Tennis Match Meme

[itsnotmymind]

Meme from lokifan.

So, let’s do the tennis match meme: ask me a question in comments (RL or fandom) and I’ll answer and then ask YOU a question that’s somehow related to yours.

Comments

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

What's your opinion (popular or unpopular) about the current state of fandom culture right now? What are some things that annoy you about it, things that you feel have improved over the years, and things that you feel needs major fixing?

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

I feel like I've been a little distant from fandom lately - in large part because so little of it is on LJ. I kept a tumblr for about a year, but I found the format unpleasant and stressful. Tumblr can be fun when it's about sharing gifs and brief messages, but for conversation, meta, and fic - the bread and butter of fandom - it is absolutely terrible. I have not found a format I enjoy as much as livejournal (and dreamwidth, etc.). I'll never get over fandom backing off on livejournal (unless they find a new format that's just as nice - threaded comments are great!

I do read the Sunnydale Herald, and so keep up with Buffy fandom on tumblr and forums. I don't know that Buffy fandom has really changed that much, as far as people's opinions go. There seems to be less bashing of Buffy the character than there used to be, which is nice.

The fandom I would most want to be involved in is Jessica Jones - I haven't even seen any Jessica Jones fanvids, though they must be out there.

Question for you: This question is more related to my answer than your question, but: What is your favorite format for fandom interaction? LJ? Tumblr? Mailing list? Forum? Other?

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Tumblr can be fun when it's about sharing gifs and brief messages, but for conversation, meta, and fic - the bread and butter of fandom - it is absolutely terrible

Yep, pretty much. I still use Tumblr (have for the past six years now I think?) but I'm not as interactive on there because I've always found it such an impersonal space. As you said, the aspect of conversation and discussion is what keeps fandom alive and it's just not there, at least not in a constructive manner anyway. People are just screaming their thoughts and trying to convince others about how morally right they are and how everything else is wrong. There's no room for discussions or debates or interesting metas, which makes me sad.

There seems to be less bashing of Buffy the character than there used to be, which is nice.

Interestingly, I never saw any Buffy bashing when I was in the BTVS fandom when the show was on. Granted, I wasn't active with online fandom until after the series had ended, but even when reading message boards/forums I never came across any negative of Buffy herself. Perhaps that's a blessing.

The fandom I would most want to be involved in is Jessica Jones - I haven't even seen any Jessica Jones fanvids, though they must be out there.

There's quite a few fanvids on YouTube, some I quite like, though I wish there were more. But the only Jessica Jones side of fandom I've seen has been on Tumblr. I haven't seen much of any talk of it outside of that, aside from people discussing it on ONTD and on individual LJ journals.

Question for you: This question is more related to my answer than your question, but: What is your favorite format for fandom interaction? LJ? Tumblr? Mailing list? Forum? Other?

Honestly? LiveJournal, without a doubt.

The reason for this is because, well, LJ was the first online place I joined and where I found a large community of people to interact with. Before I was just merely lurking on different sites, but I never joined any of them. LJ was the first site I actively joined. The interaction is much easier, especially with comment threads and maintaining control over conversations and archiving them easier than, say, open voids like Tumblr. I'm able to make friends and talk with them instead of just liking/reblogging to validate mutual friendship. I also find I write more here than I do anywhere else, and I enjoy talking with people more here than anywhere else. I know that DW is the alternative place for an LJ-like format, but every time I go there hardly anyone is talking to each other. Which is interesting.

I'm sad that fandom did a mass migration from here to DW/Tumblr/Twitter because I want to talk fandom with people, but nowadays you only mostly see the "oh I don't do fandom" types that bash fannish things which is bizarre to me.

I have heard that there's something new in the works that combines the best things of LJ and Tumblr for people to migrate to, but honestly, I feel like while that might be interesting it'll probably end up like most alternative sites. The thing about fandom is that it's so fragmented now that I doubt there will be one main hub for it anymore. I just wish that people would migrate back to LJ, because yeah some people are uncomfortable with how it's changed which I understand, but LJ is probably by far better for communicating and talking and maintaining control over your own content. IDK. I'm just rambling now.

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

I encountered Buffy-bashing before I ever saw an episode of the show. A feminist blogger I read argued that the writers engaged in gender double standards because Seeing Red was treated as raped, while Buffy giving Spike a blow job in Gone after he tells her to leave. That wasn't the bashing - I disagree with the argument having seen the show, but I don't consider bashing, and at the time had no real opinion on it at all. Somehow I stumbled upon a bunch of Spike fans commenting on this blogger's post, and there I saw the bashing. Buffy was a terrible person who brought the attempted rape on herself, e.g. I was just horrified. When I started watching the show, I was determined I would at least like Buffy, just because the nature of the bashing so disturbed me. Fortunately, I liked her from the start, and ended up loving her.

I agree with you about LJ. In fairness, I was never involced in mailing lists, but LiveJournal is just such a uniquely excellent medium. There are very few places where you can say that the comments on a post are consistently as worth reading as the original post. It's not stressful the way Tumblr is - when I had a tumblr, I was always very aware how many followers I had. I never think about my LJ friends in terms of number. I will never understand why fandom left LJ.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Yikes. :/ I'm glad that I never got that deep within the fandom to see that side, then. Like, how can you not love Buffy Summers? Seriously.

Yeah, also Tumblr has an activity chart to show how many people have liked/reblogged from you, which makes people even more stressed. I think this is a problem not just with Tumblr but other social media platforms in general, since it's mostly focused on the numbers instead of the actual content and people you're interacting with. There seems to be an obsession with focusing on the numbers instead of viewing your followers as actual people.

I will never understand why fandom left LJ.

From my observation over the years it was a number of things, the biggest was definitely the Strikethrough of '07 that kind of really made people contemplate wanting to leave the site for somewhere else. (Tumblr went through something similar recently.) And then came the issues with ownership of the site which got many people wary, so they ended up jumping ship. It's kinda why DW was created to be an alternative place to go to, before Tumblr became kind of the central place for most of fandom to migrate to. So, in a way I understand why fandom left LJ during that time, but it's something I wished that people would just migrate back to because I've seen so many people on Tumblr reminisce about LJ and want that kind of community back again. So I'm like, then just come back? We didn't go anywhere? idk

[itsnotmymind.livejournal.com]

I encountered a lot of Buffy-bashing back in the day - I guess I was hanging out in the wrong places. But I never saw anyone call her the most evil character on the show, so she's still better off than Riley...

Yeah, I would be OK with them migrating back to Dreamwidth! Since it is so similar to LJ, anyway. Admittedly I stopped crossposting to Dreamwidth because it was too much of a pain, but I do have an account and I regularly back up my LJ there.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

It's odd that nobody mentions DW when talking about fandom migrating back to journaling formats. I think that most people among Tumblr circles who miss that will actually prefer DW more if they're still wary of LJ, since that's what it was initially created for, to be a backup alternative.

I do have an account there, but I haven't used it and have only friended a few people who abandoned LJ entirely for DW just to keep tabs on them, but otherwise I don't even go there that much. I also personally dislike the layout of DW and they haven't really updated the site since it was first created, but it does resemble LJ of old which I do like.