I know the author very well (well enough that they will expect me to see their story) I don't leave comments. The reason for this is simple, even if it sounds harsh – most of the fic I read simply isn't good enough. I don't want to send feedback that isn't honest and say that a story was great when it has all sorts of flaws, and I don't want to send feedback that discourages the author, because writing fic is a hobby, not a profession, and I don't see why someone should be slagged off for not attaining a high standard in something they do for fun.

branchessays - Authors as Real People - Many of the things I see said by RPS authors about the source-person sound remarkably similar to what I see literary critics say about creative authors. It isn't about the person. Despite the fact that the production in question uses that person's work, their name, the details of their life--it isn't about them. // Also, incidentally, it's a lot easier to write about people who are safely dead.

brn_gamble - Community-Related Thoughts -- The Fake Cut - So why do I believe people should avoid the 'fake cut' (or outside link)? // To me, it's all about SUPPORTING the communities you belong to. Rather than using links to take people AWAY from the community (for commenting in your private LJ), I feel it's better to post a link inside your private LJ -- which then has the potential to drive your flist back to the community to view and comment.

Fandom-Specific Meta

jazzypom - A reading of race in Harry Potter - In JK Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, race is an important concept that isn't really discussed at length in the text. But it is there. It is not race with regards to biology per se, but race as a social construct and tied to how one places oneself within the society at large. [HP]

rexluscus - Too much fic, not enough time - It is true that fanon can be annoying. Writers forgetting the canon facts about a character in favor of the fanon cliche, writers using the same standard way of getting two characters together ad nauseam, writers perpetuating the same willful misinterpretations of a character's actions, etc. But I've found that a lot of the fandom cliches and conventions (I guess they're the latter when they're done well, the former when they're done poorly) in HP fandom are actually rather fun. Sometimes I don't want strict canonicity. Sometimes I want a willful misinterpretation or two. [HP]

emelerin - The Wraith - What we seem to be looking at is a race which can only survive at the expense of another race. It's a wonderful 21st century conundrum, and nothing Original Trek would have come up with, because it wasn't a concern in 1960's US politics. It does, however, have relevance to our own time, where one of the principal challenges facing western society is the question of how to integrate/not alienate/cope with groups of people whose thoughts and beliefs run contrary to our own. [SGA]


On Reading/Writing/Creating

reenka - [stuff the blue ribbon, kthnx.] - There is definitely something that drives me absolutely up the wall about the idea, baldly stated, that of course one writes in order to be basically worshipped by one's readers. Not just to be read (something I do identify strongly with-- more readers, yesss!!), but to be admired. Oh my gahd. Gag. Me. Now. // That is such a... such... a complete disregard of craft and a sort of dismissal of any kind of pride or pleasure in being a writer in the first place....

sophia_helix - "the mystic caves of creation" seems appropriate (note: no plato intended) - How much of a "group" project do we expect or want our stories to be? Fandom has such a mix of approaches to writing, from the interactive writing circle to the unlitateral, one-way deliverance of story, emerging from the mystic caves of creation, to...well, acknowledging that fandom actually does have an influence on what stories are written and how they're written. And everyone seems to find their own niche in this very sliding scale of creative production.

tarie - [untitled] - What are your bullet-proof kinks in fic/art/etc? [Discussion]