Fandom engagement

[jasmasson]

The article The Endless Appetite for Fanfiction by by Elizabeth Minkel on fansplaining.com was linked by amalthia and was very interesting. Very much mirrors my experience of fandom.

Without doubt, the best time I had in fandom was in the LJ days, where fanfic and fandom were together, but in fairness AO3 is a much better reader experience and fanfic repository than lj ever was, but as the author argues it makes it a pure reading experience rather than an engagement with a fandom.

Not sure that’s ever going to get better, however, in the spirit of ‘being the change you want to see in the world’ my New Years resolution is to comment on any fic I like enough to bookmark, and kudos any fic I like at all. I could do better, I know, but NY resolutions are all about achievable goals, right?

I’m doing https://www.tumblr.com/fanfic-reading-challenge (again, if you like reading fanfic, enjoy spreadsheets and feel a great sense of satisfaction in ticking items off a to do list you should give it a try, it’s great) and one of the comment tasks was to comment on at least 10 chapters of a 20 chapter or more fic and I rather enjoyed doing that. I don’t believe I’ve ever commented more than once on a fic before and it was rather fun - I’ll definitely do it again!

And finally every time I rec a fic, I’ll drop a comment to the author saying I did so; that’s always nice to hear, right!

Fannish 50: #2

Comments

[amalthia]

I was brainstorming last night and thought maybe I should try and organize a challenge community for readers with the purpose of leaving feedback for authors.

I'm not sure how that would look or how to organize it and I don't want to half-ass it.

I love that your resolution to be the change you want to see. :) Good luck!

[jasmasson]

Thanks! That sounds like a great idea- hope you can pull it off. Perhaps you can get a group together at Escapade? 🤔

[amalthia]

I was hoping to brainstorm ideas on how such a challenge or community would work. I've never run a challenge community before but it seems like if I want something like this to exist I may have to start it myself. :)

[annavere]

Hi! Found your journal from Shortcuts! Just wanted to thank you for the article. I'm extremely new to fandom and it was very interesting to read. I've bookmarked the site for future learning.

I made a similar New Year's Resolution, and since I've got a daily planner (in a physical notebook, even) started for the year, any day I leave a comment it goes straight into the list of accomplishments. I guess it's my personal version of a commenting challenge. Trying to encourage myself to be more mindful of the whole system.

[jasmasson]

Hi! Good to see you 😁! HLH was fun; more Methos always a very nice gift.

It is an interesting site, and fandom, like lots of things, is going through a lot of changes and challenges with the proliferation of AI in particular, along with lots of other changes... It’s always interesting to read how it seems to others. Fandom seems oddly simultaneously much bigger (14 million fics on AO3!!!) and smaller (less engagement/fragmentation/discord ‘gatekeepers’) to me than it used to be!

Commenting on fics and posts seems like a good way to keep involved with the good things, so we’re doing our bit! 😇🤣