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Teaspoon and slash: a pondering

  • Mar. 9th, 2008 at 11:59 PM
pontisbright: pontisbright (Default)

(Sorry for the borked formatting, LJ is chucking a mental)
I'm reccing at calufrax this week, and since calapine pointed out the tragically small number of slash recs so far, I'll be serving up an all-slash, all old-skool (or old/new crossover) selection of fics.

Finding stories has been interesting - possibly in a way which is just a reflection of my own reading habits - but it made me ponder.  My automatic reaction was to go looking for slash I'd already loved on LJ, in the hope that I'd find it at Teaspoon, with varying degrees of success.  Some people seem to upload everything they write as a matter of course, both to multiple comms and to Teaspoon: some stories only crop up on LJ (often in small comms, where there’s likely an small audience of familiar faces): some (especially older) fics are on knackered old geocities sites where the author has likely forgotten they’re even still there (and it’s only thanks to the likes of ghost2 and the who_otp Masterlist of Doooom that we ever find them again).

Conclusion: it seems as if a lot of writers of slash and femslash don’t use Teaspoon – or if they do, they’re selective about what they post there, especially with stories involving explicit sexual content. 

So, I’ve got two questions. One: is that accurate?  (I'm more than happy to be proved entirely wrong!)  And two: if I’m not just being crap, what’s the likely reasoning behind writers being selective at Teaspoon?  Is it the notion of small LJ comms being a cosy coterie – and if so, is that a lovely thing or a problem?  Readers, do you mentally categorize Teaspoon and LJ differently in terms of expectations?  Writers, are there some stories you’ve written that you feel are ‘more Teaspoony’ than others?    Can you unpick what your notion of ‘Teaspooniness’ is?

(Please note: this is in no way a dig at Teaspoon, which I love with a burny flamy love.  Nor a dig at LJ comms or individuals.  I know that some stories seem to have the best ‘fit’ in certain locations; some were written as commentfic or ficathon entries or in-jokes, and outside of that context they can read as oddities, weird deviations from the author’s usual style, or just plain incomprehensible.  And that’s before we get to the fics that we regret for one reason or another, and will happily let vanish in the LJ scroll (as much as anything ever can) instead of placing them somewhere more accessible like the ‘official’ fic archive.  It’s entirely up to you where you post your fic: I’m just curious about the reasoning, that’s all.)  

LJ – for any old thing, which you can pass off as just fluff if need be, but which can also result in nice quick feedback and the making of fannish friends
Teaspoon – for ‘proper’ fic which you’ve spent a bit of time over and reckon is worth showing to people outside LJ (despite the fact that you value the opinion of those on LJ more): feels a bit more detached from the audience
ff.net etc – not worth even looking at

Apologies for the tl;dr.  Am interested to know if other people's heads are quite so keen on compartmentalisation as mine, anyway...

 

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Comments

[identity profile] vandonovan.livejournal.com wrote:
Mar. 10th, 2008 02:05 am (UTC)
Oh, it's very true. I am very much the "Here is my thing, don't read if it you don't like it, I'm posting it anyway." Because, um. Yes, it's the internets? I tend to post things, you know, where asked, too. You know. Slash fic to dw_slash and Two fic to two_love or what not. I'm not going to post an epic Ten/Rose with side-bits-of-Martha to a Martha comm. I get censoring for LJ. I don't post fic to my personal LJ anymore because too many people who read me aren't fannish/aren't into my fandoms. But it seems strange to me to NOT want to crosspost all over. Ahahaha.
[identity profile] pontisbright.livejournal.com wrote:
Mar. 10th, 2008 02:18 am (UTC)
All most wise and perfectly logical.

I suppose it's an extension of your I don't post fic to my personal LJ anymore because too many people who read me aren't fannish/aren't into my fandoms self-censorship, though: the same principle, but applied to an archive which is presumed to be 'not into my fandoms' (or pairings, or whatever), even if only by weight of numbers rather than any intended bias. Which of course is why people like you going 'hi, actually here is some Four/Adric' is a good good thing.
[identity profile] vandonovan.livejournal.com wrote:
Mar. 10th, 2008 02:22 am (UTC)
but that's so strange to me. Teaspoon is organized by Doctors. So my Two/Jamie should never infringe on someone looking for Five/Turlough or Ten/Master or whatever. They would never come up in a search. I mean, I guess, MAYBE if you predominantely wrote Ten/Rose and got a crapload of people watching you for updates and suddenly posted a Two/Jamie it might throw your readers for a loop. I feel this way about my ART a little, on deviantArt. I have a lot of people who watch me for equine stuff, so when I throw out some random obscure 70s British slashy picture, I feel a bit guilty for making them suffer through that when they're here for the horses.

But, you know. To me there's a difference between wanting horses and getting Avon/Vila slash and wanting Doctor/Rose and getting Doctor/Jamie. (Also, it doesn't stop me from posting my slashy B7 fanart to my dA account; I just feel mildly guilty.)
[identity profile] pontisbright.livejournal.com wrote:
Mar. 10th, 2008 03:06 am (UTC)
Who is such an odd fandom, though. I'm not sure that some new series types would consider Doctor/Jamie any more irrelevant than 'horses' (though you have amused me no end with the notion of you having two main interests: horses and Avon/Vila, heh). Which is more their problem than yours, certainly - and as you say, chances are they'd not find it unless they were looking.

Ahh, fannish guilt. Powers the entire internet, you know.