gwyn: (Default)
[personal profile] gwyn
I probably should do a big dump of days, shouldn't I, to catch up? But I'm not. I am a contrarian, I guess.

Day 2

In your own space, create a list of at least three fannish things you'd love to receive, something you've wanted but were afraid to ask for - a fannish wish-list of sorts. Leave a comment in this post saying you did it. Include a link to your wish-list if you feel comfortable doing so. Maybe someone will grant a wish. Check out other people's posts. Maybe you will grant a wish. If any wishes are granted, we'd love it if you link them to this post.


1. I would love beyond reason, and I feel really ridic asking for this, but spirit of the challenge, yadda yadda, to see some fanworks inspired by my fanworks. I thought it was so interesting and cool to have podfics of a few fics this past year, and the fanmix playlists inspired by Things We Lost in the War literally made me cry, it was so amazing. I don't really know any artists in my current fandoms, so I know it's really unlikely to ever have art or story covers based on anything I wrote, but wow, that would be beyond amazing. One can dream (and I think that's the fan writer dream, isn't it? Art inspired by your writing? And the artist's dream, fic inspired by your drawing?). I confess I've considered even commissioning someone to draw something (is it weird that I want to see the scene where Steve and Bucky eat ice cream in the Groundhog Day fic?), but I don't even know how to go about doing that, so mostly I just dream.

2. I really miss collaborating on vids. I've never collaborated on fic. But I think collaborating with someone for something would be a wonderful thing to do that I miss. There are ways to do vids over the interwebs, I think, and though I've never done it with fic, I see people do it all the time, so that seems like something fun to try.

3. Comments. Recs. Not for me, necessarily (though I'm never gonna turn that away), but sperrywink inspired me to remember that this is a thing I want for the world: I want people to comment or make recs (whether it's a formal rec on a list or a reblog with your comments about it) for a fanwork or a creator's body of work, especially someone who's not a BNF who's already drowning in comments and is recced everywhere in the universe. Because yeah, the kudos button is great, whatever, but so often, even if anonymous commenting is enabled--yes, that's a thing you can do sometimes!--people won't do it, even if they like something. Or they stay silent and just hit a like button on tumblr or never post a rec to a community they're part of for various reasons.

But there are a lot of things out there that just don't get the love or attention they deserve, and knowing that so many people sort for things based on hits to comments ratios or what have you, that those works will never get the love they deserve makes me really sad. And those comments sometimes can be the difference between that creator feeling hopeless and worthless and never creating again, and feeling inspired and worthwhile and eager to keep going. There are communities out there that exist just to shit on creators ("this person should kill themselves" was a line a friend saw once), and I would like those of us who aren't vile, disgusting people to counteract that and spread love instead of nastiness. I know sometimes commenting seems fraught--there are people who'll be crappy if you commented on an old fic, or who never respond, or pick fights, or whatever. But those folks, I think, are outliers, and for the most part, people are thrilled to receive even a tiny "I liked this!" It's often the same fics or the people getting all the comments, so it would be even cooler if you commented or recced something that is under-recognized.

But that's what I wish for--that you will make the effort to leave even a tiny comment, or reblog a fanwork announcement post with at least "rec" on it. For anyone, even if, yeah, it's already got a million notes, but someone who might be under the radar is even better. Just…let people know you value the time and effort. Because fanworks come from the heart. They are not paid for except by sharing love. And I am sad at how one-sided a lot of that squee and sharing love has become. It's a gift economy, and your gift can be a comment or a rec.

Date: 2016-01-05 09:03 pm (UTC)
ratcreature: RatCreature at the drawing board. (drawing)
From: [personal profile] ratcreature
that's the fan writer dream, isn't it?

Not every author seems to like art. I remember in SGA I did a acrylic painting that illustrated a story and posted a link in the LJ comments and never heard anything back. That was a bit disappointing. I liked the story so much that I spent so many hours creating art for it an never heard anything back.

I guess it s always a risk if you don't ask before whether they'd even like art, but I find asking in advance awkward, because sometimes I don't finish art and don't want to disappoint, and if I already finished something, I'm going to post it.

Date: 2016-01-05 09:33 pm (UTC)
dorinda: Someone writing at a desk while wearing a large helmet with an oxygen tube attached (a device called "The Isolator"). (isolator)
From: [personal profile] dorinda
I'm happy to see you snowflakin'! And re: comments/recs, allow me to heartily second that. Any tiny word of feedback just puts me into orbit for days. I know a lot of "Web 2.0" (blergh) these days seems to be about, you know, "yell your 'content' (double blergh) into the void", but I'm not finding myself well-suited to that sort of thing. If there's anyone out there who reads my thing and is willing to say something back, I'm immensely heartened. ♥

Date: 2016-01-05 10:14 pm (UTC)
sineala: (Avengers: Steve: Hand in hair)
From: [personal profile] sineala
Coincidentally on the topic of recs, did you know you've been recced on Fancake today? :)

If I could art, I would art you an art. You deserve it. :) I have never formally commissioned fanart but I know a bunch of people on Tumblr who routinely commission fanart of their own stories and have made recs lists of the people they've worked with, so I think it has to be something that's doable and I'm sure there are plenty of people who would be very excited to get art commissions. (I think this is also why people sign up for Big Bangs -- I saw on Tumblr that there is going to be a Stucky one. IDK if you saw that.)

I've never figured out how to collaborate on fic yet, but I see other people doing it, so it must have worked out somehow. I have collaborated on vids but that's really more of "we are in the same house using the same computer and it's your turn to do the second verse." I guess Google Docs is probably what all the cool kids use for fic collaboration?

I am trying to be better at commenting on fic I have liked lately, personally. I commented on everything for the Cap-IM Exchange (55 stories) and I'm not saying they were all great comments but I just wanted everyone to have something nice on their story. (Some poor people had negative comments; some people's recipients never commented.) And I think, huh, maybe I should just keep doing that -- I mean, it doesn't take a lot of effort to say, "Hey, I really enjoyed this!" or whatever. So, yeah, I'm with you on that one.

Date: 2016-01-08 03:32 am (UTC)
nagasvoice: lj default (Default)
From: [personal profile] nagasvoice
I've collaborated with folks on fics using Google docs. One person starts the document and invites the others with the right to edit it, not just comment on it. It works something like Word docs "track changes" will (Word docs emailed back and forth would be another method you could use, just a bit slower.) The advantage of Google docs is that all of you can be working live at the same time in Google docs, you see people typing as they go, it's fun. As you add changes, they're color-coded to individual users, or you can add comments with highlighted points placed how you want them to show up, and you can also reply to comments in pretty long strings. It used to get buggy or slow if the piece was really long. When it starts getting over 20 pages I would suggest breaking it up into more workable chunks like chapters to keep it easier to handle. You also have to consider how you're going to manage it if you and your collaborators aren't agreeing on important stuff. For instance, if somebody else is the writer and I'm just beta-reading, I'll comment but I don't expect that person to adopt everything I say.

Date: 2016-01-06 01:36 am (UTC)
killabeez: (Default)
From: [personal profile] killabeez
You know (I hope) that I would really love to collab with you on something. I also hope that might be something I have some actual chance of doing this year. And I'm going to take your request for more comments in the world to heart. ♥

Date: 2016-01-06 07:23 am (UTC)

Date: 2016-01-06 05:52 pm (UTC)
sperrywink: (Default)
From: [personal profile] sperrywink
Awww, thank you for continuing my commenting request to people. That's very cool.

I've collaborated on one story, and it was loads of fun. We did it as a back and forth- one person would write a paragraph or three, and then the next person would continue. We didn't really have a road map, so it was fun to see the twists and turns that developed as the story grew.

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