neadods | Wednesday Roundup

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Wednesday Roundup

I bought the all-star cast reading stories from "House on Pooh Corner" at Stratford (Fanfare Books, they had at least one more copy of both CDs) because it had Judi Dench (Kanga) and Stephen Fry (Pooh) on it, but the one who makes me laugh like a loon every time I hear him is Geoffrey Palmer's sardonic Eeyore. Highly recommended.

In honor of the Bollywood discussion the other day, I made a Bollywood exercise mix. The pace is quite slow - I did barely over a mile in 25 minutes - but it's a nice way to ease back onto the treadmill after a vacation. Only four songs, because Bollywood doesn't do short numbers:

1 - Kahin Aag Lage (Taal soundtrack)
2 - Chale Chalo (Lagaan soundtrack)
3 - O Rey Chhori (Lagaan soundtrack)
4 - Chaiyya Chaiyya (several soundtracks; mine came from Bombay Dreams)

FLIST ROUNDUP:

Fabulous Doctor Who Vid to "This is Not Your Year." Images for all new seasons. Downloadable here.
The Time Princess Sweet fluff of the Doctor telling his daughter a bedtime story.
Dark Aegis has a nice Britpick post for those of us who keep forgetting that there is no "gotten" in British English and that "pants" is considerably ruder on the other side of the sea.

THE LATEST LJ ANGST:
BubbleBlunder's open letter articulating the problems and questions the fans have with LJ
LJ's latest clarification/response (specifically mentioning the letter)

Nea's comment on the whole thing: nobody's really in the right here. LJ's team has done some real boneheaded things, *particularly* knee-jerk banning of legitimate expressions (breastfeeding icons) and in not warning and permitting people to take down stuff before lowing the banhammer. That one of their own has been mocking people is just the icing on the cow cake.

On the other hand, fandom by nature infringes on copyrights and trademarks, and "we've always done this sort of legally questionable thing and nobody complains" is not, in fact, a legal defense, nor is it an accurate statement. Cease and Desist orders were winging at fans who went over the line well before there was a world wide web; if the actors/copyright holders/Powers That Be bothered to dig us up when we were underground in the 70s and 80s, then it's all the easier for them to find stuff that's out in the open on the Web.

Do I think there ought to be a fandom exception? Hell, yes, I am a fan - I create and consume exactly the sort of things that they've been C&Ding and striking out for most of my life. But my "I want" doesn't change the law, and if I want it to, then I need to put my effort into *changing the law,* or arguing for a change in the rules based on specific precedents (of which there are many in the whole 6A thing; I knew the first set of strikeouts wouldn't stand because I'd been through the exact same thing with AOL back in the early 90s. The only difference is that the 6A thing happened faster than AOL's "ooops, we went too far" backdown.)

As for the seismic shift to other LJ-like forums... I'm not going anywhere. First, because I've paid to be here and I want my money's worth. Second, there is absolutely no guarantee whatsoever that GreatestJournal and InsaneJournal and Journalfen and whateverjournal won't do *the exact same thing.*

ETA: The Terrible Secret of Livejournal, a post that repeats much of my point. The terrible secret of Livejournal is that a lot of fandom material is illegal.

It's not just incorrectly classified as illegal. It doesn't just "appear" to be illegal to people who don't understand. It doesn't just "resemble" illegal material. It isn't just "illegal to show to minors but perfectly okay as long as you card everyone." It's not "arguably" illegal under hypothetical assumptions that haven't been tested in court. It's not just against Six Apart's terms of service. It's not just disfavoured by Barak Berkowitz's personal taste. There exists material that may be in a grey area, but a lot of it isn't. A lot of fandom material really is definitely illegal to distribute; sometimes even illegal to possess.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Re: the LJ debacle

I totally agree with everything you said here. While I certainly think 6A have made some stupid decisions lately and have created a publicity nightmare for themselves, I think this over the top reactions of fandom has been just as bad.

I tried to explain that to a friend of mine the other day, saying imagine you were in your classroom and you announced a decision, good or bad, to your class, and a good portion of your students started responding in a very rude manner by holding up cat macros, mini porn stories and over the top vids? Would you have rational response to it? I do think that 6A reacted badly, but fandom has been just as rude.

And frankly, I'm getting a little tired of this being compared to things much more important than displaying fan works. I'll be glad when this is all over with.

this being compared to things much more important than displaying fan works

Ah, yes, I love the smell of badly-argued First Amendment rights in the morning. The FA gives you the right to *say* it. It doesn't give anyone else the obligation to provide the forum.

Anybody Godwined yet? No, wait, don't answer, I want to live in the bliss that is ignorance.

I think fandom has got so used to having creators turn a blind eye to fan fiction and fan art that they are forgetting we don't have a legal ground to stand on. I think right now if JKR decreed there could be no more fan related works based off her books, I'd just laugh at the reaction of the fandom. Because they seem to have forgotten the works they are so proud of really don't belong to them in the first place.

Fan*fiction* in particular is a legal grey area. (I used to work in a copyright office.) While the characters and universe are someone else's property, the fan author does actually have rights to any unique situation or character they bring to the mix.

Which is why TPTB tend to pointedly ignore fanfic.

George Lucas has always tried to split the difference - he once owned two copies of every fanzine put out - and he still says "you can do X, Y, and Z and I'll give you a forum to do it, but you can't do A, B, and C." Some fans were happy to play in his playground. Some wanted to do A, B, and C, and made sure it was far underground.

And then there were the dorks who had to wave the red flag just to see what happened.... and discovered that irritating the 800-pound gorilla isn't the brightest concept in the universe.

The Powers That Be seem to be quite happy pretending ignorance. It's a wise fan that makes it possible for them to keep that pretense up.

Second, there is absolutely no guarantee whatsoever that GreatestJournal and InsaneJournal and Journalfen and whateverjournal won't do *the exact same thing.*

I think that's the kicker that some people don't seem to get.
I have my own domain (several, in fact). I like them a lot, but I chose to be here because of how well LJ does social networking. I post my fic on LJ because of the community. I'll continue to do so until I get kicked out or the environment becomes not worth the investment of my time.

I think that's the kicker that some people don't seem to get.

I am reminded of the first online fandom I was part of. There was a free listserv. Eventually the person who ran it pissed off enough people that a competing listserv was set up and everyone moved in a huff from A to B and spent quite some time congratulating themselves on being where everything was "nicer."

Then, about 2-3 years later, the new mod was annoying people, someone pointed out that the old listserv was still in place, and everyone moved back, relieved to be away from "all that" and back where everything was nicer.

I keep thinking of that every time I see people listing all the alternate journals they've registered on.

Yeah, that was the brilliant thing about mailing lists: You had the option of starting your own when the inevitable fandom disintegration hit. You really could take your friends and go play elsewhere without letting personal differences leave a bad taste in your mouth. And it's only fairly recently that LJ became so monolithic (in large part because it's been so good with the social networking setup and makes it so easy to keep track of blogs on other systems) -- I can still dimly remember when half my online not-met-through-LJ friends had blogs that weren't on LJ and only shifted here themselves following the flow of traffic.

I've pretty much settled on just staying on LJ myself and just using my JF account for my fic (that being the only really questionable content I post). Because if I lose the JF account, it's not taking such a massive hit to my online social network as losing my LJ would be. And it's not like I had more than 13 people following my on-LJ fic blog, anyway. The GJ, JF and IJ accounts have basically been A) as backups in case of LJ loss and B) for the purposes of commenting on other's accounts on those systems.

What? You mean, I don't have a god-given right to publish without permission sexually explicit text and images using copyright characters and trademarked names associated with brands that have a strong financial interest in maintaining a family-friendly image? Communism, I say! Communism!

*snort* Thanks for your post! Very sensible.

The bitchy version of the post listed all the legal rights that were infringed by that infamous Snarry art. As a fan? Hot stuff. But otherwise? Let's see, we've got Rowling, Rickman, Radcliffe, and Warner Brothers having their trademarks and copyrights infringed, and then there's the vagueness of the federal laws, which apparently include depictions of fictional pedophilia as well as real acts...

I'm glad there are other people who think some portions of "our side" are really, really embarrassing themselves right now.

*points to icon* Next Media*West, buy me a drink and I'll tell you all the I-remember-whens of someone who's been coming since we were in the first hotel...

Been there. Done that. Donated the T-shirt to Goodwill a long time ago.

On the other hand, it must be said that Bubble seems to have her head screwed on and is making some very valid points in a very good way.

Thank you for one of the most sensible posts I have seen on this issue.

(I was writing slash 25 years ago, and I remember the precautions we used to take to see that it didn't get into the 'wrong' hands or come to the attention of the authorities.)

I remember when Paul Darrow had shitfits about slash and was hounding fans over their freelance work because of it. I remember the C&Ds that came down for Beauty and the Beast zines. I remember the backlash about George Lucas drawing the line at "Slow Boat to Bespin." I know the story of the fan who got hammered by Yarboro for fanfic, and that Yarboro wanted the names and addresses of every single person who had the zine in question.

Basically, I remember that the good old days weren't a wonderful playground of "we can do what we do and everyone's happy." A bunch of us ~~dinosaurs~~ print-era fans have been wondering how big and how bad the backlash would be for coming out so strongly in public.

Frankly? Banning from LJ, not so bad in comparison to some of the shit that has and could happen.

Which fandom were you in 25 years ago? Or was it still Who? (My first whofic was in '80. Good times...)

Started in Blake's Seven fandom in '78 (and the reason that there was no published slash from '78 to '83 was that a fan editor had promised Gareth Thomas she'd kill anyone who tried to. (Mind you, if any of the rest of the cast had heard another cast member's tape...)

Was in S&H for a little while, then into The Professionals (and Lewis Collins discharged a shotgun over the heads of fen who had done a lot less than write slash about his character) and lots of other stuff, mainly vintage, until about ten years ago. I'm sort of putting my toe in the water again, but only with gen. I'm not really a Who fan - though I've been around since the first episode, one way or another. I think I was too old to fall in love with it...

I share a house with

inamac who discovered your LJ and kept telling me what you'd been saying. It sounded like fun, so I started reading for myself.

Gareth Thomas? I thought it was Paul Darrow who got his knickers in a knot about slash!

No. That came later. This was in either 1978 or 1979, when the fan putting together the first B7 adult zine (which was passed around set, by the way - all the first zines were) was buying Gareth Thomas drinks after a theatre performance. She told him about the zine (more than I would have done) and he asked, "Who does Blake get?" (and you would.) She said, "Well, in the one story I've got so far - Cally." Sez GT: "Why not Jenna?" The editor retorts that he should think himself lucky because if B7 fandom went the same way as Trek fandom it would be Avon. She then spent the rest of the evening buying him G&Ts and reassuring him that she wouldn't let that happen. She then spent the next few days ringing her friends and telling them. (Which was how I first heard about it.)

You have to remember that, at that time, B7 fandom was extremely small, and active fandom was very close to the set. David Jackson was spending most of his free time at the flat shared by the committee members of one fan club - one of whom he later married. David Maloney's secretary was very close to the committee of one of the other two clubs. One of the cameramen was an active fan, and one of the FX men was close to fandom. Mike Keating and Peter Tuddenham viewed fandom as source of drinks and wild parties. The fans often saw scripts during filming. Maloney encouraged fans, to the extent of said zines being circulated.

We didn't actually think that GT would do anything to us if we did write slash (being a pretty laid-back sort of guy) but the impression we got from those members of the cast we did know, particularly from David J, that there were others who were, in his words, "puritanical". However, the fan editor involved had a rep for being fierce when crossed (there is a story about a hotel room and a sword) and UK fandom was too worried about keeping its relationship with cast and crew to put it in jeopardy by publishing slash.

I'm sure people were writing slash in secret. I wrote my near-slash sotry "Mindfire" around this period, but it was not published, though for personal reasons rather than fear of fannish wrath. However, I was pretty out of the B7 fandom by the time my last B7 story was published, by Peter Anglehides (I never could spell Pete's name!) a short time after the end of fourth season (which I loathed.) By then I was working in other fandoms.

B7 fandom was extremely small, and active fandom was very close to the set.

That can be both a blessing and a curse - a blessing because you get the perks of a close relationship with the actors and all, and a curse because they're keeping tabs on you!

On the other hand, it's foolish to put some things openly up on the web on the assumption that TPTB *won't* find it in all the noise.

Personally, I prefer to keep my distance from both set and actors, which leaves me free to say what I think without fear of offending any of them. I'm not sure that Chris Boucher remembers the vitriolic exchange of letters we had towards the end of third season, but I prefer not to be asked to tell him how wonderful I (don't) think he is.

On the other hand, David J and Anne H fell in love almost at first sight, and remained so until David's death last year, so at least one good thing came out of the close connections between B7 fandom and the set.

That letter is so much better than the 150+ pages of arsiness fandom churned out. (99 bottles of beer? you still in primary school?) I just wish that there had been more comments in the vein of that letter and less of the macro-ing and maybe 6A would have answered the queries sooner.

And it's also nice to see that the LJ Staff have given themselves a work account so maybe the ass hattedry of

burr86 won't happen again.

But they still haven't updated the TOS on the site. They keep referring to a set of rules we can't even see and that's what really annoys me.

They keep referring to a set of rules we can't even see

And that is a HUGE problem. We can't follow rules we can't reference, and as long as 6A keeps that vague, I think they're opening themselves for small claims court cases. "Your honor, the plaintiff has lost $150 worth of services due to an infraction that is not plainly spelled out and advertised..."

I just wish that there had been more comments in the vein of that letter and less of the macro-ing

I think that panfandom has given itself a sense of entitlement that is both unbecoming and unhealthy... although admittedly, I only saw the Snarry picture because of a macro.

Even a link to the lj_biz post would be better than nothing. But how many new members will they catch out because they keep the TOS so vague? Or is that what they want to do?

I doubt that they're actively trying to "catch" anyone by leaving loopholes - to have that plan would also imply that they're dedicating manpower to searching and checking in hopes of catching someone out, and I doubt they're going to put that amount of money and effort in.

I'm thinking that they're still discussing the TOS with the lawyers, on the basis that they *are* going to have to back down on some of this.

he 150+ pages of arsiness fandom churned out

There's a rebuttal letter up, but I was unimpressed by it. The writer kept going on and on deconstructing one line about pornography in the original - which was a pretty laughable line - and missing the meat of the argument which is still most of what fans do is illegal. Bitching about how misogynistic one line about porn is doesn't magically make downloading, art using actors, etc., legal.

If you're referring to

legionseagle's post, I admit that the post and the earliest discussion threads were waxing outraged and humorous by turns over that line about pornography. But then the author of the terrible secret post pulled out his "dead" LJ account to come snark, and that thread got into details. Also somewhere in that discussion was a link to a really good dissection of what was wrong with the terrible secret post.

Tracked the links down -- here is the other post that tore through his on several levels in OP and discussion threads.

I dunno, while the OP was snotty on several levels (the code inputting your name was offputting, particularly since I was arguing his side!), I find this rebuttal a bit precious and snide too.

Notice that he never mentions, as he's listing all that's illegal, that for something to be illegal, it has to be established as such in a courtroom, and that (to the best of my knowledge, anyway), none of the things he lists have been brought to court.

I know of quite a few Cease and Desist letters. I know of a fan writer and editor who were brought to court and lost. I know of a fan artist who got blackballed by an actor who didn't like her sense of humor. Harry Potter fans have been sued and assorted film and TV producers have gone after downloaders.

So, yes, there have been court cases. There have been court cases that RUINED fans. I can name names.

The comments all seem to boil down to "he's a sexist, egotistical git, so he doesn't know what he's really saying." And I still think that however obnoxiously he said it, what he said is true.

So I was up front waiting on the receptionist to get back and mentally structuring this reply. I planned to run down the points of

mskala's that I agreed with (which basically turns out to be the things that he gave a rhetorical wave-in-passing to and never bothered to dwell upon, like copyright and trademark laws being more all-encompassing than they would be in an ideal world, or the way no fan wants to be the test case, or the risk of losing LJ entirely if it gets caught in the middle of any kind of a legal action), while noting that I had been satisfied that he certainly knew less about the legal treatment of obscenity and pornography than, say,

legionseagle and

terrie01. (

miriam_heddy being someone with whom I am unacquainted and her qualifications or lack thereof not being mentioned, I'm not pinning my arguments on any statements of hers. She drew some commenters who struck me as fairly intelligent, though.)

I was still assuming that the lack of discussion on his understanding or lack thereof on the legal standing of fanfic boiled down to fannish copyright experts being sick of the subject and him as (in the discussions that I have seen) being only interested in swinging through others' threads in an attempt to score quick superiority points without deigning to stick around long enough to actually defend his arguments. And then I realized why the reactions were ignoring the copyright question:

Neither the group whose complaints initially caused Strikethrough 07, nor the various spokespeople for LJ/6A, nor the protesting fans have been discussing the copyright/trademark aspects of fanfic and fanart: This has been a discussion about obscenity and pornography.

And here is why the lawyers in the group have been ignoring the whole "fanfic is illegal!" thing that

mskala was jumping up and down on in his post: Fandom knows that already. There are always clueless n00bs coming in not realizing about not being in the corporate ownerships' faces (or doing shit like showing actors Theban Band art of their characters in compromising positions), but anyone who's been in fandom for a few years has heard the horror stories about C&Ds, sites being yanked, fandoms going underground. This is the fear we all live with, and we're dealing. It doesn't have to be raised in every fannish discussion, because it's in the background of all of them.

To have someone go yanking it into an unrelated discussion just to make the fangirls cringe is definitely a tactic worth sneering at. Or ignoring, to keep discussions on their original topic.

And here is why to make a big deal about his tone and to brush aside both his "ph33r the C&D, fangirls!" distraction and his brief lipservice to valid points: Even if everything in his post was completely inarguably true and something no one in fandom had ever considered before, he was still telling us, "Siddown and shuddup and enjoy what you're still allowed to have." A male self-appointed spokesperson for corporate execs at 6A and various media empires (all of whom can be assumed to be largely male), speaking down to a group he explicitly identifies as women, telling them to be grateful for whatever the men are letting them have.

Way too many women out there who've internalized the idea that they only deserve what others give them and shouldn't even ask for what they want for me to be happy about the message being reinforced. (I'm going to blame the patriarchal culture for my initial acceptance of the post as a justified chastisement and for my having passed it along as a message others should read. Because it makes me happier than to blame my own obliviousness to tone and inability to notice when and how I've been offended without time to ponder the matter.)

This is the fear we all live with, and we're dealing. It doesn't have to be raised in every fannish discussion, because it's in the background of all of them.

I recently (yearish ago) got into a fairly huge fight in the remnants of Beauty and the Beast fandom, some n00b members of which wanted to reprint all the old zine fiction online, under original names, *whether they had permission from the authors or not.* And when I, as one of the authors, had a shitfit, was told that I ought to be proud that I was a fan, and why did I have to be so selfish?

It was pretty clear from the back and forth that some of the most vociferous simply never grasped the damage that they could do to the original fan authors that way... and they didn't give a damn either.

It's an attitude that I keep running into in other fandoms as well, the fannish entitlement that is perfectly happy spitting on TPTB and fellow fans as long as the person in question gets that they want. It's not a lot of people, and they're usually slammed into eventually shutting up by people who know that when one fan goes down, the whole fandom is in trouble. But it's enough to convince me that it's a background that does need to be reiterated as often as possible, in the hopes of dinging through the newbieness and the entitlement into a dim grasp of fannish self-preservation.

he was still telling us, "Siddown and shuddup and enjoy what you're still allowed to have." A male self-appointed spokesperson for corporate execs at 6A and various media empires (all of whom can be assumed to be largely male), speaking down to a group he explicitly identifies as women, telling them to be grateful for whatever the men are letting them have.

And there is a huge, valid point. His attitude was very patronizing and misogynistic at heart; witness his definition of porn. That he is a git is unarguable. That he is patronizing and rude is also unquestionable.

I have to mull over the argument that he is dragging off topic by bringing up copyright in a discussion about obscenity. Because I'm still not convinced that the dividing line is quite that cut and dried. A lot of people have been arguing from "Fandom does all these things (including this art) and so it ought to be untouchable" which blurs the line as well... not to mention brings up the entitlement issue and ignores that precedents set for one rule - obscenity in art - can very easily and quickly turn into issues over other rules. Including copyright.

While it could be said better, and definately have a different spokesperson, I think at heart I really do agree with the comment "be happy what you still have." Because with a few more minor tweaks to the TOS, there go all the dl, fic, and RPG comms. And there is nothing to stop the other journals that people are going to for making the same changes to their TOS for the same reason, because it *does* go back to the law... and certain fannish expressions go outside the law no matter where they're hosted.

And I think at heart the original discussion isn't just obscenity, it's about the law. One law among many, but about the law, and what 6A will or will not do to become a viable business within the law.

Been pondering this all the drive home.

Even if everything in his post was completely inarguably true and something no one in fandom had ever considered before, he was still telling us, "Siddown and shuddup and enjoy what you're still allowed to have." A male self-appointed spokesperson for corporate execs at 6A and various media empires (all of whom can be assumed to be largely male), speaking down to a group he explicitly identifies as women, telling them to be grateful for whatever the men are letting them have.

This, I must say, is the first time I've *really* grasped the objection to the original post, because it goes into the issues rather than picks at single sentences.

But in the end, I think I'm persistently interrogating the text from ~~the wrong~~ a different perspective. Probably because I was on the ground for some of the previous issues; legality is something that I think about a LOT, and I think the oldschooler print fans really do put more weight into that than the newschool net fans. The rules, to some degree, changed then.

But because many of the war stories I know involve women suing women - fans suing Anne Rice; Chelsea Quinn Yarboro chasing a couple of women out of fandom - my perspective is stuck in the issues of law and punishment instead of which law and which TPTB is making things hard on fans.

I'm very much agreed that newbies do really dumb shit and we need to keep up with the indoctrination into fandom etiquette, and that indeed fans with more exuberance than sense do some pretty appalling things in terms of not wrecking things for everyone else.

And I'm also agreed with the point about the very different attitude fans have post-internet -- in my first two online fandoms (which were also the first fandoms where I was actually interacting with other fans rather than just telling the stories to myself in my head and not sharing them with anyone else) we all knew about the former fans (and even at least one former ficcer) who made it to the shows in question to become actual scriptwriters. One of the pieces of "conventional wisdom" shared with newbies was that the people actually working on the show didn't dare make any public acknowledgement of reading fic (even in the cases where we knew or strongly suspected that they did) because of the potential lawsuit coming from a fan who saw an actual episode that seemed suspiciously like a story they'd written. We felt benevolently neglected and allowed to go our way in peace. It would have been a very different environment if we were more aware of the things you've seen closer to hand -- you're mentioning things that happened in fandoms I've never been in and the stories from them weren't well-known in my own fannish circles. (And my first online fandom was in Star Trek, so we did have a few old-schoolers from the zine days.)

the people actually working on the show didn't dare make any public acknowledgement of reading fic (even in the cases where we knew or strongly suspected that they did) because of the potential lawsuit coming from a fan who saw an actual episode that seemed suspiciously like a story they'd written

It's certainly happened, which makes George Lucas' open involvement in fandom a bit surprising.

(To loop back to another thread on another post, one of my favorite scenes in We'll Always Have Parrots is one where all the actors in a cult show are acting out bad fanfiction.)

Trek is the granddaddy of fans making good; there was even a series of novels published once that were the best of one of the semi-pro fanzines. The line between fan and pro is always a wavering gray one (just ask Rusty!) - but when in doubt, I've always felt it best to keep one's head down and one's distribution system hard to trace.

Ah. I hadn't dug down far enough. But is there really a rebuttal? Because the statement "much of what fandom does is illegal" is pretty true. Torrents, file shares, homemade DVDs, tapes, fanmixes, fan art... they all violate one law or another and "we always do this" or "we aren't hurting anyone" are weak defenses at best.

*goes off to check*

I skimmed back through both, and I don't think the legality issue was actually touched -- though in

legionseagle's case, I know that was likely because that's ground she's covered in the past and is probably well tired of by now, as evidenced by a throwaway reference to fandom not needing this guy to point any of this out to us because of the many many discussions on same we've had over the years in which fannish lawyers and copyright experts have weighed in. (I'd try digging through her LJ for a few good past discussions to point out, except that they were in her old LJ and she deleted that one a while back.)

As for the seismic shift to other LJ-like forums... I'm not going anywhere. First, because I've paid to be here and I want my money's worth. Second, there is absolutely no guarantee whatsoever that GreatestJournal and InsaneJournal and Journalfen and whateverjournal won't do *the exact same thing.*

And there is an almost 100% probability that they will do the same thing, for the same reason that 6/A-LJ most likely did it - because that's what their lawyers told them to do. I strongly suspect that a lawsuit against some social-networking site over these issues is inevitable; there have been too many "nudges", just to see who would flinch. I'd guess that the first site to say the equivalent of "publish and be damned to you" will get hit hard with a large, ugly, and ruinously expensive lawsuit. I don't blame 6A-LJ for not wanting to be that test case.

I'd already seen this post yesterday, but scrolling back to look for additional comments on the entries posted late in the day let me see that edit, which was a lot of stuff I didn't want to read but can't disagree with. (My own stance on fanfic vs. copyright law has generally been a distinction between illegal vs. wrong, but that holds little ground in a legally-based argument.)

But last night with this still in mind I had the thought regarding a comment I'd seen elsewhere discussing the generally repressive trend of much of American society of late, and it started me wondering if the fannish reaction to 6A this summer has been sort of a camel-breaking-straw situation. LJ being the last bastion of where we feel safe in saying what we want -- and where we feel like we can protest and not only get heard but not wind up under federal investigation for doing so. And given that 6A backed down over the initial round of bannings -- specifically because fandom made enough of a stink, as best we can tell -- there's really no wonder that LJ users now believe that a wave of cat macros and outraged comments is a legitimate and effective discussion tactic.

And totally OT, rereading my own comment and mostly sitting here staring at little chibi Romana I, it suddenly clicked for me how much the first Romana was like a Time Lord version of Hermione. Good lord. (No wonder I liked Romana II so much more -- Luna is a much more comfortable fit for me than Hermione.)

a distinction between illegal vs. wrong

Well, yes. Victimless crimes and all that. But legally speaking, we're on thin, cracking ice.

there's really no wonder that LJ users now believe that a wave of cat macros and outraged comments is a legitimate and effective discussion tactic

Except that wasn't what they responded to the first time. It was the rational, calm, legal descussions that made them back down, not the macros. While macros can make a person laugh, I weep for anyone who considers them the equivalent of rational discourse.

I think the problem is that it's not the reasoned discussions that most of us remember -- even those of us who took the time to actually read through some of them. It's the various ways fandom united to take their complaints to management and make their voices heard -- flood of macros included. (Hmm. On further reflection, my initial hypothesis -- that the "colorful" expressions of fannish outrage stuck in memory more than the calm and rational ones -- seems a bit less plausible than the idea that people remember throwing every possible form of discourse at LJ/6A staff and management and getting the desired result. So rather than dissect it and figure out what exactly got the job done, they're just pulling the all-out response again.)

So rather than dissect it and figure out what exactly got the job done, they're just pulling the all-out response again

Which only makes us all look like total hysterical dorks, she types sardonically.

The problem comes when reasoned discourse gets ignored or brushed aside too often. Then stronger attention-getting methods have to be used. How much of the hysteria is coming from a perception of LJ/6A tuning us out if we don't make an unignorable fuss and how much from too many people fed up with feeling voiceless IRL is open to question.

True. But I can't help but wonder if using more rational response during round 2 might be more effective than going all-out because something in that surge worked the first time around. I don't *know* if saying "X days ago you did Y and then did Z, so why are you doing Y again?" would get a response (in fairness, I must say I've seen some rational comments that are still unanswered) - but I do wish that hysteria wasn't such a quick fallback. Because it makes us look bad to third parties. I can't imagine that the owners of GreatestJournal and InsaneJournal aren't paying attention to this.

It is entirely possible that what GJ and IJ are learning from this is "how a major social networking site can infuriate a significant number of customers and drive them to other networks." JF in particular has been making upgrades to welcome LJ refugees and making assurances of being fan-friendly in a way that 6A isn't.

JF has made a marketing point of "We're not LJ!" since fandom_wank moved. But I'm still not convinced that they're necessarily a better place to be.

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Wednesday Roundup

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LJ and Fandom

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