An Archive Of One's Own

[astolat]

**NEW ETA**: we're going to take a stab at putting this together. For more information and discussion, please join and/or watch fanarchive.

ETA: If you are coming to the conversation late, xenacryst has helpfully collected up a bunch of links to a subset of noteworthy discussion threads, over here!

First, why fanfic is not illegal and why YOU should stop

Comments

[cathexys]

Thank you

[gchick]

I've been struggling more and more with the whole issue of publicity vs. hiding what we do. I spend a lot of time teaching people to remix and transform and appropriate (and vid, for that matter), but from a place of "these are incredibly culturally powerful tools, but I can't tell you where I learned them...."

Every time I see big shiny celebrations of fan culture that completely ignore 40 years of women's creative work, I want to not only let my freak flag fly, but march up and down the streets with it -- and then something else (lately fanlib, but it's far from the first) reminds me that getting out there without doing it on our own terms is only a small part of the battle. It seems like a fan-culture site that gets our culture while really making the most of the internet as it is now (as opposed to publicizing fan work just for the sake of ad dollars or eyeball-share or whatthehellever)... oh, yes.

[cathexys]

I think we're definitely working on various fronts to get the word out, to not let our history disappear!!!

But yes, I like the idea of a fan culture site as the underlying concept :D

[laurashapiro]

Oooh! What vids did you show him? Which ones did he use in his class?

[slodwick]

I would be delighted to help out on something like this, but I don't think I'm qualified to handle the coding/setup. It's a brilliant idea, though.

archive engineering issues

[astolat]

I don't disagree, but I would say that much of the reason that fanfic.net is a badfic haven is because the interfaces and design are bad and not satisfying for the picky readers that most of us are, once we get through the first rush of "omg my fandom!" I know that when ff.net was first launched, I wasn't inherently avoiding it; I avoided it because it was just terrible to use

Re: archive engineering issues

[anatsuno]

I think in our day and age, Something like the "post here AND to LJ at once" tool is actually a necessity to build a large scale fandom site where people will come, post, and play, yeah.

Re: archive engineering issues

[juliabk]

I agree completely with you about fanfic.net. The biggest problem there is the interface. I'm a unifandom reader and I want specific things when I go looking. I simply cannot find what I'm looking for there. I can go to Area52 or somewhere like that and find it in moments. There are archives out there that have some of what's being discussed here, but I've yet to see any software that does it all. The API would be a huge boon. And one thing LJ is *lousy* for is long fics.

[cblynn]

I think this would qualify as a charitable activity. I'd make room in my budget to contribute if this can actually get off the ground.

[almostnever]

You've put a lot of great ideas together here. anatsuno linked me to this post since we were just discussing what our dream fandom site would be like. Here's what I was telling her

f-locking

[astolat]

Yes, I think locking is a very good option to allow (and also google-blocking) on an individual user basis, so the archive lets different people manage their own comfort level.

The problem with adding vids (other than vids as links -- which I think would be brilliant) -- is the massive bandwidth cost, and the bigger questions of legality.

Re: f-locking

[almostnever]

I was thinking vids wouldn't be hosted on this hypothetical dream site, but embedded in posts (like here on LJ) from wherever they're hosted. Or linked, yes.

I'd love to be involved in making something like this real, though I also fret a bit that there would be a lot of herding-cats obstacles as well as the significant technical and design challenges.

Re: f-locking

[redina]

Yes, I think locking is a very good option to allow

Y'know what the kicker is... other than a sitewide search, you've just mostly reiterated LiveJournal. {g} I consider LJ a 'necessary evil' in all it's f-locked, cliqued, and PITA navigation. {chuckle}

Archives are popping up faster than weeds, but folk still run to their journals first and *maybe* consider posting outside LiveJournal. While I think your ideas are good (I was around when FF.net started, as a Trek/ASC archivist), look around us. How many of the writers you're acquainted with primarily just post on LiveJournal versus posting [in addition] to a non-journal? From my own personal experience, I'd say 80-90% of the SPN writers I see only post to LiveJournal. There's a phrase about leading a horse to water (heck, you could've built an irrigation and filtration system) but you can't force it to drink... or something like that. {g}

Dina