(no subject)

[seraphtrevs]

Check out this awesome article about fanfic from TIME magazine!

Seriously, it's the best mainstream article I've read about fanfic. It made my day. :D

Comments

[speccygeekgrrl.livejournal.com]

Holy crap, that's fantastic. My day is also made!

[seraphtrevs.livejournal.com]

I loved this line: Fan fiction is what literature might look like if it were reinvented from scratch after a nuclear apocalypse by a band of brilliant pop-culture junkies trapped in a sealed bunker. HE GETS IT! :D

[gaiafaye.livejournal.com]

"To say that we can think certain things about a story or what might happen next in a story or what might have happened if someone had turned left instead of right but that we can't write them down is absurd."

This is pretty much my thought when people bring up the legality or ethics of fanfic.

There's a genre called Mpreg, which is about male characters getting pregnant, and it's way more popular than you'd think.

.... *cough*

Anyway, thanks for this link! It goes way more into explaining fanfic than other articles have bothered to.

[seraphtrevs.livejournal.com]

This is pretty much my thought when people bring up the legality or ethics of fanfic.

Agreed!

And I was so impressed with the mpreg mention, actually. It wasn't all "EW GROSS" - just, huh, this is a thing.

[aurilly.livejournal.com]

It's so good. I read it last week before it came out in print. It is the most thoughtful, lovely... PERFECT.

And looking forward to your next chapter! :)

[seraphtrevs.livejournal.com]

It just gave me warm fuzzies. Not that I ever want fanfic to be ~mainstream,~ but it's nice to read something from an outsider's perspective that isn't patronizing or judgmental.

And it's coming! I'm off to work on it right now! \o/

[levitatethis.livejournal.com]

This is an incredibly thoughtful look at fanfic -- not only it's origins but what drives it and the purpose it can serve. I like that the writer acknowledges the two sides of the coin -- the arguments for and against it -- while ultimately seeing it as a show of love and admiration and interest in characters that extends far beyond simply sitting back and reading about them.

[seraphtrevs.livejournal.com]

I was so impressed by the whole thing. It not only was a great article of an outsider looking in, but it also brought up some interesting points that even I haven't considered in the 15 years I've been involved in fandom. Good stuff!

[marenpaisley.livejournal.com]

It's funny that my first reaction after reading the article at my parents' house the other week was a feeling of horror. It was like all of the secrets of the secret society I'd stumbled upon at age 14 were leaked to the press and exposed to the world. It's kind of how I feel about Facebook - our actual identities are on the internet?! Outrageous! :D

It is a great article, though. After the initial shock, I was able to read it for what it is. And when you think about it, it's high time that the spotlight was shown on the hobby that is fanfic writing given that so many people participate in it. It'd be interesting to see if there was ever a way to get an estimate as to how many people do read and/or write fic, just to show how prevalent it is. I also got the feeling that the author found the copyright issue to be kind of silly, but that may have just been my own impression.

[seraphtrevs.livejournal.com]

Ahaha, I can definitely understand that reaction. Like, even if fic ever became ~mainstream~ (which I don't think it ever will), I would never ever (ever ever ever EVER) tell anyone IRL that I do it. I mean, maybe if I wrote only gen, but I don't. People just aren't going to get it.

HOWEVER, it was really nice to see a mainstream article that reacted to fic positively instead of "ew gross" or completely baffled as to its existence. (The last reaction has always confused me - like, is it really that hard to imagine that some people might want more stories about books/movies/tv shows they love? I guess most people are just really passive about their entertainment. It always bugs me when people say that TV rots your brain - it only rots your brain if you're not using it while you're watching.)

And yeah, it would be interesting to see how prevalent it actually is. I imagine more so than we might think.

I also got the feeling that the author found the copyright issue to be kind of silly, but that may have just been my own impression

Yeah, I think he was - and he's right. The Organization for Transformative Works, which they mention, has a lot of interesting thoughts (http://transformativeworks.org/faq) about the legality of fanfiction.