Quote of the Day

[morgandawn]

Thank goodness fandom never got this memo: where would we be without the My Little Pony crossover porn, the wingfic and the sea cucumber shapeshifting slash?

"... the net is probably not the best place for [fans] to display their work. It is also accessed by a much wider audience, and there will therefore be pressure to avoid extremely graphic scenes, the most controversial topics, and the weirdest settings and plots. "

Comments

[hannah]

I still love your anecdote that the only two things everyone agreed needed warnings were scat and Michael Jackson.

[mecurtin]

What delusional person said that?

[xenacryst]

Ahhhh... AHAHAHAHAHA HEEEEE WHOOP *giggle*

*snort*

[morgandawn]

I remember sitting next to a zine editor and friend at Escapade in the late 1990s wondering if we would ever be allowed to talk openly about incest fic. This was after the slash fan community had finally agreed that we, as women, could admit to liking non-con fic (but before the phrase dub con was created - a phrase that only exists inside media fandom).

It may all start with Mary Jane but it quickly slides into Mary Sue D/S, BDSM fic.

[elf]

Wow, now I wanna see what's still hidden away on paper, if the net isn't getting the extremely graphic controversial weirdness.

[morgandawn]

this was written in the mid 1990s...and besides its all been printed on French postcards already.

[rivkat]

I have sympathy for bad predictions, because I've made enough of my own. But I grin anyway!

[morgandawn]

So true. Nothing like reading your own emails from 1995 on various topics (fandom, slash, whatever) to realize we all have an inner dork who spouts off from time to time.

Last year when I was sitting with a few fans I knew 'way back when', I mentioned some silly position that we'd all adopted in an ongoing fannish argument. They were horrified and denied they'd ever think such a stupid thing! I was tempted to go back home, dig up our emails and send it to them...but I realized that most people don't want to be looking at the email equivalent of 20 year old pictures of themselves with poofy hair and Flashdance leg warmers.

OTOH, sometimes it is fun to open the 'album' and peek and giggle.

[tazlet]

Well, they were right about the pressure--just not about the outcome. Where did you find that?

Nevermind...

[tazlet]

Oh, that's right-you've been reading old letter 'zines.

[niqaeli]

Huh. I can see how someone might theorise that but the benefit of hindsight is great for showing how badly that miscalculates the online environment's effect!

The pressure still exists, but it's far less effective online than it was previously. The sense of anonymity probably contributes (whether that sense of anonymity is true or whether it actually provides any safety is a whole other issue), but also just the fact that the internet is so large. More fans get together, spark brainstorms, and if you get like-minded fen around each other, they're much more likely to follow the rabbithole down farther.

But who saw that coming in the 90's?

(Maybe anyone who saw the proliferation of porn of all kinds on the internet coming would've seen the proliferation of acceptable fandom tropes coming...)

[stewardess]

The net is so huge there is even room for spaces where fans get together to feel pressured to avoid extremely graphic scenes and controversial topics I think it's called www.henneth-annun.net. :D

[sabaceanbabe]

But isn't that what fandom is all about???

[cee_m]

LOL. Yeah. Something like that.