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Fandom far afield
When was the last time you participated in fandom on the internet not through a journaling site? I don't really mean posting fanfic to something like fanfiction.net, unless you also post and discuss in the forums there. I mean discussion, meta, the posting of fanfic, the making of graphics, etc, all being share through a medium other than LJ, DW, Insane Journal, JournalFen, etc. This would be a forum, website, mailing list . . . if you did something like a fanzine, not online, I'm interested in that too.
1) What fandom was it?
2) What was the medium? (e.g. was it a forum, a mailing list, etc)
3) When was this?
4) Are you still active in that fandom?
5) Why did you participate there, and not at a journaling site?
6) Are you more active in fandom on journaling sites or at other places?
7) How did the different mode of interaction affect your fandom participation?
8) Does there seem to you to be a difference in fen between the other medium and journaling sites? What are the differences? Why do you think those differences exist? Is it the nature of that fandom, or do you think it has anything to do with where that fandom is taking place?
9) What were the fen in the other medium's thoughts on yaoi? (No, seriously. What was the general sentiment towards slash?)
10) Was it easier or harder to get into a fandom through a medium other than a journaling site?
11) Which medium do you prefer?
If it sounds like I'm doing a study, I'm not. I'm just dabbling around in this other fandom, the fen of which seems mainly to congregate around a forum rather than playing on LJ/DW. I'm wondering how many people share my experiences there. Forums used to be my main method of fandom access. I was comfortable in them and found LJ inconvenient and not very suited to my style. I became used to it because I decided a lot of cool people were here...and now I'm beginning to think it's the only way!
1) What fandom was it?
2) What was the medium? (e.g. was it a forum, a mailing list, etc)
3) When was this?
4) Are you still active in that fandom?
5) Why did you participate there, and not at a journaling site?
6) Are you more active in fandom on journaling sites or at other places?
7) How did the different mode of interaction affect your fandom participation?
8) Does there seem to you to be a difference in fen between the other medium and journaling sites? What are the differences? Why do you think those differences exist? Is it the nature of that fandom, or do you think it has anything to do with where that fandom is taking place?
9) What were the fen in the other medium's thoughts on yaoi? (No, seriously. What was the general sentiment towards slash?)
10) Was it easier or harder to get into a fandom through a medium other than a journaling site?
11) Which medium do you prefer?
If it sounds like I'm doing a study, I'm not. I'm just dabbling around in this other fandom, the fen of which seems mainly to congregate around a forum rather than playing on LJ/DW. I'm wondering how many people share my experiences there. Forums used to be my main method of fandom access. I was comfortable in them and found LJ inconvenient and not very suited to my style. I became used to it because I decided a lot of cool people were here...and now I'm beginning to think it's the only way!
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2) What was the medium? Most of the active internets fandom can be found on the Tumulus messageboard (http://robthurmanbooks.proboards92.com/index.cgi); there are comms, but they're rarely in use.
3) When was this? Up until this spring, I was reasonably interested/active in the fandom. People still use that forum, but it's not a large fandom.
4) Are you still active in that fandom? No. The book series continues, but my patience with the author does not.
5) Why did you participate there, and not at a journaling site? As mentioned above, that's where the fandom's centered. Thurman herself used to post there, too.
6) Are you more active in fandom on journaling sites or at other places? I'm more active on journaling sites overall.
7) How did the different mode of interaction affect your fandom participation? It felt less immediate than it might on eljay; people on not-journaling sites aren't on them nearly as often.
8) Does there seem to you to be a difference in fen between the other medium and journaling sites? What are the differences? Why do you think those differences exist? Is it the nature of that fandom, or do you think it has anything to do with where that fandom is taking place? The fans tended to be/come off as much younger than in many of my fandoms, so most differences can be chalked up to that and the feeling of "what if the author is watching." Saying anything critical of the series wasn't especially welcome, for instance.
9) What were the fen in the other medium's thoughts on yaoi? Shallow fangirling. Not that there's anything wrong with that--it's a series for that sort of thing--but the attitude was basically, "they're pretty, sounds good."
10) Was it easier or harder to get into a fandom through a medium other than a journaling site? About the same? I don't feel a very strong connection to fandom outside of people I already know anyway, for a lot of reasons. If I was aiming for a closer bond with other fandom people, I would find it a lot less gratifying in the short term, though.
11) Which medium do you prefer? Journal sites, because that's where my friends are.
I've had other fandoms where the fandom presence is stronger/extant at all outside journal sites, but in at least one case (A Song of Ice and Fire, I'm looking at you), I've heard enough about how disagreeable the general viewpoints of non-journal fandom are that I have little desire to go seeking it.
Also, my experiences with fandom tend to be less social in general than I think others' are. I already have my small group of friends to get excited over things with; I don't necessarily want to go try and bond with strangers.
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Saying anything critical of the series wasn't especially welcome, for instance.
Sounds like a bummer.
I've heard enough about how disagreeable the general viewpoints of non-journal fandom are that I have little desire to go seeking it.
Yeah, this is what's strange to me. Is it a different kind of fan that goes to non-journaling sites?
Oh, Song of Ice and Fire. I read the first two, and got a little fed up (with Sansa. Why do I have to read about Sansa?), but now for some reason everyone at my work is reading it. My work is awesome. It makes me want to try again.
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Yeah, this is what's strange to me. Is it a different kind of fan that goes to non-journaling sites?
Yes. Eljay ASOIAF fandom is primarily female, as far as I can tell. Non-eljay ASOIAF fandom...isn't. You get some really boneheaded neckbeard-y men, is what I've noticed. Brienne (who's my faaaaaavourite) is a pretty popular character in eljay circles from what I can tell, for instance, but she's significantly less so in other places. She's also basically a deconstruction of the beloved Lady Knight trope--she's not omghawt or feminine or witty or adorably fiery-tempered or any of the other things that I at least associate with that character archetype. And thus, she's...not hugely popular outside eljay, far as I've seen.
A Song of Ice and Fire has its really good points, and it has its...really not so good points (cf. any time GRRM tries consciously to handle The Gays). Sansa is only barely not my favourite character in the entire series, but in fandom overall (including the non-eljay parts), she's horrendously unpopular--or she's only popular after a certain point in the books. I can understand why people don't like her, but I was very fond of her from the get-go, personally. You probably didn't get quite to the point where a lot of people like her better? I'd suggest trying the books again, or catching the tv series when it debuts, because then you don't have to put up with GRRM's sometimes-awful writing. /o/
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My problem with Sansa was actually the writing. I felt like here is this girl who is basically confined by her upbringing, just as Arya is. Arya casts all that off, which looks very well to our eyes, but is actually a very irresponsible and not very reasonable thing to do. Sansa, meanwhile, is using tools at her disposal. In trying to be what everyone wants her to be, she's also trying in her own way to be strong.
But partly the reason I have so much dislike for the character of Sansa was that I felt she had so much potential. It's not that I wanted her to become Arya, or to even "come into her own". Though I did want her to come into her own eventually, it did not have to be some act of defiance, or some act of generosity, to make me feel differently about her. What I wanted was some glimmer that things would change somehow--or some glimmer of awareness of her situation on her part.
I felt like that was coming, and I was very excited about all the Sansa parts in the first book. In the second book, I got really frustrated. I felt like the character was being used as a foil to show that Arya was awesome. And I did like Arya; she was my favorite. But by the second book I felt that she was meant to be, and that we were meant to hate Sansa REALLY HARD so that we could like her after some big turn, and the manipulation in that upset me. It made Sansa so 2d--and Arya 2d to boot, which made me stop reading.
So you're looking forward to the TV series? I don't know anything about the quality of the production; I was worried it could come out like the Sword of Truth adaptations (which I didn't watch, but heard about. I . . . uh, strongly dislike Terry Goodkind, but I did read a couple of the books, and was interested in the idea of an adaptations).
I liked what I read of Brienne--a lot more than most the women in those books ;o)
I associate messageboards with older fandoms/fans.
This is interesting, because some comments to this post say the same. One person posited that older, more conservative people are drawn to the control and organization of forums and mailing lists, which always have mods. But someone else was talking about Jane Austen fandom, all of which occurs on forums, and they were talking about how it was mostly the teen crowd.
It is interesting, where kids will choose to go. I wonder where the . . . actually, I'm not going to finish that thought. I'm glad that the only Twilight fandom I've experienced occurs on ONTD.
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I couldn't remember if you would've gotten to Brienne or not! But yeah, she is so bamf. I am sort of okay with the possibility of the series never being finished, because then I can imagine that she has a happy ending with Jaime.
The TV series has an amazing cast so far. (One of the reasons I'm looking forward to it hardxcore is because if anyone can make me like Tyrion, it's Peter Dinklage, omg. :D) I'm told that HBO doesn't always handle various Stuff and Things all that well, but I am looking forward to giving it a chance.
Also, the kids playing the Stark children are adooooorable. /o/
It is interesting, where kids will choose to go. I wonder where the . . . actually, I'm not going to finish that thought. I'm glad that the only Twilight fandom I've experienced occurs on ONTD.
Ahahahaha. ♥ I haven't any idea where Twilight fandom resides, either--I imagine it's large enough that there're several places. How curious how some messageboards skew younger.
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There's some backlash to her because she's such a "girly" girl.
Yeah, her being so girly read as just so much set up to me. Not that she would ever be ungirly, but that we would see the ways in which girliness could actually be a strength. And it would be juxtaposed against Arya, who took a very male approach.
I was interested partly because I was totally a girly girl when I was little. I meet so many gals now who I consider far more girly than me (what? you brush your hair?), who talk about how tomboyish they were when they were young. I just wasn't, which was weird, because I went for a lot of badass sword wielding heroines. I also just liked pretty dresses and ponies and the idea of balls.
I love things that show us a woman trying to express herself individually and exert power within the paradigm of male dominated society, juxtaposed against a woman who defies that paradigm. Depending on the context, the latter can come off positively or negatively, and same with the former.
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There's a character in Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel the series fandom that most people you meet walking on the street just hate. Looking at him, I understand why people don't like him. BUT I LOVE HIM WITH THE PASSION OF A THOUSAND FIERY SUNS. But I also feel like he was mishandled by the writing.
It's interesting to say that, since these characters only exist as writing. I hate it when people say authors got their own stories wrong--unless they mean a plothole or something. But here I am saying it. The set up for Connor (the Angel character) is just great, and the actor brings a lot to the role, but what does happen with the character doesn't live up to all the elements that are there.
I feel the same about Harry Potter's Draco Malfoy.
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And oh, Draco Malfoy. He is definitely someone I can see the argument for. I've never watched Angel, but I'll trust you on that one.