News
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Volunteer Recruiting: Testing Volunteers & Web Developer Staff
We would like to thank everyone who responded to our previous call for Support Staff. The chairs are reviewing applications and should be contacting people within the next two weeks.
Today, we're excited to announce the opening of applications for:
- Testing Volunteer - Closes May 27th
- Web Developer Staff - Closes May 27th
We have included more information on each role below. Open roles and applications will always be available at the volunteering page. If you don't see a role that fits with your skills and interests now, keep an eye on the listings. We plan to put up new applications every few weeks, and we will also publicize new roles as they become available.
All applications generate a confirmation page and an auto-reply to your e-mail address. We encourage you to read the confirmation page and to whitelist volunteers@transformativeworks.org in your e-mail client. If you do not receive the auto-reply within 24 hours, please check your spam filters and then contact us.
Note: We are continuing to work on a set of Volunteering Frequently Asked Questions that we hope to have posted within the next few weeks. If you have any questions about volunteering for the OTW, please let us know.
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OTW Fannews: Collaborative playgrounds
It's not only communication between entertainment creators and fans that's becoming common, but also a creative dialogue. Anna Pinkert at Spinoff Online wrote about the benefits of embracing slash and other fan creations. "At a recent event, a reporter showed The Avengers star Mark Ruffalo a series of drawings of his character snuggling with Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark. He began giggling, and then even made up captions for one of the cartoons, “Would you like a gummy worm?” Better yet, he told the reporter, “I endorse [this art] 100 percent. You know what it is? It’s open-source creativity.” She suggests that "[h]omoerotic fan art might be a new signal that you’ve arrived in Hollywood. People know your face (and your abs) well enough to do 30 sketches of you embracing another star." At least some actors are ready to invite fans to play.
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Strategic Planning Update #9
Statement of Purpose
The Strategic Planning Committee is continuing to work on helping the OTW develop a strategic plan for the next 3 - 5 years. As a quick refresher, the first stage of this plan is to survey internal stakeholders. We are in the process of interviewing all committees in turn and creating a report on each committee. The reports only include information that is gathered from the committees themselves, and all the conclusions and recommendations come from aggregating the data of those surveyed.
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OTW Fannews: Separate by intention?
Given media representations apparently a lot of people continue to think that female fandom projects are rare, although this may have to do with how gender segregated fandom projects often are. In a feature on the "Hello Sweetie" podcast, its founder discusses why it came into being. "She and others were listening...to 'Geek Show Podcast,' the popular online show started by X96’s 'Radio From Hell' host Kerry Jackson, local movie critics Jeff Vice and Jimmy Martin, and Tribune TV critic Scott D. Pierce. "'They never have any female panelists, rarely had female guests, and a lot of people were complaining about that,'"...On one episode of 'Geek Show Podcast,' one of the hosts said, 'If you [women] want to have a podcast, you should start one.'"
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852 Prospect - AO3 Supports our Sentinel*
The OTW is delighted to welcome 852 Prospect -- the Sentinel Adult Fiction Archive -- to its new home within the Archive of Our Own. The Archivists of 852 Prospect (most recently alicettlg) have worked hard in conjunction with ADT and Open Doors to make this move a reality.
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OTW Fannews: Cultural Triggers
While in some places fanfic writers are getting arrested, in others the concern is instead about how fans could be ruining pop culture. "Mr. Rushfield laments that fan culture is set in its ways and does not want to be challenged. I think this is an oversimplification...Yes of course, some fans will never be happy. Some fans say and do things I find shocking and disrespectful, but I think that this is a very small minority...To think that this subset of fans is the driving force behind any artistic decisions, is not giving enough credit to writers and producers in entertainment."
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OTW Fannews: The places fanfiction goes
NYU's student newspaper decided to feature fanfiction with a particularly local angle -- fanfiction set on its campus. "Remember when you were waiting for your acceptance letter? Whether NYU was your dream school or just your safety, you’d catch yourself longing for the city, dreaming of the day when you’d leave your home for the magic of New York...You weren’t the only one dreaming. In fact, some would-be students have dedicated hundreds of pages to their NYU-centric fantasies. So focused are these writers’ efforts that NYU Fanfiction has swelled into its own thriving—if slightly inaccurate—genre."
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Archive of Our Own among TIME's '50 Best Websites 2013'
The Organization for Transformative Works was pleased to learn that one of our projects, the Archive of Our Own, has been named among the '50 Best Websites 2013' by TIME magazine staff. We are excited to be included in this list and in the company of a number of other great websites.
We would like to extend a thank you to OTW members whose generosity has helped to support the continued development of the AO3 and to AO3 users who provide the content that helps make it one of the 'Best Websites'. We look forward to continuing to build the AO3 to make it even better in the years to come.
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Volunteer Recruiting: AO3 Support & Tag Wrangling
We would like to thank everyone who responded to our initial call for Tag Wranglers, AO3 Documentation Volunteers, and Communications Staff. The AO3 Documentation Lead and Communications Chairs are reviewing applications and should be contacting people within the next two weeks.
Today, we're excited to announce the opening of applications for:
- Support Staff - Applications due May 12
- Tag Wrangler Volunteer - Applications accepted on an ongoing basis (role may be temporarily closed based on level of interest)
We have included more information on each role below. Open roles and applications will always be available at the volunteering page. If you don't see a role that fits with your skills and interests now, keep an eye on the listings. We plan to put up new applications every few weeks, and we will also publicize new roles as they become available.
All applications generate a confirmation page and an auto-reply to your e-mail address. We encourage you to read the confirmation page and to whitelist volunteers@transformativeworks.org in your e-mail client. If you do not receive the auto-reply within 24 hours, please check your spam filters and then contact us.
Note: We are working on a set of Volunteering Frequently Asked Questions that we hope to have posted within the next few weeks. If you have any questions about volunteering for the OTW, please let us know.
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OTW Fannews: Fans front and center
Television is increasingly turning to fandom to find viewers. The Los Angeles Times put a spotlight on AMC's The Talking Dead. "Broadcast directly after the phenomenally successful 'The Walking Dead,' 'The Talking Dead' has taken on a life of its own, evolving from a half-hour companion show into a full-fledged, hour-long monster mash whose ratings in the coveted 18-49 demographic surpass a host of prime-time shows on the major networks." It seems likely this recipe will be copied since "Even more significantly, 'The Talking Dead' is one of the least expensive series on AMC's prime-time slate — the set is spare, there's no band and the production is low-frills. While declining to say how much the show costs, Stillerman said 'it's a good business model. We get a nice return on our investment.'"