mmm donut pimp

Huh. From just_like_rogue:

What's Your Filling Ficathon, hosted by technosage

Welcome to the "What's Your Filling?" Ficathon, where the jelly doughnut hits the fan.

Say what?

We've all read it. The story that takes your absolute favorite character or pairing puts them in a totally implausible situation, and then completely strips them of every distinguishing characteristic to make said situation work. Grah! Right?

The point of "What's Your Filling?" is to prove that you can write goodfic about even the most outlandish things. In this case, jelly doughnuts.

Mmm. Donuts.

ETA: Fixed lj name.

huh

wickedwords talks about Community, Readership, and Writing the Field.

But there was this one part that just tickled me, because it's so true.

There is more risk in it for me as an author as readers tend to prize writers who are consistent, and they know vaguely what they can expect. And I'm not just talking quality of technical work here, but focus characters, relationships, and characterization. It's a brand, and readers want to know going in that if they pick up that brand, they will be getting a certain sort of thing: a story that focuses on their favorite characters, situations and relationships.

For some insane reason, mayo popped up in my head. Like, there are only two kinds I can tolerate and I only buy one of them, Kraft. There is, for me, no other mayo. I know them, I like them, they are consistently what I want in a food condiment.

Now I keep thinking brand names, though, and association, and reminds me of that association meme that went around, where people asked for three words to describe them. This is one of those many, many Deep Fannish Issues that I always think I have something to say about, but I really don't. I think part of it is that someone else said it better, and part of it is that I live in exceptions. I don't read outside my pairing except when I do, and only these people, unless it's someone they rec, and only off this community. And then there's this entire Return to Gen thing which is basically another way for me to say It's All About John Sheppard for me in SGA. So actually, my fandom is SGA/John Sheppard. Well, that was easy.

And there's the kneejerk, really unworthy reaction that I've carried for *five fandoms* of wanting to break out with "But I'm not *interested* in any other pairings/characters." It's like *herpes*; the defensiveness is so ingrained. Which is totally an autodefensive maneuver which I am honestly not sure ever, ever had a reason to exist. It *doesn't*. I have never actually been actively involved in a ship war. I just heard a lot about them. And seriously, for the newbiefangirl of yore, that was all I needed to know. Somewhere, [insert OTP] is being harassed by Other People. With the assumption that Somewhere Out There, my ship is under siege by these Other People, and I'd damn well better be ready.

I actually have no idea where I'm going with this. Except wickedwords is very, very smart.

Right. So thought. I'm wondering, from my carefully protected slope of SGA real estate, where literally, I've managed to work my flist and filters to a point where I only see exactly what I want to see on any give day--what's the difference between perception and reality in fandom really? Is there a chance--a small one, but there--that we actually can remake fandom based on how we perceive it to be? Like--um. And this is so off the point, but what the hell--if I sit there with say, five friends and keep *talking* about how the fandom is biased toward Weir/Lorne fic, will the fandom eventually conform to that based on the expectation of readership and/or because they think That Is How It's Supposed to Be?

In my defense, I haven't slept much in the last week, so seriously, if this makes no sens, I can't even *tell* you how much that doesn't surprise me.