Organization for Transformative Works News

Links Roundup for 1 June 2012

2012-06-01T18:21:40Z

Here's a roundup of fan fiction and Fifty Shades of Grey stories that might be of interest to fans:

Months after its re-release, Fifty Shades of Grey continues to make news in the most unexpected of ways, including some hastily written articles that prove strangely uninformative. These include an episode of the Dr. Oz show that used the book to focus on the science of arousal; various features pointing out how men like the trilogy too; both Glibert Gottfried and Ellen DeGeneres did readings from it; an article focusing on the hero's home ("[Director of Sales Erik] Mehr said that about a year ago, his team began to get phone calls from people who wanted to know 'the layouts of the penthouse and the details of the condos.'...When the Escala held open houses, visitors included 'Fifty Shades' fans who wandered about, checking on the amenities and basic floor models."); and a discussion of a fanfic remix as well as an interview with the author of a published parody who notes "'Fifty Shames,'...paid more than my first two books that took several years to write. It’s just kind of mind-boggling to me."

Also boggled are the book's original publishers Amanda Hayward and Jennifer Pedroza, who were featured in a story about the international connections between the publishers and author. "Amanda and I met online through fan fiction," said Pedroza..."We realized we had some really good writers so we started The Writers Coffee Shop (in October 2010)." The venture is doing well. "The Writers Coffee Shop will still receive royalties for the next three years, Pedroza said, enough to convince her to retire from teaching and focus on publishing for awhile." A post by obsidianwings also looked at the issue of publishing in relation to the book and suggested that fandom is becoming mainstream publishing's slush pile reader.

The issue of literary quality is something examined by The Record in "'50 Shades' another brick in the wall between fans and critics". "These days, anyone can write a book – or at least be credited with writing one. Biographies, autobiographies, novels and cookbooks are published based on reality-TV success, athletic victories or, in James' case, Internet fan fiction gone viral. Readers want to be part of the discussion with their friends, whether it's a well-regarded look back in history or a racy romance that may not be well-written. Concerns of the critics are not a priority...Many reviewers hated 'Bridges of Madison County,' 'The DaVinci Code' and 'Eat, Pray, Love,' yet the public loved them all, as books and as movies."

A Florida library is refusing to put '50 Shades' on their shelves--though technically, it's in good literary company as a banned book. Brevard County, Florida spokesman Don Walker told the New York Daily News "'We don't put pornography on our bookshelves,' branding the book 'mommy porn' before admitting, 'I'm not sure what that is.'" Perhaps the bans allow libraries to avoid spending money on the many copies needed to satisfy reader demand. A Miami New Times blogger noted that not only is "Every single [copy] checked out. What's amazing is that there are currently 450 holds on the book." He then compared this to other popular books in the system and noted that "The only book that rivals Fifty Shades in Miami-Dade Library's most popular list at the moment seems to be The Hunger Games."

Lastly there's been discussion of fan fiction itself, particularly in college newspapers. One of these, The Daily Collegian, published a two-part article that included an interview with OTW board member, Francesca Coppa. And BlackBook listed "Superstars of Fan Fiction," including OTW board member, Naomi Novik.

If you write or read fan fiction, why not contribute to Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Announcing OTW First Fridays on Tumblr!

2012-06-01T17:24:49Z

As an organization designed to support the fan, we're aware of the importance of following fandom as it migrates across social networks. That's why we've rehabbed and redesigned our Tumblr. By following transformativeworks you'll get our OTW blog posts along with photos, gif sets, quotes and all the cat macros that make Tumblr great.

In addition to redesigning our layout, we're also starting a new campaign dubbed First Friday. Each first Friday of the month we'll highlight a different section of fandom. Whether it's a specific fandom like Star Trek, Sailor Moon, or Sherlock Holmes, or a fandom practice like cosplay, fan videos, or knitting, we'll spend the whole day celebrating. For our inaugural First Friday we're highlighting Archive of Our Own. To kick off the festivities we're giving away 15 Archive of Our Own invite codes. Simply follow transformativeworks for a chance to win an invite for you or a friend.

Our latest social network endeavor is spearheaded by our Communications volunteer Nistasha. As a freelance social media manager by day and internet scholar by night, Nistasha's tracked tags include #Armie Hammer, #crossovers and #acafan.

We look forward to seeing everyone on Tumblr and celebrating our first First Friday.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Newslink Roundup from 30 May 2012

2012-05-30T19:44:08Z

Here's a roundup of group gathering stories that might be of interest to fans:

The Walt Disney Archives and Disney fan club D23 is putting on a show called Fanniversary. The presentaton is "a celebration of movies, TV shows, attractions, characters and all things Disney that are celebrating milestones in 2012. It’s a roughly 90-minute presentation filled with rare and never-seen-in-public clips, audio, photographs, art and more, touring the country for the first time ever." The six city tour had already sold out when it launched.

Another fannish event in Southern California was centered on bronies, and the first ever local meeting got an extensive write-up in The Los Angeles Times. "Stephen Thomas, from Claremont, became something of a brony celebrity when he based his senior high school physics presentation on 'MLP' last year. A video shot in the classroom and posted online quickly went viral; it has racked up nearly 1 million views. Thomas, now at Cal Poly Pomona, said he’d been concerned initially about reaction from his schoolmates. 'I wondered if I’d be a laughingstock for admitting how much I liked the show,' he said. 'But people didn’t think it was silly or dumb.'" They plan to hold their first convention in November.

Sequential Tart wrote about yet another Southern California gathering, this one academic and business oriented, Transmedia, Hollywood 3: Rethinking Creative Relations. Unfortunately, one of the panels that was perhaps of particular concern to fans, "Working on the Margins: Who Pays for Transformative Works of Art?", was rather inconclusive. "One of the audience questions posted to the question website asked the panelists to actually address the questions posed in the title of the panel. I had been enjoying the panel, but as soon as that question popped up on the screen, I reflected on it. I'm not sure that the panel addressed the question at all. They talked about their personal experiences, and Mike Farah was pinned down on a question about where Funny or Die pays for stuff, but even then the answer was not super informative. I came away from the panel wondering who indeed pays for transformative works of art and multimedia projects like those being mentioned at this conference? How do some of these people make a living? Where is the profit in things done for free and / or by the Average Joe?"

Finally in France a conference on "La Culture du Fan Symposium" was held, which took a more fan-focused approach to some of the same issues, featuring a panel on fan-subbing, brand fans, opera fans, an examination of the term "acafan" and a panel looking at "cultural policy and copyright law in fan production...[and] how fan activity had now entered the political arena, with their practices increasingly monitored by media producers."

If you're a fan of Disney, My Little Pony, or have your own fan gathering stories, why not contribute them to Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links Roundup for 28 May 2012

2012-05-28T20:28:17Z

Here's a roundup of feel-good fandom stories that might be of interest to fans:

A variety of news outlets covered celebrations of Star Wars Day on May 4. Among them was ESPN, which posted examples of jock and nerd crossovers and a write-up of Star Wars nights at ballparks featuring some athletes who believe in The Force.

Another fannish event in May was Comic Book Day and some fans used the occasion for an impromptu wedding at their comic book store. "They said as soon as they met, they found out about each other's geeky interests. 'Pretty much I was like look, I'm a big dork, I like Harry Potter, I like Lord of the Rings, I like all of this stuff and he was like, ‘I like that' and gave me the thumbs up,' [bride Donnita Johnson] said. The wedding was complete with a Princess Leia bridesmaid, a Spiderman best man and Batman and Wonder Woman wedding rings. The pair dressed up in Batman and Wonder Woman attire for the ceremony. They said life is about having fun and expressing who you are and the things you love."

Certainly one aspect of fandom is its enduring nature, as reflected in the story of 104-year-old Spurs fan Theresa Sanchez who, after 40 years, finally attended a game in person. Also heartwarming was the story of the father and son Captain American fans who ended up attending the premiere of The Avengers. "Captain Kevin Camarata wanted to return from Afghanistan in time for his son's birthday. He missed it by a few days, but made it up to him by sticking to the original plan: dressing as the Avengers character his son holds most dear." When their reunion video went viral, Disney offered an invitation to them to walk the red carpet.

Blogger Noah Brand discusses drawerfic, writing "I find incredibly esoteric and specialized porn to be one of the most life-affirming things in the world...every time I learn a new word like 'boytaur' or 'OT3' or 'docking' or 'unbirth'...all these things bring me a genuine and unironic joy." Such writing and self-expression is something that can never be co-opted or commercialized: "Every one of those weird kinks is a shout of human individuality in a world that wants to reduce us down to buying patterns and demographic trends. 'I am alive!' they cry. 'I am not an emerging new style, I am not a market segment, I am not co-optable.'" Brand argues that people who have access to current technologies are more fortunate than any other generation in history because they have the tools to make themselves understood. "We use those tools to keep Community on the air, and we also use them to create animated GIFs of Jessica Rabbit with a huge dick. If either of those things strikes you as a strange use of time and technology, that’s okay: it’s not for you. And that’s the point."

If you are part of The Avengers or Star Wars fandoms, or have your own feel-good fandom stories, why not contribute them to Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

May 2012 Newsletter, Volume 59

2012-05-25T16:58:23Z

I. OTW OUTREACH: US AND OUR USERS

Development & Membership has been busy debriefing after the incredibly successful April membership drive: discussing what worked well and what to improve, shipping premiums to donors, and working with Finance to record donations sent via physical mail. They’re also forming small teams within the committee to work on projects such as convention outreach, merchandise research, social media strategy, and improving our external and internal documentation.

After a year of development, the I&O committee launched and supervised the OTW Community Survey, which garnered nearly 6000 responses. A survey work group has been formed to evaluate those responses and Survey Sundays have been launched to share data with users and enable their input on results they'd like to see. I&O are also starting to look at search engine optimization (SEO) for the OTW and its various projects as a way to broaden contact with currently underserved areas of fandom.

II. FANLORE and TWC

Fanlore editors are working hard to document the fannish websites that will soon be lost because FortuneCity, a website provider, has taken down its free accounts. Any help is welcome, and the sooner the better! More information can be found at the Fanlore post about FortuneCity rescue.

Exciting things have been happening over at the Journal committee. Transformative Works and Cultures (TWC) is about to release issue No. 10 on Transformative Works and Fan Activism, co-edited by Henry Jenkins (June 15, 2012). The issue is going through the last stages of production and thanks to its online only status and tight production schedule they've have been able to include up to the minute updates on such recent topics as Kony 2012. It will be the largest issue ever with fourteen peer-reviewed essays out of more than two dozen initial submissions, and expands the scope of TWC yet again as it focuses on international political and social phenomena.

Journal is in the last stages of reviewing for No. 11, a general issue. If you’re interested in contributing to Transformative Works and Cultures, the next two special issues will be on Transnational Boys’ Love Fan Studies and Appropriating, Interpreting, and Transforming Comic Books. They are still accepting Symposium submissions on both, so if you have things to say about either, just drop the committee a note or submit your 1500-2500 word essay directly through the web site.

Finally, the Symposium blog team welcomes new member Nele Noppe, who had previously helped informally with our Zotero Index. The committee is excited to have her join us officially and look forward to her posts on Japan, doujinshi, Avatar, and legal and cultural differences in publishing and copyright policies. Also, if anyone would like to write Symposium pieces or have experience in writing them, we would love to hear from you!

III. HAPPENINGS AT THE AO3

The Accessibility, Design and Technology committee is preparing for a May deploy which will include new user stats pages and some new tools for Open Doors to use in managing archive imports to AO3. Dedicated members have been working on improving our testing documentation, and they’re thrilled to have a number of new coding volunteers, some of whom have jumped right in already! Monthly training sessions for coders are starting, the first of which will be on May 19th.

Several committees are also providing input into a proposed AO3 Diversity Statement, and a category change workgroup is being developed. That workgroup will review the existing media categories on the Archive of our Own in order to come up with a more inclusive approach. Tag Wrangling is also engaged in plans to update the Tag FAQs on the AO3. Support reported that their ticket count for this month is at roughly 100 tickets. Meanwhile, they’ve been hard at work redesigning the Support form and are working on a FAQ to better explain the tools used internally to register and manage bugs, feature requests, and code to make them more accessible and transparent to the users.

Open Doors committee is continuing outreach to Sentinel fan communities and mailing lists about the 852 Prospect import. Two public chats will be held in the coming week. Expect upcoming outreach for the Fan Culture Preservation Project (FCPP). In the meantime, take a look at the committee’s post on the MediaWestCon blog.

IV. PLANNING FOR THE FUTURE

Vidding has been working closely with Legal on their upcoming DMCA testimony in DC or June 4, and working with the new Grants team to try to raise funds to speed up hosting of multimedia fanworks of all kinds. Grants has been working on a large National Endowment for the Humanities grant proposal. More material has been added and the team plans to eventually put together an application to submit next year. If anyone with experience in Grants would like to contribute or join the Grants team, please let us know!

Strategic Planning has also drafted and approved an internal member and board liaison agreement during the meeting on May 12. They’re preparing the first committee-specific survey, and are drafting their first update post.

V. GOVERNANCE

Board minutes for 28th April and 12th of May are now available online. We’ve set up a new elections workgroup to revise the FAQs and prepare for next year, and Jenny Scott-Thompson has been appointed as elections officer. The OTW's IRC channel is also live now.

Finance has been researching Paypal alternatives and are looking into which options can be integrated with our site to give people more choices when donating.

VI. OUR TECH WIZARDS

As mentioned in our April newsletter, Webmasters have now launched an internal survey to gather feedback from committees about how transformativeworks.org can better meet their needs. This feedback will be used to help us plan the redesign of the site.

Similarly, Systems has been hard at work developing several projects, including the mail, wiki and new development test system.

VII. IT’S ALL ABOUT THE PEEPS

Volunteers & Recruiting has continued to work hard to engage with and process a swell of new volunteers! Some additional changes since last month:

New Staffers List: Age (Volunteers & Recruiting), Anurag (Volunteers & Recruiting), Alexis Latshaw (Open Doors), Amy Luo (Communications), arrow (Open Doors), Charlotte (Translation), Christa Shishino (Communications), Freya (Communications), little_ruby (Translation), Nele Noppe (Journal), queerlyobscure (Open Doors), Shawnda (Volunteers & Recruiting), Stiney (Open Doors), Tuulia (Wiki)

New Workgroup Members: Cathtice (AO3 Docs), Claire Oberholtzer (Strategic Planning), copracat (AO3 Docs), Jessica Steiner (Strategic Planning), Maia Bobrowicz (AO3 Docs), MollyC (AO3 Docs)

New Tag Wranglers: Amaranth, Amber, ariadne83, Avery, Cassandra Chan, dlb42694, Eccles enchantersnight, lalejandra, MarcDelani, markey, MelanieW, Naghtielus, pawheart, Shannon Black, Spockside, theleaveswant, untitled102
New Coding Volunteers: Andreja, Ariana, caithnard
New Testers: Lena
New Translators: Aliya Agaeva, Ellie, Jessica A.
Departing Staffers: Lisa Schmidt (Journal)

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links Roundup for 25 May 2012

2012-05-25T13:54:14Z

Here's a roundup of stories about pros playing inside the fandom sandbox that might be of interest to fans:

Dubbed the "world's very first (and only) Science Fiction Football Musical Comedy!" Packer Fans From Outer Space recently ran in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Geared to a hometown audience with its "songs about love, Wisconsin traditions and our historic football rivalry, including 'You Gotta Hate the Bears' and 'Winning is the Only Thing,'" it still provided insiderish/crossover/genre-hopping fannishness that lots of non-Wisconsinites could recognize.

Not far away, Canadian Charles Ross performed a one-man show in Adrian, Michigan that was insiderish only to people who had never seen Star Wars (is there anyone left?) “It’s basically me onstage — with no costumes, sets, props or real talent — me, onstage, retelling the original, bad hair, 1970s-1980s ‘Star Wars’ trilogy, basically using my own body and my own impressions,” Ross said. His obsession with the saga came from a source many fan creators can relate to -- wanting to know what comes next. As a child he saw a double feature of the first two Star Wars films made. “But [my father] didn’t tell me that it wasn’t the end of the story. I was convinced that the sort-of lame tone left over at the end of ‘Empire Strikes Back’ was the way the story actually ended. And I was like, ‘What a bummer of a story!’"

Sony Music decided to employ fan fiction to promote the band One Direction. They partnered with a Wattpad writer who created a five-chapter eBook about the band members "designed to coordinate with the video for the band’s single, 'What Makes You Beautiful.'" Fans then spread links to the books and video. The marketing effort is among the finalists for the GennY Award which "recognizes best practices of those who have applied new and innovative techniques to connect and communicate with youth." The winner will be announced at a conference focusing on youth marketing.

Then there are some creators who are writing their own fanfic. One that was widely circulated was a story about Lost co-producer Damen Lindelof writing Mad Men fan fiction as fictional sci-fi writer Ken Cosgrove. Another frequently republished story was about romance novelist Diane Story writing Britney Spears RPF, made all the more notable given that she is the aunt of Britney's former husband, Kevin Federline. Story also "created a contest on her website where the winner can win an actual wedding invitation from Spears and Federline's 2004 wedding." And finally, Booktrib hosted an article on fan fiction that discussed Vampire Diaries actor Matt Davis writing fanfic on Twitter: "His crazy, sometimes smutty interpretation of the show he resides on is without a doubt the talk of the community. If the actors can write an alternate universe based on original content, why shouldn’t the fans?"

If you are a fan of Vampire Diaries, Britney Spears, Mad Men or One Direction, why not write about it on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links Roundup for 23 May 2012

2012-05-23T13:47:13Z

Here's a roundup of stories about fanfic that might be of interest to fans:

Fan fiction has been widely discussed online, but the recent discussions surrounding the highy visible success of Fifty Shades of Grey continues to take that discussion to new places with, unfortunately, new misinformation. One example is an aside in a discussion of changes in publishing that describes fan fiction as "author-approved online 'mash-ups' by fans of cult novels." Another is the suggestion in a Huffington Post interview that fan fiction has only ever been written for sci-fi and fantasy genres. Still as this "concert preview" that focuses on fan fiction written for Def Leppard demonstrates, there are certainly going to be fewer people than ever who have never heard of it.

That visibility suggests that efforts like Social Samba's "SagaWriter" tool will become increasingly common, though also that fan fiction is going to be less about fans and more about marketing. "One day TV networks might have budgets to hire social TV teams as big as their main writing teams, but for now a show like The Walking Dead could easily make a Saga where you get to talk to your favorite character while trying to avoid getting eaten." The platform allows for interactive storytelling, but not, it would seem, fan originated stories. Explains SocialSamba CEO Aaron Williams, "Within our tool you can’t use copyrighted material. We follow the same DMCA rules that everyone else does. We see TV shows and other storytellers have interest in creating fan fiction. The WB adding Big Lebowski characters to Xtranormal, the fact that they are taking steps like this was a good thing to point to for us. It means its good for the brand. For us we see that wave coming, brands or storytellers can skin to look like their brand and embed in whatever platform they use to reach out to fans."

Other people are being more thoughtful about the fan fiction that already exists. Wired Magazine contributor Clive Thompson posted ruminations on how fan fiction writers are creating "paracosms", using the Brontë sisters' early writing as an example, and cited evidence that "MacArthur fellows were twice as likely as 'normal' nongeniuses to have" created paracosms as children. Thompson warned though that "we have to stop denigrating it" if society is to reap the rewards of such play.

Britain's The Guardian in the meantime suggested that authors must value fan work in today's marketplace. "[T]he success of a novel such as Fifty Shades of Grey is far less surprising to anyone who understands the dynamics of fandom than to the mainstream publishing industry...That it was fan-fiction based in Stephenie Meyer's Twilightverse is beside the point. That it was chosen by fans and made successful through their support is far more significant. Because what fans want above all else – what in fact defines the very essence of fandom – is ownership of that which we adore." What's more "The publishers that survive will be the ones that understand that their role is to amplify the signal of those artists already chosen by fandom. The writers who succeed will be the ones who are there day in and day out, as much a part of fandom as any other fan, and on first name terms with the neighbours."

If you'd like to help out people still learning about fan fiction, why not write about it on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

852 Prospect Import - Open House!

2012-05-23T07:10:20Z

As we recently announced, the much-loved Sentinel Adult Fiction Archive, 852 Prospect, is moving in with the AO3! You can find details about the move in our announcement post; however, if you have more questions about the move, or if you're just curious about Open Doors, you can join our Open Doors team for an open house this week.

The open house will take place on May 25, 2012 at 01:00:00 UTC (see when this is in your timezone) in our Public Discussion chatroom. It will last approximately one hour. You can access the chat at: https://fanarchive.campfirenow.com/eb4b6 - just click the link to drop by. Everyone welcome!

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links roundup for 21 May 2012

2012-05-21T22:15:56Z

Here's a roundup of stories about fandom under pressure that might be of interest to fans:

In some of the latest takedown actions from the past month a fan offering free high-resolution downloads of his artwork for video game Fallout was contacted by a law firm representing the game owner Bethesda, issuing a cease and desist for his website. The artist replied in detail to the charges and has so far refused to turn his domain name over to the company, although he did remove links to the posters.

Popular website TV Tropes removed fanfiction recommendations on their site after encountering problems with Google's Ad Sense which required them to remove "mature and adult content" from the site. Aside from the issue of advertiser control of content, however, others were upset about what it meant for their use of the site. As one poster commented "The problem, as I see it, is that the admins have destroyed countless hours of our work. I don't demand that pages be restored onto this particular server, but I do demand that the source material (pages as they existed pre-cut) be made available in some fashion, so that those who want can host it elsewhere."

In many places, online access to content isn't affected by advertisers or corporate owners, but by governments. For example, Vietnamese authorities have recently mandated that Internet companies assist in online censorship. Among the provisions of a proposed decree, "Internet users 'are strictly prohibited' from providing fictitious personal data" which will prohibit all forms of anonymous blogging and discussion. Personal blogs will have to publicize the name and contact information of the individual responsible and will be held personally liable for all the published content on their blogs.

On the other hand at least one sports blogger is alarmed at the possibility that team owners might put important decisions in fans' hands. "As counter-intuitive as it sounds, as much as the Sixers should care about making the fans happy, they shouldn't care about what those fans want on a Wednesday afternoon in the middle of a devastating losing streak. When they ask what the fans think about their roster, it isn't hip, catchy, or new-media savvy. It's insulting." Instead the blogger suggests, "continue to ask us what we think of a new lighting scheme, insist on our thoughts about a moose for a mascot, and call our home phones to ask how to make better use of '1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Sixers.' Those are the some of the best elements of a new fan-owner partnership."

If you have news of legal actions against fans or content takedowns, why not write about it on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW. Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Survey Sunday #1: ALL the questions

2012-05-20T19:58:14Z

Welcome to our first Survey Sunday, where you will find a list of all questions asked in the OTW Community Survey. We introduced the idea in our previous post: we cannot release raw survey data to the public, but still want to give you the opportunity to interrogate that data. So from now through December, you can ask us questions relating to survey, and we'll try and dig up the answers.

The idea behind of posting this overview of all questions is that it enables you to ask combinations. A very conservative example: by cross-referencing questions #35 and #36 you get "Do people without prior wiki experience have trouble creating Fanlore articles?"

However, before you dig into the questions, please read our fine print so you know what to expect in terms of results:

Some results may be preliminary, due to the text answers not yet being included in the overall results (we will specify when this is the case).

We may already be planning to answer the inquiry in an upcoming update post: in that case we will let you know once it goes up.

Depending upon the volume of requests, we can't guarantee an answer within the two week period before the next Survey Sunday.

Depending upon which questions are being cross-tabulated, we may not be able to come up with a clear response.

And since we are still just starting to go through data, we may have to add to the above disclaimers as we go along and figure out what we can and can't do.

A note on survey structure, or: "why didn't I see question X when I took the survey?"

The survey used a ton of conditional questions – different answers led down different paths – so no-one saw the entirety of the survey. Conditional questions allowed respondents to skip anything irrelevant: if you tickied "Never heard of Fanlore", you didn't get any Fanlore questions but jumped straight to the "Fan Video project" section.

Another example: people who answered "Yes, I am an OTW member" weren't directed to "Have you ever donated to the OTW?", because becoming a member requires donating. Only non-members were asked if they ever donated.

Where to send your inquiries

We would like to ask for your queries and comments to be made at our website posts (no account needed) which you'll be able to find through http://transformativeworks.org/news-topic-tags/otw-sections/survey-research. We realize that people read OTW News through other sites and sources as well, but at the moment we cannot guarantee that we will see and answer your comment elsewhere due to technical constraints.

Our list of questions is below. We're looking forward to your queries!

OTW Community Survey: List of questions

The questions are listed in their order of appearance, but that doesn't necessarily reflect the way you took the survey because of the skip logic explained above.

The question types are either closed questions (yes/no or pre-defined answers), write-in fields (short replies), or boxes (essay-style replies). Basically, this means that closed questions will be easiest, and text boxes will take the longest to evaluate.

Demographics

What country/countries do you consider your home?
type: write-in field

What is/are your native language/s?
write-in field

What language/s do you use in fannish or fandom contexts?
write-in field

Fannishness, fanworks, fan community

Do you consider yourself fannish / a fan?
closed question

Where do you spend most of your fannish time?
three write-in fields

If you consider yourself a member of fandom: how long have you been "in fandom"?
numerical write-in field

Do you consume (watch, play, read...) fanworks?
closed question + write-in field

Do you create fanworks?
closed question + write-in field

What general fannish community/communities, if any, do you feel part of?
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Archive of Our Own (AO3)

Have you ever used the Archive of Our Own (AO3)?
closed question

Do you have an account at the Archive of Our Own?
closed question

How efficient do you find the Archive's invitation system (invite queue or sending invites)?
closed question

What are you using the Archive for?
closed question + write-in field

Have you ever used the Archive's search function?
closed question

How useful do you find the Archive's tagging system?
closed question

How efficient is it to search and find works on the Archive?
closed question

Did you find content in your fandom(s) on the Archive?
closed question

Do you leave Kudos on works you like?
closed question

Do you leave comments on works you like?
closed question

How easy is it to leave comments?
closed question

What are your reasons for not commenting on the Archive specifically?
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How easy do you find it to create bookmarks on the Archive?
closed question

How easy do you find it to use bookmarks on the Archive?
closed question

How easy do you find it to post works to the Archive?
closed question

How would you rate the ease-of-use of running a challenge?
closed question

How would you rate the ease-of-use of participating in a challenge?
closed question

Have you used the collections feature of the Archive?
closed question

How easy do you find it to sort and find works within the collections?
closed question

How easy do you find it to set up and maintain a collection?
closed question

How do you like the look and feel of the Archive?
closed question

How would you, personally, describe the Archive's atmosphere?
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What is your favorite thing about the Archive, if any?
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If you could change one thing about the Archive, what would it be?
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Fanlore

Have you ever used the Fanlore Wiki?
closed question

Do you have any wiki experience apart from Fanlore?
closed question

How easy did you find creating or adding to articles on Fanlore initially?
closed question

How comfortable do you feel adding content to Fanlore, in general?
closed question

How comfortable do you feel expanding or correcting content created by others?
closed question

If you have ever looked for content about your fandom(s) or your fannish culture on Fanlore: Did you find that content?
closed question

When you are browsing Fanlore, which of the following navigation methods do you use?
closed question + write-in field

How easy do you find searching and navigating Fanlore, in general?
closed question

Are you clear on what kind of content is welcome on Fanlore?
closed question

Have you ever needed assistance on Fanlore?
closed question + write-in field

How useful did you find the help pages/tutorials?
closed question

How easy do you find asking for assistance on Fanlore?
closed question

How do you like the look and feel of Fanlore?
closed question

What is your impression of the atmosphere on Fanlore?
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What is your favorite thing about Fanlore, if any?
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If you could change one thing about Fanlore, what would it be?
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Fan Video and Multimedia Projects

Are you aware of the OTW's fan video projects?
closed question

Which ones have you heard of?
closed question + write-in field

How useful did you find these resources?
closed question

Why were the resources not useful to you? How could we improve them?
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Transformative Works and Cultures

Have you ever read Transformative Works and Cultures (TWC) or its affiliated Symposium blog?
closed question

If you have considered submitting an essay to TWC's Symposium section, or the Symposium blog, but hesitated to do so: What are your reasons?
closed question+ write-in field

Legal Advocacy

Have you ever received a cease and desist letter, or had a fanwork removed from a site for intellectual property infringement?
closed question

Are you aware of the OTW's legal advocacy work?
closed question

This is a list of Legal Advocacy's contributions. Which ones have you heard of?
closed question + write-in field

Do you feel that the OTW's legal advocacy had an impact on your fannish practice or your attitude towards the legality of fanworks?
closed question

How has the OTW's legal advocacy work affected your fannish practice?
(e.g. are you more/less confident, have you adopted terminology...)
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How would you describe your previous attitude?
closed question

How would you describe your current attitude?
closed question

Open Doors

Are you interested in the preservation of at-risk fanworks and fannish projects?
closed question

Are you aware of the option to "orphan" a fanwork on the Archive of Our Own?
closed question

Have you designated someone as your "fannish next of kin" using the OTW's process?
closed question

How easy did you find completing the "fannish next of kin" process?
closed question

In the event that you could not maintain your fanzine collection any longer, would you consider donating it to the Fan Culture Preservation Project?
closed question

Are you the maintainer of a fannish community web site, a fannish resource web site, or an archive?
closed question

If you were unable to continue to maintain or preserve your site, would you consider asking Open Doors to help you preserve the site's content and history?
closed question + write-in field

The OTW

Have you ever been an OTW member?
closed question

How long have you been a member?
closed question

What was your main reason for becoming a member?
closed question + write-in field

What made you stop being a member?
closed question + write-in field

What might make you choose to be a member in the future?
closed question + write-in field

Have you ever donated to the OTW?
closed question

How easy did you find the donation process?
closed question

How did you first hear about the OTW?
closed question

I first heard of the OTW by way of this project:
closed question

The OTW hosts the following projects under its umbrella:
closed question

Which OTW projects are most important to you?
closed question

The OTW is represented on a variety of communication platforms. Which of these OTW online outlets have you read or heard of?
closed question + write-in field

We post the following types of content to our OTW online outlets. Which ones are you interested in, generally speaking?
closed question

What type of content would you like to see (more of) on the OTW online outlets?
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OTW website

Have you read the OTW website (transformativeworks.org) before?
closed question

Based on your previous visits to the OTW website (transformativeworks.org), how strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements?
The OTW website made it easy to find the information I was looking for / The OTW website is easy to navigate. / The OTW website met my expectations as a user.
closed question

What should we improve about the website, in your opinion?
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What information would you expect to find on the OTW website that's not currently there?
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Do you have any other feedback about the OTW website?
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Final question

Anything else you'd like to tell us?
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Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links roundup for 19 May 2012

2012-05-19T14:30:21Z

Here's a roundup of stories looking at transformative works that might be of interest to fans:

In this Tumblr blog post, the issue of transformative works is addressed directly and as with many Tumblr posts, the image conveys the message. Here, the subject is Johannes Vermeer's Girl With a Pearl Earring holding a camera as if to take a picture of her painter or the viewer. "[T]ransformative work, intratextual work, is most emphatically not a new thing, nor a creatively barren thing. It’s awesome. And this image here is delicious, because it takes that lovely painting, in which the model is mysterious, alluring, her parted lips gleaming and her eyes wide as she looks out at the viewer, objectified - and it drags it straight into the 21st century by adding the camera, making it into that recognisable MySpace pose, making her the CREATOR of the image not just the object. She is looking at herself, not at us, and this careful composition becomes an ephemeral snapshot, a fleeting moment in her day."

University of Utah English professor Anne Jamison was profiled as a scholar of fan fiction after the course she taught on it became attached to discussions surrounding Fifty Shades of Grey. "Focusing her scholarly eye to the phenomenon was a departure from the norm for the 42-year-old professor, a native of Albany, N.Y. Yet fan fiction fed her longtime interests in female writers and genre fiction, and she’s in the process of compiling and editing articles for a scholarly anthology on the topic. 'I told everyone I knew that [fan fiction] is a global connective of housewives and professional women exchanging erotica and writing advice online,' she said. 'Everyone yawned. I thought it was very interesting.'"

Other higher education coursework also addresses the existence of fanworks. In a recap of vidding that included citations from the OTW's Rebecca Tushnet, one student concluded "Despite the forces of money, law, technical challenges and the fans’ need to interact with the shows and characters that they love, vidding was born and continues to thrive. The fan communities and their pursuits are supported by the efforts of those, like Lessig and Tushnet, who fight for a better environment for remix culture. Over the months and years to come, I look forward to enjoying the stories and perspectives of fan culture in these kind of vids, and monitoring progress in the fight to allow them to do it."

If you make fan vids, write fan fiction or create fan art, why not write about it on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW. Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Urgent! Fortunecity.com free sites deleted

2012-05-18T16:43:15Z

Fanlore is appealing for help in an urgent effort to assist fans affected by the disappearance of free sites on FortuneCity, an early Internet website provider that hosted many personal fanfic websites and small archives due to its free accounts. In conjunction with the more clearly communicated Geocities fadeout a few years ago, this action on Fortunecity's part has meant the loss of another chunk of fannish history.

Fanlore is hosting the website addresses of the now deleted sites. Knowing the addresses to old sites gives fans searching for them a chance to recover and access the content once held there by going through the Wayback Machine.

A Google spreadsheet has been started so that volunteers can "claim a fandom, read the instructions...and pitch in."

Although an email was sent to account holders, many of the addresses tied to those accounts are no longer valid or are no longer frequently used by the maintainers. In addition many fans did not see an announcement banner because it was placed with the site ads, which many users have blocked while visiting the site.

The effort to document the URLs of the missing pages is urgent because they are currently stored by Google, but Google deletes its cached records in a short time if a webpage disappears or changes. This is why many typing fingers are needed, to record those addresses before they disappear from search results.

If you can help, please do the following:

1) Sign up on the Google spreadsheet for particular fandoms. Follow the instructions to record the addresses.
2) Contact Fanlore if you need help with the project, or want to submit addresses but do not have a Fanlore account (use Fanlore's contact page here: http://transformativeworks.org/contact/fanlore%20gardeners and put "FortuneCity help!" in the subject line)

If you are an author or artist whose work was deleted by FortuneCity, we would welcome it on the Archive of Our Own. If you need an invitation to upload your work there, contact AO3 Support via our support form and put "FortuneCity content" in the summary line.

Please do what you can to help rescue these lost works!

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Announcing Survey Sunday!

2012-05-17T19:50:11Z

To everyone following news on the OTW's Survey we conducted last month, we wanted to not only provide you with some more results, but also lay out our plan going forward in terms of

1) What we can release;
2) How quickly we can release it;
3) What sort of schedule you can expect.

Last week's post, OTW Community Survey: First results, was only a stopgap release while we were putting together a plan for not only dealing with the data, but also figuring out a sustainable schedule for releasing the information as this involves volunteers from various committees as well as coordination between Internationalization & Outreach, which developed the survey, and Communications which will be working on the public posts. In addition to releasing the information publicly, the survey workgroup is working on creating data reports for the internal use of its various committees. And since, as with all OTW projects, we are dependent on the time our volunteers and staffers can make available, the work is more likely to progress in fits and starts than in a consistent way every week.

To that end, we wanted to introduce what we're calling...

Survey Sunday

Survey Sunday will take place every two weeks now through December, and will allow anyone interested to ask their own questions which can be answered with our big pile of data!

We've had a few suggestions to release the survey data set publicly so that the survey analysis can be crowdsourced. However, one of our primary considerations when putting together this survey was ensuring the privacy of our respondents; as such, we decided to release only aggregate data this time around (those of you who took the survey may remember that this was part of the commitment we made in our disclosure statement). Specifically, the statement promised to survey takers that information would only be released in the aggregate (with the exception of specific, anonymous quotes) and that individual responses would be available only to OTW staff and volunteers. (All those people who have access to the data have signed a confidentially agreement which restricts them from discussing the survey contents with anyone outside of the workgroup, including anyone else in the OTW.)

However, we also realize that people are curious to find out specific data given the large number of responses we received, and we want to fulfill those wishes. So to that end, we are going to be offering a regular forum where people can make those requests, and we will turn around and attempt to answer them by the next posting date. We have to include a few disclaimers though, such as:

1) Some results may be preliminary, due to the text answers not yet being included in the overall results (we will specify when this is the case).
2) We may already be planning to answer the inquiry in an upcoming update post: in that case we will let you know once it goes up.
3) Depending upon the volume of requests, we can't guarantee an answer within the two week period before the next Survey Sunday.
4) Depending upon which questions are being cross-tabulated, we may not be able to come up with a clear response.

And since we are still just starting to go through data, we may have to add to the above disclaimers as we go along and figure out what we can and can't do.

A look at our process

In the interests of offering regular updates on the survey data, we won't be publishing data in the order it originally appeared in the survey. Instead, we'll publish the results out of order, based on how quickly they are processed, and we'll sometimes give you some preliminary data (for example, data which doesn't factor in written-in results) while the more complex data is being processed. We think that this will ensure you can be more involved in the process, and can ask questions and discuss the results as they emerge instead of waiting for us to produce one big report.

Not only will different types of questions take different time & effort to evaluate, but different people from the survey workgroup volunteered for different sets of questions, depending on interest and skill set. This spreads out work, but it also means not everyone is available at the same time or can work at the same speed. (In other words, welcome to volunteering at the OTW!)

Here's an example from the first section of the survey, which covered "demographics & fandom-related questions."

1. What country/countries do you consider your home?

You might think these answers would be simple to sort but that isn't always the case. Geographic information isn't viewed by all people in the same way, so there isn't any single way to report it, although the linked graph above was put together to give us at least an initial look.

To analyse this question, the first step was to filter out duplicate results that were clearly typos - "United Kindgom" and "UK" are fairly clearly the same place. The next step was the tricky cases - grouping certain countries together can seem more controversial to one person than another, and the names used may also be important. Kudos to the person who justified writing Texas as their home country by giving the years it was independent, but sorry, we're counting that as part of the USA for these stats. In most other cases, for the purpose of the graph countries were grouped together where there were doubts for the purposes of creating an initial top 10 (e.g. 8% for Canada includes Quebec).

But this data could also be put in graphs in different ways which yield other problems: what would be considered a continental area? And this could separate data -- La Reunion is in a different continent from France. We'd like to do more analysis of the second and third countries people listed, and we've got a world map that we're going to update with the full data at some point, but that requires us to re-do that analysis to match the countries the mapping software uses.

2. What is/are your native language/s?

This was another write-in answer, and its 6844 replies need more filtering & categorizing.

7. Do you consume (watch, play, read...) fanworks?

This is relatively simple at first glance (that's why we picked this for inclusion in our first post), but there were a number of write-in responses that will have to be added into the final results.

9. What general fannish community/communities, if any, do you feel part of?

About the most challenging question from an analsyis perspective, apart from the big essay-style ones. Because this question predictably yielded extremely disparate answers, we need to figure out how to group and classify them meaningfully. While this is perhaps one of the most interesting answers to see the results to, unfortunately it's not likely to be finished very soon.

How will the survey results affect the OTW's future?

The survey was designed for two reasons. First, it would provide us information on our members, users, and people aware of the OTW. Second, this information would help us develop policies and procedures for the organization and its projects. For this reason, we are simultaneously creating survey results for the use of our committees and workgroups. However, this work is likely to proceed at the same pace as the public survey results, so it is likely to be many months before committees have all the information pertinent to them. We see the survey as one of the OTW's major projects for this term, and its data likely won't be incorporated and implemented until next year.

However, we expect to communicate these effects publicly once the project concludes and all parts of the org have a chance to provide input and reactions to the data. This may be done in conjunction with the strategic plan. The simple answer is that we don't have a set date for this yet, but it will be part of the project's conclusion.

Sharing data

We know that people will probably be keen to reblog and share the information we put out. The aggregate data that we publish through OTW news channels may be freely reblogged, shared, linked to, etc. If you post about the data, please provide a link back to the OTW website (survey reports can be found through: http://transformativeworks.org/news-topic-tags/otw-sections/survey-research) so that people can find more information about it, and ask their own questions.

What happens next?

Our first Survey Sunday will kick off this weekend, on May 20 (or 21 for some of our readers). We will begin by posting the full list of questions in the survey. This will enable anyone who either did or didn't take the survey to see what interests them and start coming up with suggestions for results they'd like to see.

We would like to ask for comments to be made at our website posts (no account needed) which you'll be able to find through http://transformativeworks.org/news-topic-tags/otw-sections/survey-research. We realize that people read OTW News through other sites and sources as well and it would be more convenient to comment through those sources. However there are several reasons why we'd prefer not to gather comments through them for this project. The first is that not all sites that receive our news feed are being actively posted to, rather the posting has been automated. The OTW currently has eight different outlets just for OTW-News (not counting additional sites/sources for AO3, Fanlore news, OTW Tag Wranglers, etc.) While most of these sites are set up to deliver responses to our Communications Committee we have been having technical problems caused by spam blacklisting that mean that some messages do not get delivered from all sites, and some sites like Twitter are currently not getting delivered at all. Our Systems team is working on solutions for this but in the meantime, to be certain your comment gets seen, please make it at our website. This also saves time for the survey workgroup team in rounding up your comments.

Thank you for your patience as we work on this project. We welcome your input and look forward to sharing exciting developments from the results with you soon.

In the meantime, here are a few more graphs we have pulled together from data where we have complete results:

Results: Graphs for questions #54,#56,#70,#71

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links Roundup for 16 May 2012

2012-05-16T11:39:02Z

Here's a roundup of stories about the importance of fandom that might be of interest to fans:

Singer Alexandra Burke wrote about the importance of her fans, saying she can "fully appreciate the extent that 'fandom' as some people like to call it has really taken over. I am superclose to my fans (probably too close for it to be healthy lol) but I feel like they are this extended family of mine and they do so much for me, and there's no better form of honesty than if these guys don't like something/don't like some of my music - they won't dress it up in cotton wool - they will just tell you damn straight!" What's more, "[t]he last few years I think for me have certainly changed my perception on this whole 'movement', and no doubt that of label's and management who now have whole teams dedicated to ensuring that the fanbase is looked after."

Dr. Who fans, on the other hand, got a whole book written on their importance. SFX reviewed The Official Doctor Who Fan Club: Volume One and concluded that "[e]ven readers born many years after 1971 will probably experience a stab of nostalgia. You are transported back to more innocent times: before forum flame wars; before fandom had been commodified. This was a time when you could write to the Doctor and know there was a decent chance of getting a letter back; a time when Who fans had to make their own entertainment (one of Keith’s innovations was a 'lending library' of hand-made, one-off novellas of old stories, available to borrow one at a time). You may find yourself wondering if we weren’t better off back then."

If the discussion at Den of Geek is any indication, the above book will likely sell well. Contemplating what fandom did for Dr. Who, they note that "the market is completely different these days. Before the show came back, Doctor Who merchandise was a relatively small but lucrative area, mainly based round adult collectors. Now it's a huge and broad market, with magazines and toys selling large numbers in supermarkets to kids." They then attempt to quantify Who fandom, speculating "When you consider that Doctor Who Magazine's 2011 circulation was 30,682 these figures are impressive, but for further context we must ask: how many hard-core Doctor Who fans are there?...If you combine the highest figure from fan-sites' Twitter followers or forum members the total is roughly 145,700. This figure does show is that, even adjusting upwards (say, doubling the figure to accommodate variables), the kind of fan who is debating how much of Destiny of the Daleks was written by Terry Nation or Douglas Adams has gone from being the near-totality of fandom to being a minority (the average UK viewing figure for the 2011 series was 7.75 million)."

Certainly the U.S.'s SyFy network has realized the importance of fannish content to its bottom line. Their recent upfront presentation included various shows targeted at fans. Aside from creating two different shows aimed at collectors, there is a new project on cosplayers, Divas of Dress Up, and the "Untitled Mark Burnett Project...where fans of science fiction/fantasy books and movies compete to create the most flavorful and inspired dishes from the foods featured in the imaginary worlds that they love."

If you are part of Dr. Who fandom or want to share your fandom recipes, why not write about it on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links Roundup for 14 May 2012

2012-05-14T13:56:32Z

Here's a roundup of stories about the changing nature of fandom that might be of interest to fans:

Writing about the experience of moving from fan to pro, baseball blogger Joey Matschulat echoes the discussions of burnout that also recently made the rounds among television recappers, only this time discussing the revelations of fellow sports bloggers. "I still enjoy writing about this team...but my fandom won't have a snowball's chance in hell of being what it once was until the day I walk away from all of this, and it may never be the same. That's just the way it is...I welcome with open arms the next wave of young, talented, hungry writers that want to try and make a name for themselves in the ever-expanding world of online baseball scouting/sabermetric analysis...but if you're really going to commit for the long haul, be prepared to live with the unintended consequences of your decision."

Some changes can be generational, as evidenced by the fact that kids can now go to writing camps that include fan fiction on the agenda. But changes in music fandom have been as much technological as they are due to cultural awareness. Nitsuh Abebe posted about how music fandom has gotten rewired in New York Magazine. "There are the rituals, for one thing. The youth of previous decades have fond memories of hand-labeling cassette mixes or scoping out the record shelves of party hosts; youth of today can eventually feel the same about, say, those ecstatic binges of discovery that keep you up all night listening to Korean pop. Physically handling your record collection is like wandering a neighborhood you know by heart, bumping into unexpected friends; diving into the massive catalogue of streaming music is more like being able to teleport to any city on the planet, an experience as daunting as it is freeing."

More than one technology company has decided to target the fan market, but the real change is in how information flows through fan networks and changes the fannish experience. ESPN blogger and self-proclaimed "NBA junkie" Daniel Nowell tested the effects of social media on his game-watching by staying off Twitter for three weeks. "I’ve heard people talk about the power of Twitter as a community-builder, a way to sit and watch games with friends, but it had never occurred to me that Twitter was making the product of the games themselves more enjoyable. In fact, I’d come to think of tweeting during games as a distraction, and on the nights when I needed to do it for an assignment I treated it warily. But once I was off Twitter, I realized that what it allows members to do is experience the game all day long."

Tallulah Habib of South Africa's IT Web wrote about what she called "the fandom disconnect" between businesses that find fans the most potent of their marketers, and the entertainment industry, which doles out mixed messages to its audience. "Take, for instance, the approach of copyright holders on YouTube. By all means, they should ask the video site to take down content that is dumped straight 'as-is' onto the free channel. That's piracy, plain and simple. But what of the fan-created content?" Arguing for the importance of fanworks, she notes the changing way that fanworks can affect the marketplace. "A music video taking a song from one artist and clips from a television show by someone else promotes both of them. For free. I personally have whole playlists of songs that I first discovered through these means. I have become interested in TV shows because I saw amazing videos about the characters. People have made money from me not because of cinemas or DVD specials or the radio, but because something I saw on YouTube took my breath away."

If you want to share how your experiences in fandom have changed, why not write about it on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW. Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links Roundup for 11 May 2012

2012-05-11T14:15:32Z

Here's a roundup of stories about gendered aspects of fandom that might be of interest to fans:

Conversations on various fan sites continue to revolve around creator reluctance to feature female characters in their work. One gamer discusses how "the fact that you have to play as a man puts [his significant other] off just enough that she’d just rather play another game", and notes that "As a white man, I can only really imagine this position of disassociation. There are few games which force you to play as a woman."

Of course, it isn't just a lack of representation but also the way that women are treated as gamers that affects their enjoyment, something which escapes the attention of many male players. The creator of online comic The Oatmeal discovered this after he received angry responses to a panel he drew about female gamers having advantages simply for being female. "Citing surprise and ignorance about the violence female gamers face, he withdrew his argument," and made a $1,000 donation to the Women Against Abuse Foundation, explaining, "A lot of people are talking of rape threats, sexism, harassment, and a lot of other awful things. I'm a guy and I barely talk into my mic, so I’ll concede that my view of things is probably very skewed." Unfortunately, these problems exist in most fandoms in different forms, as a post by hockey blogger Karen M pointed out. "What I realized is that in the world of hockey fandom women are like [Russian hockey players]. We are a minority group that are battling everyday against the weight of oppressive and offensive stereotypes. A Canadian coasts on a few shifts and he's 'having an off night'. A Russian coasts and he’s 'lazy and not living up to his potential.' In hockey fandom misogynist insults are common and women are dumb puck bunnies until proven otherwise."

Alyssa Rosenberg at Think Progress suggests that women "even outside the core fan community, will be interested in fantasy and science fiction if work in those genres have anything to say to them." "Snow White and the Huntsman is being explicitly sold not just as a story with two female leads...but as a story about the connection between beauty and power, about competition between women, and about styles of rule and command. From the outside, the women in the movie don't look like women acting like men. They appear to be women acting like women but with the force of armies and heroes available to play out the issues that they're grappling with personally."

The Mary Sue notes that good stories appeal to all sexes, citing the success of The Legend of Korra, which has a female lead. "Some Nickelodeon executives were worried, says [Korra co-creator Bryan] Konietzko, about backing an animated action show with a female lead character. Conventional TV wisdom has it that girls will watch shows about boys, but boys won’t watch shows about girls," writes NPR's Neda Ulaby. “During test screenings, though, boys said they didn’t care that Korra was a girl. They just said she was awesome."

If you want to share your experiences in the The Legend of Korra or Avatar: The Last Airbender fandoms, or have something to say about misogny in fandom, why not write about them on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links roundup for 9 May 2012

2012-05-09T21:09:33Z

Here's a roundup of stories about rare fandom activities that might be of interest to fans:

As this article at the Daily Beast points out, "The surprise revival of Tupac Shakur in hologram form at Coachella...stunned audiences--but Japan's been onto the hologram game for years." The article discusses concerts performed by fictional character Hatsune Miku. "Though her voice is sampled from Japanese voice actress Saki Fujita, Miku is literally the collective product of her legions of fans...who create her songs and videos via collaborative websites...One Miku enthusiast might compose an original song for her using Vocaloid, for example, and then upload it for others to hear. That song might then inspire illustrations, videos, or remixes from other fans...It's the perfect formula: Miku gives fans exactly the music they want without the scandals and dramatics of real-life pop stars and all their real-life flaws."

Fans of inanimate objects are legion as well. In a live-tweeted story, The Washington Post covered the journey of the space shuttle Discovery on its way to its future museum home in Washington, DC. "To the delight of fans on the ground, the shuttle completed extra passes over the National Mall and Dulles." The article wrote about varied people stopping their day or setting aside time to try and catch sight of the shuttle's journey. "At the National Mall, cheers, whoops, and hollers erupted from the crowd, entranced by the sight of a space shuttle anchored precariously on the back of a 747. 'It's a spectacular view to see the big shuttle on the back of a 747,' said JJ Morgan, a 70-year-old Silver Spring resident...His wife, Carol, was a little less jubilant. 'I’m a little sad because I can remember when the space program first started, and I'll miss it. I'll miss following it.'"

"Nerdcore rapper" Adam WarRock has written songs about various TV shows such as Parks and Recreation, Downton Abbey, and Justified, but it was his rap inspired by Ta-Nehisi Coates, a senior editor at The Atlantic, that made the news. Coates is a favorite blogger of WarRock's, one who WarRock sees as "a welcome and comforting voice when it comes to speaking on race and America, specifically America's complex relationship when it comes to race in all elements of our culture and ethics." The rap, called "Ta-Nehisi,""came partly out of [WarRock's] own struggles with racial identity" growing up as an Asian American in Memphis, Tennessee. But "even though 'Ta-Nehisi' covers more serious territory, WarRock still found room in the final stanza to squeeze in one TV reference, a nod to HBO's The Wire."

Hollywood.com turned to a museum owner to discuss Three Stooges fandom as the new Stooges film adventure opened in theaters. Said owner of the "Stoogeum" Gary Lassin, "'Half thought it was blasphemy to try and make the movie, half were eager looking forward to it. Now that people have seen it, the people looking forward to it liked it, the people who weren't looking forward to it weren't going to see or didn't like it.' Lassin hits the nail on the head: babyboomers who grew up on Stooges aren't that different than the target demographic that clamors for the latest comic book movie or installment of Twilight. They just haven't had a movie to flock to the last few decades."

If you are in a small fandom, or part of Vocaloid fandom why not write about it on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW. Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

OTW Community Survey: First results

2012-05-09T14:13:57Z

The OTW Community Survey closed on Thursday 2nd May after its two-week run. An amazing 5986 people responded, which surpasses our wildest expectations. We'd like to thank everyone who took it and who helped to spread the word for making it such a huge success! We'd also like to apologise for the delay in posting about our preliminary results. We had originally intended for this post to go up the day after the survey closed, but unfortunately the mass of data involved and some unexpected commitments on the part of some key staffers meant that we weren't able to do this. We're sorry that we didn't post an update about the delay -- improving our processes to cover stuff like this is one of the things we're still working on. Thank you for your patience and your overwhelming response to the survey!

We wanted to cover lots of bases and get a broad picture of our userbases and their needs, which meant that this was a long survey! So we're especially pleased (and relieved!) that the completion rate was 82.2 % -- that is, 4921 people actually finished the entire survey and clicked the "done" button. (Don't worry if you were one of the other 18% -- we'll still be counting the results from partially completed responses.)

The high number of respondents corresponds with a humungous amount of data. Some of this will be reasonably easy to collate, while some of the free text responses will require more in-depth analysis. The final question ("Anything else you'd like to tell us?") alone yielded the equivalent of an epic Big Bang story: 60.000 words!

We've formed an internal workgroup who will help evaluate and publish the results. Due to the amount of data we're working with, this will be a gradual process, but we'll try to keep you up-to-date with the details as they emerge. We thank you for your patience while we get to grips with it all. The really meaty data may take us a while to collate, but here are a couple of tasty morsels to whet your appetite!

Where is everyone?

We had responses to the survey from fans all over the world - and a few from beyond this world (hello to the fan who responded from Narnia!) The top ten countries, by number of respondents, were as follows:

What types of fanworks are people enjoying?

Fandom is a diverse and wonderful place, and people are accessing a whole range of different types of fanwork. The vast majority of respondents (5613 of a total 5716) said they read fanfiction, but other types of fanwork such as fanart and fan videos of various kinds weren't far behind - and we can't wait to delve into the free-text responses to this question!

Stay tuned for more!

We're working hard on analysing the rest of the data and wrangling it into a nice accessible format. We really value all your input, and we'll do our best both to publicise it and respond to it. The response to the survey was beyond our wildest dreams -- we're feeling a teeny bit overwhelmed, but also excited about having such rich results to work with! Thank you to everyone who responded, publicised it, and worked to make it such a huge success.

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

852 Prospect Moves In With the AO3

2012-05-08T22:37:17Z

Sentinel fans remember with nostalgia how Blair moved in with Jim. We have good news for those who know and love 852 Prospect, the Sentinel Adult Fiction Archive; it's moving in with the Archive of Our Own!

In this post:

a bit of background explanation

what this means for authors who have work on 852 Prospect

and what to do if you still have questions

Background explanation

The first iteration of the Automated Archive software was written by astolat for 852 Prospect back in 1997, but for some years that software has been growing increasingly creaky, and now requires all updates to be done by hand. As a result, alice ttlg, 852 Prospect's archivist, has been looking for a sustainable new home for the archive. That new home will be as an Integrated Collection in the AO3.

In its new home, 852 Prospect will be a separate, searchable collection with its own identity. We're currently exploring the possibility of doing a complete archive transfer, in which we could preserve old rec links by creating redirects at the original site. The archive will move in early June.

What does this mean for authors who have work on 852 Prospect?

If you have work on 852 Prospect, and you still have access to the email account associated with those stories, then when the import happens, you'll receive an email letting you know you can come and claim your works. If you already have an account on the Archive of Our Own under that address, you'll receive an e-mail letting you know that those stories have been added to your account.

If you don’t have an account on the Archive of Our Own, you will be invited to create one, and will be able to claim your imported works and associate them with that account.

All imported works are set, by default, to be viewable only by logged-in AO3 users. Once you claim your works, you can make them publicly-viewable if you choose. After 3 months, all unclaimed imported works will be open to all visitors, just like 852 Prospect currently is.

If you no longer have access to the email account associated with those stories, contact the Open Doors committee and we'll help you out. (If you've posted the stories elsewhere, or have an easy way to verify that they're yours, that's grand; if not, don't worry, we'll figure something out.)

If you have a story on 852 Prospect which you've already imported to the AO3, once the 852 Prospect import happens there will be two copies of the same story on the archive. This situation is temporary! Down the line, we’re planning to implement a way of merging two copies of the same work, so that you can keep your comments and kudos on the version you've already uploaded, *and* the redirect from the old archive address will still work. (Alternatively, we can change the redirect to point toward the copy you have already imported to AO3. Just claim the new copy of the work, and contact Open Doors with your AO3 account name(s), Prospect 852 account name(s), and links to the works that you want the redirect to point to.

Once the stories from 852 Prospect are on the AO3, you can then edit, delete, etc, the same way you would with any work you posted on the AO3. Or, if you don't want the works to be part of 852 Prospect in its new home, you can choose to delete the imported works or to orphan the imported works. (Orphaning leaves the works on the Archive, but removes them from the control of any user account. You can choose whether to remove the name they were associated with on the old archive, or leave it displaying as a pseud.)

If you would like to prevent any works associated with a particular e-mail address from ever being imported into the Archive, please submit that e-mail address (and any info that can be used to verify your identity) to Open Doors.

If you still have questions...

If you have further questions, try the Open Doors FAQ; if the FAQ doesn't offer the answers you need, you can contact the Open Doors committee or leave a comment on this post and we'll respond as soon as we can.

We're also planning to hold two public chats on Campfire (the online chat platform the OTW uses): Sunday, May 19, at 18:00 UTC, and Thursday, May 24, at 01:00 UTC (click the links to see when the chats are held in your timezone). You can access OTW's public chatroom using this link.

Anyone who has questions about the process is welcome to join the Open Doors team at those chats, and we'll do our best to answer you.

Many of us in the OTW are longtime TS fans who really care about having these stories preserved for new generations. We're delighted to welcome 852 Prospect aboard the AO3!

-- The Open Doors team

April 2012 Newsletter, Volume 58

2012-05-08T15:13:03Z

I. OTW EVENTAPALOOZA

April saw numerous activities taking place throughout the OTW which required coordinated activity from various committees and workgroups. The most notable was our incredibly successful membership drive under the leadership of our Development & Membership committee. The drive broke records in terms of funds raised -- 1,256 individual donations totaling over US$35,744. This support is both welcomed and necessary to sustain the OTW's projects and help the organization continue developing resources for fans.

The OTW also launched a survey intended to gather information from members, interested fans, and anyone with awareness of the OTW or its projects. This online survey ran from April 19 to May 2, and we heard from just shy of 6000 respondents! Our I&O committee who organized the survey are a little overwhelmed at the task ahead but are extremely happy at how successfully fans spread the word to get this volume of response. Needless to say, full results of the survey will take some time to collate as it contained many places in which fans could express themselves in their own words. Expect to see updates on the results as the year goes on with the first results out later this week.

One surprising effect of the survey was reported by our Abuse committee: the AO3 has been receiving an increase in Fannish Next of Kin requests and they invite everyone to designate someone for their account.

And yet another event of note was the April Showers event at Fanlore and the Archive of Our Own! ADT estimates that there was an increase of about 3,000-4,000 new works in April but due to the SSA import in March which brought many new works to the AO3, April numbers need to be compared to February. Using those figures, 19,822 works were posted in April in 1,959 different fandoms, compared to 15,863 new works in February. Traffic numbers have also exceeded what the system could handle only a month or two into this year!

Particularly significant is that there were 1,888 new fandom tags created in April, up from only 429 in March! There were also 82,116 new bookmarks created in April, up from 69,041 in March. So there are clearly many new works for readers to dig into!

II. FANLORE and TWC

The Wiki committeewas busy promoting April Showers as they invited everyone to add their fandom memories to Fanlore via Twitter. They also held two Fanlore editing chats to answer questions about wiki editing. Summaries of those chats were posted on the Fanlore community at dreamwidth. They also posted about the Fanlore forums and received some awesome feedback! These forums are still at the early planning stage and Wiki would welcome any input from users, particularly from people with experience modding forums.

In the meantime the Journal committee is talking to various parties at the University of Iowa to plan an academic conference for 2014; stay tuned for more information!

III. HAPPENINGS AT THE AO3

2012 has so far brought an unbroken streak of monthly deploys, adding series subscriptions and better page titles as well as several bugfixes -- see the Release Notes on the AO3 for more details ! The ADT committee has also been running training for Open Doors on the archive import process, and is soliciting feedback on the new email-batching and user stats features that will be coming up. Fun with stats!

In the meantime Tag Wrangling recently hosted their first Open House of the term. Questions were asked and answered, and there was a lively discussion about guidelines and procedures. The staff hopes to host several more before the end of the term at varied days and times to accommodate users across the globe.

The Support committee reported that their ticket count is holding steady at about 200 new tickets coming in each month. Most tickets are resolved within 48 hours. Certain tickets, however, may take a bit longer as they need more in-depth research. Support recently met with the Tester Leads who will be helping Support investigate some of those trickier bugs. \o/

Open Doors is getting the ball rolling on an import for 852Prospect.org. They've been collecting feedback on the SSA import to revise and properly document the archive import process; training with Support to prepare for answering 852Prospect tickets post-import; training with AD&T on more technical aspects of importing to improve future troubleshooting abilities; and moving toward bringing importing directly under Open Doors.

IV. SEEING AND SPEAKING

Vidding members Francesca Coppa and Tisha Turk are, along with members of the Legal committee, preparing for DMCA testimony in early June. They are also continuing pre-planning work on a Dark Archive for multimedia fanworks. Last but not least, April saw them unveiling a Showcase of Fan Videos at the A03. Check it out if you haven't already seen it!

V. GOVERNANCE

The Board has been busy as usual - you can see the full details in their minutes for 31st March, 7th April and 14th April. Planning has started for next year's election. The Strategic Planning Workgroup presented a roadmap for creating a plan, which was announced as part of the spring drive. Board members also helped Devmem co-ordinate things for the April drive, and the new Grants committee has also been launched.

Meanwhile Finance prepared financial statements for the annual report, and supported DevMem by monitoring income during the drive and answering questions from members.

VI. OUR TECH WIZARDS

Systems resolved 73 tickets; deployed Errbit to production; aided in TW.org's recovery from the overwhelming response to the membership drive/survey mailing (\0/); tightened security on otw5; and underwent other security maintenance procedures as outlined in our documentation.

Webmasters took an early step toward redesigning transformativeworks.org, by working on internal and external outreach to gather feedback about the site. Questions about the site were included in the OTW Community Survey, and an internal questionnaire is being developed that will be used to gather feedback from OTW committees.

VII. IT'S ALL ABOUT THE PEEPS

Volunteers & Recruiting has been working hard to engage with and process a swell of new volunteers resulting from the recent drive and survey projects! While other recent months saw about 20 willing-to-serve (WTS) forms per month, VolCom received roughly 140 forms in April. VolCom is working very hard to find placements for all of these volunteers and is also using the surge in WTS forms to test new intake procedures, as well as creating documentation for existing procedures. Some examples of their work last month:

*New Staffers List*: Curtis Jefferson (Communications), crowa (Internationalization & Outreach), anatsuno (Journal), Francesca Coppa (Open Doors), Hadrien Asbury (Open Doors), tartan (Open Doors), arrow (Open Doors), Stiney (Open Doors), baerga69 (Webmasters), moonmagicks (Webmasters), Natalie (Webmasters), Lady Oscar (Support)

*Departing Staffers List*: Suzanne Scott (Journal)

*New Workgroup Members:* Matty (AO3 Documentation Lead), hele (AO3 Documentation), Kylie (AO3 Documentation), lionpyh (AO3 Documentation), mumble (AO3 Documentation), Scott S (AO3 Documentation), jrho (AO3 Documentation), Yshyn (AO3 Documentation), Maia Bobrowicz (Elections Workgroup), Lucy Pearson (AO3 Documentation & Elections Workgroup), Claudia Rebaza (Elections Workgroup)

*New Tag Wranglers*: Batsutousai, supergreak, Salahra, afterandalasia
*New Coding Volunteers*: Anoel, just_chiara, Lal, Mark Bowers
*New Testers*: Vel, mary0111

*Departing Tag Wranglers*: welfycat

Links roundup for 7 May 2012

2012-05-07T14:31:43Z

Here's a roundup of stories about women in fandom that might be of interest to fans:

An urgent call is going out to any female fan artists in the New York City area! The PBS program Off Book did a piece on fan artists on May 2. "The fan art community is one of the most creative and active online. Taking pop culture stories and icons as its starting point, the fan community extends those characters into new adventures, unexpected relationships, bizarre remixes, and even as the source material for beautiful art. Limited only by the imagination of the artist, the fan art world is full of surprises and brilliance." Apparently it is also "limited only" by the gender of the fan artist in the show's eyes, as not a single woman appeared to speak despite some of their fan art being shown. Super-wiki owner missyjack protested the exclusion of female artists on the YouTube post, and received a request from a show representative to gather the names of fans willing to be interviewed. If you're a female fan artist in NYC who would be willing to take part and broaden this representation of fan artists, comment at her blog.

Also infuriating to many female fans was the representation of female audience members by MovieFone with regards to the new Marvel movie release, The Avengers. More than one female fan protested the representation of women as passive audience members dragged to the film simply to please boyfriends. The Discriminating Fangirl wrote "Instead of writing an intelligent guide to the movies for people who aren’t already fans" the article included "idiotic, sexist stereotypes." She summed up the problem with "Yes, because every girl going to see The Avengers is a giggling twit who’s obsessed with being pretty, watching inane rom coms, and who never got over high school. That’s insulting both to fangirls AND to girls who dig rom coms, because it...downplays womens’ intelligence and their taste in films. If girls like it, it must be fluff." She added that "superhero genre stuff AND romance genre stuff...[are] two interests [that] are not mutually exclusive."

By comparison the just-completed ROFLcon III, a "State of the Web Union" conference held in Cambridge, Massachussetts, had a panel on Fangirl Culture alongside other panels on internet memes and supercuts ("those densely packed, tightly edited video compilations that usually hone in on an idiosyncratic film or television trope"). The Fangirl panel "brought together several fanfic creators-slash-experts, who discussed the increasingly mainstream visibility of fanfic, as well as the bad rap it sometimes gets — despite the fact that most of us grew up daydreaming ourselves into the lives of our favorite characters." It also spawned a related online article about the origins of vidding.

If you are a female creator of fanworks, you can help correct the media assumption that there are only one or two of you out here. Why not contribute to Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW. Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

New OTW Chat Channel!

2012-05-06T17:08:31Z

For everyone who uses IRC and has been looking for ways to join in conversations with OTW volunteers, look no further! The OTW is now registered on Freenode at #otw-dev.

This channel is a new option for OTW volunteers, particularly those who work in our Systems and AD&T committees, to keep in touch with each other. It will also allow interested people outside the org to meet us! We don't guarantee that there will always be someone in there, but we hope people will find the additional contact point useful.

Many people who are coders and work in site development use IRC to communicate with other coders and systems folk. We hope that the increased visibility of those volunteers who serve in these areas of the OTW will allow for more collaboration and discussion with those working in similar areas outside of our organization.

To sign in visit this link:
http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=#otw-dev

Type in your name, fill in the captcha and you should be able to log on.

For those wanting more information, rules are posted at:
http://transformativeworks.org/volunteer/otw-irc-channel

Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Strategic planning update

2012-05-05T19:34:14Z

The Strategic Planning workgroup very much appreciates the feedback we've gotten on the roadmap post that went up during the recent drive and want to take this opportunity to respond to some of the common themes. Of course, we may not have seen all of the posts people have made in their personal spaces about these issues. We'd love for people to contact us (http://transformativeworks.org/contact/communications will get a message passed to us) so that we can hear what you have to say. We will do our best to respond to each of you individually, though we can't promise individual responses if the team is overwhelmed with feedback.

We did want to clarify a few things based on the feedback we've gotten so far. For starters, the roadmap is a very basic, high level document that outlines the very tip of the Strategic Planning workgroup iceberg. Its original audience was intended to be the OTW Board, which is why it may seem strangely structured and/or sound overly academic. The drive came up on us quickly after the roadmap was created and, in our haste to get it out to you all, we decided to post it with almost no editing. We apologize for any confusion this caused.

What we're working on is the first public Strategic Plan for the OTW. The group consensus is that this needs to be the most basic, org-organizing, internal problem-addressing SP possible. Our goals are to make it:

practical

usable

implementable

straightforward

as jargon-free and plainspoken as possible

short-term

The OTW's long-term strategy and goals, relationships with external actors and other orgs, etc., are all things we are keeping in mind, but, as far as this particular plan goes, the org just isn't there yet. Although it may seem old for fandom, the OTW is absolutely a baby in its non-profit context. With that in mind, the Strategic Planning workgroup is focused on making this version of the plan basic, operational, and short-term even for a strategic plan (which would normally cover up to 5 years). Our goal is to specifically design this first plan to help the org gets its feet underneath it and address a bunch of internal, systemic problems that are, in fact, a big part of what’s preventing the org from formulating workable long-term goals or pursuing strategic projects such as, for example, teaming up more with the EFF.

Although it was not written into the roadmap, transparency is very important to us. While none of us have the time to spend hours writing lengthy updates about what's going on, we have committed to giving at least monthly (if not more frequent) updates in order to keep the org as a whole updated on our process. Anyone with feedback on our updates should absolutely get in touch with us if you're comfortable doing so, especially if you have thoughts on how we can structure these better or provide information in a more efficient or transparent way. (A message through http://transformativeworks.org/contact/communications is the best way to contact us.)

Everyone in the Strategic Planning workgroup sees our role here as that of synthesizers -- which means, contrary to how it might have seemed in the roadmap post, the majority of our time is going to be spent gathering information from actors/stakeholders at all different levels of the OTW. We will be seeking to find out how you use the org, what you need, what you do, what you'd like to see change, what you'd like to see stay the same, etc. with the goal of increasing satisfaction and usability. Our major information gathering techniques are:

observing internal org meetings

reading internal org documentation

group-on-one interviews

group-on-group chats

original surveys tailored for each division of the OTW, for both current and formerly involved persons

original surveys tailored for users/interested parties

compiling and analyzing data from the big OTW survey

This kind of information gathering is something we have to do incrementally and carefully, so that we get usable, helpful information that we can actually synthesize into practical plans for each division of the OTW, as well as the org as a whole. We'll be as transparent as possible about how we come to the conclusions we do about each division/part of the plan, while maintaining the confidentiality of the participants.

We'd also like to be clear, so that there is no confusion or suspicion about this: No one in this group has any desire to make any kind of proclamation from "on high," and no one in this group has any kind of fundamental personal agenda outside of helping make the OTW work more smoothly and successfully. We want to get the OTW into shape, but we are not particular about the type of shape. We're okay with a square, or a hexagon, or a rhombus -- but it's very clear to us, and we're hopeful you agree, that the OTW can't go from a squiggly line to a fractal without a lot of work.

This work is going to take time. We are currently working from a very loose timeline that has the first version of the strategic plan being released in December. We haven't worked on developing a more structured timeline for these reasons:

We don't want to set up unrealistic expectations

We don't want to put the workgroup in a position where our choices are "fulfill unrealistic expectations by cutting corners and burning ourselves out" or "fail"

We aren't yet clear ourselves exactly how much time each step is going to take; currently, each member of the Strategic Planning workgroup is putting in ~5+ hours every week. (That may seem particularly low or particularly high, but it's the number we're comfortable with, especially since we're trying to avoid the burnout endemic in the OTW.)

We are hoping that the regular updates will both serve as a way of keeping you updated on our progress and provide us with a better way to eventually evaluate how long each step will take.

Of course, we are still in the "set up" phase; once we've successfully gone through the division we've chosen for our test run, the next divisions should run much more smoothly and quickly, and we hope we'll be able to refine and release a more definite timeline. Practically, we also realize that it takes a lot of time to gather and synthesize information in a useful way. Synthesizing data, discussing it, figuring out the steps to take, going back to consult with the actors and stakeholders who provide and are affected by the information -- that's not stuff that can be completed with one two-hour meeting the week after.

Again, we'd like to encourage feedback (messages sent through http://transformativeworks.org/contact/communications will be passed to us, and that is the best way to reach us); in addition to trying to address the feedback in our updates, we will also be folding the feedback into the information we gather for synthesis. Contact will be kept as confidential as possible, and while some of the text of questions may be shared verbatim (especially when being addressed in future updates), any names attached will be withheld.

We look forward to hearing from you -- and working together as we move forward.
Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Links roundup for 4 May 2012

2012-05-04T15:21:26Z

Here's a roundup of fan activity stories that might be of interest to fans:

Erik Kain writing for Forbes discussed game mods being created for Game of Thrones and declared, "I think that this, and really the entire modding community, is living proof that games are much more a participatory medium than most other forms of entertainment. Sure, fans write fan-fiction all the time for popular franchises like Star Wars, but there’s something more impressive about a community of gamers banding together to create a gaming experience using tools that developers of popular games have made available." While not explaining what the key differences are, Kain concludes, "With the question of a new or alternative ending still very much on many of our minds in light of the Mass Effect 3 ending controversy, many critics of the critics have posited that a game is a work of art and can’t be changed due to fan pressure; that this sets a dangerous precedent and cheapens artistic integrity. Does a mod of a game like Mount & Blade or Skyrim or Half-Life 2 threaten its artistic integrity as well? The art is being changed – and not just due to fan pressure, but by fans themselves. The modding community is taking a work of art and changing it, distorting it, and making it in some ways a new work. Their own work."

The Mass Effect 3 fans would not be the first to get a reworked ending. As author Elle Lothlorien tells it, her readers already got her to change her second novel's ending. "'The whole shift from paper publishing to e-publishing has allowed a whole new relationship between the readers and the author, so when fans began to contact me about the ending, it was odd at first. I realized that I can take this to the next level. I rewrote Sleeping Beauty and collaborated with CreateSpace to publish the alternate ending.' Lothlorien pointed out that a traditional publishing model would have made re-publishing the book with an alternate ending nearly impossible, especially given the time delays and marketability concerns of the industry as a whole. By utilizing print-on-demand, the author was able to conceptualize the alternate book and bring it to a physical print edition in a matter of weeks."

Of course, regardless of how popular the canon ending is or isn't, fans don't necessarily stop creating. Despite the last Harry Potter film being released, Wizard Rock is continuing on. In an interview, members of wrock band Harry and the Potters discuss the origins of their fandom and the future of their work. "'We were casual fans. We had read the books once, but we weren’t involved in online message boards discussing Snape’s sex life or anything,' [guitarist and keyboardist Paul] DeGeorge said. 'We just thought it would be a cool way to re-contextualize these stories, turning them into rock songs.'" The band continues to have enough gigs lined up to keep them busy, and they aren't alone. A recent article on the upcoming off-Broadway opening of the UK production Potted Potter notes it has been going on, in one form or another, since 2005, and name drops another recontextualization of Potter, A Very Potter Musical, starring the (now well-known) Darren Criss, which continues to add to its over 8 million views.

If you are a Harry Potter, Game of Thrones fan, if you mod video games or are a creator of fanworks, why not write about it in Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. Links are welcome in all languages!

Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW. Mirrored from an original post on the OTW blog. Find related news by viewing our tag cloud.

Last Call for the OTW Community Survey!

2012-05-02T19:12:55Z

If you haven't taken the OTW Community Survey yet (see our announcement post for details), now is the time to do so!

It closes at midnight UTC today (when is that in your timezone?).

We'd love to hear your opinion on all things OTW as we work to keep making the organization even better! The survey is hosted on a secure connection at Surveymonkey:

https://de.surveymonkey.com/s/surveyOTW

OTW Community Survey

We're looking forward to announcing preliminary results tomorrow!