Masha's Roulette #16: Meta Articles About Social Media and Fandom Etc
Welcome to the 16th issue of my weekly random grab-bag of recommendations newsletter, where I will show you some things to read and some things to listen to, and my solemn promise that at least one item in here will be new and interesting to you. I'm very sorry I forgot to send this newsletter out last week! I just started a new job and my daily schedule has changed significantly due to that. Another thing that has changed significantly since last week: Twitter is now on fire! This is not the first social media network or fandom-talking-platform to catch on fire, however, so here are some reminders that similar things have happened before, and people have always found somewhere else to go.
First, Some Things to Listen To
I made my friend listen to Kikuo songs besides Aishite Aishite today and am very proud of myself because Kikuo is a genius and a truly experimental and inventive musician who explores dark and interesting themes with his work in new and interesting ways. I am not going to link to the really disturbing stuff though. I like his newish song Knife Knife Knife and his older-ish song The Cat's Dining Table.
Also, the current event song in Project Sekai is a song I really like by a producer I really like! Unfortunately it's for my least favorite group of characters but that's fine I can ignore them.
Also also, this was stuck in my head for a while. My mom likes to sing parts of this song all the time, but she is also entirely tone-deaf so it was not until I looked it up on Youtube to show someone else that I learned the song actually has a completely different melody than what my mother sings.
Now, Some Things To Read
The Life and Death of Fandom Platforms
This is an article about a Video Essay on Youtube, but I'm linking the Fanlore article here specifically because it has a lot of other links to further reading, excerpts, and commentary, and also the Youtube video essay is a whole half hour long and who has that kind of time?
State of the Migration: On Fannish Archival Catastrophes, and what happens next
Tumblr post regarding the 2018 NSFW ban and related situations that happened. Again linking to the Fanlore article for the embedded links to further reading.
Why Monetizing Social Media Through Advertising Is Doomed To Failure (part one) by synecdochic
Loooong multi-part Dreamwidth post about monetization from someone who used to work on Livejournal's monetization team.
Internet Fans Controversy Du Jour by Sandy Herrold
Blast from the past! This post is older than me! And I find it comforting that even before the internet was a thing the way it is now people still had the same kinds of concerns that we have today.
People refer to this situation a lot in internet discussions about AO3/why it exists and compare the Tumblr purge to it often as well so if you're not familiar with it getting more context is helpful!
fandom and migration by seperis
Post from 2009 about moving off Livejournal to Dreamwidth. A fun fact: "gay propaganda" is now against Livejournal's TOS!
Thank you to the 2(!) entire people who have sent in recommendations! I decided to focus on a currently relevant topic this week, but will use next week to highlight some of those recs I received with the caveat that I have not read any of them and probably won't have time to read them by next week either so cannot endorse on a personal level.
Please send in more recommendations using this lovely form I created (using the Rec Center's form as a model). Am taking recs for fics, articles, interesting long blog posts, anything you think would appeal to other readers of Masha's Roulette. I need more recommendations! Also, share with your friends!
I'll be back next week with more things to listen to and read!