#gift economy

[elizabethminkel]

Earlier this week I reported on the very depressing for-profit fic pirating happening in certain corners of fandom—but (somewhat coincidentally, timing-wise) I also had the joy of reporting this story on fanbinding, and the work of the @renegadeguild! Featuring the words (and fanbinds) of the brilliant @celestial-sphere-press, @butterfingersbookbinding, and @fanboundbooks (who also talked about Renegade on the most recent Fansplaining episode).

Renegade's binders are strong proponents of the non-monetized gift economy—they truly embody the spirit of fanfiction, in my opinion, both in the communal way they share their work with fic writers and each other, and in the DIY way they approach making books:

There’s a strong parallel between the amateur, instinctive nature of fanfiction and the act of fanbinding. While plenty of fic is penned by formally trained writers, much of it is not. Tiffo, who binds as Fanboundbooks, likens the reverse-engineering involved in teaching oneself both activities. As writers, people try to figure out why stories work. Fanbinders collectively share the process of learning to turn that work into a physical object—tactile, clean, often beautiful. Fic is largely unencumbered by the forms and structures of traditional publishing, and fanbinders approach their work with the same spirit. “People will often say, ‘How do I do this?’ or ‘What’s the rule for this?’” Tiffo says. “The answer that we always try to throw in Renegade is, ‘This is what other people have done, but know that there is no rule to your book—you can make whatever you want.’”

It's a shame seeing people conflate the bad actors of the pirating situation—many of whom don't appear to be in fandom and seem motivated by pure profit—with the work of fanbinders at large, and seeing people scared to try out fanbinding because of the recent news. Not-for-profit fanbinding is just as legal as writing fanfiction, and I don't speak for all fic writers, but if someone ever bound one of my fics, I'd be so touched I would almost definitely weep. 😭

[solar-sunnyside-up]

How to start building your social village--

How do you go from isolated to being apart of a properly connected social circle?? How do I go from that isolated individual to an actually connected person without having to force myself out to be a regular at a club or something??

Pick the most used social media across all your connections (for my this is sadly Facebook but I'm sure you could do this through discord or some other site I'm like 90% sure this is transferable in some formate maybe other ppl could pitch those ideas tho-) and then add everyone you know! And here's the fun stuff you could do in your group!

Functional ideas Village Group for-

Offer to swap babysitting/chores/errands or even buddies for these things

Offer to exchange sale/coupon/bulk buying info (A good example of this is a have a friend who knows a butcher and so her family once every 2 months bulk orders from him directly and it'd WAY cheaper for everyone)

Holiday organizing

Dinner party ideas/hang outs (know 2 or more ppl who like sewing? Organize a dinner once every few months and watch a movie and sew! Do a book club!)

Trade/swap/leading stuff (ex tools, books, unused snacks, boardgames, clothes, etc..)

Offer to be apart of a shared calander (I use Cozi personally but again use your preferred)

Event spamming (community event sharing bc no one ever gets proper info on them in time)

Plant swaps (I personally know like 3 different plant ppl who specialize in different types of plants ex 1 person does a lot of herbs and another does all succulents and another does super well with berries and they always wanna get rid of the babies or spread the spoils)

Organizing work parties (repair parties ex fences/roofs/, bulk cooking parties ex my families perogie parties, tax prep parties, hair dying get togethers, etc..)

Fun ideas for village-

Make a village badge/crest of some kind (at one point was making badges for dinner parties as gifts so this is an easy one for me)

Funny pet photos/meme dump ground

This allows for a pretty fun way to also make ppl feel connected. If I get to know someone fairly well like my neighbor or another parent from my kiddos school- I'll just add them to my weird little club thing! Here's a patch for you. Your family now!!

[fansplaining]

Episode 217: Fanbinding

On Episode 217, “Fanbinding,” Elizabeth and Flourish talk to Tiffo (aka Fanboundbooks) about the art of turning fanfiction into physical books, and the fanbinding collective known as the Renegade Bindery (@renegadeguild). Topics discussed include how exactly you make a book, Renegade’s origin story and huge growth in recent years, fanbinders’ firm commitment to the non-monetized gift economy, and Binderary, a month-long event this February with challenges, fan-run classes, and more. Plus! (Spoiler) Flourish literally joins the Renegade Discord during the recording session.

Click through to our site to listen or read a full transcript!

[probablyasocialecologist]

“There’s: ​‘reduce, reuse, recycle,’ and with this we were thinking, how about just ​‘refuse,’” she says. ​“Before you go out and buy that thing, especially that plastic thing, consider asking your neighbor for it.” Clark points out that rather than each household needing to own its own individual garden tools, camping gear, lawn mower, baking supplies, and so on, neighbors within a community could be sharing these items. Chances are that the tools or other resources we need to perform any given task are available right down the street. “Someone might have some cake pans that they can loan out to you for that baking project,” she says. ​“We don’t have to outfit all of our homes with exactly the same stuff. We can actually connect with each other and borrow those things. I have someone coming over to borrow some camping gear soon, for example.”

[fanhackers]

“While art objects may be the gifts most publicly recognized or validated by fellow fans, and while these gifts are indeed a crucial part of fandom's gift economy, we can better appreciate the scope of fandom's gift economy if we recognize that fannish gifts include not only art objects but the wide range of creative labors that surround and in some cases underlie these art objects. We can better understand the relationship between gift exchange and community formation if we see fandom as a system not just of reciprocal giving but of circular giving. And we can better evaluate the relationship between fandom and production if we attend to not just the giving but the receiving of gifts.”

Turk, Tisha. 2014. "Fan Work: Labor, Worth, and Participation in Fandom's Gift Economy." In "Fandom and/as Labor," edited by Mel Stanfill and Megan Condis, special issue, Transformative Works and Cultures, no. 15.

https://doi.org/10.3983/twc.2014.0518.

[tommming]

Gift Economy

Maybe we all feel something so dark and painful deep down, something off and something exhausting about living in this world, which has become so thoroughly pervaded by capitalism and the values of white christian imperialism, because life is a gift meant to be given, and we are not made to exchange one thing for another.

In many indigenous societies, instead of having a transactional economy ("barter" is a myth by the way) there exists what anthropologists call a gift economy, where the main way things get passed around is through gifts and reciprocity.

I think that life itself is a gift we have received, and it's ours to do whatever we want with it, but the best thing to do when you receive a gift is to give again, if you are able. I for one think that the meaning in my life comes from giving; giving myself to my wife, and to my work, giving gifts and sharing love with my friends, giving my heart to music and to the beauty in the world around me. Life is a gift, so I want to give it.

[fixing-bad-posts]

[Image description: A tumblr text post, edited blackout-poetry style to read, "ao3 and fic writing isn't about getting attention through hits and kudos and bookmarks and comments."]

---

ao3 and fic writing is about archiving work and furthering the gift-economy of fandom

[armoredsuperheavy]

Recently I saw on TikTok that someone got a commission to bind a fanfic. I know of course that selling fanfiction is illegal and can get the fic author in huge trouble, but is commissioning someone else to bind a fic for you also illegal? Seems a bit on shaky ground to me.

There is a lot of misinformation circulating about fanbinding and fanfiction. Answers are not cut-and-dried and thus are not present in a tweet or a 10 second video. You end up with gross oversimplifications like "fanfic is illegal".

I am not legal counsel but here is a recent post that goes into questions of legality.

I would urge you to think not on what is legal, but what is ethical to do and what the repercussions of actions might be on fannish communities at large over time. At Renegade Publishing we choose to support the gift economy tradition for many complex and important reasons.

Personally I think the practice of selling commissions has the potential to be a really destructive trend. I believe fanbindings are artifacts of a community and a collaborative experience. If you want a book you need to make one, barter one, or something else like this. To simply purchase it like any other product chips away at what makes fandom special and ultimately over time, renders it yet another commodified market where our passions and interests are sanitized and sold back to us at a markup.

That's why our Discord server and free resources exist. Come and learn how to make a book. Keep fandom free and raw and untamed.

-ArmoredSuperHeavy 2022.08.01

[blueneighbor]

To name the world as gift is to feel one’s membership in the web of reciprocity. It makes you happy—and it makes you accountable. Conceiving of something as a gift changes your relationship to it in a profound way, even though the physical makeup of the “thing” has not changed. A woolly knit hat that you purchase at the store will keep you warm regardless of its origin, but if it was hand knit by your favorite auntie, then you are in relationship to that “thing” in a very different way: you are responsible for it, and your gratitude has motive force in the world. You’re likely to take much better care of the gift hat than the commodity hat, because it is knit of relationships. This is the power of gift thinking. I imagine if we acknowledged that everything we consume is the gift of Mother Earth, we would take better care of what we are given. Mistreating a gift has emotional and ethical gravity as well as ecological resonance.

"THE SERVICEBERRY: An Economy of Abundance" by Robin Wall Kimmerer

[gram-she]

Many visions of anarchy lean heavily on communication and play as an alternative to work. But authentic communication and play require an emotional intimacy that can be violently painful and terrifying for gamers.

Essentially the problem is the economics problem of information asymmetry in reverse. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_asymmetry You cannot give a gift to a person you do not know about.

There are a few methods to tackle information asymmetry. How can gamers signal needs and skills in a safe way? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signalling_(economics) How can we screen gamers for needs and skills in a safe way? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Screening_(economics)

I don't know enough about economics and anarchy to think about information asymmetry in gift economies.

[elizabethminkel]

For my second fan culture column for Atlas Obscura, I wrote about Yuletide! (The first was on 18th-century sentiment albums as proto-Tumblrs.) This piece features several longtime Yuletide participants, including Dr. Anna Wilson, who wrote this great TWC article (partly) about Yuletide, and fic writers Sandrine and Petronia:

“What I really love about Yuletide is the potential for kismet,” says Petronia, “the story that, as a recipient, I always wished existed, [and] turns out to be the story someone else always wanted to write. The idea that I always had percolating as a writer, that was too niche to put energy into, turns out to have an audience after all—even an audience of one, which is all I need.” Sandrine echoes that love of serendipitous connections. “It’s great when there’s an obscure fandom of your heart which you thought was something only you cared for, and then someone else offers it—or requests it!—and you realize it wasn’t actually a fandom of one after all.”

(Also a note: I'm aware of the irony of a fandom juggernaut being the lead image for a piece on a rare-fandom exchange. 😭 While I did not choose the image myself, I do mention it in the piece—The Untamed was a Yuletide fandom its first year!)

[solar-sunnyside-up]

Omg yall I'm so smart hold on <is drowning in shuffled papers and is clearing space for you>

ok also first---

1) I'm about to have a baby 2)  I'm currently prepping for the holiday season in advance bc I'm Like That 3) I'm v autistic (explains point 2)

This is important context to know going in, but so I've been trying to figure out a way to build that mythical social village were always told to have is fucking impossible to actually make much less from scrap and I've been banging my head against a wall over it. But I did it babes I finally figured out the least awkward and the easiest way for me to do this!! So excited!

<Whispering> Also if someone has a better name for it then a social village please lemme know--- thats the one part I havent been able to get around yet.

[fansplaining]

Renegade is very interested in the gift economy, and so we bind because we love fic and we love the stories that were made for us and we know that they were made out of the kindness of someone's heart and the love and the passion that they feel for that thing, and they're not making money, and they're spending all of their time, and we wanna find a way to say 'I love this thing, I also love physical books, and so I wanna keep it." But also it's a way of kind of giving that back, right? You know, you write fic for each other...this is just, to us, another way of expressing that...this is really important and we think it's both valid as a form of media and literature, and also it's a way we can show that to especially the author. Right? We can say, "Hey, this was important enough that I wanted to make it."

— on our most recent episode, we talked to @fanboundbooks about fanbinding and the @renegadeguild. Click through to listen or read a full transcript!

[probablyasocialecologist]

When people have found themselves in possession of an abundance of goods, they have generally seen those goods not as resources to be deployed in the service of economic expansion, but rather as so many excuses to throw gigantic parties, like the ones that presumably took place at Göbekli Tepe or, for that matter, at Stonehenge. In many cultures, giving away or even ritualistically destroying one’s possessions at festivals has been a common way to show one’s worth. That people all over the world continue to spend their meager incomes on elaborate marriage celebrations and funerals is something mainstream economists can understand only as anomalous.

Aaron Benanav, Making a Living

[fanhackers]

An Intimate Sound–Podfic and Confluence

This week, I’ve been thinking a lot about podfic, i.e.., audio versions of fanfic, read out aloud. Podfic, as an audio-based medium, sits at the confluence of disability accessibility, performance, and of course, simply being a new form of narrative text.

In the first ever published article on podfic, Olivia Riley states:

“Audiobooks, another auditory predecessor of podfic, share podfic's emphasis on fictional narrative and vocal performance as well as other qualities typical to all the audio mediums so far discussed, including portability and ease of access. The comparison of podfic to audiobooks is particularly important because in my investigation I ran across numerous instances of listeners explicitly comparing the podfic experience to that of an audiobook, while only one referenced podcasts in relation to these audio narratives; thus, we must take into account how fans theorize their own texts and experiences.”

This particular comparison between audiobooks and podfics interests me; podcasts, whether fictional or non-fictional, arguably may be more intimate, in so much as we may get to listen to the speakers’ personal opinions, thoughts, ideas, etc. And yet, podfic finds itself standing more with audiobooks, despite sharing half its name with podcasts. I’d like to complicate this further, drawing from my own experience of both running zines with audio components, as well as interacting with fellow fans who make podfic, and who have had podfic made off their own work: fans are sometimes hesitant to provide permission to have their work read out aloud, concerned about the voice and audio work “exposing” perceived flaws in their written texts.

There’s a certain intimacy involved in the process, certainly, more than just that of getting a work beta-ed, or proof-read. It’s similar to the collaborative nature of fanart for fanfic, except fanart is welcomed with a lot less hesitance.

In the same article, Riley further goes on to explore this very intimacy:

“The audio performances of podfic produce a queer network of relations between the performer, the text, and the listener. To begin with, the text itself is an actor in podfic. All the podfics examined for this article were explicitly queer in their content, featuring queer(ed) characters, queer themes, romance, and often explicit sexuality. The characters in these podfics carry variously transformed and reimagined genders and sexualities. These podfics are palimpsests of many texts and authors, including the fan fic being read aloud, the source text the fan fic was inspired by, the contemporary fanon and fan community that shaped the fic's production, the various music and sound effects often used in these recordings, and the labor of all the creators who made these media. Further, through the reader's performance, listeners receive a unique interpretation of the fan fic being read, conveyed through the intonations and other subtleties that emphasize and elide various textual significances. This profusion of overlapping and sometimes contradictory layers of meaning impact how a listener understands a character's gender and sexuality, refusing the simplicity of heteronormative binaries.” RILEY, OLIVIA JOHNSTON. 2020. “PODFIC: QUEER STRUCTURES OF SOUND.” TRANSFORMATIVE WORKS AND CULTURES, NO. 34. HTTPS://DOI.ORG/10.3983/TWC.2020.1933.

There is, then, a definite sense of vulnerability in getting podfic made off one’s work. But podfic, I’d argue, is almost the most celebratory fan-object fandom has ever produced—it sits again on a confluence, not just of medium and accessibility, but of multiple creatives, all of whom have a singular contribution in making the final product. Podfic is, in many ways, a community object, more so than most fan-objects, simply by its nature of needing multiple inputs. 

What are your thoughts on podfic?

[msfbgraves]

A Fairytale of Fandom

Imagine, if you will, in a world full of restaurants, there is a group of amateur cooks that provides food, absolutely free of charge.

These cooks are not being paid or trained, but they like to eat, and they like to share their cooking.

Some of the cooks are chefs in the making. They actually become chefs! And still they cook for free!

It becomes popular. Really popular. There's always more guests than chefs, but that's OK. Some give money for the running of the place. Some share thanks. It's enough.

It's freeing, actually. You see dishes that are served nowhere else. There's burgers and fries galore, mind, but also different stuff. Strange even. Potentially harmful. People warn about allergies and effects, though. They can't take responsibility for the effects, as little as a restaurant could. Newer cooks could mislabel. If you can take absolutely zero risks, you may be advised not to taste some dishes. But they're also new and so, so interesting and not served anywhere else.

Word spreads. People feast. People bring friends. They bring friends.

And soon, this has practically always been there.

Newer people are less likely to pay for the upkeep cost. They never have, why should they start? It doesn't change anything about the experience. Really, there is so much food to go around, a cook should be honoured to have them even look at their dish. They're getting engagement, no? Especially since the restaurants are in decline. They are far too expensive and they suck. People don't go anywhere to eat anymore, so the fact that they even show up here is significant. Restaurants would kill for that engagement. Why should anyone pay a cook at all, anyway? They're doing it for free, and some of it is much better!

But some of the stuff they serve, amirite? Undercooked. Non traditional ingredients. And what, pray, is umami? Everyone knows that the basic tastes have always been sweet and bitter, sour and salt. Umami! Umami shouldn't be here. Shellfish shouldn't be here! Don't you know people keep kosher? Everything on here should be entirely sugar free and vegan! And no umami, you freaks. Think of the children.

Also. Also. Some of the people have the audacity to not finish serving a meal. Here I am, all they way through dinner and no dessert. None! And then. Then! You're not allowed to ask if the dessert will ever arrive. Here we are, investing all that time in your free food, and you're leaving us unsatisfied!

The cook says that they didn't know anyone was even eating or appreciating their meal. They have other commitments, you see. And if no one seems to appreciate their work...

Oh, you need appreciation, now? Who are you, even? Just an idiot who cooks for free. Like everyone else here. You're not even a chef. And like you could ever stop doing it. People like you, if they didn't do it, they'd wither. It's kind of sad, really. You could spend time doing a real job. And you should do this for yourself. Isn't engagement enough?

At this point, some cooks are getting incredibly upset. People simply take without any acknowledgement. Another person was really mean about their soufflé. And another cook likes umami, but is being called a bad person because of this.

Then there are some cooks that say: "Sorry, but you're serving my applesauce with your sushi. Could you refrain from doing that. Applesauce should never be served with sushi and I do not want to be associated with your dish. People may think I approve of that."

"Well some people really like sushi with applesauce. Some of them liked your applesauce so much they went back to your stand to see what else you offered."

"I don't care. Make your own applesauce."

"But you offered it to anyone for free, at least if they showed where it came from. That's one of the rules of this place."

"No! I get to decide what my applesauce gets associated with!"

"No you don't!"

"Listen up! Your dish sucks and I want nothing to do with it! I get to say what my applesauce gets served with!"

"No. Actually. Not on this platform, you don't. Put it here, anyone can enjoy and combine it. You could have ignored my dish. That's the same thing we expect restaurants to do if we riff off their dishes!"

"But I made it! You should have asked my permission!"

"We don't ask the restaurant's permission either, but as long as no one is getting paid, this is allowed! If they don't want to know, they simply don't look!"

Third chef: "Yes, but that is a risk they take because any exposure may lead to revenue. With the free applesauce, that's not the case. I mean it's not very gracious, but they may ask you not to serve it with sushi. You can try it with somebody else's applesauce. They might not object."

"And risk being labeled a freak? In the weird new tastes club?"

"Yes. The kindest thing would have been to ignore it, sure, but as in this case, exposure doesn't pay at all, the chef's feelings matter."

"Hey guys. Do you know they've been feeding our food to a replicator?"

"They WHAT?!!"

"Yeah, the chefs are on strike. They want to replace them all with replicated food."

"But replicated food is just the most likely statistical recombination of ingredients based on the median of a sample, it has nothing to do with cooking!"

"Yeah. They want to force the chefs to reseason it after, or they serve it as is. They don't think anyone would notice. It saves on chef expenses, because they can reclass them as line cooks."

"But I want to be a chef! Am I killing my chances of that by doing this?"

"Afraid so."

"Well fuck this. We're not getting paid, the guests take us for granted, and I'm harming my career prospects. Oh, yes. And people call me a degenerate for liking umami."

Then a guest speaks up. "But I love umami! Can't really get umami anywhere else!"

"Have you ever told anyone?"

"Didn't think I needed to."

"You kind of do, though."

"But I'm shy! And it's not like I couldn't live without umami."

Chefs start leaving. It's not really noticable for a year or two. But the atmosphere changed.

Ten years later people ask: "Hey? Didn't they once have whole awesome free meals here?"

Yes. But they became too popular. And when things get that popular, you simply get too many assholes for it to be sustainable.

Will there be an alternative?

Probably. Until it gets too popular.