Here's a roundup of legal and technology stories that may be of interest to fans.

• While bills such as SOPA and PIPA disappeared from the U.S. legislative landscape earlier this year, they were only the first of many volleys targeting Internet users and companies. There is S.2151 sponsored by Senator John McCain, and the Lieberman-Collins Cyber Security Act or S.3414 which will likely be coming up for a vote soon. A recently proposed amendment to S.3414 would strike all of its section 701 "which provides companies with the explicit right to monitor private user communications and engage in countermeasures." Organizations such as the EFF and the Center for Democracy & Technology oppose these bills as they feel the language is overly broad and that current laws already enable online service providers to protect their networks.
• Speaking of SOPA and PIPA, the coalition of online companies, websites, users and activist organizations who fought those bills realized after that fight that they should enable quick mobilization of their group when future threats arise. As such, they formed the Internet Defense League, which will help spread information around the web through participants hosting a form of bat signal. Anyone with a website can sign up to take part. Online users can take various steps to defend their Internet rights from signing documents to donating to PACs.
• One thing central to Internet freedoms is keeping the means of production in the hands of as many people as possible. To that end, things like Google's video production workshops are a plus for fans and general online users alike as is the availability of the Creative Commons content on YouTube. Cathy Casserly, CEO of Creative Commons (CC) urged those with content on the site to "select 'Creative Commons Attribution license' from the 'License and rights ownership. menu." You can now also choose to "license your future videos under CC BY as a default."
• One example of the extent of transmedia, or stories created across multiple formats, is discussed by Jan Bozarth, whose Fairy Godmother Academy began as an eight book series for Random House, but quickly expanded into live events, music, and even its own dance movement. Her projects seek to enable girls to utilize technology for their own storytelling. "We all agree that we are not our iPods, iPads, Dr. Drea’s, or Thom’s. They are US. We live in the real world, but it’s got to be a world of our making and those tools help." Her project goal was "to deliver a multi dimensional story, in multiple forms, to a multi-tasking audience, who really just wants to write their own movie and star in it." She also realizes the story is only hers to start, not finish. "I can’t really own [the stories] once they are assimilated into a culture that consumes ideas only to transform, transmute and re-create. My biggest audience may or may not be born yet but my hope is that they will someday dance, sing and write some version of my story and send it back to me in another form that hasn’t even been invented yet. What lives on is the re-creation."

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Here's a roundup of media use stories that might be of interest to fans:

• The French model three strikes law against those downloading copyrighted content has been delayed in the U.S. -- for now. "The proposed Copyright Alerts system has been delayed to an unspecified date. Often referred to as “Six Strikes and You’re Out,” the policy was supposed to have been implemented in July 2012. Under it, Internet service providers like Time Warner and Verizon would voluntarily punish their customers who repeatedly use peer-to-peer filesharing software to illegally download copyrighted material." So far the French law has reduced illegal downloading but hasn't boosted media sales the way its sponsors wanted.
• Speaking of downloading, more U.S. fans will run into online restrictions in 2012. C|Net wrote about Verizon and Comcast enacting data caps. "The sad reality is that while it's a great market penetration strategy, unlimited data is simply not a sustainable economic model," said Guy Rosen, CEO of Onavo, a wireless application that helps people control data usage. "Supply is limited by the laws of physics and demand is simply exploding. Verizon's statement adds to AT&T's throttling debacle of earlier this year, ushering us into a future where all data has a price tag. It's now clear that operators will find any loophole they can to eradicate grandfathered unlimited contracts." Most of the heavy use is blamed on "video, particularly high-definition video. Services like Netflix, Hulu, and Youtube account for huge amounts of traffic on the network."
• Meanwhile one particularly popular video was taken down from YouTube temporarily due to copyright claims. "Rickrolling is the practice of promising a victim one link but directing them instead to Rick Astley’s 1987 music video, 'Never Gonna Give You Up,' instead." The takedown was particularly odd given the longevity of rickrolling and how "On April Fools' Day in 2008, [YouTube itself] rickrolled viewers by redirecting every video on the front page to Astley’s video." The video was later restored with no explanation.
• Lastly, major league baseball is sponsoring social media nights at its games. The events "vary from ballpark to ballpark, but some aspects are fairly consistent. The Cubs offered specially priced tickets and put together contests for their online fans. They encouraged their Twitter followers to use the hashtag (hash)CubsSocial to mark their tweets throughout the night. Other teams "hold in-game scavenger hunts that award autographed memorabilia or team apparel, and some clubs put together contests that result in upgraded tickets for their online followers." Other teams follow people's special events and surprise them with gift packs at the stadiums. "It's about fan engagement and the ability then to be able to enter into that discussion, and not being too corporate, but helping lead and participate in that conversation," Nationals chief operating officer Andy Feffer said. "Why? Because the social media platform is now an access point — to the club, to the players, to promotions, to ticket sales, to the story that's being told. And the story really lives now in the social media world."

If you're a baseball fan, or follow copyright issues, why not contribute to 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 about fanfic that might be of interest to fans:

• Fan fiction has been widely discussed online, but the recent discussions surrounding the highy visible success of Fifty Shades of Grey continues to take that discussion to new places with, unfortunately, new misinformation. One example is an aside in a discussion of changes in publishing that describes fan fiction as "author-approved online 'mash-ups' by fans of cult novels." Another is the suggestion in a Huffington Post interview that fan fiction has only ever been written for sci-fi and fantasy genres. Still as this "concert preview" that focuses on fan fiction written for Def Leppard demonstrates, there are certainly going to be fewer people than ever who have never heard of it.
• That visibility suggests that efforts like Social Samba's "SagaWriter" tool will become increasingly common, though also that fan fiction is going to be less about fans and more about marketing. "One day TV networks might have budgets to hire social TV teams as big as their main writing teams, but for now a show like The Walking Dead could easily make a Saga where you get to talk to your favorite character while trying to avoid getting eaten." The platform allows for interactive storytelling, but not, it would seem, fan originated stories. Explains SocialSamba CEO Aaron Williams, "Within our tool you can’t use copyrighted material. We follow the same DMCA rules that everyone else does. We see TV shows and other storytellers have interest in creating fan fiction. The WB adding Big Lebowski characters to Xtranormal, the fact that they are taking steps like this was a good thing to point to for us. It means its good for the brand. For us we see that wave coming, brands or storytellers can skin to look like their brand and embed in whatever platform they use to reach out to fans."
• Other people are being more thoughtful about the fan fiction that already exists. Wired Magazine contributor Clive Thompson posted ruminations on how fan fiction writers are creating "paracosms", using the Brontë sisters' early writing as an example, and cited evidence that "MacArthur fellows were twice as likely as 'normal' nongeniuses to have" created paracosms as children. Thompson warned though that "we have to stop denigrating it" if society is to reap the rewards of such play.
• Britain's The Guardian in the meantime suggested that authors must value fan work in today's marketplace. "[T]he success of a novel such as Fifty Shades of Grey is far less surprising to anyone who understands the dynamics of fandom than to the mainstream publishing industry...That it was fan-fiction based in Stephenie Meyer's Twilightverse is beside the point. That it was chosen by fans and made successful through their support is far more significant. Because what fans want above all else – what in fact defines the very essence of fandom – is ownership of that which we adore." What's more "The publishers that survive will be the ones that understand that their role is to amplify the signal of those artists already chosen by fandom. The writers who succeed will be the ones who are there day in and day out, as much a part of fandom as any other fan, and on first name terms with the neighbours."

If you'd like to help out people still learning about fan fiction, why not write about it 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 stories about rare fandom activities that might be of interest to fans:

• As this article at the Daily Beast points out, "The surprise revival of Tupac Shakur in hologram form at Coachella...stunned audiences--but Japan's been onto the hologram game for years." The article discusses concerts performed by fictional character Hatsune Miku. "Though her voice is sampled from Japanese voice actress Saki Fujita, Miku is literally the collective product of her legions of fans...who create her songs and videos via collaborative websites...One Miku enthusiast might compose an original song for her using Vocaloid, for example, and then upload it for others to hear. That song might then inspire illustrations, videos, or remixes from other fans...It's the perfect formula: Miku gives fans exactly the music they want without the scandals and dramatics of real-life pop stars and all their real-life flaws."
• Fans of inanimate objects are legion as well. In a live-tweeted story, The Washington Post covered the journey of the space shuttle Discovery on its way to its future museum home in Washington, DC. "To the delight of fans on the ground, the shuttle completed extra passes over the National Mall and Dulles." The article wrote about varied people stopping their day or setting aside time to try and catch sight of the shuttle's journey. "At the National Mall, cheers, whoops, and hollers erupted from the crowd, entranced by the sight of a space shuttle anchored precariously on the back of a 747. 'It's a spectacular view to see the big shuttle on the back of a 747,' said JJ Morgan, a 70-year-old Silver Spring resident...His wife, Carol, was a little less jubilant. 'I’m a little sad because I can remember when the space program first started, and I'll miss it. I'll miss following it.'"
• "Nerdcore rapper" Adam WarRock has written songs about various TV shows such as Parks and Recreation, Downton Abbey, and Justified, but it was his rap inspired by Ta-Nehisi Coates, a senior editor at The Atlantic, that made the news. Coates is a favorite blogger of WarRock's, one who WarRock sees as "a welcome and comforting voice when it comes to speaking on race and America, specifically America's complex relationship when it comes to race in all elements of our culture and ethics." The rap, called "Ta-Nehisi,""came partly out of [WarRock's] own struggles with racial identity" growing up as an Asian American in Memphis, Tennessee. But "even though 'Ta-Nehisi' covers more serious territory, WarRock still found room in the final stanza to squeeze in one TV reference, a nod to HBO's The Wire."
• Hollywood.com turned to a museum owner to discuss Three Stooges fandom as the new Stooges film adventure opened in theaters. Said owner of the "Stoogeum" Gary Lassin, "'Half thought it was blasphemy to try and make the movie, half were eager looking forward to it. Now that people have seen it, the people looking forward to it liked it, the people who weren't looking forward to it weren't going to see or didn't like it.' Lassin hits the nail on the head: babyboomers who grew up on Stooges aren't that different than the target demographic that clamors for the latest comic book movie or installment of Twilight. They just haven't had a movie to flock to the last few decades."

If you are in a small fandom, or part of Vocaloid fandom why not write about it 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.