metanarrates · 4 years ago
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nic how did u analyse a fandom so well put and u arent even prt of it KHDJJSJS
hoo boy. i've never thought i would explain why i have this extremely niche skill, but here goes ajdkdkskkd
i've spent WAY too long analyzing fandoms i was never truly a part of, because I wasn't allowed unrestricted internet access or social media until I was 18, and I was only able to minimally participate in fandom as a teenager because of it. most of my fandom exposure prior to adulthood was during whatever few hours a week i could sneak onto the few websites that my school computers didn't flag. livejournal was already pretty dead by that point but, unlike tumblr and reddit, it wasn't flagged by the school computers, so I would read a lot of fandom journals there. TV tropes also wasn't flagged, so I tended to poke around there a lot as well. I read some fanfic on AO3, but I was much more interested in reading fandom metas. unfortunately, since the undertale fandom (aka my special interest) didn't really exist on LJ, I ended up turning to analyses about fandoms I wasn't really a part of.
I got really, really invested in weird fandom dramas that had happened YEARS before i had ever stepped digital foot onto the internet. I read great analyses, not so great analyses, and since there was no other person i could really talk to about my hyperfixations, I got really, really good at dissecting how fandoms work without any outside help and very little content. it was like I was digging through the records of a tribe of people who hyperfixated almost exactly the same way I do, except I knew that once I turned 18, I would probably join those people, and I really wanted to know why fandoms liked the things they liked. I ended up being pretty obsessed with the mechanics of how a piece of media becomes popular, and what makes it have staying power. i read a TON of analyses about shows I have never watched because of this. I actually blame the fact that I'm an English major on those experiences.
so basically, my favorite genre of posts now is watching people discourse about fandoms i am not in because it's always super interesting to my autistic nerd brain SJFKDKKDKSKDK
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