Well, I've been involved in online fandom in one way or another for about 13 years, mostly under this username. The first fandom I was actively into, as opposed to just reading fic and lurking, was for a not-very-well-known (but very good!) manga series called Petshop of Horrors, and that was in the early days of LJ fandom. Things were based on ff.net and mailing lists at first, but that soon changed. I'm no longer in touch with anyone I knew there, because I had a series of pretty big life upheavals that led me abandoning a giant WIP, and I was too embarrassed to post anything after that!
My other major fandoms were Watchmen -- which was pretty awesome: small but active, lots of quality fic, little to no wank -- and Sherlock, which also has a lot of quality fic but also seems to have reached Critical Wank Mass some months ago. I've been peripherally involved in quite a lot of other fandoms, in that I might've written one or two fics, but I didn't really get to know people. There are some people I still follow or talk to from previous fandoms, but not a huge number. Honestly, I think the LJ-to-Tumblr/AO3 shift has a lot to answer for on that front, because those platforms are less conducive to actually getting to know people outside of fandom. I'm definitely more likely to talk to people from previous fandoms if they still interact on LJ than if they've completely moved over to Tumblr. And of course, canons end and people drift away and fandoms die. *sniff*
Sherlock's the only fandom I've ever made a conscious decision to move away from, for various reasons. That wasn't particularly because I'd got into SPN (though having something new to love definitely made it easier), though -- more a combination of the new series not being to my taste and a feeling that interacting in that environment probably wasn't doing me a lot of good. A couple of other people jumped ship to SPN around the same time, and I chat to them quite a lot. :) That's an exception, though, and I don't tend to leave previous fandoms behind completely -- they may be mostly dead, but I'd be really happy if I ran into new fic or someone who wanted to chat about them. It's perfectly possible to be multifannish, IMO, and it's easier to do that on a platform like LJ where we get to know each other as people rather than an endless stream of gifs. ;)
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branchandroot
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Date: 2014-12-03 08:53 pm (UTC)My other major fandoms were Watchmen -- which was pretty awesome: small but active, lots of quality fic, little to no wank -- and Sherlock, which also has a lot of quality fic but also seems to have reached Critical Wank Mass some months ago. I've been peripherally involved in quite a lot of other fandoms, in that I might've written one or two fics, but I didn't really get to know people. There are some people I still follow or talk to from previous fandoms, but not a huge number. Honestly, I think the LJ-to-Tumblr/AO3 shift has a lot to answer for on that front, because those platforms are less conducive to actually getting to know people outside of fandom. I'm definitely more likely to talk to people from previous fandoms if they still interact on LJ than if they've completely moved over to Tumblr. And of course, canons end and people drift away and fandoms die. *sniff*
Sherlock's the only fandom I've ever made a conscious decision to move away from, for various reasons. That wasn't particularly because I'd got into SPN (though having something new to love definitely made it easier), though -- more a combination of the new series not being to my taste and a feeling that interacting in that environment probably wasn't doing me a lot of good. A couple of other people jumped ship to SPN around the same time, and I chat to them quite a lot. :) That's an exception, though, and I don't tend to leave previous fandoms behind completely -- they may be mostly dead, but I'd be really happy if I ran into new fic or someone who wanted to chat about them. It's perfectly possible to be multifannish, IMO, and it's easier to do that on a platform like LJ where we get to know each other as people rather than an endless stream of gifs. ;)