I watched the thread with some interest. I don't understand what's going on, or what the real reasons are for AO3 or OTW, but I suspect they're less than benevolent. I'm not even particularly a fan of Yuletide and have never understood why people fly that flag every year. But what pisses me off is the idea that our stories aren't really ours and that they can go anywhere. It's considered poor etiquette to take a story offline, but it's considered even poorer etiquette (and perhaps borderline unethical) to archive without someone's permission.
My story is this: back several years ago I was active in fandom. I got the attention of a certain person who was writing (and publishing) an academic paper fanfiction and wanted to use my work in the process.
That freaked me out. I didn't want to be the subject of someone's study. I work in a very competitive field where everyone is always investigating everyone else, and the last thing I needed was my quirky side coming to light. I didn't want an essay published about my pron in an academic journal that would be around forever and ever. Even if it wasn't really about "me," I was paranoid that my fannish identity would be linked to my real identity. (Hey, that happens all the time.)
So I took my stuff off the internet. I figured that if the person wanted to use it, he or she could use it (it was posted publicly, after all), but that I wasn't going to just relinquish everything, and I certainly wasn't going to leave it up there for future seekers to sift through.
I got so much crap. People in the fandom said it was "unfair" of me not to finish WiPs and to deprive them of my work. And I felt bad until a fandom friend took me aside and said that under no uncertain terms did I owe anybody anything. That's the point of fanfiction: it's a no-strings-attached venture, it's free, nobody paid for it, and therefore you are not owned by anybody. Such are the pleasures of working in a medium that is free of market constraints. We never really get "credit" for our work (payment or real-world recognition), but we have a great deal of control over our stuff. Or, at least in theory.
I think AO3 defenders are bizarre. They are basically getting behind a group of people who want to academicize and homogenize fanfic. To put it plainly: OTW is a bunch of people who couldn't cut it as 18th century literature junior faculty, so they're basically trying to invent this new "transformative works" field on which to hang their academic ambitions. I firmly believe that these people are trying to use fans to get ahead (a la their rival Laura Hale). They might put a nicer spin on it--protecting fandom, preserving works, creating some big monumental archive that will legitimize fanfiction--but what they're doing is just another example of career-jockeying. Sure, they're not profiting off of AO3--not monetarily. But there are other ways of profiting. So I sort of can't believe that anyone would voluntarily hand over their stuff to AO3. I mean, you're basically saying, "Yes, make me your dissertation project."
So my bottom line is: You do what you want with your stuff. Don't let anyone bully you or pressure you into doing whatever with your stuff. It's yours, nobody else can lay claim to it, and it does not matter if you write something as a gift to someone else. You fulfilled your obligation, the gift was given back when it was given, and that doesn't mean that it has to remain on the internet forever.
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no subject
Date: 2010-01-03 02:37 am (UTC)My story is this: back several years ago I was active in fandom. I got the attention of a certain person who was writing (and publishing) an academic paper fanfiction and wanted to use my work in the process.
That freaked me out. I didn't want to be the subject of someone's study. I work in a very competitive field where everyone is always investigating everyone else, and the last thing I needed was my quirky side coming to light. I didn't want an essay published about my pron in an academic journal that would be around forever and ever. Even if it wasn't really about "me," I was paranoid that my fannish identity would be linked to my real identity. (Hey, that happens all the time.)
So I took my stuff off the internet. I figured that if the person wanted to use it, he or she could use it (it was posted publicly, after all), but that I wasn't going to just relinquish everything, and I certainly wasn't going to leave it up there for future seekers to sift through.
I got so much crap. People in the fandom said it was "unfair" of me not to finish WiPs and to deprive them of my work. And I felt bad until a fandom friend took me aside and said that under no uncertain terms did I owe anybody anything. That's the point of fanfiction: it's a no-strings-attached venture, it's free, nobody paid for it, and therefore you are not owned by anybody. Such are the pleasures of working in a medium that is free of market constraints. We never really get "credit" for our work (payment or real-world recognition), but we have a great deal of control over our stuff. Or, at least in theory.
I think AO3 defenders are bizarre. They are basically getting behind a group of people who want to academicize and homogenize fanfic. To put it plainly: OTW is a bunch of people who couldn't cut it as 18th century literature junior faculty, so they're basically trying to invent this new "transformative works" field on which to hang their academic ambitions. I firmly believe that these people are trying to use fans to get ahead (a la their rival Laura Hale). They might put a nicer spin on it--protecting fandom, preserving works, creating some big monumental archive that will legitimize fanfiction--but what they're doing is just another example of career-jockeying. Sure, they're not profiting off of AO3--not monetarily. But there are other ways of profiting. So I sort of can't believe that anyone would voluntarily hand over their stuff to AO3. I mean, you're basically saying, "Yes, make me your dissertation project."
So my bottom line is: You do what you want with your stuff. Don't let anyone bully you or pressure you into doing whatever with your stuff. It's yours, nobody else can lay claim to it, and it does not matter if you write something as a gift to someone else. You fulfilled your obligation, the gift was given back when it was given, and that doesn't mean that it has to remain on the internet forever.