Big Bangs: someone explain the controversy, please?
Okay.
Some of you may have heard about the latest... *looks for a polite word* disturbance in fandom, which on the surface was a discussion about the creation of a Gen Big Bang, which would focus entirely on gen fics. Not as an alternative to the current Big Bang, but simply as an extra one, if you will.
WAIT! Before you go on to tell me everything that was wrong with the OP's post, you can stop right there. I know what was wrong with it, I agree, and that's NOT what this post is about at all. It's tangentially related, at best.
I saw this last year when the deancasbigbang was created too, and it caught me entirely by surprise.
Why are people viewing the creation of separate, smaller, more specific Big Bangs as an either/or proposition?
No, seriously, I don't understand. It's not like having an extra BB suddenly prevents the other one from existing, or prevents people from participating in it, right? There are lots of people who can't participate in the main BB (the spn_j2_bigbang) for myriad reasons. (Timing is a big one, especially for people in school, since it coincides with exams and papers and such. Having another large-ish challenge later in the year is a great way for those people to write their long fics and get art for them, if they want it.)
For others, there's no reason they can't do both. I got all excited about it last year, and participated in both, and wrote genfic for both (shocking, I know). I didn't feel like the DCBB people were in any way forcing me out of their sandbox if I didn't have a longish Dean & Cas story to tell (I did, as it happened, but if I didn't I simply wouldn't have signed up). In fact, I was pretty excited about the Big Bangs that proliferated last year -though I will admit that, being newish to fandom last year, I wasn't aware that this wasn't standard practice- because there are few things as thrilling for an author as to get art done for their fic.
So I'm confused about the whole argument about segregating the fandom, or that if there's a separate Gen Big Bang no one outside of gen readers will go read the stories. I mean, aren't people going to cross-post on communities? Maybe not everyone, but those interested in sharing will do it, right? If people have a long, plotty fic, slash or otherwise, that doesn't fit in with, say, the Dean/Cas Big Bang, then they can still write it during that time, can't they? And post it anyway? And maybe, if they're less self-conscious about it than I am, they could ask if someone out there would be willing to do art for them. Maybe. I know I get all twisted in knots about that sort of thing, so I'd understand if it's the same for others. :P
There are other arguments against multiple Big Bangs that make more sense to me. Like, because of the huge amount of work that an author puts into their fic, and because they have to respect their posting date, they often end up producing less fic during the Big Bang season. Same with exchanges and challenges. So that feels like a more valid argument to me: that people are leaving aside ideas because they're too stressed about ongoing "big" projects which have looming deadlines.
What I don't get, like I said, is the notion that somehow this is some sort of twisted, underhanded ploy to divide fandom.
So can someone explain this?
:::ETA:::
...
It occurs to me that this might possibly attract attention. So. As usual, the rules of healthy debate apply here. Please avoid flaming, ad hominem attacks, and the like. Feel free to comment anonymously, but I will screen/delete anonymous replies that are deliberately wanky. JSYK.
Some of you may have heard about the latest... *looks for a polite word* disturbance in fandom, which on the surface was a discussion about the creation of a Gen Big Bang, which would focus entirely on gen fics. Not as an alternative to the current Big Bang, but simply as an extra one, if you will.
WAIT! Before you go on to tell me everything that was wrong with the OP's post, you can stop right there. I know what was wrong with it, I agree, and that's NOT what this post is about at all. It's tangentially related, at best.
I saw this last year when the deancasbigbang was created too, and it caught me entirely by surprise.
Why are people viewing the creation of separate, smaller, more specific Big Bangs as an either/or proposition?
No, seriously, I don't understand. It's not like having an extra BB suddenly prevents the other one from existing, or prevents people from participating in it, right? There are lots of people who can't participate in the main BB (the spn_j2_bigbang) for myriad reasons. (Timing is a big one, especially for people in school, since it coincides with exams and papers and such. Having another large-ish challenge later in the year is a great way for those people to write their long fics and get art for them, if they want it.)
For others, there's no reason they can't do both. I got all excited about it last year, and participated in both, and wrote genfic for both (shocking, I know). I didn't feel like the DCBB people were in any way forcing me out of their sandbox if I didn't have a longish Dean & Cas story to tell (I did, as it happened, but if I didn't I simply wouldn't have signed up). In fact, I was pretty excited about the Big Bangs that proliferated last year -though I will admit that, being newish to fandom last year, I wasn't aware that this wasn't standard practice- because there are few things as thrilling for an author as to get art done for their fic.
So I'm confused about the whole argument about segregating the fandom, or that if there's a separate Gen Big Bang no one outside of gen readers will go read the stories. I mean, aren't people going to cross-post on communities? Maybe not everyone, but those interested in sharing will do it, right? If people have a long, plotty fic, slash or otherwise, that doesn't fit in with, say, the Dean/Cas Big Bang, then they can still write it during that time, can't they? And post it anyway? And maybe, if they're less self-conscious about it than I am, they could ask if someone out there would be willing to do art for them. Maybe. I know I get all twisted in knots about that sort of thing, so I'd understand if it's the same for others. :P
There are other arguments against multiple Big Bangs that make more sense to me. Like, because of the huge amount of work that an author puts into their fic, and because they have to respect their posting date, they often end up producing less fic during the Big Bang season. Same with exchanges and challenges. So that feels like a more valid argument to me: that people are leaving aside ideas because they're too stressed about ongoing "big" projects which have looming deadlines.
What I don't get, like I said, is the notion that somehow this is some sort of twisted, underhanded ploy to divide fandom.
So can someone explain this?
:::ETA:::
...
It occurs to me that this might possibly attract attention. So. As usual, the rules of healthy debate apply here. Please avoid flaming, ad hominem attacks, and the like. Feel free to comment anonymously, but I will screen/delete anonymous replies that are deliberately wanky. JSYK.