Fandom vs. The Real World

[radio_silent]

This is a little bit different from my normal posts, but I want to talk about social networking. As in, TwitterFacebook  LiveJournalYoutube and now GoogleBuzz. Social networking, and fandom.

Comments

[studyofrunning]

Fandom is a geek thing. While the rest of the world has been forced to accept the computer-related aspects of geekiness because their jobs and comforts are in our hands now, they aren't going to give up hating on the rest of it because of things like psychology and outgroups and stuff. It's very easy to compare commonly accepted activities to equivalent unpopular ones, because there are so many examples of that in the world. That logic clearly does not apply. It's perfectly valid, it's just that the majority of people are really, really stupid.

I'm comfortable telling other Americans that I like Doctor Who, because they probably haven't even heard of the show itself, nevermind the spinoffs. (True story: I was just at an actual science fiction convention where three people in a room of twenty knew what "The Fourth Doctor" meant.) If there were an American Torchwood, that would be what people here knew about Doctor Who from, so I'd probably pretend not to have ever heard of the entire franchise. Also the only good Americanized versions of anything were the TVM and The Ring.

Spinoff novel authors, that's who gets paid for fanfic. Also anyone who writes for a new/reimagined/spinoff series, or joins the writing pool for an original series during a later season. And everyone at Big Finish.

Wordpress (etc.) are just blogs. There are thousands and nobody cares. LiveJournal is an oddly structured community. A blog here is more similar to posting on a very large forum than it is to posting a blog somewhere else. Blogs elsewhere are not really related to social networking in most cases. But on LJ? A lot of us aren't even here for blogs. I originally came here just for fic; I know people who are here mainly for games; there are some people who are only attached to LJ-specific graphics. Some are here only for communities and their blog is a technicality because LJ gives you one whenever you create an account.

Personally, the only thing scarier than letting offline people know that I write (and fic, at that!) is letting them actually read it. (This is not a confidence issue. This is an interpersonal issue.) If one of them found my LJ, that and my Teaspoon account would be wiped by the next day. I'd be freaked out if people even linked my other online identities to this one.

Someone explain to me what GoogleBuzz is.

[radio_silent]

hating on the rest of it
i think i must be hanging out with too many (or the right number of) fellow geeks, because i've never met anyone who seriously hated on fancreations- judged, certainty, but never out-and-out insulted.

Your true story is kind of really upsetting. Were these Buffy geeks or Stargate geeks? Not that it really matters...interestingly enough I've gotten into Big Bang Theory fanfic lately (all about geeks) and they reference doctor who (and firefly) maybe 33.3% of the time. I wonder if the show is just really popular on lj, because I don';t know how many Brits write BBT fanfic.

That, and because American Torchwood will probably be bad? I don't want to say that, because I'd love more of RTD's stuff, but I've never been really super impressed with Torchwood in the first place. But maybe it'd give him a chance to start afresh...

What's Big Finish?

Personally, the only thing scarier than letting offline people know that I write (and fic, at that!) is letting them actually read it.
Haha, I completely understand that. Can I ask if offline people read other creative writing from you? Or what kind of fanfic you write? (Although you don't have to answer either of these!)

I don't both to split up my online identities, for the most part...which could be a bad thing, but when it's all about fan creations and discussing fandoms, I don't mind if people make the connection.

GoogleBuzz is weird...it's a little like a space full of facebook updates mixed with a blog feed--you can follow your e-mail friends (or others) and see what kinds of things they post on Youtube, Flickr, Picassa, etc.

[studyofrunning]

idk what kind of geeks they were. Probably old scifi novel geeks or something. Though they were playing pictionary with nerd stuff and managed to guess "Joss Whedon" pretty quickly, which might say something.

Big Finish do the Doctor Who audios.

There is no non-fannish creative writing from me. I mean I wrote a short story once. It was crap. Nobody has read it and I don't know where it is. And I apparently agreed to write a thing at that con, so someday there will be two, I guess. But really I write fic because I'm into fic, not because I'm into writing. I have no interest in ever becoming "legitimate".

Apparently, I write annoying fluff, annoying shallow angst, and lots of remixes that come out as annoying fluff and/or shallow angst. I plan crack and big epic plotty stuff, but I don't seem to have finished and posted any of it. Ever. It's all pretty G-rated, though the plotty stuff will have PG-13-worthy amounts of violence if it ever happens.

GoogleBuzz sounds stupid. I have no accounts on any of those sites, and I don't even know what the last one is. I always thought that the best way to follow your email friends was to check your email.

[radio_silent]

ack! sorry it took me so long to get to these! :_(

so are the Doctor Who audios like radio episodes? or like a radio show about doctor who? or books on tape? i don't really know anything about them. : P

I have no interest in ever becoming "legitimate".
that's totally fine. and i like that people can write fic COMPLETELY for fun. since there's no other purpose, i guess. but also there's no pressure to be published or uber-amazing or anything.

GoogleBuzz sounds stupid.
you're probably very right. i just got turned onto this site about social marketing, mashable.com, and they liked it a lot...but they're kind of a weird group of people, anyway. : )