On the End of Canon: What keeps a fandom alive?

[icarus]

A question came up on my f-list about the end of canon in Stargate Atlantis.

I'm not sure whether the imminent end of the series has any significant effect on readership

In the Harry Potter fandom it certainly didn't. I can't imagine the end of the series would have a significant impact right away. Quite the opposite. There's a spike in interest as people mourn, fret over what's not neatly tied up, are annoyed at the author's/PTB's ships, or just miss it and want more, darn it. In time I think it will taper off as people find other active canons and drift to new fandoms, but no boom is going to be lowered late December, no, not at all.

How active the fandom remains depends on the fandom:

- Do the main archives, challenges, communities, still have people to run them? (Most Important Factor.)
- Is the fandom old enough to have a solid body of work, and fandom tropes, to sustain it?
- Are there lots of Swiss cheese-like holes remaining to play in?
- How dependent on canon is the fandom (are the majority of fics episode tags, or have the fic writers embraced AUs and crossovers)?
- How committed are the fans to keeping their fandom alive? Have fans declared that nothing will stop their ship? Or have they been ho-hum about the end of their series?
- Are there other factors to keep the fandom alive? Spin-offs, movies, conventions.

Comments

[nemesina77.livejournal.com]

To be honest, I still haven't read DH, it's actually still in it's Amazon.com special cardboard wrapping in my spare bedroom. When I heard about all the deaths I was too upset to read it, nevermind the epilogue. Basically, I'm living in AU land, which is what I mostly read in most fandoms anyway!

[icarusancalion.livejournal.com]

I'm caught between horror, amusement, and being mildly impressed. I could never have not read it.

[nemesina77.livejournal.com]

Well, to be honest, when it came I had already read several people's reactions, because I didn't get it until the day after, because it, for some reason, got sent to my parent's house instead of my apartment. So I'd read basically everything that had happened and I realized that I was really upset and that I couldn't read it at that point so it was probably smarter to wait a while. Snape was my favorite character and I hated that she did that to Fred and George. Plus, the whole epilogue sounded like something from FF.net.

I'll probably eventually read it though, I usually re-read all of the books before I go and see the newest installments in the movie series.