alt.startrek.creative
| Newsgroup | |
|---|---|
| Name: | alt.startrek.creative, ASC |
| Date(s): | 1990 – present |
| Moderator: | not applicable |
| Type: | usenet |
| Fandom: | Star Trek: The Original Series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, Star Trek: Enterprise |
| URL: | ASC / Trekiverse |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
alt.startrek.creative (ASC) is a usenet group that was created for the purpose of posting of fiction based in the Star Trek Universe.[1]
A related site was alt.startrek.creative.erotica.moderated.
In 2002, a fan wrote:
Usenet newsgroups have come and gone, but alt.startrek.creative continues to be the main forum for the posting of fan fiction based on Gene Roddenberry's creation. [2]
History
From 2006:
Yes ... that's eleven. Yesterday eleven years ago, I posted the first version of Introduction to Alt.StarTrek.Creative ... and I haven't stopped since. This was just my second stop on my path of alt.startrek.creative insufficient reluctance. At the time I was twenty-one, still in college, and we had a really bad off-topic problem. We don't have that anymore.The mighty Joseph Young was my predecessor, serving as FAQ Maintainer and Archivist from ASC's founding in 1991 until April of 1995. We went without an Archivist until July of that year when Alara Rogers stepped up for the role. Then I got insufficient reluctance expanding my role from Status of Stories FAQ Maintainer to just FAQ Maintainer.
In January of 1996, ASC premiered it's ASC Award, under my gavel, which I led for 3 years. It's those awards that I consider my biggest accomplishment, even if they keep pulling me back in. I passed them off to Charlie Rando for the 1998 Awards, then to Kattz for two years, before I picked them back up for a year, handing them off again to Seema for the 2002 Awards, who handed them to Rocky for this past year.
Meanwhile our associated groups came into being. The great Slash Debates led to the creation of alt.startrek.creative.all-ages, and spam caused first the migration of alt.sex.fetish.startrek to alt.startrek.creative.erotica then to alt.startrek.creative.erotica.moderated.
Over on the Archive side, we gained an web index to the then ftp archive in 1997. Matt Steenberg ran it for a year and a half, then I picked that up (see a pattern here?) Alara retired from the archive in 1998, and it was picked up by Constable Katie and Dina. Dina left in 2002, and Katie and I still maintain it.[3]
Fandom Migration, Access, Visibility, and Gatekeeping
Usenet and alt.startrek.creative, and later, alt.startrek.creative.erotica.moderated, were elements of a large fandom migration.
As technology and fandom changed, so did communities; alt.startrek.creative were fandom disrupters in both good and bad ways.
The print fan community found online newsgroups and communities to be exciting, frightening, exuberant, and both welcoming and unwelcoming. Some print zine fans embraced this new electronic world, some were indifferent, and others avoided it.
For fans on newsgroups, it was often their first contact with other Star Trek fans, yet despite their newly-forged connections, their interest and activity in print zine fandom was often very little, none, dismissive, or hostile.
Some fans spanned the bridge between the two, but many remained solidly in their own camps. One example of the tensions created when two communities was between the print fans who congregated in The K/S Press and alt.startrek.creative and alt.startrek.creative.erotica.moderated. Things got very heated on both sides; BNFs in both communities actively promoted their way of fandom, campaigning and "educating" others in attempts to bolster their numbers.
Print fans felt that online fans threatened their existence as there were only enough fans and fanworks to go around. Print fans also felt impatience with online fans who they felt did not respect those who had gone before and forged a harder path, as well as their tendency to think they'd thought of things first and reinvented wheels that print fans had done a long time ago. Online fans tended to view print fans as rigid and out-of-date, conservative, stodgy scolds. Both "sides" added plenty of fuel to the fires, and campaigned for the hearts and minds of what they both saw as the future of fandom. [4][5]
See much more at Feral Fans.
Slash and adult fanworks and visibility complicated things. See alt.startrek.creative Slash Wars.
For a fan in 1997, alt.startrek.creative was an eye-opener:
One day I happened to look at a creative writing group, alt.startrek.creative, when a rather extraordinary writer had happened to post a wonderful story. Finding this gem finally got me hooked on the group enough to hang out long enough to discover how things worked. I had never seen fan fiction before. Realizing that other people thought up Star Trek stories was a revelation to me. [6]
Sandy Herrold wrote in February 1997 about her experience at the 1996 Escapade convention:
I only heard a couple of people mention the unconnected/connect split at all. The New battle appeared to be between "Printfans With Modems"... vs. "Netfans": Stuff like, "They don't care about our traditions," "All net writing is barely readable crap", "If most of a show's fandom is online (like SAAB and Voyager, to name a couple), it proves that the show is crap and They're just writing porn." (And the classic, "print fans don't have beta readers; they have FRIENDS.") [7]
From a fan in February 1997:
It seems that just in the last couple of months the number of Classic Trek (and K/S) fans on the net seems to have increased dramatically.
[...]
The alt.startrek.creative and alt.startrek.creative.erotica newsgroups provide a wonderful forum for getting instant reader feedback, and lots of it.
[...]
On the subject of mailing lists, chat rooms, and other group activities on the net... I think as our numbers increase we need to really be aware of the fact that the internet is a community just like any other, with unspoken rules and customs that must be learned and respected if we want the community to thrive. It's easy to feel anonymous and casual with net communications, because heck, you can have a dozen screen names, and it's just so darned easy to jot off a note and hit "send."
It's really important that we respect each other and the customs of our little community--and that means treading softly if you're not sure of a particular group's customs. [8]
In March 1997, a print zine fan wrote:
A lot of people have no access to the Internet. A lot who do may not, for several reasons, access alt.startrek.creative. I tried it twice; once I got seven eighths of a story - the remaining file (a middle one) never did surface - and the other time, what I got was complete, but so bad I've never touched .creative since; besides which, I like paper when I'm reading [9]
From a fan in April 1997:
Regarding the concern that internet posting will kill K/S My, but this idea is breeding like tribbles! Economists would disagree. Before the station is overrun, consider this: The people who emailed me in response to the posting, wanting to buy zines (which I also prefer, old time fan that I am). If I *hadn't* posted that old vignette of mine on ASC just before Escapade, they wouldn't have known K/S was still around and I wouldn't have had the opportunity to give them info for K/S Press because they were lurking and I wouldn't have known they were there. I bet others who have posted retreads (aka stories previously published in zines) have had similar experiences. Certainly, as with anything, there is some risk. Remember what Kirk said about risk? "Gentlemen, risk is our business". I think it is ours too, by association. The internet is our final frontier and there is new life in it. So long as those of us who wish to post write one tale for a zine to balance every one that is posted, the risk that zines will 'disappear' remains minimal. [10]
From a fan in early 1998:
Perhaps the newsgroups’ appeal lies in the very nature of online communication: its immediacy, diversity and polycentric character. When you post a K/S story to ASCEM or its sister newsgroup, alt.startrek.creative, you can expect to get feedback from readers in Europe and Asia, from male as well as female fans, and from readers whose primary interest is in another Star Trek fandom. Conversation in the newsgroups tends to be direct and candid, not to mention boisterous and wildly funny, but it also tends to be deeply respectful of members’ differences. It’s hard to pin down the difference between online stories and zine stories, but I feel that online stories tend to push the envelope more, that online authors tend to give old themes a relatively fresh approach, and that a wider range of aesthetic values is tolerated in the newsgroups. Writers can get solid literary criticism online, but faultfinding of the “this doesn’t fit my definition of K/S” variety is rare to nonexistent. [11]
In 2002, a fan wrote about the cyclical nature of new fans, access, and gatekeeping:
The web archive associated with the newsgroup has had its ups and downs over the last decade, but Stephen Ratliff and his dedicated crew of archive maintainers have kept the archive (also, not coincidentally, mirror'd across three sites to avoid bandwidth problems) and the newsgroup running smoothly despite the Barbarian Hoards that have invaded the 'net each year as gated communities like prodigy and AOL gained their Internet gateways, and new university students come online every Fall.[12]
Current Staff
- Stephen Ratliff - FAQ Maintainer, Status of Stories: Backup
- Katie Redshoes - Archivist
- Ian Toldman - Assistant Formatter
- Rocky - Status of Stories: The Original Series
- Keroth - Status of Stories: The Next Generation, Status of Stories: Enterprise, Status of Stories: MIS
- Seema - Status of Stories: Voyager
- Gabrielle - Status of Stories: Deep Space Nine
Previous Staff
Past staff and members of ASC.
Archivist
- Joseph Young - (1990-1995) [13]
- Alara Rogers - (1995 - 1998)
- Dina L. - (1998-2000)
FAQ Maintainer
- Stephen Young - (1995-1998)
- Melissa Koehn - Backup Maintainer (1997)
- J Winter - Backup Maintainer (1998-2000)
- Kattz - Backup Maintainer (2000-2001)
Status of Stories
- Sarah Goose, SOS: MIS [14]
- Sasscatt, SOS:TOS [15]
- Tasha Simonova, SOS:TNG [15]
- Gabrielle Lawson, SOS:DS9 [15]
- Jamelia, SOS:VOY, SOS: MIS [15]
External links
| Related Links | |
| People | Alara Rogers, Gabrielle, Ian Toldman, John Ordover, Jamelia, Katie Redshoes, Keroth, Macedon, Peg Robinson, Rocky, Seema, Stephen Ratliff, Stephen Young |
| Places | ASCEM, ASCA, Star Trek, Trekiverse |
| Things | ASC Awards, The Mannerly Art of Critique - Peg Robinson, The Mannerly Art of Disagreement - Macedon |
References
- ^ "FAQ Alt.StarTrek.Creative, An Introduction". Archived from the original on 2021-01-25. Retrieved October 10, 2008.
- ^ from Mall Rats by ljc
- ^ "11 Years on the Job".
- ^ see I feel the need to say again how important K/S print zines are. (1998) by Shelley Butler (April 1999)
- ^ see COCO CHANNEL Interview with Judith Gran (September 1999)
- ^ from The K/S Press #11
- ^ from Internet Fans Controversy Du Jour (Sandy Herrold)
- ^ from The K/S Press #6
- ^ from The K/S Press #7
- ^ from The K/S Press #8
- ^ from Judith Gran in The K/S Press #20 (April 1998)
- ^ from Mall Rats by ljc
- ^ Maintain a ftp archive until April 2005 when he gave up his position, FAQ Maintainer's Notes: Second Year on the Job, February 1, 1997. (Accessed October 10, 2008)
- ^ sometime between 2000-2004
- ^ a b c d 2000, not sure of else