Here's a roundup of stories about gendered aspects of fandom that might be of interest to fans:

• Conversations on various fan sites continue to revolve around creator reluctance to feature female characters in their work. One gamer discusses how "the fact that you have to play as a man puts [his significant other] off just enough that she’d just rather play another game", and notes that "As a white man, I can only really imagine this position of disassociation. There are few games which force you to play as a woman."
• Of course, it isn't just a lack of representation but also the way that women are treated as gamers that affects their enjoyment, something which escapes the attention of many male players. The creator of online comic The Oatmeal discovered this after he received angry responses to a panel he drew about female gamers having advantages simply for being female. "Citing surprise and ignorance about the violence female gamers face, he withdrew his argument," and made a $1,000 donation to the Women Against Abuse Foundation, explaining, "A lot of people are talking of rape threats, sexism, harassment, and a lot of other awful things. I'm a guy and I barely talk into my mic, so I’ll concede that my view of things is probably very skewed." Unfortunately, these problems exist in most fandoms in different forms, as a post by hockey blogger Karen M pointed out. "What I realized is that in the world of hockey fandom women are like [Russian hockey players]. We are a minority group that are battling everyday against the weight of oppressive and offensive stereotypes. A Canadian coasts on a few shifts and he's 'having an off night'. A Russian coasts and he’s 'lazy and not living up to his potential.' In hockey fandom misogynist insults are common and women are dumb puck bunnies until proven otherwise."
• Alyssa Rosenberg at Think Progress suggests that women "even outside the core fan community, will be interested in fantasy and science fiction if work in those genres have anything to say to them." "Snow White and the Huntsman is being explicitly sold not just as a story with two female leads...but as a story about the connection between beauty and power, about competition between women, and about styles of rule and command. From the outside, the women in the movie don't look like women acting like men. They appear to be women acting like women but with the force of armies and heroes available to play out the issues that they're grappling with personally."
• The Mary Sue notes that good stories appeal to all sexes, citing the success of The Legend of Korra, which has a female lead. "Some Nickelodeon executives were worried, says [Korra co-creator Bryan] Konietzko, about backing an animated action show with a female lead character. Conventional TV wisdom has it that girls will watch shows about boys, but boys won’t watch shows about girls," writes NPR's Neda Ulaby. “During test screenings, though, boys said they didn’t care that Korra was a girl. They just said she was awesome."

If you want to share your experiences in the The Legend of Korra or Avatar: The Last Airbender fandoms, or have something to say about misogny in fandom, why not write about them on Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. 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.

Here's a roundup of fandom then-and-now stories that might be of interest to fans:

• The Houston Press hosted a story about the past, present, and future of music fan clubs, from The Beatles to Ke$ha. "People place pen-pal ads in the back of magazines. They join mailing lists. They discover the Internet and start fan pages. Someone opens up a chat room. Someone else builds a Web forum. The methods have evolved over time, but the reason remains the same: Fans want to connect with other fans." Focusing on the tangible offerings of official fan clubs, the writer observes that "Chamillionaire recently launched the Chamillitary Rewards/Loyalty Program though his Web site. More than just a fan club or social network, it allows fans to earn points (Chamillitary coins) for the things they'd be doing anyway: Visiting his site, watching videos, etc. They can turn around and use those points for everything from phone calls with Koopa to limited gear. It takes being a fan from a passive experience to a active experience. And so the one-way street of fan club delivering information to fans becomes a two-way street where the fan and the artist interact."
• Student newspaper The Elm focused on the changes to sports fandom. "Sports nerds are everywhere. How did we get here?" Citing fantasy sports as "a new avenue of fandom", the writer explains, "For those who don’t know what fantasy sports are, here is a definition from Elm Editor-in-Chief Natalie Butz: 'It's dungeons and dragons for jocks.'" Describing his own activities, the writer says, "I got to spend money on players, analyzing every bit of information, trying to outsmart my opponents in baseball knowledge. What could be better for a sports nerd? I was almost ashamed that I wasted so much time at my auction draft. I promised myself, 'Never again!' But, next year I’ll probably end up doing the same thing. So what if it's a little pathetic? I love sports. I loved sports stats. I love looking at baseball from different angles. The world of fandom is changing, every day getting more in depth, idiosyncratic, and well, nerdy. My advice, to all the other sports nerds out there: soon we will be the norm, just embrace it."
• Unfortunately, fandom shifts often prompt ugly backlashes, as Magic: The Gathering tournament competitor Jackie Lee can attest. "To outsiders, the Hasbro-owned fantasy game is a diversion. To these tournament participants, however, it’s a cut-throat mental battle for a $3,500 prize." Lee reached the semifinals, which was "livestreamed around the globe and commented on by a pair of sportscasters." It was also commented on by many anonymous misogynists. "[H]undreds of viewers began to berate Lee for what they considered her largest offense: playing cards while female." As she recounted, "From 'get back to the kitchen' to comments about how fat or bangable I am, to openly stating one's intention to masturbate, it was pretty much as bad as you could imagine. They grew more and more desperate for me to lose, and when I finally lost my semifinal match, they exploded in delight." The sole woman in the Top 100 ranked Magic players worldwide, Lee is highly visible, and she hopes for more company. "It's been shown that in very heavily male-dominated professions, such as certain fields of science, when the number of women begins to approach 50 percent, the chilly climate evaporates," she said. "I'm hoping that as more women enter the tournament scene, women who play will finally be regarded as the norm, and we can all stop fussing about it."

If you play fantasy sports, Magic: The Gathering, or are part of a music fan group, why not write about it in Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. 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.

Here's a roundup of stories on fandom across generations that might be of interest to fans:

• For many people fandom starts young, whether they are in a fannish family or not. Reporter Josie Loza writes about her 3-year old daughter's first fannish experience. "She’s watched and listened to the Nickelodeon preschool pop group [Fresh Beat Band] for nearly all her life." When attending her first concert of the band, "She was paralyzed. She tried to get up and dance. But she was so awestruck she just stared ahead." Many fans can probably empathize with her reaction when she took part in a meet and greet: "She buried her head in my lap. She started to cry a little; not because she was afraid. To her, these were the people who made her happy when she was sad...“They’re really here,” she mumbled. “Yes, baby. And they want to meet you.”"
• From near-toddler to well-known journalist David Brooks, fandom affects many in the same ways. He writes in The Things We Don't Choose about his attempt to switch baseball team fandoms and the importance of early fandom: "I’ve read a bunch of social science papers on the nature of sports fandom, trying to understand this attachment. They were arid and completely unhelpful. They tried to connect fandom to abstractions about identity formation, self-esteem affiliation and collective classifications. It’s probably more accurate to say that team loyalty of this sort begins with youthful enchantment...You lunged upon the team with the unreserved love that children are capable of. The team became crystallized in your mind, coated with shimmering emotional crystals that give it a sparkling beauty and vividness. And forever after you feel its attraction. Whether it’s off the menu or in the sports world, you can choose what you’ll purchase but you don’t get to choose what you like."
• Yet another journalist documented his joint fandom with his son focusing on the generational differences that revolve around media formats and levels of participation with the games: "I watch the Patriots on television with the remote in one hand and maybe a bag of chips in the other. He views them with his Droid and his laptop at his side. While I flip through the channels during commercials, he texts and Facebook chats with friends and checks NFL.com to find out if Cam Newton scored a rushing touchdown to help one of his three fantasy football teams." He continues, "My son also rarely misses a Red Sox, Celtics or Bruins game on TV, but he couldn't name any of the team's radio announcers when I asked him to do so. That's because many fans his age don't listen to the radio very often." Their use of print is also different. "For years, I subscribed to Sports Illustrated and read it cover to cover, except for the swimsuit edition, of course. My son subscribes to ESPN the Magazine, but hardly ever reads it. He ordered it so he could become an ESPN Insider on ESPN.com and read the latest sports news online. My son estimated he spends four hours most days surfing the web for sports news."

If you are a sports or music fan, why not write about it in Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. 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.

Here's a roundup of legal issues stories that might be of interest to fans:

• Creators and copyright holders have various different types of engagement with fans, and these sometime end in conflict. A remix of Samuel Jackson's reading of "Go the Fuck to Sleep" posted on YouTube was taken down although the remixer "maintained that his creative works don’t violate copyright, thanks to exemptions in copyright law that allow for “transformative” uses of copyrighted material." And the basketball team the L.A. Clippers recently asked that their most recognizable fan stop using the name Clipper Darrell, which outraged many fans who noticed the team was perfectly happy to allow him the title when the team was doing poorly.
• An actor who briefly appeared in the U.S. show Community's Dr. Who spoof Inspector Spacetime sought fan funding for a six episode web-series based on the character/show premise. "Inspector Spacetime, has developed such a devoted internet following since it first showed up at the beginning of the fall season. So much so that it has its own Tumblr and history, which is as extensive as the show it’s spoofing." However, he recently explained that "Lawyers from Sony and NBC have contacted me demanding that I cease production" but asked that contributions continue. "Richey is now calling the project “Untitled Webseries About a Space Traveler Who Can Also Travel Through Time” but [is] otherwise going ahead as planned."
• The results of copyright struggles remain in debate, with some arguing that piracy is the natural result of producers' actions. Citing a recent study on the effect of the lag in movie release times worldwide and how it had a noticeable effect on the decrease of movie downloading, one blogger asks "If you’re in the U.S., is piracy less of an issue than it used to be depending on the particular media and market? If you’re overseas, do you find that it’s easier to get pirated copies online of things that take months, if ever, to come out where you are?"
• A blogger who posted Fan Fiction: Moral Rights v. Transformative Use cited the OTW's argument that fan fiction is "an act of transformative creation constituting fair use under 17 USC § 107" while examining the case of Diana Gabaldon and George R. R. Martin. He suggests Gabaldon "is trying to build a case...for an author’s moral rights." While the aspect of noncommerciality as a fair use factor is not mentioned, he argues that "much fan fiction originates from a more participatory impulse. Gabaldon and Martin ask why fanfic writers don’t just develop their own characters, or at least appropriate old characters in the public domain (Jane Eyre, for instance), but I think they’re not accounting for this impulse, a desire to participate actively in the culture."
• Copyright holders themselves may have trouble participating in the culture depending on what their work focuses on. PayPal has issued directives to online ebook retailers that is erasing particular forms of erotic content from the marketplace. "Smashwords founder Coker said that the rise of e-books has shifted more power in the book world to payment processors and banks. In the past, readers walked into a physical bookstore and could purchase a book with cash, leaving such companies out of the equation. "Electronic payments have become the oxygen of e-commerce and e-books, so PayPal, banks and credit card companies have enormous power," Coker said. "What right does a financial institution have to censor legal content? Authors are being caught in the middle.""

If you write fan fiction, are a Community, or Inspector Spacetime fan, or you remix content, why not write about it in Fanlore? Additions are welcome from all fans.

We want your suggestions! If you know of an essay, video, article, event, or link you think we should know about, comment on the most recent Links Roundup — on transformativeworks.org, LJ, or DW — or give @OTW_News a shoutout on Twitter. 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.