btw I’ve found these stretches from the WAK blog very helpful when knitting a lot:

Plus make sure to take breaks regularly - and stop if anything starts to hurt!

especially with gift knitting I know it can be tempting to push through it for a deadline, but it’s really not worth causing long term injury. (And anyone knit-worthy should be understanding of that, imho.) Stay well :)

Also good for artists drawing with pencils/on a tablet/with a pen!

Also good for writers

Make art, take care!

Somewhere in my notes in the last few days I saw someone add some tags that I’ve been thinking about ever since. I wish I could find them again (or that I’d just saved their post at the time) because I think they made a lot of sense.

They were talking about how fanfic is becoming more and more mainstream while still remaining largely transgressive. It’s such an interesting dichotomy to think about!

On the one hand, you have sites like AO3 and realities like widespread high speed internet access being more and more accessible to larger and larger groups of people. This makes it incredibly easy for anyone at all to find and read fanfic.

On the other hand, you have the roots of fanfic. It was born out of marginalized groups such as women, people of colour, and members of the queer community deciding to take the stories that had been aimed at a largely male, white, heterosexual audience and inverting them into something they could enjoy and relate to. To this day, fanfic is a place where people write the kinds of stories that don’t get made into movies and TV shows. The kinds of stories that don’t get published or end up on the New York Times bestseller list.

Fanfic used to be written and shared in secret. People used to hide it. People still do hide the fact that they read or write it. But it’s becoming something that more and more people are becoming more and more aware of.

So now there’s a spotlight starting to shine on fanfic. People who aren’t looking for transgressive works are finding them where they always were. People who think the status quo is fine are getting upset when they enter a place where the status quo is constantly being upended.

The tags on that post that I can’t find made the point that popular media is curated and sanitized and stripped of most of its controversy in order to appeal to the widest possible audience. But that also makes that audience expect all media to be curated and sanitized in the same way. When they encounter the messy, controversial, ugly, radical, difficult things that people write in fanfic, they’re unprepared.

Fanfic isn’t big media. Fanfic authors aren’t being edited and filtered and polished - and nor are their works. The clash between the expectations of people new to fanfic and accustomed to popular media and the realities of what fanfic is and what it’s being written for - that’s part of this struggle that fandom is going through right now. It’s been going on since the beginning of course, but it’s getting louder every year.

I’m still thinking my way through this, but it really does make a lot of sense to me. If those were your tags, please let me know so I can credit you with the ideas at the core of this post.

And if you have any ideas for how we as fans can better introduce the newbies to the culture and expectations in fandom, I’d love to hear it. The better we can guide people into our space, the better they’ll fit in when they join it.

While I’m not entirely sure how, here are a few what ideas. If you’re coming into fanfic new, here is what you need to know. Perhaps other folks can think of more diplomatic ways to frame these thoughts.

This feels related to a post I saw a while back about how so much of fandom is rooted in neuro divergence. The hyper fixation, the “squeeing”, the encyclopedic knowledge. And how, as fandom gets more and more mainstream, those hallmarks of being a Fan get tagged as *cringey*

Idk. Makes you think.

I love almost every point here, but if there’s one thing I would tell new fans, it’s this:

Most fanfic is straight.

These are the best hard numbers I have (with multi/other including all fics labeled as more than one of m/m, f/m, and f/f along with ones labeled as multi/other):

AO3 is the gay porn bookstore, so AO3 is the site that cares about:

If you hate Bad Kinks, that’s fine. Just know that you will never get the kind of labeling AO3 has from the people who pander to the mainstream. If you want to get rid of The Bad Stuff, the kind of websites you’ll end up with are a sea of nigh unsearchable het, like Wattpad. And the same kinks will be there. They just won’t be labeled clearly.

People imagine that fandom is mostly queer because their own bubble is, because queer stuff sticks in their mind more as anomalous, making it seem more frequent than it really is, and because the only places that label clearly are the queer ones.

If you want to tear down the places with queer+freaky content, you will end up tearing down the only places that protect queer content at all.

No, literally no one missed that. For you, the big thing is underage. For someone else, it’s RPF existing at all. For someone else, it’s rape-as-kink.

I reiterate: If you hate Bad Kinks, that’s fine. But AO3 looks how it does because it’s opposed to censorship. A site less opposed to censorship would also be less into this type of metadata and would have less clear labeling.

Perhaps Wattpad’s terms of service would be more to your taste.

I am Ever-Powerful, One Who Protects, One Who Smites

If I go full birth name it’s “Fair Featured, Joy, of the Untamed.”

I think I like it.

I am the Pure, the Exalted One, son of the son of the Furrowed

I am Earthling, from the River-Junction, Descendent of the Orator

I am Gift from God, King

The product of plagiarism: Ten miles of peach blossoms - Tang Qi Gong Zi.

Hello friends,

I have no idea if you guys have ever heard about the Chinese film called “Three lifetimes - Ten miles of peach blossom”(?) or something like that. But if you do, please think carefully before you buy a ticket.

You can search #‎三生三世十里桃花抄袭 or “tang qi plagiarism” for more information.

Here’s something you need to know about that movie in a nutshell:

- Back in 2007, a famous BL-novel author “Windy” (Da Fung Gui Wo - 大风刮过) wrote a book called “Peach Blossom Debt” (桃花债).

- After that “Tang Qi” (T7 - 唐七) committed plagiarism, use “Windy” work and passed it off as her own! “Tang Qi” named it “三生三世十里桃花” (Three lifetimes: Ten miles of peach blossoms). Besides, “Tang Qi” has stole ideas from many more BL-novel authors, not only “Windy”: especially “Joyful” (公子欢喜).

- Base on comparisons between “Peach Blossom Debt” and “Three lifetimes”, you can see they are really similar - up to 70% (the comparison is illustrated in the link down below). The only difference is: “Three lifetimes” is NOT a BL-novel, is BxG (shoujo) one. That makes a big difference.

The Chinese government does not like homosexual, BL-novels are technically illegal in China. That’s the first reason why “Three lifetimes” is a plagiarized work but still getting more popular. “Windy” CAN NOT sue the thief, because the judge won’t support her… Plus, “Windy” is quite timid so she just don’t want to fight.

- In fact, “Tang Qi” has a group of professionals with connections that backs her up. That explains why she can’t be sue and got famous so fast.

“Tang Qi” has a terrible personality, she even mocked “Windy”: “My book is already published, what about yours? Oh, they weren’t? Do you need help from me?” “Plagiarize, plagiarize my ass.”

~Wrote by mydramalist/fudanshidesu: “The original novel is BL-themed. Needless to say, BL-themed stuff is low-profile and pretty much illegal (read underground) in China. Knowing DaFeng would have a hard time fighting the establishment, Tang Qi took DaFeng’s novel and rewrote it. She replaced homosexual characters with heterosexual characters to cater to mainstream audience… added a little spice here and there and voila! TangQi’s very own novel was born.

There’s more to the story…

Tang Qi was bold, she even made fake accounts to talk about her novels on Da Feng’s pages, she posted sh*t in the comment sections under Da Feng’s novels… Girl basically went gaga!

When people found out what TangQi was doing, things got ugly and our anti-hero, Tang Qi, decided to go full scale war. She created an account pretending to be Da Feng… Blah blah blah… Long story short, her actions harmed Da Feng’s reputation.

Today, Tang Qi is a well-known “writer” in Mainland China. So, we know the truth now! She’s a thief, who feeds and lives off of other people’s creativity, their time and effort.

If you decide to read the book/watch “Eternal Love”, please keep the above in mind and give proper credits to DaFeng, the real mind behind the story.”

- After all, “Windy” told her fans: “She (Tang Qi) did not write the story on her own but she’s still more famous than me. That’s because I’m not good enough.” – Said the author who has best-selling BL-novels, why??

It’s a long story since 2008… Hundreds of famous authors, artists, cosplayer, composer,… shared Windy’s article and boycotted “Tang Qi”; Many people hashtagged #一起来撕抄袭书, torn off “Three lifetimes” to make “Tang Qi” see their anger: http://www.weibo.com/p/100808ee2c9c99efe1425beac07329883de84f?k=%25E4%25B8%2580%25E8%25B5%25B7%25E6%259D%25A5%25E6%2592%2595%25E6%258A%2584%25E8%25A2%25AD%25E4%25B9%25A6&from=526&_from_=huati_topic.

- BUT HERE’S THE WORST PART. In 2015, they started to make “Three lifetimes” into a TV drama and movie, afraid of “Tang Qi” plagiarism responsible for low profits, that film crew bought off Weibo’s staffs, ERASED all the hashtags, articles, images,… that accused “Tang Qi” and “Three lifetimes” of stealing ideas from the search bar, to keep a lid on her plagiarism…

This is wrong. The true artist cannot gain anything, even lost her right just because she wrote a BL-novel. Are ONLY heterosexual loves beautiful, o-kay, worthy? But same-sex loves should be hidden away, ruined like that?

And what about the true talented authors, who went with their guts on their works?

- “Tang Qi” not only plagiarized BL-novel authors once but more than 5! And 2 of them had been made into film in Mainland Chinese… If the film crew hadn’t had bought off Weibo, “Three lifetimes” wouldn’t have been this popular, I believe so.

- So, if that movie will be in your area, please consider before buying the ticket!

- - - - -

Note:

(1) The comparison between “Peach Blossom Debt” and “Three Lifetimes”:

https://tieba.baidu.com/p/3573276406?pn=1 (more than 10 parts).

In English (short version): https://hamster428.wordpress.com/2015/07/09/plagiarism-allegations-against-tqgz/

(2) Even its drama poster, OST, and “book” cover is plagiarized too:

http://m.weibo.cn/5802830735/4070336805431010

http://m.weibo.cn/1875808141/4081929105563790

(3) Tang Qi has published some books, and 3 of them have been accused of plagiarism, but still being printed. Why? Because BL-novel authors can’t sue her!

More than 30 Tang Qi’s “characters” are the copy-cat of characters made by Joyful. Such as one of Tang Qi’s main male character who is in purple and silver hair→ it is EXACTLY THE SAME as Joyful’s character whose name 勖扬天君.

(4) Faking accounts, cyberbullying, back-stabbing,… Read more about filthy tricks Tang Qi has done here: https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10203680700097895&id=273489969522688

meirl

SMACK BARM MOON WET

WHAT'S MOON WET? WHY, HERE IN EARTH'S ORBIT IT'S GOOD AS GRAVY

IT'S THE WATER OFF THE MOON

I am once again asking this website to stop informing me of major events like this

26.10.20 - the fifth consecutive day of protests against Poland’s court’s near-total ban on abortion.

they follow a ruling by Poland’s Constitutional Court that abortions, even in cases of foetal defects, are illegal.

it means that abortion is now only valid in cases of rape or incest.

the fight is about the right to choose.

 Hey, to you sci-fi/fantasy writers out there (and maybe some others, but this is mainly for things that can’t really be researched irl), if you want to write a character who is a driven, passionate expert on something, don’t write about them rambling indifferently about some boring, mundane part of it. Give them a deep, intense hatred of some oddly specific wow-I-did-not-even-know-that-was-a-thing-and-it-would-have-never-occurred-to-me-that-it’s-a-bad-thing thing they’ll gladly rant about.

 Write a dragon rider who really fucking hates it when a dragon is trained to bow while being reined. A space ship engineer who is pissed off when perfectly good antimatter ship has been adapted to run on neutral matter. A historian who is still not over the massive failures of a general who lost a specific battle 300 years before she was born.

 The guy currently giving us a series of lectures on the restoration of historical buildings really, really hates polymer paint. At the artisan school our stained glass teacher really hated this one specific Belgian artist - we never really figured out what did that guy even do, but he’s been dead for over 200 years and our teacher was glad that at least he’s dead.

 Experts don’t just know things you’ve never thought about. They’ve got strong opinions about it.

nobody talks enough about the bermuda triangle these days what's with that

Hey! So back in 2012, they discovered these pyramids at the bottom of the sea surrounding the Bermuda Triangle that altered currents and sent ships crashing into sharp rocks and other shipwrecks and the entire archaeological community went, “what the actual fuck do we do with this information” and have collectively decided to ignore it and hope it goes away. 

In 2013, Snopes ran this article that debunked the whole thing, and, in fact, the doctor that supposedly found these pyramids doesn’t actually exist--except that the article never actually made rounds and therefore everyone is still reeling from crystal pyramids three times the size of the ones in Giza, Egypt two thousand meters under the sea. 

There was a huge resurgence of crystal pyramid articles in 2016, we’re still doing circles about whether or not these pyramids actually exist or if its a story from a legend from a conspiracy theory from the 1970s. We’re pretty sure that they don’t exist, but who knows with the Bermuda Triangle. It’s just bizarre enough to fit right in with the rest of the weirdness surrounding the area.

But then, later in 2016, there were some articles about scientists--real ones this time--finding these weird hexagonal clouds above the Bermuda Triangle. Hexagons are found a lot in nature, but not normally in clouds, so people sat up and took notice. They eventually realized that these clouds--anywhere from twenty to fifty miles wide--were essentially signals that they were dropping “air bombs” that would run up to 170 mph--over a Cat 5 hurricane-force winds--in that area in microbursts.

And then, just as fast, still in 2016, came the articles of, “no, these hexagonal clouds aren’t the reason that the Bermuda Triangle is fucking weird.”

And....then? We haven’t really heard anything since 2016. Unless you count Ancient Aliens as a viable resource for what goes on in the Bermuda Triangle, anyway. Then we haven’t heard anything on the Bermuda Triangle since 2018, thereabouts.

@gayarsonist​ YOUR TURN DAZZLE ME WITH THE BULLSHIT THAT THIS PLACE PRODUCES

You are not your thoughts.

However, you are the one listening to them.

I'm late to the paleontology drama but my god this is so funny

Meirl

Anyway, as we enter cold & flu season in the YEAR of corona, this will come in very handy.

This was created by Vox and if you look at small print, you'll find the sources used to create the table.

Obviously there are exceptions and we're getting conflicting and new information about covid-19 all the time but by mid-august, I believe we certainly had observed enough cases for experts to put this together at least.

I think a lot of the debate over what constitutes “fanfic” just boils down to people wilfully refusing to engage with each other’s rhetorical shorthands.

Like, yes, from the perspective of fanfiction as a cultural institution, clearly Dante’s Inferno is not fanfic. It’s operating in a completely different context with respect to the relationship between the author and the text that doesn’t really have any contemporary equivalent.

However, when folks say “Dante’s Inferno is fanfic”, that’s not a statement that exists in a vacuum. Typically, it’s made in response to a class of popular criticisms of fandom culture that very specifically frame the absence of original creation as a driving authorial agenda as the heart of What’s Wrong With Fanfic™.

So what “Dante’s Inferno is fanfic” very often means is “the absence of original creation as a driving authorial agenda that’s being cited as the reason that fanfiction can’t be art is also found in many works that are considered great art“.

That’s a big, cumbersome pain in the ass to say, though, so it gets shorthanded into something that’s incomprehensible to anyone who isn’t already familiar with the criticisms it’s addressing.

Now, obviously the the argument that the presence of original creation as a driving authorial agenda is some sort of categorical litmus test for whether a work qualifies as real art is dumb as hell. So if “Dante’s Inferno is fanfic” sounds like a senseless thing to say, that’s mostly because it’s a response to an equally senseless criticism!