Expecto Patronum.

[rogueslayer452]

Taken from this fandom meme:

What's the longest time you've been in a fandom. Not necessarily your oldest fandom, but a fandom that you started and still continue to read/write/create content for in some way.

Honestly, it would probably have to be Harry Potter. I got into it during high school, started from seeing the first movie that had just came out to buy/rent and I hadn't known anything about the books until then, but once seeing the first movie I was curious and ended up reading the books and it just bloomed from there. From reading the books to going online and finding the fandom to being excited about the movies coming out, Harry Potter was honestly one of the biggest fandoms I joined and the longest I've ever been in fandom for. Even now, while I've gone and gotten myself into other fandoms along the way and despite everything that has been revealed about the author over the years especially recently, I'm still kind of in the HP fandom. It was a massive influential factor in my life, in more ways than one, and I'm still a part of it. I still read fanfic, I love a lot of the fanart and the gifsets and discussions that come from the fandom still.

What's a fandom that you wish had a bigger following?

The Expanse. I know the show has gained more attention over the last couple of years thanks to the fan campaign to save the show and getting more people to notice and start watching it, but I do wish there was a bigger online fandom presence. Unfortunately, this is what happens when it comes to science fiction shows that aren't Star Wars or Star Trek related, they tend to be very niche and very much under the radar. Someone pointed out that it probably won't be until after the show ends that people will finally end up hopping onto it and going, "omg why didn't anyone tell me about this show??" Which, y'know, fair enough, better late than never and I've done the same thing with shows that I've gotten into that people told me about that ended some while ago. But still, I do wish there was more fan engagement.

Comments

[violateraindrop]

Harry Potter is a weird one for me since I read most of the books in German and only later the English originals. At that point, the only thing I was involved in online was the Sims community.

I got into The Expanse when Amazon picked it up. Now I'm also on book 7! I wish it was more popular. At least among icon and graphic makers since that's where I'm more involved.

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

Sounds like you are where I am with Harry Potter. Still love the books, still partake in some of the discussion, though I probably listen to/read it more than anything else. I just feel as though I've run out of things to say, at this point.

I have to admit I don't read much HP fic anymore, and I write it even less frequently. Always open to reading it, though! I think especially now that I've divorced myself from JK Rowling along with much of fandom, and have begun to acknowledge other things I didn't before, because I wanted to see the best in someone I now view as a pretty deplorable human being.

Like you, Harry Potter played a HUGE part in my life. Which is something I don't think non-fans or more casual fans really understand. And sure, maybe it seems silly to them, but how many people would say the same about their favorite sports teams? I can't relate to people practically exploding with excitement every Superbowl Sunday, but I get that it's important to them, so whatever. They're honorary Ravens, I'm an honorary Ravenclaw. (Actually Hufflepuff, but that didn't work with the analogy.)

I used to LOVE browsing fanart! For whatever reason, I lost interest in that. But I loved it almost as much as fanfic.

[blakmagjick]

I also got into HP in highschool...and it was after a friend dragged me to see the first movie.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

I wish it was more popular. At least among icon and graphic makers since that's where I'm more involved.

Same, yeah.

And I think it's just really interesting which shows end up becoming huge among online fandom spaces where there's a lot of graphic making while others don't, which the latter may have a large following overall but very little fandom content. You just never know what might catch on, what fandom latches onto.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Like you, Harry Potter played a HUGE part in my life. Which is something I don't think non-fans or more casual fans really understand.

I think some people tend to forget that this was some people's childhoods, so there's a level of nostalgia for them. And while it wasn't necessarily my childhood (more like, my teenage years), it meant a lot to me and I, along with so many, kind of grew up with it. And it's not like most of the fandom hasn't been critical of the series, because I've seen the shift over the years from people talking about headcanons and other ideas of that nature to discussing more serious topics of the fucked up things in the series, especially in regards to JKR and the influences of her writing. It's not like most fans blindly think that HP can do no wrong, there's been a lot of very in-depth conversations, from changing of perspectives, to us having grown up with the series, etc.

So for non-fans or casual fans, on the surface level it may seem silly to still be interested in the series, but it's rather hypocritical to judge people who still enjoy the series and are still fannish over it when, as you said, other people get really hyped into things like sport events and the like. I don't understand it, but I don't berate them for enjoying it if that's what they like. So why is HP (and similar kinds of fiction) viewed as different? Because it's deemed "for kids" and therefore immature? idk

I used to LOVE browsing fanart! For whatever reason, I lost interest in that. But I loved it almost as much as fanfic.

idk where the majority of the fanart community is anymore, honestly. Tumblr was a biggest place to find fanart, but after their "porn ban" (that didn't really ban porn) it erased a lot of the fanart blogs there, and made even the existing fanartists there discouraged from posting. I guess Twitter could be a place, but it's next to impossible to find anything on there. It's really sad.

But yeah, I enjoy the fanart whenever I see it. And I loved visiting individual artists websites that hosted their artwork back in the day.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I wasn't even aware of the books until after the first movie came out, and I think for a lot of people this was the same for them.

[blakmagjick]

I had heard of the books...but they were "kids books" and I was in highschool so I didn't figure I'd want to read them.

I'm really sad that JK Rowling is such a piece of fucking garbage.

[elizalavelle.livejournal.com]

I think some of the fan engagement misses is that there aren't as many places that feel dedicated to the fandoms. It's almost like we have too much choice combined with spaces that don't require as much engagement, lots of the fandom engagement is clicking a like button of some type and not so much having deeper discussions.

[impala-chick.livejournal.com]

I agree about The Expanse!! I did just read a really fabulous Amos/Jim fic series, but I hardly see any fic for that show.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

It is bizarre, because I know it has a fanbase (there wouldn't have been a fan campaign to save it, if there wasn't) but there's very little fan content created for it.

[rogueslayer452.livejournal.com]

That is very true, especially since some platforms have made it impossible to actually engaged properly due to ridiculous restrictions or the way a site is formatted. I've ranted about this before about fandom being so scattered nowadays due to so many different sites now available which, on one hand is good for different needs but on the other hand bad because those places aren't always fandom-friendly and will place heavy restrictions that make engagement near impossible (see: posts disappearing into a void, banning content, purging, etc, this has happened before and will happen again....)

We need a better solution when it comes to fandom, something like AO3 where a site is created by fans for fans that won't be beholden to greedy and power-hungry corporations and companies that run these sites.

[impala-chick.livejournal.com]

I wondered if everyone in the fandom is just on twitter or something? I don't use twitter for fandom stuff.

Nice icon btw.

[elizalavelle.livejournal.com]

That's why I still love LJ. I know it's not as lively here as it once was but I really like that you need to put some effort into engaging and not just click a like button.

Agreed about needing a fan space that's more for fans and less for profit. Capitalism ruins a lot of things.