(no subject)

[uisceros]

With the advent of a book I've been waiting a year for (oh the waiting!), I got thinking about the Harry Potter fandom, and fandoms in general.


The HP fandom was not my first fandom, but it's the one that's stayed with me the longest. Other things come and go, but I've been in the HP fandom since 1998, I believe.

Anyway, I've been in it forever. So it's special to me.

Occasionally I would partake in discussions, but overall my focus was fanfic. Still, I did know quite a bit about the fandom on a whole. HP fandom is huge, and the shipping area of it is massive. There are ships for characters you'd never guess. And these ships all have names... and symbols. There are captains. It's insane and hard to describe to people who don't know.

Like, my ship; Leather and Libraries. Otherwise known as Dramione. There's an official candy (Lifesavers)...

Anyway, what I was getting to is the massive HP fandom controversies that happened. Somehow I missed them all.

I don't know about other fandoms, but in the HP fandom we have BNFs (Big Name Fans). And there are fangirls for the BNFs. Cassie Claire is/was one. And from that (the desire to be a BNF, the desire to bring down BNF, fighting BETWEEN the BNFs, etc) there was an intense amount of discord. Stuff that honestly disgusted me, because aren't we supposed to banded together over something? Isn't that the purpose of fandom?

I haven't really encountered stuff like that in this fandom, which makes me extremely happy. Then again, I avoid forums and discussion boards because honestly, I don't want to hear the negativity. I'm in this fandom because I love it. I don't want to hear other people being negative.

That being said, I really love reading Fandom Wank, because some of the stuff is really ridiculous.


In closing, thank you people of the drama fandom, for being so utterly, amazingly, totally awesome! *squishes* Love you all!

Also, totally going to be MIA for a few days while I read my book. Which I am getting tonight! So excited!

Comments

[omizu.livejournal.com]

I am a lurker in the Harry Potter fandom. I lurk with the skills of a mother f-ing ninja.

That said I'm also a Harry/Draco shipper. *shrugs* Can't help it.

Lately I've been writing Naruto fanfiction. I have two stories I'm working on over at ff.net

What book are you getting? *curious*

[uisceros.livejournal.com]

Yay! Another lurker! *high fives*

I never got aboard the slash train in HP fic for some reason (though I did read the strangest slash hermaphrodite fic once)... I ship Draco/Hermione almost exclusively. But, you know, anything with Draco makes me super happy.

Cool! I am painfully unaware of most things manga, but now I totally want to check out your fics... despite not know what they're about... I never really wrote fic (though I do have three random Animorph poems from 1998), but I've already read it.

I am getting City of Glass by Cassandra Clare, the last book in her Mortal Instruments Triology. I've liked her writing style since her epic Draco Triology (which if you haven't read, you SHOULD. It's Harry/Hermione in general, but there's some AWESOME Draco/Harry undertones), so the whole things makes me super excited.

[omizu.livejournal.com]

well I'm usually terribly embarrassed by my writing, but here's the link to my stories.

www.fanfiction.net/~gentlewatersoul


hhmmm I'll check them out, they look familiar. (cause I love me some books all the time too)

[uisceros.livejournal.com]

Sorry it's taken me so long to reply!!

I didn't read any of your Naruto fic yet, but I DID read the HP one. I really really really liked it! Really liked how you characterized Draco's reaction to finding out he was part Veela. It makes sense though, I mean, for his whole life he was taught that being anything less that pureblood was vile. And then suddenly he finds out that he is the enemy, so to speak.

I especially liked how he dressed up to die. Such a Draco thing to do.

[airplanemusic.livejournal.com]

I think every decently large fandom will have BNFs and their ass-kissers. I know it exists in Johnny's fandom, though I didn't really read enough forums/communities to know many of them by name.

[uisceros.livejournal.com]

I honestly have no clue. The only fandoms I've gotten heavily involved with are the Harry Potter fandom (in-so-where you cannot avoid the BNFs, even if you tried), the POTC fandom (where we had semi-BNFs, but I liked all of them, and there was no controversy), and the drama fandom, where I haven't gotten myself involved in the BNF business. The only reason I know most of the old school HP BNFs is from fanfic. Since the drama com doesn't really have that much fic, I'm kinda in the dark.

I think I hate the ass kissers the most, more than the BNFs. Like, being nice and pleasant is one thing, but when someone changes their whole opinions on something JUST because of what a BNF thinks? That's ridiculous. Granted, I'm not entirely exempt from it. I was a bit of a BNF fangirl back in the day. But I blame youth for that.

It's sad, because I kinda want to be one, but I think that's true of everyone... we all want fame, even if it's only relative.

[alexandral.livejournal.com]

Big fandoms scare me. At some point it stops being about enjoying the book/the movie/the tv show and starts being about talking about talking about talking . :D I like reading FandomWank.

I think dorama fandom also has BNFs (as any other fandom I knew) who usually can influence opinions of the rest of the fandom.

[uisceros.livejournal.com]

I agree, it's like people forget why they're in the fandom to begin with!

Fandom Wank is hilarious, and I love it. I especially love that they expose the major hypocrisies of some fandom people.

I don't really know any drama fandom BNFs myself (maybe dramabeans?), but as I was with HP, I'm not hugely invested in following fandom fashion. Mostly for the reason that I don't want to be influenced by it. I like my own opinions, thanks you very much :D

Come to think of it, maybe it was the BNF influence that exacerbated the BBF backlash...

[biases.livejournal.com]

Ooh, do you think you could rec me some good Draco/Hermione stories? I read an awesome one a while back and it piqued my interest; if you have any links I'd love you (more!) forever. ♥

[uisceros.livejournal.com]

OF COURSE!

You're in luck. I made a rec list about three years ago. Most of the links are dead, but you'd probably be able to find most of them by googling the title + fanfic. If you can't find some but really want to read them let me know. I'd probably be able to find them somehow. (The Draco Triology, which is the first one listed, is extremely hard to find, but worth it. If you want to read it, I have it downloaded somewhere)

http://uisceros.livejournal.com/120660.html

(Btw, they're mostly smutty...)

[satoyan]

Awww, the first steady fic stream I got into was Dramione. I was never in the fandom at all except for reading fic, not even enough to know the name (although I've heard it a few times), but I still read some Draco/Hermione stories sometimes. My first real fic OTP!

[uisceros.livejournal.com]

Yay, another Dramione-er! I'm also weirdly surprised when I meet others, even though it's a pretty large ship, considering the uncanon-ness of it all.

I only read fic as well, but I was also around for the establishment of Fiction Alley, as well as the hey-day of the BNFs. Fandom crap was unavoidable at that time.

Despite my intense love for D/Hr, I haven't read any fic in a long time. Which makes me sad, actually. I should read some soon. It's funny, I actually started out a rabid H/Hr shipper (and I still ship them in canon, D/Hr doesn't work well in canon for me), but D/Hr is my true OTP.