thefourthvine | Poll: You Make the Call, Because I Sure Can't

I haven't been posting recently, mostly because of real life issues, none of which is amusing. But I'm trying to get back into the swing of things - if I don't post to LJ, eventually all of my writing starts to sound like I'm attempting to give orders to an eight-year-old without leaving any wiggle room the kid can later use to claim that it was not his fault because I never said not to set the house on fire.

But, unfortunately, my recs writing has been stalled by a cohort of evil bacteria. Turns out that if I'm entertaining myself for a full hour, between naps, with internet-based illness metaphors ("switching back to dial-up," for example, and you don't want to know what I did with "information super-highway," although I will note how proud I am that I managed, even in my weakened state, to make an obscene joke out of every word of that phrase), I'm not well enough to produce any recs sets, let alone ones I'd be willing to share with, well, anyone.

Still. I wanted to post something before I forgot my own journal password. What, I asked myself, is like posting, only less requiring of actual higher brain functions? Polls!

And this is a very good time for me to post a poll. For some time I've had a bunch of questions I wanted to ask you all - for example, who are you, and what are you reading, and also, how did you come to be here? So I seriously considered just re-running my first-ever poll.

Except, of course, that that would not count as any kind of writing at all. So I pondered for a bit (i.e., three naps), until I remembered a recent humiliation I suffered while attempting to explain a fandom kerfluffle to Best Beloved, who does not so much grok the fandom lifestyle. (Me:"See, okay, this one person said, okay, I'm not really sure because it's f-locked, but I do know that this other person said, um, something. About fans. Or fandom. Or maybe...huh. You know, I'm not really sure how it started, but what eventually happened was..." Best Beloved: "This is like high school, only in slow motion." Me: "Yes! Exactly!") My narration ground to a halt entirely - to, I suspect, the relief of all - when Best Beloved asked for a definition, with examples, of the term "Big Name Fan." At which point I was obliged to admit that I don't really know that.

Yeah. See, I know what the term means. Or, okay - I know what the initials stand for. But there's no handy index of name biggishness for individual fans. (Or maybe there is, and I just haven't found it yet; that would be fairly typical of my fannish experience to date.) Do I know any BNFs? Do I know of any? Have I been corresponding for years with one? There's no way to tell! So I exist in a very Zen zone when it comes to BNFs: I generally assume that either everyone is or no one is. Unfortunately, this did not satisfy Best Beloved's need for detailed, precise, and, ideally, thoughtfully indexed information.

Turns out there's a lot of shame in admitting to a loved one, whose good opinion you value and would like to keep, that you have been using a term for years without really understanding it.

No, I'm not going to ask you all to define BNF for me. I'm not insane, people. (Although if anyone wants to send me a handy link to the Index of Name Biggishness by Fan, really, my love for you will be intense.) I'm not actually going to ask you to define anything, since I'm not, you know, up to learning anything right now. Instead, I'm going to ask you your opinions of various concepts I have encountered within the fannish world. Together, we will make authoritative declarations about these things! And then, some other time, when I've regained the use of my brain, I will ask you to explain them to me.

[Poll #593002]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Best poll EVER.

Also, I've owed you email for a couple months now. Oh, RL. How I kick you.

Thank you for the poll, almost as entertaining as your rec lists are. I forget now where I heard about your blog (metaquotes?), but when I'd read a few of the ranty/enthusiastic columns, had to link. Even though most of your fandoms are ones I don't read, your responses to fics are always witty and entertaining.

I have to go with some of the replies above and ask, what the hell is fan service? & I have to agree about the definition of BNF being (good BNF) = someone who has contributed to their fandom, sitemistress, writer, betareader, con organiser, yaddayadda - (badBNF) = snooty floozie with too many shared issues.

And ick to the more baffling ship name combos and acronyms, largely because am senile and cannot remember many of them.

Fake cuts are cool only when (a) they look like actual LJ cuts! and (b) if there's more than one in a post, they both link to the same post. If they don't make requirement (a), it's like calling yoghurt "fake custard"--it ISN'T. Because it's JUST YOGHURT. (Or, less analogously, JUST A LINK.) Whereas (b) is just a requirement because I only click on one cut in a post, and I'll miss whatever fic was behind the less appealing cut if they go to different places but don't tell me that.

...maybe I need to step back from the fandom, if I can get heated over the use of the term "fake cut". :D

Smished pairing names are only acceptable if they're ridiculous and not taken seriously. I can see myself using them, but only for, like. Nymphadumbledora & Pettigrupin.

Hmm. Most of my answers are a bit... off, since I often found I was somewhere in between two options, or that I wanted to use phrases like 'It depends'. For example - fan service. Can be good and squeeworthy if done well, but if done badly can feel patronising and plastic.

Other options that I would have liked:
For wank: takes up time that would be better used creating things of squee.
For fake cuts: Every time I see one a homicidal rage comes upon me and I wish a painful death from an unfortunate and inexplicable incident with a microwave, two litres of honey and a baby grand piano upon the wanker who created it. Fake cuts are the song fics of lj entries!!! I feel so strongly about this I am using multiple exclamation marks and soon will be forced into ALL CAPS. And don't get me started on the *fake* fake cuts.

*blinks* Huh. Why the homicidal rage? Honestly this is just a question not an argument provoker--I've never understood the flap about fake cuts.

Wow. Um. You're good on a bad day and I don't come close. ^_^

Hey, you were online. Could you please let me know if you're still a member of

fanaticize's Team D or not? Thanks.

Holy shit. I completely forgot to post my points there this week! I actually only got two points, because of the illness. But, um, I will go grovel over there. Anyway, sorry, and thanks for reminding me on that one.

Whoops.

Pairing names:
Pet pairing names make me want to snarl and throw things. This may have taken root the first time I saw "Spuffy." It sounds like the sort of prize you'd win at the local fair -- cheap, possibly containing salmonella, and trying laughably hard to be cute when it. just. isn't. It's even worse when the pairing isn't even a combination of the names, or a canon reference, because using fanon or something from a fic? Seems almost to be deliberately excluding new fen.

Wank:
Sometimes, scary. There are some fandoms where you read the wank, or posts in general, and you just know that to the writer, the characters are real. The characters are REAL and are their FRIENDS -- so, hi, that sketches me out.

BNF:
I tend to think of BNFs as the people everyone knows -- people who write the stories and meta that everyone in fandom reads, the ones in fandom that those passing by can easily identify.

I myself am pretty much the anti-BNF, being much more of 'sits in the corner' girl, but I'd certainly consider you a BNF.

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Poll: You Make the Call, Because I Sure Can't

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hope RL gets better for you soon

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OT: fanaticize

Re: OT: fanaticize

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