Fic Rec Post #1! (August 25-312009)
So, as promised here's my first rec post! I decided to do it retroactively, so here's for the last week of August. I did a big Merlin rec list not too long ago for 
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I don't have time to read the subtext meta now, but it raises some interesting questions. I'll have to poll my flist and see if they've had this experience either as a reader or a writer.
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And the subtext meta was really interesting. I think most people are inclined to give the creator's opinion more weight but I don't think we're obligated to. I mean fandom, or at least slash fandom, would have a hard time existing if we listed every time TPTB told us to stop or that we're wrong.
And the thing is, is there really any such thing as a wrong interpretation? There is certainly better or worse supported interpretations but how you interpret something is on a personal level and no one can tell you that your feelings are wrong.
I also found the meta interesting for some of the etiquette questions that came up. Like of author's getting offended that someone saw a pairing that they didn't intent and mentioning it. liviapenn argues at one point that if she writes a gen fic, it's a gen fic. She's written slash before, so obviously she doesn't have a problem making the boys kiss. If ( ... )
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That's a really interesting point. One of the things that was so interesting to me about House fic is that the line between what's gen and what's slash is really, really permeable given the canonical relationship of the characters. No one has the ultimate authority in deciding if interaction A is homosocial or homoromantic, provided the interaction isn't explicitly sexual. So what Reader B sees as slash, Reader C can read as gen, and one can only guess at what the original writer intended. While it might be unsettling for a writer to have readers see something intended (and I think that speaks more to the writing process than the fannish process), I agree with you -- I think you have to be open to interpretation. To feel otherwise is hypocritical.
I feel kind of dumb posting a rec to a 2 year old meta, but if you want to talk about it over here ( ... )
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So that's why people dig Merlin. ;)
Although, admittedly it can become a tricky situation outside of the creator's space. For example, what are your obligations when rec'ing the fic on your personal journal?
Tell me more about this, if you don't mind -- are you talking about characterizing a fic differently than the author when posting a rec? I love the politics and norms of reccing -- it has such potential to be a sticky situation when at its heart it's a very kind gesture.
Oh, and would it be ok for me to add a note saying that you wouldn't ming people commenting on the original post should they want to join in?
Sure. I'll go ahead and unlock it now.
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Well, that and scenes like this:
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Maybe another reason I'm not into Merlin is that I don't find any of the people involved attractive. Sorry!
The author did not intend for this fic to be slash or even preslash.
Preslash, oy. On a side note, preslash is something I don't really understand. By definition, preslash implies some sort of slashy continuum, i.e., a relationship happens after this point in time. But just as often I see preslash used in those nebulous sorts of contexts where the existence of slash depends solely on the reader's take. As a classification designation, I'm not sure it (a) works as intended or (b) that there isn't a better signifier out there. But I digress!
Personally I lean towards the side that the rec'er should be able to rec a fic however she wants...I do feel that I should at least point out if my personal classification of the fic conflicts with the author's classification. I agree with this, and I think that's enough concession to the writer. If someone gets their feathers ruffled over that, I don't ( ... )
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Ha, you don't need to apologize. I'll admit no one immediate struck me as attractive when I started watching but I'm one of those people that can't separate attractiveness from personality. It wasn't until I got more into the show and fell for Arthur that he got massively hot for me.
On a side note, preslash is something I don't really understand. By definition, preslash implies some sort of slashy continuum, i.e., a relationship happens after this point in time.Ii really is a confusing term. Oddly enough, it's only recently that I've started to use the term. Before I'd just roll my eyes and think "choose one or the other, either it's slash or it's gen!" Now I'm doing that thing where I bookmark every fic I read I find the term a lot more useful. There are a lot of fics where I'm torn because maybe it's one sided UST, nothing happens, and as far as we know, nothing will happen. Is it still slash if it's one sided? I tend to ( ... )
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Seriously, we need a better signifier. These are the kinds of fic I sometimes like to read, but I probably pass over a lot of them because the designation isn't always clear.
If there's intent and no action (where action can include the pairing admitting their feelings and a fade to black) then I consider it preslash.
Hmm. I think intent definitely counts, so I'm not sure how I'd classify that. Maybe just designate unrequited UST? Be descriptive in your notes, authors!
There seems to be a lot more "drive by recs" where the rec'er is mostly making a squee post urging others to read.
I think there's a place for drive by squee recs, but I really do miss the way they're replacing traditional reccing. And I'm not terribly a fan of delicious, so I probably miss them more than most.
It's one thing to bookmark a fic, but traditional bookmarking functions within browsers really only allow for a link and a title, no room for an additional explanation of why you might ( ... )
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Yeah, I do that too. Or skip over fics because it's not my OTP or something. Terminator kind of got me over that. There was so little fic in that fandom that I ended up reading everything I could get my hands on. And even though I'm in more prolific fandoms now I find some of that has stuck. I was reading femslash last night.
I think intent definitely counts
So if intent counts, what would *you* classify as preslash? Fics where if you have your slash goggles on you could imagine more happening? Fics where one character is thinking about their friend but hasn't made the jump from friend to something more? Because those strike me more as gen.
It's such an ambiguous term!
I'm not terribly a fan of delicious, so I probably miss them more than most.Even though I discovered Delicious years ago it's only very, very recently that I've started using it. It's kind of something you need to get the hang of ( ... )
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Yeah, I do that too. Or skip over fics because it's not my OTP or something. And even though I'm in more prolific fandoms now I find some of that has stuck. I was reading femslash last night.
Heh. Bandom wasn't nearly as prolific as I'd expected (seriously, SGA ruined me for all other fandoms, I think) and I ended up reading pairings that weren't my OTP and became a little OTPy and genderswap, which I usually hate with a burning passion. The things we do in desperation! But, like you, I'm glad I did -- I discovered some great fics and pairings that way.
So if intent counts, what would *you* classify as preslash? Fics where one character is thinking about their friend but hasn't made the jump from friend to something more? Because those strike me more as gen. For me, any sort of gay content automatically qualifies for a slash signifier, be it preslash or ( ... )
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Hmm, I had to go back and read through some of my responses there since I'm not quite sure what I was saying. :P I'm not sure if I'm going back on what I said earlier and if so, this might just show that my definition changes a lot. Anyway, if the fic is all about character A saying that they want to jump character B, you're right it shouldn't be gen. Gen is fic where romantic feelings aren't the focus of the fic, so I'd probably put it down as pre-het/slash/femslash (depending on the genders of characters A & B). Thinking back though, I'm not sure if that's what I was doing on my delicious....
One of the things that really bothers me about Delicious is that it doesn't aggregate bookmarks. There about 75 different addresses for the same LJ post and without aggregation ( ... )
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I do that sometimes, although worse is when I conflait two stories of a similar theme.
Dude, I wish you would vid more! *is totally a follower*
Aww, thanks. Did you know I'm making a vidding computer? *bounces* A friend of my dad is going to pick it up next week and finish putting it together for me. It's going to have a quad processor and 8GBs of RAM, a 1TB hard drive and a dedicated memory card. *iz excited*
Right now my laptop won't even let me vid. I did something funky to it and now none of the vidding programs will work :( Which sucks since I've gotten a couple really great vid ideas in the past couple months.
Also, kronos999, one of my room mates, is currently creating a program that'll really change the way I vid. It'll let you tag an episode as you watch it at certain parts, that way later when you want a scene of John and Rodney looking slashy, you can check ( ... )
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I still do a lot and have been forming a lot of opinions lately of what I like and don't and it always makes me miss the conversations we used to have about podfic. I often email raxhel with my thoughts but I don't think she's ever even listened to a podfic before so it falls kind of flat.
And a slight side note: did you hear about podbang? It's a challenge put on by amplificathon where people do podfics for long, 30K+ fics :D
I signed up for it and requested SCC fic as my first choice, however I doubt there's any long enough to fit the challenge :(
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I haven't in a while, but that's more a function of time and not having a primary fandom than a loss of interest in podfic. I did try a podfic I was really excited about the other day and it just didn't work for me. The story was an MCR fic by bexless and it was sort of an AU version of the movie Stigmata. The girl who did the reading had a sort of high-pitched voice that didn't fit the story and she didn't really get the pauses in the dialogue down. It was really hard to follow, so I stopped after a few minutes.
Podbang sounds awesome! I'd really like to record more fic, but I know I have that high-pitched girly voice that doesn't match up well with a lot of stories. Definitely keep us updated on what you get, though. And feel free to share your podfic thoughts with me. :)
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