Remember this?

[brigdh]

Deep Fanfic Thoughts, by Jack Handey. Oh, man. I'd almost forgotten about that site. So much good stuff. My favorite one is:
People think it's fun to write fanfic because you get all those readers. But they forget the negative side, which is the psychosis.

It's funny because it's true. And then:

I don't think I'm alone when I say I'd like to see more and more planets fall under the ruthless domination of Prospect-L.

Prospect-L! I miss Prospect-L. That was so much fun. I was too scared to ever actually post, but I read all the messages religiously. I learned a lot on that list. Mainly things like 'don't piss off the moderator', but occasionally actual information would sneak through, too. We need another Prospect-L. I suppose fandom_wank is similar, but it's not the same.

And also check out: Life Cycle of the Bitter Old Fanfic Queen.

Comments

[quixotic-sense.livejournal.com]

Except that, as you said, you were too intimidated to participate. I'm not sure that I want a forum with an atmosphere that discourages the less confident to join in.

The thing to remember about anime fandom in general is that the native English-speaking (Western) fandom is a relatively small subset of it. The Chinese-speaking fandom, by all descriptions, is larger and more vibrant. Partly because so many manga get translated into Chinese and they're cheap. Many people of my generation in South-East Asia grew up buying manga (translated into Chinese, Malay/Indonesian, Thai, Filipino, or whatever) from newspaper kiosks for $5. So manga/anime is not really a geek thing, it's a pop culture thing. Especially when you also get Hong Kong martial arts comics and American comics being sold side by side.

I often feel iffy about fanfic critique without the author's consent in anime fandom, because sometimes it does turn out that English is the author's third or fourth language. I'm not a native English speaker either, and I do think that language problems are best corrected through private e-mails.

It's the consent issue that really gets me, though I'm always up for exchanges of information. I just think that I'd prefer it to happen in the context of discussions of the actual source material, rather than fanfic. That said, I'm not a big fan of meta (particularly when it focuses on fandom and fanfic rather than the source material) in general, so YMMV.

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Except that, as you said, you were too intimidated to participate. I'm not sure that I want a forum with an atmosphere that discourages the less confident to join in.

Well, that's true. There is a reason why it had the reputation as the 'mean list'.

I just think that I'd prefer it to happen in the context of discussions of the actual source material, rather than fanfic. That said, I'm not a big fan of meta (particularly when it focuses on fandom and fanfic rather than the source material) in general, so YMMV.

I love meta. And I think it might have been neccessary to have meta in the Sentinel community, at least if you wanted a fairly active list. There just wasn't that much to say about the show itself. It hadn't run for too long, and it was so bad that there wasn't much to comment on. But the fanfic it inspired could do great things with the premise and the characters, and of course there was much more of it.

[quixotic-sense.livejournal.com]

Hmm. If the intimidation factor is resolved (leaving aside the critique issue), such a forum could go a long way towards being a place for interesting and informative discussion. I wonder if it would be wise narrow down its scope, though. The animanga fandom is huge. Even though a lot of animanga fans are multifannish, they don't necessarily love all their fandoms to the same extent. While, say, a comparison of the Shinigami in YnM vs Bleach could be fascinating, are there enough people who crosses over between the two fandoms? And someone who's in it for X and FMA, for example, wouldn't be too impressed with a flood of posts on GetBackers.

Are you thinking of a mailing list or an LJ community?

[wordsofastory.livejournal.com]

Are you thinking of a mailing list or an LJ community?

Oh, I wasn't seriously thinking about starting one. Just being nostalgic over something I was part of, years ago. I don't know nearly enough about the wider anime fandom to run something like this.