as warm as the sun from up above

[pensnest]

It is my LJ 21st anniversary. Amazing. Am still sad about LJ's demise, since DW, while plainly better functioning and better run, was too late to pick up on all the fandoms that fled, and so is less lively than LJ used to be. It transformed my fannish life.

*

I walked four kilometres (plus a little bit) today, to the hairdresser and back. It is a delightfully sunny, warm Spring day, and I regretted even putting on a cardigan to go out. Stuffed it into a bag on the way home.

*

My plantses are growing. Three green courgettes and two yellow (I broke the third, sigh); three pumpkins, a dozen sweetcorn stalks. A sole cauliflower and about four feeble kales, which is disappointing as I got a lot of tasty crunchy cake last year and would like to do more this time. The mange tout I planted in the garden have done nothing at all, but I have put out framework for beans and will plant them this week.

Comments

[author_by_night]

I wish DW had picked up more fandom. Tumblr's fine, but it's really not the same.

[kitarella_imagines]

Oh congratulations on the 21st anniversary!

[jacieleigh]

Ditto about Fandom with DW. It pales in comparison to what LJ once was. It seemed that 20 years ago, everyone in the Fandom was on LJ. Now, everyone is so spread out, there's not really a good place to go hang out online to be fannish. *sigh*

But congrats on your 21st anniversary!

[pensnest]

It's such a shame. I think the DW launch was just a bit late—for reasons passing understanding, fans had hared off to Tumblr. Which was a great place to share images, but stories? Conversations?

[pensnest]

Thank you. I wish I'd found LJ sooner, really.

[pensnest]

I think if fandom were on DW nowadays it would be a more civilised place. I don't exactly have a fandom space these days, because no fandom, but I read fannish subreddits, and so much of it seems so pestilentially juvenile.

[author_by_night]

And I feel like what fandom community is left is very quiet.

I'm tempted to blame it on all of us no longer being twenty, but I knew lots of people the age I am now and older who were very enthusiastic. I think part of it is simply that no one's really in the same fandoms, so it's hard TO get enthusiastic. It's lot less "OMG I love this thing too!!!" and more comparing notes. I have friends who still write OMGWTFBBQ-esque posts, but I don't know their fandoms, so I can't really say anything beyond "sounds like a good TV show". :/

[kitarella_imagines]

Gosh I only found DW about 2 years ago, I never knew anything about LJ! I wish I'd found DW a lot sooner, my loss ☹️

[pensnest]

From the Reddit communities I get an impression of great rowdiness and unfannish behaviour, of a lot of people pouring into the community who have no knowledge of fannish norms, and shouting at one another rather a lot. A lot of fandoms of which I know nothing at all, and which mostly have names I don't know—quite possibly from animé/manga/Asian TV/Asian boybands, which I've never been interested in. Also, of bots infesting AO3.

It's just an impression, mind you! I have had ONE bot comment on my AO3.

[pensnest]

In 2005, when I joined, it was a brilliant space for fannish community.

[turps]

21 years, what is time!?

Congrats on your baby plants.

[author_by_night]

Sorry - I meant specifically the fandom community on DW feels a lot quieter. So what I'm saying is, I think part of the problem is that everyone has such different fannish interests, whereas on LJ, back when it was active, it was easier to find a lot of people with those same interests. But this also means people don't talk about their fandoms much, because everyone's having different conversations. It's hard to get people excited when they're not excited about the same things, you know?

[turlough]

I don't remember exact date I got my LJ since I don't have it anymore. I'm fairly sure it was in April too however and definitely sure it was in 2005 so happy anniversary to us!

The way fandom has scattered all over the net is so sad. From what I understand even Tumblr is considered oldfashioned these days so I've no idea where the younger generations are hanging out.

I'm so envious of your lovely spring weather! It never got warmer than +8C here today despite the lovely sunshine.

Keeping everything crossed your plants will continue to grow and flourish!

[kitarella_imagines]

I can imagine. Fannish communities seem to be shrinking and disappearing, don't they...

[jacieleigh]

I definitely noticed a HUGE difference in the maturity of the group when I went from *NSync to NCIS... LOL

[pensnest]

Oh, yes, I agree. In the heyday of my LJ time, I was a popslasher and there were a handful of meaningful fandoms around, Supernatural and SG:A being big factors. But it felt coherent. Plus we had Metafandom.

Camp Sparkle changed too. Over time, people moved away from popslash and on to other things, and although there were often two or three people sharing a new fandom, it did splinter, and when you're trying to get together in a fannish way without any fandoms in common, it doesn't really work. I think there is so much around now that one could be a fan of, but it's hard to find a workable fandom when the source material is so niche.

[pensnest]

They definitely don't seem to have the coherence they once had. I suspect something seriously old-school like Jane Austen fandom probably works, but the fanfic is kept ruthlessly separate from the main fandom!

[pensnest]

TikTok and Discord spring to mind. I won't Tik or Tok, and I tried a Discord once and did not like it, so here's me, being old-fashioned. Harrumph.

Another beautiful morning today. We went off to a little village for a ballroom dancing session, and passed so many pretty gardens! As for my vegetables, I have to worry now about should I repot them into bigger, or just plant them out, and when, and, and, argh.

[pensnest]

I think Covid had an influence, too, in that it gave people the time and boredom to seek out something different, quite a lot of which turned out to be fandom they could pontificate about. Sigh.

[pensnest]

It is very odd to think that I am Really Quite Old now. I get my state pension this year! Eek!

[kitarella_imagines]

I think although AO3 is a great 'one stop shop' for fanfiction, it's not a real community, it's an archive. It might be better if we had AO3 as the archive PLUS all the other little communities for actual fans and not just people who want to read fanfics at AO3.

I didn't know there was a Jane Austen fandom! I can imagine that any raunchy fanfics would indeed be kept away from the fandom.

[rikes]

21! Wow. Must be around my 22nd, then. What a joy it has been to know you for that long! ♥

Good luck to all your plants! It's still too early to plant anything here.