Welcome to our Events Calendar roundup for the month of July 2013! The Events Calendar can be found on the OTW website and is open to submissions by anyone with news of an event. These can be viewed by event-type, such as Academic Events, Fan Gatherings, Legal Events, OTW Events, or Technology Events taking place around the world.

• Westercon is the "West Coast Science Fantasy Conference" held annually in the western part of the United States. Westercon 66 will take place in Sacramento, California from 4-7 July 2013. In addition to workshops and panels, the program features special guests, a masquerade and costume ball, an art show, musical events, and a writers workshop.
  Read and share about Westercon on Fanlore
• Readercon celebrates "imaginative literature" - that is, literary science fiction, fantasy, horror, and unclassifiable works known as "slipstream." The 24th Readercon will be held 11-14 July in Burlington, Massachusetts. The annual convention brings together more than 150 professionals from the publishing industry from cross the U.S., Canada, the U.K., and sometimes even Australia and Japan. The event typically sees an attendance of over 600 readers and fans.
  Read and share about Readercon on Fanlore
• The OTW is excited to be hosting a fan meetup and outreach event - A Meetup of Our Own at the San Diego Comic Con. The meetup will be held at the Tequila Bar & Grille at the San Diego Marriott Marquis & Marina on Wednesday, July 17, 8:00-9:30pm. Complimentary margaritas, sodas, and chips and salsa will be provided. The event will also feature games, opportunities to socialize with other fans, and prize giveaways. A Comic Con registration is not required to attend. Suggested donation is $5 per person.
• Comic-Con International returns to San Diego, California for its 44th year. This mult-media, multi-genre, multi-fandom convention features panels involving celebrities, entertainers, and creators from a diverse range of entertainment. Special events, autograph signings, an exhibition hall, and screenings of films and television episodes occur throughout the 4-day event. San Diego Comic-Con will run from 18-21 July.
  Read and share about Comic-Con on Fanlore
• Held in Messe Essen, Germany, Star Wars Celebration Europe II is an event for all ages. The Celebrations began in 1999 in Denver, Colorado and in 2007 went international to London, back to Los Angeles, to Tokyo, and then Orlando for the last one in 2012. The con contains exhibits, an interactive show floor, screenings, merchandise, celebrity guests, panels, and autograph sessions. Costuming workshops, academic discussions, behind-the-scenes insights, fan films, and sneak peeks at the future of Star Wars are all elements of Celebration as well.
  Read and share about Star Wars Celebration on Fanlore
• SysAdmin Day is held to show appreciation for the work of systems administrators and other IT workers. It is celebrated on the last Friday in July. The first System Administrator Appreciation Day was celebrated on July 28, 2000. There are many suggestions for the proper observation of the holiday, the most common being cake and ice cream, so if you're reading this, thank your SysAdmins!

This month we have received a request for research participation from Inese Murneice, a student in the MA, Communication, Culture, and Media Program at Coventry University for a study involving female football fans who write fan fiction.

The full call & consent statement is below:

This informed consent is a part of the research for Master’s Paper which intends to examine how female football fans, who write fan fiction, create concepts of identity, fandom and creativity. Through the method of ethnofiction I want to enable female fans like myself to build and express narratives, putting them into the main position. The task, therefore, is:

Inese can be reached at Pillar Box 102, 71a Hertford Street, Coventry, West Midlands, CV1 1LA, United Kingdom or murnieci@uni.coventry.ac.uk. The study is being supervised by Mafalda Stasi (mafalda.stasi@uni.coventry.ac.uk).

This study is conducted for the purposes of completing an MA degree with Coventry University. There are no plans at the moment to pursue this project further. Should the opportunity arise for further academic projects (typically, academic article in a reputable peer-reviewed journal) all participants will be consulted and their informed consent asked anew.

If you have requests for research participation, please view our policy for inclusion at our website.

The OTW encourages anyone to submit an event that's not already listed, and to check out the calendar throughout the year!

• In the post Fandom as Inhabitation of Negative Space, Tumblr blogger Saathi 1013 addressed the common question "Why don’t fanficcers write original stories instead of fanfic?” She uses the poetic concept of enjambment to explain the differences in thinking between fanfic and original writing. "[O]ne of the cool things about enjambment is that the break is...essentially a half-second of playing conceptual mad libs before your eye tracks to the next line and you finish the sentence...the way the author wants you to. But the thing is, good poets build that moment of unknowing into the meaning of the poem...It’s not just a pause for breath or for emphasis, but it can also be the thing that gives room for the poem to do something special: to ignite from the essential spark of the reader’s imagination, to turn and twist like a living thing, never the same twice."
• Boston Metro's take on fanfiction was decidedly different, as it described an Erotic Fan Fiction competition. "The thing is, though, that while we’re sure a fair amount of this particular type of literature is penned by pasty, 50-year-old virgins, typing sweatily and furiously in their parents basements at 3 a.m., fan fiction can also be mined for comedic gold. That’s the idea behind comedian Bryan Murphy’s Competitive Erotic Fan Fiction, a monthly comedy show (soon to be made into a podcast) he’s hosted for the past two-odd years at the Nerdist Theatre in San Francisco. The premise: eight comics write — and read aloud — short pieces of erotic fan fiction based either upon their own fancy or audience suggestions. The audience decides who has written the most titillating — or just plain absurd — story by a show of applause."
• The fan practice of remixing TV content to filter out specific storylines is presumably only as racy as its original content, but it was upsetting to at least some creators, regardless. "Mr. Lindelof, who was aware of Mr. Maloney’s chronological re-edit of “Lost,” said he could not quite bring himself to watch it, even if he appreciated the impulses that led to its creation. 'I totally embrace the experiment,' Mr. Lindelof said. 'But part of me feels like, oh my God, if it actually works better in chronological order, what does that say about me?'"
• Twin Peaks is a show some might say could benefit from plot clarification, but The USA Today instead gave a nod to its fandom's Welcome to Twin Peaks photo project "in which fans submit pics that combine the iconic image from the series' opening credits with a road/scene in their town."

What's your take on fannish creations? Write about it in Fanlore! Contributions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, podcast, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent OTW Fannews post. Links are welcome in all languages! Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

• The first wave of Kindle Worlds press coverage mostly quoted from Amazon's press release with a few reaction links. Follow-up articles proved to be more critical and more aware of fannish perspective. The Millions asked Will Kindle Worlds Commodify Fan Fiction?. "It is fitting, perhaps, that the same week as the Yahoo/Tumblr acquisition, Amazon announced a project entitled 'Kindle Worlds.' It feels like more of a broader trend than a coincidence, because the Kindle Worlds endeavor is about an organization inserting itself from the top down. 'Worlds,' we learn, are Amazon-ese for fandoms."

  By contrast "There is an enormously freeing diversity in the world of fan fiction. I don’t mean that the writers are diverse — they are mostly female, and surely there must be socioeconomic implications in the ability to sustain such a hobby...The possibilities spin off into exponentially increasing permutations, spurring weird stuff and beautiful stuff, quite often fiction that’s better written than the source material that inspired it, creating fandoms that are so broad and varied and encompassing that a person can usually find whatever they’re seeking within. If not, well, that person may as well just write it herself. If that’s not the most accurate reflection of the rest of the internet — the organic, cultivated internet, grown from the bottom up, with no contracts, no exchanges of cash — then I don’t know what is."

• The Guardian again tackled the topic, this time declaring How Kindle Worlds aims to colonise fan fiction The "colonization" term seemed deliberately chosen. "Fan fiction writers are, first and foremost, fans: passionate ones, sophisticated ones, and knowledgable about the culture they're writing for and about. And while Amazon's not-very-exciting payment terms might entice a few into the professional fold, many more will continue to write whatever they like online for the joy and social prestige of the thing itself. Nevertheless, the attempted legalisation and professionalisation of one of the weirder and most enjoyable subcultures of the internet marks a significant moment in the history of networked literature."
• Publishers Melville House decided to tackle the announcement in fanfiction form. "Jeff looked up from his arm screen to find that Damon had leaned in close enough that he could smell the cool death on his breath. 'Glad to see you’re up to your usual business, Jeff—taking a happy and vibrant community and doling out a pittance to exploit and corrupt it.' He placed his long-fingered hand on Jeff’s chest. Jeff heard himself whimper quietly from somewhere beyond his control. 'And what about content, Jeff? I assume there are restrictions? You have to take the fun out of it somehow.'"
• Geek Empire noted Amazon's true target, professional writers. "In that regard, Kindle Worlds resembles nothing so much as another Amazon service, Mechanical Turk. There, business and developers commission small, iterative tasks that users can perform, often for remuneration as low as a penny. As Amazon would have it, Mechanical Turk gives businesses a “scalable workforce”—to which one might add, a workforce that is cheap and inherently disposable . That’s what Warner Bros. has gotten in exchange for the license to use its characters: a virtually free and disposable workforce."
• Investing site Motley Fool hosted a post which noted that the move was a way to create a longer revenue stream for content owners. "Partnering with Amazon in its fan fiction program would not only help media companies, which are looking for ways to promote their television shows and movies, but it would also help laggard book publishers such as Scholastic, which need new ways to profit from concluded franchises."
• An article in Chicago Grid reminded people that books aren't all Amazon may be after. "And do remember that Amazon also has a TV production studio. The language on the Kindle Worlds page that describes the relationship between a Kindle Worlds author and Amazon is conversational; I’m certain that authors will be required to click through something more obtuse and comprehensive when the program goes live next month. But as-is, we can’t dismiss the possibility that Amazon (and its first-look production partner…yes, Warner Studios) is buying worldwide rights to exploit the author’s work across all media for the life of the copyright, for nothing more than the possibility of royalties for the ebook."
• A post at Tosche Station poked at all the problematic possibilities in Amazon's announcement -- such as rights granted upon submission, not acceptance, no legal protection if there's infringement of non-partner brands, and "The net revenue is based off the customer sales price, not the wholesale price, which tends to be less. That seems okay, doesn’t it? It does until you read this: 'Amazon Publishing will set the price for Kindle Worlds stories.' Hm. So that means that your royalties and revenue could change in an instant, depending on how Amazon decides to price your story–and keep in mind, Amazon could decide to price it at zero, depending on how your contract is written."
• Another fannish blogger noted the problem with shared universes among fans -- who really owns fanon? "Lastly, what about plagiarism between Fan Fictions? Fan Fiction writers inside of fandoms can and will borrow from each other. Sometimes an idea is so great that one person reads it in a Fan Fiction, thinks it’s actually canon that they missed, and puts it in their story. I’m guilty of that because the idea that Tycho Celchu was talking to his fiance when Alderaan was destroyed was a beautiful idea and I honestly thought it was canon. When I asked the writer, they also had thought it was canon then realized it wasn’t and unfortunately I was never able to trace back to the person with the original idea. But at least in Fan Fiction, it’s free and we can call enough other out on it without needing legal recourse. Now that we start making money off of the ideas? Oh boy…"
• The UK's Metro covered the bases with the pros and cons of fanfic as well as where best to publish it. "Tastes may be changing – Justin Bieber and The Hunger Games have made way for One Direction and Star Trek in the past year or so – but demand remains high – fanfic story uploads to the site [Wattpad] have increased by 60 per cent from 2012 to 2013, and this year is only five months old...The other issue is control –- [novelist Sheenagh] Pugh suspects that better writers will opt out to preserve theirs, particularly as Amazon would take ownership of their ideas. ‘I don’t think the best of fic will find its way on to Kindle Worlds,’ she said. ‘If the standard does prove to be low, that in itself will put off writers who care about their work, in the same way that they often won’t put their work on the FanFiction.net website because of its reputation for hosting acres of rubbish.’"
• The Daily Dot also took note of the varied volume of content among fandom sites. "However, there is also the possibility that Kindle Worlds is aimed at a new generation of fans—ones who are growing up with the assumption that it’s completely reasonable to want payment for your fanfic. While popular Tumblr-based fandoms range from crime shows to young adult novels, and participants range in in age from 12 to 60, many are simply unaware of the seething underbelly of Wattpad-style fanfiction. On Wattpad, a One Direction fic written by a middle-schooler can receive upwards of a million hits. The fiction on traditional sites like Archive of our Own may be more tightly written, but the most popular story there only boasts a measly 360,000 hits. The question is, will the mostly teenage Wattpad audience have enough interest to pay for fanfic when you can already read ten stories on your smartphone every day, for free?"
• At The Atlantic, Noah Berlatsky uses comic fandom to suggest that there's little difference between official tie-in works and fanworks. He asks "In terms of creative process and in terms of audience, does it really matter all that much if you're writing about Kirk and Spock's new adventures for free or for profit?" Then he dismisses one obvious difference with "Admittedly there's not a whole lot of gay sex in super-hero comics... but that seems more like a genre distinction than an existential one." Instead he suggests "If "fan fic" was the name of a genre and a community, it can now be the name of a marketing campaign and a marketing demographic. You could even say that Amazon is turning the term "fan fiction" into fan fiction itself, lifting it from its original context and giving it a new purpose and a new narrative, related to the original but not beholden to it. Dreams come out of the corporation and go back to the corporation, fungibly circulating. Your brain is just another medium of exchange."

What other discussions have you seen about Kindle Worlds? Write about it in Fanlore! Contributions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, podcast, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent OTW Fannews post. Links are welcome in all languages! Submitting a link doesn't guarantee that it will be included in a roundup post, and inclusion of a link doesn't mean that it is endorsed by the OTW.

There's been a lot of talk about Kindle Worlds lately, and the OTW has received some questions about its legal implications. The OTW has long maintained that noncommercial fan fiction is fair use, and Amazon's new program does not change that in any way. It also doesn't change anything about the AO3's continued mission to provide a permanent platform for noncommercial fan fiction. (And don't forget, works on the AO3 are readable on the Kindle and other handheld platforms.)

So should fan writers put their works on Kindle Worlds? That is, of course, up to you. We believe that every author should make up their own mind about whether they want to publish their work on a particular platform. However, we also believe that every person should have a full understanding of the terms they are agreeing to by doing so. We've reviewed the information Amazon has made available to date, and have tried to explain the practical implications in this post.

In the professional publishing world, the terms of the contracts (agreements) between authors and publishers are heavily negotiated by the authors' agents. It appears that Amazon expects to use a "one size fits all" contract for Kindle Worlds. They haven't yet made that full contract available for potential submitters to read. But here are some terms of the Kindle Worlds contract that are mentioned on their page of which you should be aware:

• "Amazon Publishing will pay royalties to the rights holder for the World (we call them World Licensors) and to you."

  This means that whoever holds the copyright to the underlying work will be making money off your stories, as well. How much? We don't know.

• "Your standard royalty rate for works of at least 10,000 words will be 35% of net revenue."

  The key phrase to be aware of here is "net revenue." This means that your royalty will not be calculated on the price of the book (so, for a $1 book, 35 cents a copy), but rather on whatever's left after all of Amazon's costs, which are undefined, are accounted for. Depending on how aggressively Amazon defines its costs—and Hollywood, for example, is famous for calculating them very aggressively—that could mean you get little to nothing.

• "Amazon Publishing will acquire all rights to your new stories, including global publication rights, for the term of copyright."

  This appears to be intended to be an exclusive license on all forms of the story.

  What does "exclusive license" mean in this context? It means that no one else can make any other use of the story—including, quite possibly, you yourself. For that reason, it likely means that Amazon wouldn't let you include your story in both Kindle Worlds and a fandom site.

  Why does "all rights" matter? Well, what if Amazon likes the story and wants to commission a graphic novel adaptation of it? This language implies that they can do so…without any additional payments to you.

  Also, "for the term of copyright" means that Amazon claims the right to your work until many years after you've died--so for all practical purposes, forever. (Although you may, because of U.S. copyright law, be able to terminate this agreement after 35 years, but even that is a long time.) If, in the end, you decide you don't like the deal you're getting from Amazon, you may well not be able to withdraw your stories from Kindle Worlds, even if you are willing to give up any further royalty payments.

• "When you submit your story in a World, you are granting Amazon Publishing an exclusive license to the story and all the original elements you include in that story. This means that your story and all the new elements must stay within the applicable World. […] We will also give the World Licensor a license to use your new elements and incorporate them into other works without further compensation to you."

  So, not just Amazon, but the copyright holder to the underlying work, as well, has rights to what you create. Write the story that the underlying copyright holder wants to use as the basis for the summer blockbuster version of the story? You've donated it.

  Also, "your story and all the new elements must stay within the applicable World" implies that, if you happen to create a popular OC or other idea, you can't use it in other stories not published with Kindle Worlds.

Finally, there are a number of contract terms that are important in publishing but not yet discussed on the Kindle Worlds page. For instance, editorial control—Amazon has provided "Content Guidelines" for works, but there's a lot about them that's unclear. They include prohibitions on crossovers, on "offensive content," and on "offensive depictions of graphic sexual acts." It's hard to know exactly what these mean, and whose standards will apply. We cannot predict how consistently these restrictions will be enforced or how fan-friendly the enforcement process will be. It's also not clear whether Amazon will claim the right to do anything more than reject a work for failing to meet those guidelines (like edit it against your will). And the terms may change depending on what happens next and whether the program expands. There is also mention of a Cover Creator, but no mention of whether it will cost you anything to use it, or whether you will have permission to use images from the show in question. Presumably, more of these will become clear when Amazon publishes the actual contract.

As we said at the beginning, whether you want to participate in Kindle Worlds is up to you. If it meets your needs, great! We hope this post has helped you make up your mind in an informed fashion. Regardless, the OTW will continue to provide a platform and advocacy for noncommercial fanfiction.