Escapade 2016 Panel "Who Are We?"
Mar. 1st, 2016 05:05 pm![[personal profile]](/%20https://www.npmjs.com/package/ocr-https-www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
strangerI had a great time at Escapade. princessofgeeks came to the convention this year, and she abetted and encouraged my "all meta, all the time, meta is my drug of choice" mindset.
The last two panels I went to included this and "Fandom is Fic" (see adjacent post).
WHO ARE WE?
Escapade 2016 panel, noon Sunday
Moderators: Aral, Katie
Description: How do we define ourselves as slash fans in this age of so many OT3s and etc? Is slash-only space slipping away? (And would that be bad?)
Things people said, paraphrased but mostly in order:
Introductory remarks:
ConText, an East-coast slash convention modeled on Escapade has considered itself "slash only," meaning m/m or f/f only, but now has changed that to "queering the canon."
And: "Slash" is now "shipping" for many younger fans, a symptom of the change of atmosphere in fandom.
Question from mods: What does "slash" mean to different fans?
Answers from different fans:
* A fan uses "slash" as the accepted term for a class of fanfic that would have to be described in a long paragraph.
* Slash is fic on a queer spectrum.
* Slash includes threesomes and poly.
* Yaoi has its own traditions and specific sexualized terms.
* Slash can include casual hook-ups, although others are bothered by OTPs that are unfaithful to each other.
* The OTP concept is part of the conversation about slash.
* Slash is one expression of my gay identity.
* A slash fan may write any or all pairings and groups, including m/m.
* A self-identified older fan, who started in gen, sees "slash" as a sexual relationship of any pair within fanfic.
* Fan who likes men, two men better, three men still better, etc, says early slash presented an m/m pair with difficulties based on social acceptance, or not, of the relationship, but slash conflicts now can be built on difficulties with specific characters' personalities.
* The term "slash" wasn't used until after K/S wasn't the only pairing in fandom, since a general term wasn't needed until then.
* Queer as Folk led to fan stories based on canon same-sex relationships being classed with slash in practice.
* Fans inexperienced in using AO3 have problems tagging and finding types of stories.
* Queer threesomes including well-developed screen female characters feel like slash.
* The term OTP may be used to mean my most valued relationship, whether it's a twosome or threesome or whatever.
* Original fiction about queer characters has to define its own new terms, not using "slash."
* Slash is a new romance genre without the oppressive heteronormative paradigm. Even threesomes are edging into romance-trope territory.
* Poly stories must overcome barriers to being accepted, and slash is easier and even clichéd in comparison.
* M/m/f relationships perpetuate male over-representation; but f/f/m relationships can feed into porn tropes of two women entertaining a man.
Mods: Newer social media, and the way AO3 tags and classifies fanfic, how do those affect fandom?
Answers:
* There are new ways of finding recs, such as tumblr rather than someone's list on a website.
* Mainstream vocabulary is also expanding.
* Specific fandoms (Smallville...) need categories beyond "slash", such as "emo" or "m/m hatefic" that wouldn't be as common in fandom at large.
* AO3 tags don't filter very well, since you can't rank them in a search. It's easy to get umpteen stories with your desired tag as the last or least important, not the primary pairing or first description.
* Tumblr has its own tagging style, and story-summary style, which can be part of the creative presentation as commentary on the story or genre or another story. Use of very freeform and wacky tags ("mandolin" or "not your grandmother's Jack Harkness") doesn't translate well to AO3's wrangled, standardized tag system, where it's not recognized as part of the whole fic. This was compared to the use of "<snark>snarky comment</snark>" and "#made-up-hashtag-category" as now used in casual text as meaningful, not as formatting, especially on the web. It's not tradition and not everyone sees it as valid, but it communicates efficiently to some groups in (and out) of fandom.
* AO3 was created in reaction to the LJ bannings and strikeouts. It took off as a fic platform when the younger fans using tumblr realized that tumblr is a terrible platform for fic. [Transcriber note: Not sure this lines up chronologically, but it was a clearly-stated viewpoint in the panel.]
* LJ/DW had a custom of conversation about a posted fic in the comments section, but this isn't done much on AO3, which is a loss. Where can meta and story critique happen?
* We need threaded comments to make sense of a conversation. [Transcriber note: AO3 has them, but I don't know how well they nest.]
* AO3 is a public space, at least within fandom, while LJ/DW have a specific fan who "owns" a forum and moderates its comments, so LJ/DW feel more private in that sense.
* AO3 is now hosting non-fiction, such as meta essays.
Mods: "Slash, back to slash," a call for final comments
Comments from the audience:
* A teacher's 18-year-old class was 3/4 people who recognized "slash" as a term, but all the class members use "ship" for any and all pairings. "Slash" has become a historical term for younger fans.
* Can "ship" be used for platonic relationships? Yet?
* One complicating issue not addressed by the traditional terms is asexuality.
Final summary: What is it important to identify as now? Specific-fandom fan? Slash fan? Other-trope fan?
# # #
princessofgeeks came to the convention this year, and she abetted and encouraged my "all meta, all the time, meta is my drug of choice" mindset. The last two panels I went to included this and "Fandom is Fic" (see adjacent post).
WHO ARE WE?
Escapade 2016 panel, noon Sunday
Moderators: Aral, Katie
Description: How do we define ourselves as slash fans in this age of so many OT3s and etc? Is slash-only space slipping away? (And would that be bad?)
Things people said, paraphrased but mostly in order:
Introductory remarks:
ConText, an East-coast slash convention modeled on Escapade has considered itself "slash only," meaning m/m or f/f only, but now has changed that to "queering the canon."
And: "Slash" is now "shipping" for many younger fans, a symptom of the change of atmosphere in fandom.
Question from mods: What does "slash" mean to different fans?
Answers from different fans:
* A fan uses "slash" as the accepted term for a class of fanfic that would have to be described in a long paragraph.
* Slash is fic on a queer spectrum.
* Slash includes threesomes and poly.
* Yaoi has its own traditions and specific sexualized terms.
* Slash can include casual hook-ups, although others are bothered by OTPs that are unfaithful to each other.
* The OTP concept is part of the conversation about slash.
* Slash is one expression of my gay identity.
* A slash fan may write any or all pairings and groups, including m/m.
* A self-identified older fan, who started in gen, sees "slash" as a sexual relationship of any pair within fanfic.
* Fan who likes men, two men better, three men still better, etc, says early slash presented an m/m pair with difficulties based on social acceptance, or not, of the relationship, but slash conflicts now can be built on difficulties with specific characters' personalities.
* The term "slash" wasn't used until after K/S wasn't the only pairing in fandom, since a general term wasn't needed until then.
* Queer as Folk led to fan stories based on canon same-sex relationships being classed with slash in practice.
* Fans inexperienced in using AO3 have problems tagging and finding types of stories.
* Queer threesomes including well-developed screen female characters feel like slash.
* The term OTP may be used to mean my most valued relationship, whether it's a twosome or threesome or whatever.
* Original fiction about queer characters has to define its own new terms, not using "slash."
* Slash is a new romance genre without the oppressive heteronormative paradigm. Even threesomes are edging into romance-trope territory.
* Poly stories must overcome barriers to being accepted, and slash is easier and even clichéd in comparison.
* M/m/f relationships perpetuate male over-representation; but f/f/m relationships can feed into porn tropes of two women entertaining a man.
Mods: Newer social media, and the way AO3 tags and classifies fanfic, how do those affect fandom?
Answers:
* There are new ways of finding recs, such as tumblr rather than someone's list on a website.
* Mainstream vocabulary is also expanding.
* Specific fandoms (Smallville...) need categories beyond "slash", such as "emo" or "m/m hatefic" that wouldn't be as common in fandom at large.
* AO3 tags don't filter very well, since you can't rank them in a search. It's easy to get umpteen stories with your desired tag as the last or least important, not the primary pairing or first description.
* Tumblr has its own tagging style, and story-summary style, which can be part of the creative presentation as commentary on the story or genre or another story. Use of very freeform and wacky tags ("mandolin" or "not your grandmother's Jack Harkness") doesn't translate well to AO3's wrangled, standardized tag system, where it's not recognized as part of the whole fic. This was compared to the use of "<snark>snarky comment</snark>" and "#made-up-hashtag-category" as now used in casual text as meaningful, not as formatting, especially on the web. It's not tradition and not everyone sees it as valid, but it communicates efficiently to some groups in (and out) of fandom.
* AO3 was created in reaction to the LJ bannings and strikeouts. It took off as a fic platform when the younger fans using tumblr realized that tumblr is a terrible platform for fic. [Transcriber note: Not sure this lines up chronologically, but it was a clearly-stated viewpoint in the panel.]
* LJ/DW had a custom of conversation about a posted fic in the comments section, but this isn't done much on AO3, which is a loss. Where can meta and story critique happen?
* We need threaded comments to make sense of a conversation. [Transcriber note: AO3 has them, but I don't know how well they nest.]
* AO3 is a public space, at least within fandom, while LJ/DW have a specific fan who "owns" a forum and moderates its comments, so LJ/DW feel more private in that sense.
* AO3 is now hosting non-fiction, such as meta essays.
Mods: "Slash, back to slash," a call for final comments
Comments from the audience:
* A teacher's 18-year-old class was 3/4 people who recognized "slash" as a term, but all the class members use "ship" for any and all pairings. "Slash" has become a historical term for younger fans.
* Can "ship" be used for platonic relationships? Yet?
* One complicating issue not addressed by the traditional terms is asexuality.
Final summary: What is it important to identify as now? Specific-fandom fan? Slash fan? Other-trope fan?
# # #
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-02 02:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-04 02:46 pm (UTC)Ship wars will always be with us, but it's not so much the GAY IS BAD OH NO MY EYES thing any more, at least not inside our community.
Thanks for the write up. Much to ponder here.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 06:53 am (UTC)That was me saying that, and I stand by it. AO3 went into open beta in late 2009. At the time, I couldn't give my invites away. Nobody cared. A couple of years (and FFN mass deletions) later, there started to be a lot of discussion on Tumblr about how awesome AO3 was and how "nobody" used FFN anymore (demonstrably untrue, but those conversations were happening in those kinds of terms).
The initial AO3 users were from the LJ-based fandom that spawned the site, but the massive backlog on the queue for AO3 invites came after the site became visible to people outside of that sort of community. The most important factors, IMO, were 1. enough time passing that new big-fandom-creating canons came out (older fandoms already being entrenched on older platforms), 2. FFN engaging in its regular practice of alienating current users and chasing off a bunch of organized people who could tell their friends where they were heading, and 3. Tumblr switching from seeing FFN as the default to seeing AO3 as the default. The last two are intertwined, though some of the "Let's move to AO3" discussions happened in FFN forums too.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 07:28 am (UTC)Apologies for miscalculating Tumblr's age. I became aware of it as a platform well after AO3 took off, and didn't think to check my assumption.
(no subject)
Date: 2016-03-09 07:41 am (UTC)February 2007: founded
2007-2009: lots of arty hipsters, increasing numbers of young fans who were never on LJ at all (including lots of that vast hoard of fans who got into fandom via Quizilla choose your own adventure/quiz fanfic)
2009-2011: LJ types start flooding to Tumblr in greater numbers, non-LJ fans also increase in numbers (college kids finding fandom for the first time, people from other kinds of forums and things, FFN people looking for more social interaction), some of the arty hipsters move on to yet newer social media
2012+: "Fandom" is completely entrenched in its new home and LJ is emptied out
That's just kind of vague. But "fandom" was definitely big on Tumblr before us LJ/DW types threw in the towel and headed over there. There are plenty of people on Tumblr who will post about usenet or zines or dinosaurs roaming the earth, but I think we were joining an existing community.
(no subject)
Date: 2024-07-28 06:47 pm (UTC)