Fandom: Oh, Hugo, Where Have HuGone

[escritoireazul]

If I had an active fannish Twitter or Tumblr, I would have added to my profile: 100% Absolutely Positively Not a Hugo Award Winner. But I don't, so I shan't.

The Fanlore write-up of the controversy.

This is really putting me off the Hugos and Worldcon. Feels like another cultural clash in SFF, and I am really fucking tired of them. They're necessary and good changes can come out of them, but so tired.

Comments

[rhoda_rants]

*cringe* *cringe* *cringe*

I do not want anyone associated with the Hugos to even know that Ao3 exists, nevermind having them wander in and ruin it for us. That archive is one of the last bastions of, "Let's all just get together and write about stuff we love," with relatively little wank or controversy (such as, say, Tumblr), and the nomination announcement made me feel like someone had painted a target on my back. I get why people are excited about transformative works being "legitimized" by a recognizable SFF organization, but I much preferred when only other fanficcers knew about us. (Not that I'm anywhere near prolific enough to notice, but still--*CRINGE*.)

Also: Bless Fanlore for putting all this in one place.

[ilyena_sylph]

+wry+

It'd be sorta hard for nobody associated with the Hugos to even know AO3 exists, given the Hugo winners who have fic on AO3 (or helped create it)...

...but at the same time Boy Howdy do I feel you on the target on back. More people being fen is great, but fannish spaces in the public eye unsettle me immensely.

[rhoda_rants]

LOL--true, I keep forgetting how many "legit" authors either started out writing fanfic or still do. And yet, the closer the general public comes to finding the channels where fanfic is housed, the more likely we come to my mother finding and reading mine, and well *CRINGE*.

[escritoireazul]

I definitely understand this feeling, but I think in a lot of ways, the horse is out of the stable on that one. So many of the people who use AO3, even people who created it, are a part of the pro SFF scene, too, and many are outspoken about and proud of their fic roots (or current fic writing). I think it's still possible to keep an individual distance between your work (generic you) and pro spaces, but as a whole, we exist in a public way that is becoming more public all the time.

That is a hard transition for a lot of people, and I hope everyone can find their way to getting what they want from their fandom experience.

Fanlore's doing the dirty work collecting stuff for sure.

[havocthecat]

Like. I don't need the old guard SFF WSFS validation, but it sure is fun to see them huff and puff about the AO3 ruining science fiction by getting its cooties all over everything.

[rhoda_rants]

Yeah, it's hard, especially if you came to the "scene" by exchanging fics chapter by chapter over emails like I did, just to a handful of people as opposed to the internet at large. There's no stopping it, and intellectually I get why having this type of transformative work recognized is a good thing, but I also feel very, very protective of my particular corner of it and don't want it publicized. I don't know how to join to those feelings together nicely.

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