In which I blame Tumblr for destroying fandom (kinda)

[the_deep_magic]

Ugh.  I have only caught the barest whiff of wank (that doesn't sound right, but you know what I mean) on Tumblr because I follow only a few people, but I have to say, I think the shift to Tumblr is seriously undermining fandom, any fandom, as a community.  Just about every fandom I follow is involved, and I know wank is nothing new, but even a few

Comments

[anivad]

"I WANT TO LOOK AT PICTURES OF ZQ, NOT HAVE TO READ WANK."

this is the best reaction to Tumblr.

[the_deep_magic]

I still post everything to LJ first, but yeah, even when I post to a comm I feel like I'm talking to myself.

[eefreeboo]

I feel this way too mostly. It's great for pretty pics and the place to go if you want to see them first but it's a nightmare to navigate and rubbish for interacting. I also find some of the etiquettes strange and am forever wary of standing on toes if I post or reblog so I mainly just lurk. It also seems extremely cliquey at times (people only reblogging things friends post when you know they've seen the same thing posted before; only using the tags for comments. The latter can be quite amusing but you have to click on each individual post for each person to see them. Who on earth has the time to do all that?!). It's a nightmare for spoilers/rants atm too so I'm just skimming it for pics and hoping I don't see anything that drives me mad

[therumjournals]

Please do this! I keep seeing references to various interviews on Twitter, then I come to LJ and either see just a few gifs or nothing, and I don't have time to go scouring for the sources. I would love you forever if you would put them all in one place where we could squee over them communally :)

[anivad]

Get Missing E! then you can see all the tags in one place.

[the_deep_magic]

Yeah the fact that there's no "mutual followers only" option makes me very, very hesitant about what I post. I mean, even posting publicly to LJ, usually only your friends read it (and THAT'S incredibly telling: "friends" vs. "followers"). On Tumblr, it could get reblogged who knows where or in what context and you could have people jumping all over themselves and you to prove how morally superior they are. It hasn't happened to me, but mostly because I only reblog funny pics.

[meine_liebe]

I mostly just keep tumblr for pics. tbh the fans in tumblr are scary. they can just flame everyone/everywhere just to re-tumblr a pic/fic/news. which is kinda mess up i think.

[the_deep_magic]

Yeah, it seems like everybody goes off the rails for things that are taken out of context. I don't know, maybe it's just a small number of very vocal people, but it seems like the crazier they are, the more likes and reblogs they get.

[meine_liebe]

it's not small number coz I heard it's getting bad as in even the actors are 'aware' of the fanatical fans. The thing is tumblr most of the time have no lock post or filters. everyone everywhere can see, unlike lj/dreamwidth. even AO3 have lock fics only members can see.

[therumjournals]

I agree with everything you said. I've been clinging to LJ and really hope that people will come back, but not holding out hope due to the combo of AO3 and tumblr....which are just NOT the same for incubating that communal fandom feeling.

[the_deep_magic]

Yeah, I love AO3 as a fic archive (No character limits! Searchable tabs! PDFs aplenty!) but it's definitely not the same as posting to an LJ comm. Kudos are nice, but comments are better.

[marlee813]

I'm glad someone could say this better than I could. This has been something that's really been bothering me since that whole malicious attack that had people leaving LJ like it was on fire. While I've had tumblr longer than I've had LJ, there truly is no sense of community in the sense of everyone coming together. I miss the community feeling and the mass flailing of fans in one convenient thread. While I love tumblr, mostly for its pictures, the wank for ANY fandom is getting ridiculous and I find myself having to avoid tags for certain people; and while I love AO3, it's mostly centered around kudos, where comments are rare and limited to the fandom of the moment. It's a lazy way of saying you like the fic, whereas I prefer the insightful or even flaily comments people either leave or I leave for them.

I'm gripping tightly onto LJ as well. And I hope people start coming back.

[the_deep_magic]

Yeah, I have a love-hate relationship with kudos. And hit counts. I've had several people comment to me that they pick what they read by the ratio of kudos to hit count, which is kind of ridiculous. And if I were mostly posting Pinto instead of Teen Wolf fics (which is the fandom of the moment), I'd hardly get any comments at all.