The Utility of Fandom, or What Have You Done For Me Lately?

Someone asked me the other night if it was worth getting involved in the SGA fandom given the recent wankiness. She's a good writer, with a feel for dialogue and a playful sense of humor. I'd love to see her take a crack at John/Rodney. We talked for a while and it got me thinking.

The Utility of Fandom, or What Have You Done For Me Lately?

Ultimately, what matters in fandom is what you produce. What you give to the fandom.

If you generously write stories for people to read, run archives to make the fics available, go through the effort of combing through and recommending good stories, beta-read stories, or run challenges and communities and newsletters -- what you've done for others is what will matter. That dedication and sincere effort.

Challenge communities: There may be squawks of complaint over how a challenge is handled. But ultimately, the person who ran the challenge made dozens or even hundreds of stories available.

Writers and Betas: There may be people who get upset about this or that aspect of a story. But eventually, the smoke clears, and the story (or stories) remain. And people enjoy them. Months down the line no one cares about the wank. Happens all the time.

Reccers: I've yet to hear of a wank surrounding a rec-list (if you want to participate wank-free, you may have just found your niche). But if there ever were one, personally, I only remember gratitude for reliably good story recs.

Newsletters and Archivists: Someone might complain about how a newsletter is run, or about an archive's policies. But in the long run, they're both darned useful, and that effort (and money) has made stories more readily available.

I don't say the trite, "this too shall pass." What I mean to say is that I've noticed those who complain very often produce nothing for the rest of us. There is nothing tangible, no stories, no community, no archives, nothing for us to enjoy or participate in (unless you like schadenfreude).

For those who do the work -- keep writing the stories. Run your communities, archives, and rec-lists. You're the ones doing something for the fans. Believe me, the readers know who's done something for them lately. ltlj? Has given us a lot of great stories.

For those who want change: add to the fandom. The field is wide open. There are no start-up costs, no barriers, anyone can write anything. Start a community. Begin a challenge to promote the kinds of stories you want to see. There are plenty of successful politically motivated fanfic communities. Put your webspace to use and create an archive; eFiction is easy to install. If not, prepare to be disappointed and for your words to be like dust.

The equation is simple. The fanfiction community runs on, shock of shocks, fanfiction.

Even this essay. Pfft. It'll be gone in a day or two. Since I'm a fanfic writer, I'd better get back to work on that John/Lorne fic.