Fan fiction

So I'm reading this article about fan fiction, and they reference fanfiction.net, and I go there, and, well, there's a lot of fan fiction out there. Let me put it this way: if someone wrote something that got published, ever, regardless of how popular, then somebody else has probably added on to it. Plays, movies, TV, you name it. Some you could imagine would inevitably happen, for instance, 28,283 Star Wars pieces. But 26 for Fiddler on the Roof? 424 for The Good Wife? (But only 30 for The Andy Griffith Show? What's wrong with these Mayberry fans?)

All this bumbling around in make-believe venues can't be good.

But, apparently, it is. These folks, mostly young, presumably, are creating what are called paracosms, and in doing so, are setting themselves up nicely for a rich and productive adult life. This is from Wired:

Paracosms are the fantasy worlds that many dreamy, imaginative kids like to invent when they’re young. Some of history’s most creative adults had engaged in “worldplay” as children. ... MacArthur fellows were twice as likely as “normal” nongeniuses to have done so. Some fields were particularly rife with worldplayers: Fully 46 percent of the recipients polled in the social sciences had created paracosms in their youth.

A full and rich life of the imagination would seem to be a good thing. Read the article, Clive Thompson on the Importance of Fan Fiction, then explore a bit on the fan fiction website. You'll be surprised at what you see. And I'll bet you anything you read a bunch of them.

And maybe you'll even write one!
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Why they invented the interwebs

One thing that has been true about the internet since the day Al Gore invented it is that it can provide a home for the narrowest of narrowcasting. The history of popular culture in the 20th Century was the development of the mass market. Radio, movies, television, books. Each one came along and, through the development of an appropriate mainstream media mechanism, found the largest possible audiences. A movie or television show wasn't a hit because a lot of people saw it; it was a hit because just about everyone saw it. Mainstream media did, indeed, become the monster (and often the idiot) many people think of it as.

The internet and attendant technologies changed that, putting the means of production into the hands of just about anyone. If you wanted to make a good-looking TV show in 1970, you had to be NBC or CBS. To do it today, you need a couple of hundred bucks and an email account. At the most base level, the web page, the internet has been available to anyone who wanted to be on it from day one, at virtually no cost whatsoever. Everyman publishing communities were one of the first thing to pop on on the internet. Suddenly anyone could have a website about anything. For collectors, for enthusiasts, for people really interested in something that not too many other people were interested in, this was the paradigm shift. Factor in searching, and there you were. If you were interested in hunting for killer owls in the Antarctic, you could put in a search for "hunting for killer owls in the Antarctic" and a second later you were connected to huntingforkillerowlsintheantarctic.com, where like-minded owl seekers were already posting photos of their latest darkly feathered trophy. Absolutely nothing was so small that not only could a website be built around it, but a community could develop around that website.

There's been no turning back.

Today, which is turning out to be an all-Disney day here at Grinwout's, we have discovered what has to be the narrowest subject matter to yet hit the interwebs. It is a site called DSR - Disneyland's Secret Restroom, devoted to one very special (?) restroom in the Happiest Place on Earth.

This website is a loving tribute to the Secret Restroom, filled with photographs, comments, details, and even secrets about the secrets! We hope you'll enjoy it, and that you'll share your photos and remembrances with us.

Oh, yeah. The Disney fans are lining up (so to speak). The site has pages devoted to the door, the mirror, the towels, the vent—everything you could want to know about the DSR, lovingly presented as only the internet can. Sure, there are sites on the Haunted Mansion and POTC, but those are so...broad. So popular. So obvious. Everyone knows that the real Disney fan's interest lies elsewhere. Disneyland's Secret Restroom: check it out. (If you're going to be there for a while, bring a magazine in with you.)

[Via BoingBoing]
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