Pardon me. I'm using "LJ" and the recent fandebate as simply one, admittedly limited, example of the potential and need to improve on the power-imbalanced, monologic, Owner-vs-guest structure of the typical blog format, which as we saw this summer, can ravage LJ too.
Form follows function; I love seeing fandom subvert and transform both. I hope to see OTW reach past dominant (!) computer-mediated communication (CMC) tools for something that would allow OTW's work to be as transformative to online commentary as fanworks are to their texts.
LJ is FAR from my ideal, especially after this year's demonstration of 6A's deep unprofessionalism and shallow social conscience. My fan activity takes place in many sites beyond LJ; similarly for many OTW folks, I know.
ANY software that allows for a robustly interactive, non-ephemeral, and many-to-many conversation --- the sort humans LIKE to have, as opposed to the sort computer limitations force upon us --- is going to be better than the one-sided conversation privileged by hierarchically structured fora and owner-dominated blogs. Those models are steeped in the same Sage-on-the-Stage, Voice-of-the-Master assumptions that I work to change in classrooms and other settings.
One reason I love fandom is its capacity (not always realized) to be non-hegemonic, to invite and include many voices, rather than being run by the few, to open up new frameworks for thinking and being, to have fic-fests rather than blogging flame-fests, or the physical slugfests that rule the RW news.
Just as fans surface "other voices" in a text, and fandom voices other views alongside the author's, and classrooms and meetings can either encourage or stifle new conversations and voices, so can CMC tools do, through structuring for it, or against it.
I agree the CMC options at hand have their limits.
I hope that OTW's journal fen (*g*) might seek maximum openness, USING ANY SOFTWARE, rather than default to software that is convenient, "shiny," and OMG beloved by the patriarchies it so perfectly replicates. That would be ironic since one purpose of OTW & its journal is to celebrate fandom being the opposite!
no subject
Form follows function; I love seeing fandom subvert and transform both. I hope to see OTW reach past dominant (!) computer-mediated communication (CMC) tools for something that would allow OTW's work to be as transformative to online commentary as fanworks are to their texts.
LJ is FAR from my ideal, especially after this year's demonstration of 6A's deep unprofessionalism and shallow social conscience. My fan activity takes place in many sites beyond LJ; similarly for many OTW folks, I know.
ANY software that allows for a robustly interactive, non-ephemeral, and many-to-many conversation --- the sort humans LIKE to have, as opposed to the sort computer limitations force upon us --- is going to be better than the one-sided conversation privileged by hierarchically structured fora and owner-dominated blogs. Those models are steeped in the same Sage-on-the-Stage, Voice-of-the-Master assumptions that I work to change in classrooms and other settings.
One reason I love fandom is its capacity (not always realized) to be non-hegemonic, to invite and include many voices, rather than being run by the few, to open up new frameworks for thinking and being, to have fic-fests rather than blogging flame-fests, or the physical slugfests that rule the RW news.
Just as fans surface "other voices" in a text, and fandom voices other views alongside the author's, and classrooms and meetings can either encourage or stifle new conversations and voices, so can CMC tools do, through structuring for it, or against it.
I agree the CMC options at hand have their limits.
I hope that OTW's journal fen (*g*) might seek maximum openness, USING ANY SOFTWARE, rather than default to software that is convenient, "shiny," and OMG beloved by the patriarchies it so perfectly replicates. That would be ironic since one purpose of OTW & its journal is to celebrate fandom being the opposite!