Out of curiosity, when did the, 'fanfic doesn't need to adhere to canon, everything is valid and good, don't give concrit unless specifically asked for' attitude become the norm? Genuine question.

I was active in fandom back in the LJ days, when sporkings and comms viciously mocking Mary Sues were the norm, but then I sort fell out of fandom spaces for the past (checks notes) fifteen years holy shit. The current attitude seems diametrically opposed to what I remember fandom being like (kinda shitty, it was 'cool' to be an asshole back then), and I'm just curious as to when and how the shift happened. I mean, I assume it was a gradual thing, but is there anything in particular that stick out to you?

(Also, because tone doesn't convey very well through ask, and I don't want to leave you with a poor impression-- this is by no means a defence of the 2000s attitudes, nor an aspersion on the current ones. I'm genuinely only curious about the evolution from one to the other; I hope that comes across.)

Hi anon!

TL;DR because my response got LONG -> Anon this existed before Livejournal as an attitude, in fact modern fandom was literally born out of being not canon compliant (*waves aggressively to Spirk shippers*) and this existed on Livejorunal too and there have always been big pockets of fandom that really frowned on sporking even there, like that was not cool when I was on LJ, unless you were a certain age, or in certain spaces in fandom.

But also AO3 was its kind of final death knell re: making it cool to bully 13-16 yo writers (who were largely the victims of sporking) and killing dreams, which was born out of meta happening on LJ and in other places about like... not trying to make people miserable for writing a free fic out of the love in their heart that someone else didn't like or think was good enough.

Anyway, the longer version of this under the read more!

(For everyone else, welcome to some of the uglier aspects of 00s fandom!)

So there was actually criticism around all the stuff you mention 15-20 years ago as well. I was also on Livejournal during that time and there was a pretty big proportion of people in certain fandoms who recognised even then that like... setting up communities to mock say, Mary Sue writers, was actually a pretty weirdly cruel thing to do to people who were providing free labour and the literal only 'payment' they could get in a kind of energy exchange was people just not being complete dickheads to them.

So things were already changing, especially in many LJ communities and awards communities. There were a lot of big debates over whether concrit should be asked for, and a growing movement of authors who said they welcomed constructive criticism for example, instead of assuming it should automatically apply. There was also a lot of meta around the function of fanfiction and whether it should even be 'good' by published standards if the author was just doing it for themselves, and for fun (esp if they were just going to get punished for it by folks who were elitist, judgemental, grammar purists etc.)

Things really changed around the time of AO3 (2009-2010 - literally around 14~ years ago, you may have just missed the big change anon!), Strikethrough and the Dreamwidth exodus. There was a massive swing away from leaving concrit unless the author specifically asked for it, and fandom became a lot more generally able to recognise that a lot of labour goes into fanart and fanfiction and that paying with public criticism is shitty actually. Also people were just more able to recognise that like most fanfiction writers aren't trying to become professional writers and many don't want to be.

(I would actually say things changed around the time of fanfiction.net too - rude comments there were definitely noticed and could create some pretty forward 'hey why are you doing this on something you literally don't have to read' responses from fellow readers - idk what fic sites you were on. The small indie fic sites where you could often only comment via email for example, definitely drew a lot more critical attention than sites that tended to have public comments).

The 'fanfic doesn't need to adhere to canon' literally exists since the very first Spirk slash fic in modern fanfiction in the last few decades. Literally, as soon as you write Kirk/Spock, you're not adhering to canon. Our fanfiction 'ancestors' literally paved the way for a legacy which is about not adhering to canon in order to see the world/s and thing/s you want to see, be entertained by, by turned on by, or enjoy, from the very beginning. You may not have been in slash circles anon, but the foundation of queer same sex fanfic is in many ways the foundation of fandom. But yeah, this is literally where fanfiction started! As soon as you're shipping characters that aren't canon for fun (or for whatever reason), you're making it pretty clear that you want stories different to canon, and you have to change things to often keep those characters in-character.

So yeah! That's been there for decades. Idk what circles you were in on that front! While it was fairly common for a while to criticise characters for being OOC (Out of Character), imho, a lot of folks started to recognise that they literally weren't paying for what they were criticising, and they could just walk away and potentially not like...blast the fanfic. Some folks started to recognise more that people were writing with ESL, or were teenagers (some 40 yos in fandom realised they were mocking literal 15 year olds in their proto-podcasts and websites and realised actually that's just...mean? Really mean? Not the way to nurture new generations of fanfiction writers. Definitely in no way encouraging), or were writing for themselves, or writing for like one other person, or writing for fun, or writing for free, or writing for personal reasons etc.

'Don't Like Don't Read' wasn't just about political stuff, it was also about just walking away if you feel the urge to slam a fanfic in the comments.

I've been in fandom for around 2.5 decades anon, and there were so many spaces that were not actually as shitty or mean-spirited as the ones you were in? Or ones that at least had a lot of different thoughts etc. Like, sporking (mocking/bullying badfics and sometimes the folks who wrote them) was disapproved of by a lot of people in fandom even while sporking was at the height of its popularity (the Fanlore page goes into more detail about this). It might have just been the fandoms you were in, or the people you were hanging out with (and that might have been dependent on your age or just if you were around people who wanted to be 'cool' back then - in the same way that being an 'anti' is cool among certain crowds today. It's possible to spend years in certain crowds and never get an image of broader fandom for example - we can all end up in spaces like that! I know I have.)

When I started writing fanfiction (which no one will EVER find lmao), generally giving positive comments was normal. Constructive criticism was actually pretty rare and there were already fanfiction aggregate sites that generally disapproved of it in their Rules of Conduct. People were encouraging and polite. And this was around 20 years ago on Livejournal and private indie fanfiction websites.

I would actually say there was never exactly an evolution from 'one to the other' because like thousands of people in fandom already believed this and argued in defense of supporting fanfiction and transformative works via accepting that people are labouring for free and that not everyone wants to become a 'better writer' etc. - the meta was there on Livejournal in the 00s. There were communities where sporking was seen as hip/fun, and communities where it was literally banned or at the very least, super frowned upon.

There were meta fandom communities where sporking was the subject of discussion and you know eventually in a lot of those meta communities, that's where a lot of folks decided actually that calling out the fanfiction of 16 yos as 'cringe' or 'badly done' maybe said more about us as human beings and what we wanted fandom to be, than it did about the actual fanfic itself. By the time AO3 came around, people built it with this in mind.

To this day on AO3 it's mostly considered appropriate to say you want concrit in your author's notes, and to otherwise assume as a reader it's never welcome if it's unsolicited. That started during the LJ era. And it was talked about at great length. There's obviously going to be people who disagree! But for the most part I'm a big believer in compassion and 'not everyone is here for the same reason' and 'they literally gave this to us for free and it's meant to be fun' (like yourself! What we do/think/argue 10 years ago on LJ is sometimes different to what we do 10 years later lol, I used to be against trigger warnings pre-AO3! Times change a lot :D )

So yeah, this was definitely something that was around before you and I came to fandom, and it was something that continued to grow as an attitude during, until finally it kind of won out on AO3. But yeah fandom as we know it was born in people literally not being canon compliant to make some gay dreams come true (Spirk shippers bless them all), at a time when there was no representation.

Even in the earliest days of fandom where comments could only happen via email, one of the earliest phrases authors used were things like 'flames will be used to roast marshmallows.' For those reading who don't know, flames are hate comments, critical 'this fic is bad because' comments etc. Except you emailed them directly to the author, because there was no place for comments on a fic.

And this started because authors in part got death threats for writing gay stuff.

So you know, from the very beginning, authors in fanfic have by and large had a very low tolerance for criticism / hate over something they're doing for free and making no profit out of, when they're changing/altering the canon as they please to create representation (or hotness lmao), that is literally a labour of love in a world of very little representation. From there, things have just grown. The whole 'flames will not be tolerated' existed even before Livejournal did.

Honestly there are still people who love sporking and you could probably find groups and Discords dedicated to that even now (actually you literally can, there's a Dreamwidth group for it), it's kind of wild but it started to get cool again. Just like 90s clothing :D (Which is also wild because I can just take that crap out of my closet and wear it again).

But yeah it also sounds like you may have been in some pretty crappy pockets of fandom! When I was on LJ in the 00s I avoided those places and still got to experience fandom across multiple fandoms (mostly NCIS, Captive Prince, HP, Profiler, The X-Files and some others) and communities.

I was super active in some fandom communities and saw a lot of meta happening, and my view during the early and late 00s was that sporking was largely pretty frowned upon after a very brief (like 3-6 month) era where it was cool for only some folks, and then everyone (including some - but not all - of those folks) was like 'heyyyyyyy hang on a minute.' It was something that the bullies did, and enjoyed, and otherwise folks kind of stayed away from it, especially once they learned people were becoming too scared to write fics, which is the inevitable outcome of mocking/bullying folks and fics that have been made purely out of love for something.

Like, publicly making a spectacle out of what a 13 yo (they were often teens - and it's kind of sad how many 40 yo women were doing the sporking :/ ) wrote out of love, just for fun/clout was not considered cool by everyone even back then, because like, a lot of us saw that as killing new generations of fandom (some folks who sporked considered it a win if a fic or account got deleted, this is not based behaviour), not actually creating good writing, internalised misogyny (Mary Sue hatred and self insert hatred), etc. It's hard to explain because I do really think we were in different corners of fandom at the time, but I don't know anyone personally from my time on Livejournal who actually liked sporking as an idea or enjoyed it or enjoyed listening to it or reading articles mocking fic.

I knew about it from very lively 'is this okay' 'actually no it's not even if it's just for fun this is trying to hurt people and saying 'it's just the fic' is not going to be the bandaid a teenager needs to understand why older folks (generally) in fandom are mocking them for being new at a skill' discussions on LJ in meta fandom communities. So this is how much I could be in fandom and not be a part of it and also have like a wildly different experience to your LJ experience!

I think if I'd been a teenager during that era it would have seemed a lot more appealing (in the same way that many teens are antis now before they grow out of it), and fuck it if I was a more bitter person who was just around people who liked to make fun of what other people created, perhaps I would have enjoyed it too, I can see a lot of reasons why a person would fall into that in LJ -> but I was an adult on LJ trying not to be mean to people or what they were creating, so yeah I was maybe just in very different spaces! (Don't get me wrong, I have my giant fucking character flaws, but I was very scared of people hating me so like I didn't want to do things that would make that happen, lol, and also I was scared to put up fic myself during the era of active sporking. I know for myself that sporkers didn't just scare away writers of 'badfic' - they...intimidated a LOT of people).

Before AO3 I was on FF.net, posting fics on LJ, posting on Schnoogle, gossamer, and a couple of other archives. So I don't think my experience was that 'narrow,' I just think I wasn't around like... anime at that time or other places where it might have been happening. I also avoided like...Draco/Malfoy where CC drama was happening and I know sporking was popular in that specific arena / pairing for a while as well (er, as well as anything to do with Mary Sues).

So yeah! That's about where that is. Generally gatekeeping fandom is just seen as not a great thing to do to people, and that creates other kind of beliefs that are generally upheld as being more inviting/nurturing. After all, if someone truly wants to get better at writing, they can ask, or do courses, but as we all know, everyone has to write some bad stuff to get good at it, but not everyone wants to be good. Folks are in fandom for different reasons. I'm rambling now so I'm going to finish my lunch! :D

Halfway Saniwa (Ch.3)

{Chapter 3: Welcome to the World}

<Japanese> “English” ‘thoughts’ The next week was a big day, it would be the first time she could step outside of the sterile room.  Dressed in with a simple attire, Kaiita waited with baited breath outside a door which attached to a partition chamber separating her from the outside world. She could see people on the other side of the room, some resembled doctors or something she’d  assume to be so- and the other- was dressed unlike anything she’d been prepared for. 

< Ready Kaiita-san?>

The text dialogue translated the Japanese for her spoken over the intercom, and swallowing any doubt she gave a curt nod in reply. There was a sound of hissing air passing back and forth through a vent as the first pair of doors opened, slid apart for her, and only then did it finally click they were oddly ornate- resembling a technological version of shoji partition doors. Kaiita steps inside the inner chamber and they slide closed behind her with a finality that made her neck break into goosebumps. “I’m detecting an increase in your heartrate Kaiita-sama, please relax, everything will be just fine.” Spoke the four legged companion in her arms. Ever since the Konnosuke arrived, he hadn’t left her side; they patiently acted as a companion and part time stuffed animal with complimentary warmer pads inside their body to curl up next to during the night. Now they accepted role of confidant, held secure against the girls front like a cat but giving off a sense they were anything but a simple PET. “ I-…right, you’re right.”

Another hissing sound reached her ears and she could sense the air moving around her. Instantly she could tell the difference- there was an aroma other than just… nothing reaching her nose. Over time in a perfectly sterile room smells like that which came off her food, and the soaps she was provided for cleansing, were much more pronounced.  But unlike those, this hit her like a wave- and she knew EXACTLY what it was. “..sakura?” she uttered the word and a picture of what they were came to mind- but why would she smell something like that? “Ah yes- it is spring after all! We are on the 2nd floor and this wing is close to the open balcony of the building. Come come-! Let’s go see them Kaiita-sama! I’m sure they will lift your spirits.”

The second doors cracked open and more air flooded in, gliding over her skin, informing her that outside it was much warmer. Standing before her as she exited, were 2 people who she could confirm now were doctors due to their name tags, someone who looked like a secretary or manager- basically they wore a suit and beside them was-

“Hajimemashite- Kaiita-san, watashi wa Keiko desu, mata aete ureshii.” < It’s a pleasure to meet you Kaiita-san, I’m Keiko, I’m happy to see you again.> The translation of what Keiko spoke appeared on a clear tablet plate she was holding and spoke it verbally as well in her own voice. “Amazing…” she breathed, watching as it translated even her reaction back to the woman … making the miko laugh.

Yes, a miko, at least she appeared to be.

Kaiita could recognize the crimson hakama, the clean white haori, and even the patterned outer coat or robe that was tied from shoulder to shoulder in a red cord. “I mean- it’s good to see you face to face Keiko-san, “ she continued, unable to stop herself from analyzing the woman’s attire. This didn’t go unnoticed and Keiko smiled almost knowingly. <Unless your companion has already explained, I am not just a miko, as you will come to understand, I am a saniwa as well. There will be much more to explain but first, tell me- how do you feel?> While she hadn’t had much time to get to know this woman very well, up close Kaiita could get a sense now that this woman was somehow…’ bigger’ than she really looked. Somehow her presence didn’t match the petite figure and demure face. It was like something other than her body heat was pressing up against Kaiita and it make her fidget in place- unable to do anything about it. “I feel good.” She replied, “ It’s nice and warm out here. It smells good too, Konnosuke said there are sakura outside?” <Ah! Yes, I suppose you can smell them couldn’t you, come with me and I’ll show you to the balcony.  However, I must ask you to prepare yourself, while I’m sure you’ve never seen Japan before… this is more than just simple city. > Ah- yes, this was the distant future right? She almost forgot- what? Were their flying ships or space stations in the sky? Kaiita wondered this and more as she followed behind Keiko who walked with a soft sound of a bell in her step. The doctors meanwhile were following, along with that person in a suit. They were talking amongst themselves as they passed little batons and tapped various menus and devices on their own tablet screens. Out of the corner of her eye Kaiita could think she saw an MRI scan of herself, with various other similar charts that overlapped different parts of her body. What stuck out also was an odd fluctuating image of her body that almost reminded her of one of those new age color spectrum maps of the human aura. 

The hall didn’t go for very long, and she noticed a few other rooms of similar fashion to her own but all were empty it seemed. They took a right and the hall became a windowed view, and that’s when Kaiitas breath did catch her throat. 

Keiko touched a section of the window and suddenly it parted- after forming edges seemingly out of nowhere! They too slid aside from one another like a shoji door and Kaiita followed her outside onto the balcony.  There was the city below them, and from this edge she could see their building was done up in a style resembling a castle- but it was far more complex with  several other towering sections with the same ornate tiered roofs. Below a rather modern city sprawled out before her, and it wouldn’t have been so impressive than any other metropolis in the 21th century had it not been for the small details. Many sky trains rode back and forth on tracks that seemed to hover in the air. Cars looked more or less the same if more a bit more stylized, and then she could see projected signs from the second floor on the street across from their building. They changed and animated on their own! Thankfully it wasn’t too overdone- like some sci-fi vegas- but the city gave off a far more automated look than anything she could think of. 

This was okay, it wasn’t too startling for her at all, but it DID hammer in the idea she wasn’t in her own era any longer. Thankfully the future didn’t look too alien that Kaiita couldn’t handle it- for now. Coming closer to the edge of the balcony she could see a heavy tree line of blooming sakura illuminated by floating lanterns. They were attached to nothing, they just hung in mid air with no strings and probably no flame inside. Yet they glowed and flickered with a light unlike any bulb she’d seen. The breeze blew a waft of their flowers perfume up to her and she visibly sighed.

< What do you think?> Keiko was looking at her, and Kaiita thought it over a moment before answering.

“…its…different, but not too much. I think if I saw space ships I might have freaked out. “ < Oh they exist, just…  they are out in space- like satellites would be. And they are certainly not for commercial use.> “Oh…” all the girl could do was blink at the senior saniwa, who proceeded to giggle in amusement. At least someone was finding this funny. Still Keiko was sympathetic, and she reached out to pat Kaiita’s shoulder- albeit..hesitantly, seeing if she was relaxed enough. Kaiita didn’t resist and in that moment of non-verbal consent Keiko smiled more warmly at her. < I understand you’re being very brave right now. There may come a time soon when you may feel overwhelmed, and I would advise you to not bottle that up. Be open as much as you can, it will make your adjustments easier if you can face those emotions directly. For now, you needn’t be too concerned about acclimatizing to an alien world- not where you are going.> This was... comforting but odd, what did Keiko mean by that last part? She conveyed her curiosity with a raised brow at the tiny creature still held in her arms.

“What Keiko-san means is you will be leaving this building and being sent somewhere else. Somewhere… a ‘bit more your pace.’ The arrangements are being made, as it appears the doctors have approved you are ready for transfer.” Konnosuke’s response drew the girl’s attention back to the doctors who indeed seemed to look approving of her and were singing off something with a stylus and mailing it digitally before handing it to the person in a suit. “Where am I being taken now?” she asked Keiko who had followed her line of sight. Before the woman replied she spoke something to the two doctors who would nod and then bow to her before leaving them alone on the balcony. The person in the suit followed as well, but not before looking back once more at Kaiita as they door closed behind them. Keiko turned to her and nods, < Kaiita-san, after the head bureau signs off on your bill of health, you will be assigned a Citadel.>

“A citadel?” Was she hearing this right? “Like-… as in- a citadel, citadel? A big- place? Like castle or-“ Maybe the translation wasn’t working, surely they meant maybe a little apartment or a place to stay. As if reading her mind the Konnosuke nods to confirm there was no mistake. “A citadel is assigned to every participating member of the E.S.C. It acts as their home base and place of residence. The size is expected as well in your line of work, as you will come to understand.”

“So… I’m going to move into a town?”

“Not exactly, it’s rather a large property of land with various specific buildings which come standard to every saniwa’s needs. Each citadel is very special, and will be under your complete control.” The fox continued, tail beginning to swish with excitement, “After all, as Master of the house, it will become your home.” <Konnosuke can explain more, but first, how about we get you something to eat? Outside maybe? There is a nice shop across the street.>  Keiko suggested pointing to something with an animated sign that had a kettle pouring something into a cup. A Café? Despite all the heaviness and gravitas of what was just dumped on her, distracting herself with a familiar concept was a welcome idea. All Kaiita could do was nod, and allow Keiko to lead her away and down stairs.

Master of a Citadel? Yeah she could use a coffee right now, surely she was dreaming.