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Dear Author
Apr. 19th, 2012 05:23 pmWill Windows 7 ever stop being weird to me? No. No it will not, I suppose. Anyway, you know what we haven't done in awhile? Had one of the eleventy-billion ONTD comms smashed in our face, forcing us to read whatever post of the day LJ has chosen to highlight. Today's beauty? Fanfiction and how authors view it.
Sadly, this forces me to respond in kind.
Dear Author*,
Congratulations on being published. Double congrats if you are now a Name in the book world, even if it's really more of a lowercase thing. Odds are good that you've managed to amass a fanbase by now, especially if you are a Name, be it lower or capital. As many a fallen star will tell you, be good to your fans. You are an author so you can't pander as much as say, a hollywood action star, nor should you. Stay true to your vision and write the stories that come to you as they should be written, not necessarily how your fans *want* them to be written. This, however, does not mean ignore all criticism. Sometimes the critics are the people who most want you to live up to the potential they see in you. Sometimes they just want you to fall on your face. Whatever the case may be, congratulations upon your fanbase.
Here's the thing. You cannot dictate your fans' actions anymore than they should dictate yours in terms of how the story progresses. When you zig and they were desperately hoping for a zag, at least one will be struck by the idea to take a What If approach and write out that zag. Depending on your fanbase, more than one person may have the same bolt of inspiration and they will take it in an entirely different direction.
Once more, congratulations! Now your fandom has fanfiction! This is an incredible time in an author's life. Many are frightened by this natural occurrence. There's very little to fear, dear author. Let me clear up a few misconceptions about the strange and wonderful world of fanfic.
1) First and foremost, in order to have achieved fanfic status, your work has to have touched someone. ** Possibly you built a fantastic world that others wish desperately to live in. Perhaps your characters are well crafted and fully three-dimensional and speak to others as strongly as they speak to you. On some level, you have done something pretty impressive. You have made a perfect stranger care about your creation. You should be proud!
2) While I'm sure there are some unscrupulous people out there who might wish to profit off their take of your world, it's not really a widespread thing. Feel free to bring the banhammer of justice down upon these misguided folks, but don't think for a minute that most of your fans will share this same audacious way of thinking. Most people understand that these creations are your babies and that they have no right to profit off of them.
3) You don't have to read it. I know, I know. It's incredibly tempting to do so, and there are those fans who don't understand that if you do read it and acknowledge that you read it and then later twist their idea, you could get your ass sued, and they will give you the big sad eyes and beg you to read their work of art anyway... but you wanna know a secret? They'd do this anyway. Seriously.
4) You "banning" all fanfic does not make sense. You are effectively flipping off your creatively inspired fans and telling them that you think they are inferior. They will respond in one of two ways.
They will either write their fanfic anyway, but it'll be influenced by the knowledge that you don't think they're good enough to do so, and that's just not a fun chip to carry on your shoulder or they will drop you like a hot potato. The spark that drew them to you and your world(s) will be extinguished because you have shown yourself to be an insecure jackass.
Ultimately, fanfiction is proof that you did something, somewhere, right. You have fans. Maybe not you personally, but your work does, and since you are an author, that's kind of the point of this whole endeavor. Your work touched someone so much that they felt compelled to try their hand at writing in your world. Yes, some of it will suck. Some of it will be complete tripe. It's okay, some of your work is probably left in the dark as well and these people are most likely not being paid for their efforts. Which, follow along with me now, means they do this because they love it. They might even love you. You telling them to go away and make their own imaginary friends is just a dick move, plain and simple. Embrace the love, even if you're wise enough not to read most of it.
Embrace the fact that you have fans who think enough of your world/characters/whatever to spend their FREE TIME obsessing over your work.
*Not to be confused with Dear Author, though similar idea.
** For the sake of being polite, we're going to ignore the times when fanfic is born of a fandom where the author is a complete and utter fuckwit who had a semi decent idea and blew the execution on every front and still managed to get an audience of any size whatsoever, k?
Goddamn, I hate it when I'm reminded how insecure some authors are when it comes to other people playing in their proverbial sandbox. Guys, seriously, if hell freezes and I write something and it's published and I have fans who want to write their own version of events, I will cry from sheer happiness. People giving you their free time is a good thing! Usually they aren't even asking anything from you in return! How is this a bad thing unless you're dealing with that one person who thinks, "I shall make the money!"? I just... no.
In other news, Monday I went to Ulta for the first time. It was somehow both more than I thought it would be and less. Probably because there were quite a few things that were sold out and that's just not really an attractive thing to see as a customer, y'know? On the other hand, I did buy my first China Glaze nail polish. They did have some of the Hunger Games colors left, but... none that spoke to me. If I'd known the cashier would be swiping a coupon that took more than half the price of the polish off, I'd have bought one just for funsies. But I didn't so instead I was content to just look until Ari mentioned she wanted to try a bright blue. I considered it and decided since she wanted to try it, and I wanted to try the brand, and hey, I'd told myself I could buy something small, we could totally do this. So I bought Sky High-Top. Which... is a bit of a mixed bag. In the bottle it looks like there's this iridescent sheen to it. Yeah, no. That does not exist at all. (WHY IS IT IN THE BOTTLE THEN?!) And it looks nothing like the website is showing, which isn't all that shocking. For those who are familiar with it, it's essentially Citadel blue. Ari declined to try it afterall, which is okay because if she changes her mind, I'll still have it. It looks pretty good on me, so it's not like it was a waste. Perhaps this is one of those things where one should actually put on a top coat? But my laziness. And the fact that I haven't got one at the moment... :P Anyway.
I also bought Mood lipgloss. Because I'm classy.
Sadly, this forces me to respond in kind.
Dear Author*,
Congratulations on being published. Double congrats if you are now a Name in the book world, even if it's really more of a lowercase thing. Odds are good that you've managed to amass a fanbase by now, especially if you are a Name, be it lower or capital. As many a fallen star will tell you, be good to your fans. You are an author so you can't pander as much as say, a hollywood action star, nor should you. Stay true to your vision and write the stories that come to you as they should be written, not necessarily how your fans *want* them to be written. This, however, does not mean ignore all criticism. Sometimes the critics are the people who most want you to live up to the potential they see in you. Sometimes they just want you to fall on your face. Whatever the case may be, congratulations upon your fanbase.
Here's the thing. You cannot dictate your fans' actions anymore than they should dictate yours in terms of how the story progresses. When you zig and they were desperately hoping for a zag, at least one will be struck by the idea to take a What If approach and write out that zag. Depending on your fanbase, more than one person may have the same bolt of inspiration and they will take it in an entirely different direction.
Once more, congratulations! Now your fandom has fanfiction! This is an incredible time in an author's life. Many are frightened by this natural occurrence. There's very little to fear, dear author. Let me clear up a few misconceptions about the strange and wonderful world of fanfic.
1) First and foremost, in order to have achieved fanfic status, your work has to have touched someone. ** Possibly you built a fantastic world that others wish desperately to live in. Perhaps your characters are well crafted and fully three-dimensional and speak to others as strongly as they speak to you. On some level, you have done something pretty impressive. You have made a perfect stranger care about your creation. You should be proud!
2) While I'm sure there are some unscrupulous people out there who might wish to profit off their take of your world, it's not really a widespread thing. Feel free to bring the banhammer of justice down upon these misguided folks, but don't think for a minute that most of your fans will share this same audacious way of thinking. Most people understand that these creations are your babies and that they have no right to profit off of them.
3) You don't have to read it. I know, I know. It's incredibly tempting to do so, and there are those fans who don't understand that if you do read it and acknowledge that you read it and then later twist their idea, you could get your ass sued, and they will give you the big sad eyes and beg you to read their work of art anyway... but you wanna know a secret? They'd do this anyway. Seriously.
4) You "banning" all fanfic does not make sense. You are effectively flipping off your creatively inspired fans and telling them that you think they are inferior. They will respond in one of two ways.
They will either write their fanfic anyway, but it'll be influenced by the knowledge that you don't think they're good enough to do so, and that's just not a fun chip to carry on your shoulder or they will drop you like a hot potato. The spark that drew them to you and your world(s) will be extinguished because you have shown yourself to be an insecure jackass.
Ultimately, fanfiction is proof that you did something, somewhere, right. You have fans. Maybe not you personally, but your work does, and since you are an author, that's kind of the point of this whole endeavor. Your work touched someone so much that they felt compelled to try their hand at writing in your world. Yes, some of it will suck. Some of it will be complete tripe. It's okay, some of your work is probably left in the dark as well and these people are most likely not being paid for their efforts. Which, follow along with me now, means they do this because they love it. They might even love you. You telling them to go away and make their own imaginary friends is just a dick move, plain and simple. Embrace the love, even if you're wise enough not to read most of it.
Embrace the fact that you have fans who think enough of your world/characters/whatever to spend their FREE TIME obsessing over your work.
Sincerely,
M.
M.
*Not to be confused with Dear Author, though similar idea.
** For the sake of being polite, we're going to ignore the times when fanfic is born of a fandom where the author is a complete and utter fuckwit who had a semi decent idea and blew the execution on every front and still managed to get an audience of any size whatsoever, k?
Goddamn, I hate it when I'm reminded how insecure some authors are when it comes to other people playing in their proverbial sandbox. Guys, seriously, if hell freezes and I write something and it's published and I have fans who want to write their own version of events, I will cry from sheer happiness. People giving you their free time is a good thing! Usually they aren't even asking anything from you in return! How is this a bad thing unless you're dealing with that one person who thinks, "I shall make the money!"? I just... no.
In other news, Monday I went to Ulta for the first time. It was somehow both more than I thought it would be and less. Probably because there were quite a few things that were sold out and that's just not really an attractive thing to see as a customer, y'know? On the other hand, I did buy my first China Glaze nail polish. They did have some of the Hunger Games colors left, but... none that spoke to me. If I'd known the cashier would be swiping a coupon that took more than half the price of the polish off, I'd have bought one just for funsies. But I didn't so instead I was content to just look until Ari mentioned she wanted to try a bright blue. I considered it and decided since she wanted to try it, and I wanted to try the brand, and hey, I'd told myself I could buy something small, we could totally do this. So I bought Sky High-Top. Which... is a bit of a mixed bag. In the bottle it looks like there's this iridescent sheen to it. Yeah, no. That does not exist at all. (WHY IS IT IN THE BOTTLE THEN?!) And it looks nothing like the website is showing, which isn't all that shocking. For those who are familiar with it, it's essentially Citadel blue. Ari declined to try it afterall, which is okay because if she changes her mind, I'll still have it. It looks pretty good on me, so it's not like it was a waste. Perhaps this is one of those things where one should actually put on a top coat? But my laziness. And the fact that I haven't got one at the moment... :P Anyway.
I also bought Mood lipgloss. Because I'm classy.