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30 questions fic meme: origin story
A meme, swiped from ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
hafital, which I hope lots of people will do at least the first day of because I want to know EVERYONE's fandom origin story! I love fandom origin stories! I love them so much I HAVE TWO.
1 - How did you first get into writing fanfic, and what was the first fandom you wrote for? What do you think it was about that fandom that pulled you in?
About a week after I started high school, I metiulia in gym class, and by that Friday she had convinced me that The X-Files was pretty much the most awesome thing to exist in all the world, so I watched the rerun of "Anasazi" (the last episode of S2, the one where Scully shoots Mulder, which let me just say was a FAIRLY CONFUSING introduction to the series, and yet I adored it) that was airing in the leadup to the premiere of season three.
In very short order, I joined Iulia in being full-on, profoundly obsessed with The X-Files. My family had gotten AOL around then, and at Iulia's suggestion I started participating in the post-episode chat rooms. And at the same time--and as best as I can recall, all in the first month of high school, before my fourteenth birthday--my dad took Iulia and I to a youth program at his workplace (which I won't identify by name, but there were armed guards out front and supercomputers inside). The program was intended to introduce teens to the internet, presumably for educational purposes. We had a T1 connection, the Mosaic web browser, and Iulia's guidebook to all things X-Files related, including the address of an online fanfic archive. It was more or less the first URL either of us ever typed out (I distinctly remember sounding out the "h-t-t-p-colon-slash-slash ... rutgers-dot-e-d-u") and it led us to fic. Possibly some kind of Freddy Krueger crossover.
I don't remember any kind of thought process that intervened between discovering that fic existed on the internet and writing some of my own (and then presenting it to Iulia but not, thankfully, to the internet at large--Iulia still has hard copy of everything I wrote that year, though, so I can never make her angry). The X-Files had utterly absorbed my brain, and since I'd already been writing stories since I was physically able to write, stories about the X-Files (okay, specifically about Mulder and Scully sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G in a painfully PG-13 sort of way) just spilled out of me for the next six months or so.
Then I got frustrated by the way canon kept changing out from under me while I was trying to write fic that stayed congruent with it, and stomped off to play in my own sandbox. I didn't look back for years.
Fast forward seven years. After a six-year separation from media fandom, I had rediscovered it through![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
thelionforreal, who lived across the hall from me and Iulia our sophomore year of college. This time I was on the slash side of the force, and lurking hardcore--I read my way through all the NSync RPS I could lay hands on, and then, via Helen's slashomatic, an ungodly amount of Sentinel and Sports Night fic. I even doodled some bits of fic during my lurking year, but nothing actually stuck until Iulia and I went to the World Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention in 2002 and decided, for whatever reason, to go to the screening of that year's Hugo-nominated Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode, "Once More with Feeling" (ALSO a fairly confusing introduction to that series, especially when you're watching a screener copy with none of the special effects finished yet).
Nonetheless, Iulia and I both adored it, and notwithstanding the whole senior-year-of-college thing we were doing just then, we started exploiting all available sources to get our hands on the rest of the series (borrow DVDs from a friend! Buy a "trading card" on eBay that includes VHS tapes of season three as a free gift! Hit up random girl we'd never spoken to before in our history practicum for her copies of season five! ANYTHING.) I don't know how obsessed Iulia got, but I fell at least as hard as I had for The X-Files--I literally sat in class and doodled Spike's name in the margins of my notebooks. I definitely read all the fic I could lay my hands on (as long as it had Spike in it) (Spike Spike Spike Spike).
(I will tell you a secret. "Sudis" means "spike" in Latin. I thought "spicus" was too obvious, so I went for a synonym.)
We were watching season 7 as it aired, at the same time we were frantically catching up on previous seasons as we could get our hands on them. On October 8, 2002, "Same Time, Same Place" aired, and on October 10 I passed up going out to see some friends to sit in my room and write Small Mercies in a state of RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION over the way the Scoobies USED SPIKE AND THEN JUST THREW HIM AWAY WHEN THEY WERE DONE WITH HIM.
Ahem. Anyway, I sent that story off to an archive where I don't think anyone ever saw it, but I also tracked down a mailing list or two and joined them, and a couple of months later when I tossed off a bit of random Spike/Xander fic while working late one night, I posted it to the mailing list and got feedback from Mad Poetess and that was it, I was hooked forever. It's been all downhill from there.
1 – How did you first get into writing fanfic, and what was the first fandom you wrote for? What do you think it was about that fandom that pulled you in?
2 – Name the fandoms you've written in, and how much you've written in that fandom, and if you still write in it.
3 – For each of the fandoms from day two, what were your favorite characters to write?
4 – Do you have a "muse" character, that speaks to you more than others, or that tries to push their way in, even when the fic isn't about them? Who are they, and why did that character became your muse?
5 –If you have ever had a character try to push their way into a fic, whether your "muse" or not, what did you do about it?
6 – When you write, do you prefer writing male or female characters?
7 – Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?
8 – Do you write OCs? And if so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues, and if not, explain your thoughts on OCs.
9 – Pairings – For each of the fandoms from day two, what are your three favorite pairings to write?
10 – Pairings – Have you ever gone outside your comfort zone and written a pairing you liked, but found you couldn't write, or a pairing you didn't like, and found you could?
11 – Genre – do you prefer certain genres of fic when you're writing? What kind do you tend to write most?
12 – Have you ever attempted an "adaptation" fic of a favorite book or movie but set in a different fandom?
13 – Do you prefer canon or fanon when you write? Has writing fanfic for a fandom changed the way you see some or even all of the original source material?
14 – Ratings – how high are you comfortable with going? Have you ever written higher? If you're comfortable with NC-17, have you ever been shocked by finding that the story you're writing is G-rated instead?
15 – Warnings – What do you feel it most important to warn for, and what's the strangest thing you've warned for in a fic?
16 – Summaries – Do you like them or hate them? How do you come up with them, if you use them?
17 – Titles – Are they the bane of your existence, or the easiest part of the fic? Also, if you do chaptered fic, do you give each chapter a title, or not?
18 – Where do you get the most inspiration for your fics (aka "bunnies") from?
19 – When you have bunnies, do you sit down and start writing right away, or do you write down the idea for further use?
20 –Do you ever get bunnied from other people's stories or art in the same fandom?
21 – Sequels – Have you ever written a sequel to a fic you wrote, and if so, why, and if not, how do you feel about sequels?
22 – Have you ever participated in a fest or a Big Bang? If so, write about your favorite experience in relation to one. If not, are there any you've thought about doing? And if not, why not?
23 – When you post, where do you post to? Just your journal? Just an archive? Your own personal site?
24 – Betaing – How many betas do you like to use to make sure there aren't any major flaws in your fic? Do you have a Beta horror story or dream story?
25 – Music – Do you listen to music while you write? Do you make playlists to get into a certain "mood" to write your fic? Do you need noise in general? Or do you need it completely quiet?
26 – What is the oddest (or funnest) thing you've had to research for a fic?
27 – Where is your favorite place to write, and do you write by hand or on the computer?
28 – Have you ever collaborated with anyone else, whether writing together, or having an artist work on a piece about your fic?
29 – What is your current project or projects?
30 – Do you have a favorite fic you've written? What makes it your favorite? And don't forget to give us a link!
hafital, which I hope lots of people will do at least the first day of because I want to know EVERYONE's fandom origin story! I love fandom origin stories! I love them so much I HAVE TWO.1 - How did you first get into writing fanfic, and what was the first fandom you wrote for? What do you think it was about that fandom that pulled you in?
About a week after I started high school, I met
iulia in gym class, and by that Friday she had convinced me that The X-Files was pretty much the most awesome thing to exist in all the world, so I watched the rerun of "Anasazi" (the last episode of S2, the one where Scully shoots Mulder, which let me just say was a FAIRLY CONFUSING introduction to the series, and yet I adored it) that was airing in the leadup to the premiere of season three. In very short order, I joined Iulia in being full-on, profoundly obsessed with The X-Files. My family had gotten AOL around then, and at Iulia's suggestion I started participating in the post-episode chat rooms. And at the same time--and as best as I can recall, all in the first month of high school, before my fourteenth birthday--my dad took Iulia and I to a youth program at his workplace (which I won't identify by name, but there were armed guards out front and supercomputers inside). The program was intended to introduce teens to the internet, presumably for educational purposes. We had a T1 connection, the Mosaic web browser, and Iulia's guidebook to all things X-Files related, including the address of an online fanfic archive. It was more or less the first URL either of us ever typed out (I distinctly remember sounding out the "h-t-t-p-colon-slash-slash ... rutgers-dot-e-d-u") and it led us to fic. Possibly some kind of Freddy Krueger crossover.
I don't remember any kind of thought process that intervened between discovering that fic existed on the internet and writing some of my own (and then presenting it to Iulia but not, thankfully, to the internet at large--Iulia still has hard copy of everything I wrote that year, though, so I can never make her angry). The X-Files had utterly absorbed my brain, and since I'd already been writing stories since I was physically able to write, stories about the X-Files (okay, specifically about Mulder and Scully sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G in a painfully PG-13 sort of way) just spilled out of me for the next six months or so.
Then I got frustrated by the way canon kept changing out from under me while I was trying to write fic that stayed congruent with it, and stomped off to play in my own sandbox. I didn't look back for years.
Fast forward seven years. After a six-year separation from media fandom, I had rediscovered it through
thelionforreal, who lived across the hall from me and Iulia our sophomore year of college. This time I was on the slash side of the force, and lurking hardcore--I read my way through all the NSync RPS I could lay hands on, and then, via Helen's slashomatic, an ungodly amount of Sentinel and Sports Night fic. I even doodled some bits of fic during my lurking year, but nothing actually stuck until Iulia and I went to the World Science Fiction and Fantasy Convention in 2002 and decided, for whatever reason, to go to the screening of that year's Hugo-nominated Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode, "Once More with Feeling" (ALSO a fairly confusing introduction to that series, especially when you're watching a screener copy with none of the special effects finished yet). Nonetheless, Iulia and I both adored it, and notwithstanding the whole senior-year-of-college thing we were doing just then, we started exploiting all available sources to get our hands on the rest of the series (borrow DVDs from a friend! Buy a "trading card" on eBay that includes VHS tapes of season three as a free gift! Hit up random girl we'd never spoken to before in our history practicum for her copies of season five! ANYTHING.) I don't know how obsessed Iulia got, but I fell at least as hard as I had for The X-Files--I literally sat in class and doodled Spike's name in the margins of my notebooks. I definitely read all the fic I could lay my hands on (as long as it had Spike in it) (Spike Spike Spike Spike).
(I will tell you a secret. "Sudis" means "spike" in Latin. I thought "spicus" was too obvious, so I went for a synonym.)
We were watching season 7 as it aired, at the same time we were frantically catching up on previous seasons as we could get our hands on them. On October 8, 2002, "Same Time, Same Place" aired, and on October 10 I passed up going out to see some friends to sit in my room and write Small Mercies in a state of RIGHTEOUS INDIGNATION over the way the Scoobies USED SPIKE AND THEN JUST THREW HIM AWAY WHEN THEY WERE DONE WITH HIM.
Ahem. Anyway, I sent that story off to an archive where I don't think anyone ever saw it, but I also tracked down a mailing list or two and joined them, and a couple of months later when I tossed off a bit of random Spike/Xander fic while working late one night, I posted it to the mailing list and got feedback from Mad Poetess and that was it, I was hooked forever. It's been all downhill from there.
1 – How did you first get into writing fanfic, and what was the first fandom you wrote for? What do you think it was about that fandom that pulled you in?
2 – Name the fandoms you've written in, and how much you've written in that fandom, and if you still write in it.
3 – For each of the fandoms from day two, what were your favorite characters to write?
4 – Do you have a "muse" character, that speaks to you more than others, or that tries to push their way in, even when the fic isn't about them? Who are they, and why did that character became your muse?
5 –If you have ever had a character try to push their way into a fic, whether your "muse" or not, what did you do about it?
6 – When you write, do you prefer writing male or female characters?
7 – Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?
8 – Do you write OCs? And if so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues, and if not, explain your thoughts on OCs.
9 – Pairings – For each of the fandoms from day two, what are your three favorite pairings to write?
10 – Pairings – Have you ever gone outside your comfort zone and written a pairing you liked, but found you couldn't write, or a pairing you didn't like, and found you could?
11 – Genre – do you prefer certain genres of fic when you're writing? What kind do you tend to write most?
12 – Have you ever attempted an "adaptation" fic of a favorite book or movie but set in a different fandom?
13 – Do you prefer canon or fanon when you write? Has writing fanfic for a fandom changed the way you see some or even all of the original source material?
14 – Ratings – how high are you comfortable with going? Have you ever written higher? If you're comfortable with NC-17, have you ever been shocked by finding that the story you're writing is G-rated instead?
15 – Warnings – What do you feel it most important to warn for, and what's the strangest thing you've warned for in a fic?
16 – Summaries – Do you like them or hate them? How do you come up with them, if you use them?
17 – Titles – Are they the bane of your existence, or the easiest part of the fic? Also, if you do chaptered fic, do you give each chapter a title, or not?
18 – Where do you get the most inspiration for your fics (aka "bunnies") from?
19 – When you have bunnies, do you sit down and start writing right away, or do you write down the idea for further use?
20 –Do you ever get bunnied from other people's stories or art in the same fandom?
21 – Sequels – Have you ever written a sequel to a fic you wrote, and if so, why, and if not, how do you feel about sequels?
22 – Have you ever participated in a fest or a Big Bang? If so, write about your favorite experience in relation to one. If not, are there any you've thought about doing? And if not, why not?
23 – When you post, where do you post to? Just your journal? Just an archive? Your own personal site?
24 – Betaing – How many betas do you like to use to make sure there aren't any major flaws in your fic? Do you have a Beta horror story or dream story?
25 – Music – Do you listen to music while you write? Do you make playlists to get into a certain "mood" to write your fic? Do you need noise in general? Or do you need it completely quiet?
26 – What is the oddest (or funnest) thing you've had to research for a fic?
27 – Where is your favorite place to write, and do you write by hand or on the computer?
28 – Have you ever collaborated with anyone else, whether writing together, or having an artist work on a piece about your fic?
29 – What is your current project or projects?
30 – Do you have a favorite fic you've written? What makes it your favorite? And don't forget to give us a link!
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