butterflydreaming

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My day-to-day is pretty much devoid of validation or praise, and I don't know how to fix that. There isn't even payout on the things that should generate mild affirmation.

It stands out as a major highlight that last week, my niece brainstormed a movie plot over take-out, and we wrapped it up wishing it were a real movie. The creative zone alone was something I keep trying to make happen in my life (with low success).

I've been over two years with my job and I know my bosses aren't the kind to give praise. But I can't seem to make it happen in my personal life, either.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

capri0mni

I've had periods in my life like that, too. And it sucks. To me, it feels like I'm slowly turning invisible (or at least, semitransparent).

I hope things start sprouting for you, soon. <3

From:

butterflydreaming

Thank you.

There is a gameshow podcast called The Writers Room where the two scriptwriters brain storm a movie together. I want to create or find something like that, a creative play space. Fandom doesn't seem to have that anymore -- or was I just lucky once?

From:

capri0mni

I don't know. ...I seem to be an outlier, in that it's easier for me to write original fiction / original characters than it is for me to write fanfic. But I really like reading other people's fannish snippets.

And I couldn't tell you my "trick" if I tried.

Well, no. That's not quite true. I do like writing fairy-tale like stories. I guess you could say that's my fandom. I compare it in my head to making a crazy quilt: taking bits from a bunch of stories, and stitching them together (The foundling child from this story, the jealous king from that story, the scheming court wizard from over there, and how about a talking bird from that-a-wau?)

Sometimes, when I'm really stuck, I'll try telling a really well-known story but switch the hero around: "Rapunzel," from the witch's point of view, or "The Frog King" from the king's valet's point of view. ...That kind of thing.

Or I just don't even try to write a complete thing. Sometimes, I'll just write a scene and leave it at that.

From:

butterflydreaming

Fandom has been my place to do that with other people, instead of being alone in my head with my characters.

From:

capri0mni

I haven't really been involved in fandom spaces since Usenet was the place to go for that (specifically: rec.arts.drwho). So... somewhere around 17 years?

How does it feel like fandom has changed?

From:

butterflydreaming

The gold standard for me is early LJ. It had a community with an active core group of a dozen or so, loads of lurkers but that core group made the community fun. And at the time, a fic posted to ff.net would always get a comment or more. I hate to tell at clouds, but the social media norm of the Like button has decreased engagement.
In between then and now I was in Tumblr, which was at first engaged, and then shifted with the general cultural change. This is across multiple fandoms and different media.

From:

capri0mni

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<cite? but the social media norm of the Like button has decreased engagement. </cite>

~Nod~

I was also wondering if the rise of streaming services (where each franchise is in its own separate universe.

And also, how the big media companies now see themselves in competition with the fans -- see: G.O.T., the final Star Wars trilogy, etc..

From:

capri0mni

but the social media norm of the Like button has decreased engagement.

~Nod~

I was also wondering if the rise of streaming services (where each franchise is in its own separate universe.

And also, how the big media companies now see themselves in competition with the fans -- see: G.O.T., the final Star Wars trilogy, etc..

From:

igenlode

I wasn't around [on LiveJournal] in that era, so I've only witnessed it in old group archives -- but yes, that sort of LJ collaboration, e.g. the MS Elegante, was exactly what came to mind when you originally mentioned it... (Hence my suggestion of RP forums.)

From:

igenlode

A web search throws up this: https://fiction.fandom.com/wiki/Fiction

Looking at the 'Recent' page suggests that the site is still active, although those most recent changes don't look much like stories to me...

Or I know somewhat who is involved in various (French-language) roleplay forums -- a quick look suggests that these exist in English as well.
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Fandom+RP+sites

From:

butterflydreaming

Thank you for looking. But wow, that Novelas site is a mess (and so may ads!). I'm in Discord, in a large and lively server, but even there I've been frustrated by the creative engagement. I have a writing collaboration that has been going well as far as adding to the story, but when I started a thread to get our plot plotted instead of just pantsing, I couldn't get half of the participants to engage. So I feel like my ideas are dominating but also that the group is... not super interested?

From:

igenlode

The only collaboration I ever did was on a Web message board -- and that was because it was supposed to be a roleplay, but only the two of us kept going after more than about three posts. Which had the benefit that with only two people handling all the characters we were able to develop some actual plot/story, instead of just having everyone 'playing' their own character...

But that one was simply done on the basis of posting a scene up to a cliffhanger/endpoint and then waiting to see what the other person would do with it next. So there really wasn't any longterm plot planning involved, even though it did turn out with quite a satisfactory arc in the end. http://ivory.ueuo.com/Tower/Fiction/Pirates/index.html

I'm not sure that a lot of people in that sort of scenario are necessarily interested in creating an advance structure -- and my experience is that most people in most groups are more than happy to let someone else make the decisions, and don't actually want the responsibility and trouble of having to do it themselves. There are usually a handful who will speak out and a lot more who sit around in the background and will go along with whatever is decided. If you got *half* your participants taking an active role in decision-making, I'd have said you were doing unusually well!

Provided you've got the ideas, I imagine the rest of the group is probably quite happy with that. And no, they're probably not super-interested in the sense of wanting to influence the direction of the story, but just want it to be available for them to participate in wheneverthe mood takes them....

It's nice to be able to ping-pong ideas off someone, but I really don't have very much experience of it, and it's not my normal form of creation.