Linking to Public Fan Sites

Related terms:
See also:	Fandom and Visibility, Outing, Fourth Wall
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Linking to public fan sites became a topic of discussion with the advent of the Internet when more and more fans began posting their fan fiction, vids, fanzine ads and other aspects of fannish life online.

In the early 2000s, fans began using blogging platforms such as diaryland and Livejournal to discuss both their fannish and personal lives. Even though these posts were public, many fans felt shielded from public scrutiny and TPTB by their relative anonymity and the overwhelming amount of content available on the Internet. However, as more and more fans and as more fannish discourse left print letterzines and members only mailing lists behind to embrace these public Internet forums, a cognitive disconnect arose regarding how visible fannish lives could and should be to others.

The issue of when - and if - to link to another fan's website or blog became the topic of frequent debates. Some fans felt that permission needed to be obtained before linking to another fan's website or blog. Others felt that as long as you were keeping your website or blog inside relatively small fannish circles, you could link without permission. And others felt that once something was posted publicly online, it was public and could therefore be discussed publicly in whatever forum you chose. And yet a final faction felt that while linking without permission was permissible, all linking must cease at the website or blog owner's request.

Some fans state their "linking policy" on their website or their Livejournal User Info page in the hopes of clarifying their expectations of the fandom community: "...linking: I'm fine with anyone linking to this journal, or any unlocked entry within. As far as I'm concerned if it's unlocked, it's public and fair game. (Just don't mention this journal in connection with my name if you happen to know it.)"

Another example of a linking policy asks that the author of the post be notified they have been linked: "Go right ahead! I always appreciate the notification (especially since LJ doesn't offer any statistics on referrers), but linking to public documents is the foundation of the Web and IMHO there's never any need to ask permission for links."

However, as seen below, there is a wide variety in linking policies and many different approaches to linking to public fan websites across fandom communities. Many of these policies are community-specific, some were created in response to historical events, and some are technologically driven. In the end, it falls on the individual fan and the fandom community to explicitly state their privacy and visibility expectations and to also understand that those expectations will neither be universally accepted nor universally followed. In the world of the World Wide Web, fandom policies and practices will always remain local.

Some General Words About Fandom Visibility

"[Fandom] visibility is important. Fans who find fan fiction, art, and videos often feel a sense of validation, and they may feel that their own interests are more normal. Whether this reassurance is a good thing or not depends on what we think of the value of fan creativity. ... Countervailingly, the fact that [fan] creations are no longer mimeographed and circulated among a circle of friends who already knew one another can create a greater sense of exposure, and a certain fear that the powers that be might crack down if the fans aren't careful. Visibility invites study, and sometimes legal threats, as shown by the section of chillingeffects.org that hosts copies of cease and desist letters received by various fan sites."

Blanket Prohibitions

Some fans offer blanket prohibitions against linking.

Journals

A typical example for blanket prohibition again linking a personal journal would be: "[...] PLEASE DO NOT LINK TO MY JOURNAL OUTSIDE OF DW!" Others would add a note to a specific post hoping to exclude certain types of linking: "Please do not link to this post in newsletters." Others attempted to limit linking just to their fanfiction: "Feel free to read [my stories], but please do not link them anywhere. These fics were previously locked to friends, and I'll lock them again if I find they've been linked. Please respect my wishes on this." Some fans attempted to prevent multiple types of links in one post: "Please do not link to this post, or any of my other fic! Thank you."

Archives and Websites

In the case of many fanfiction archives and websites, fans would ask that links be directed to their main page or a page that contained an age statement. While the "link to the main page" practice is rooted in long standing traditions of limiting children's access to adult material, such restrictions can lead to somewhat amusing instructions. See for example a 2006 post in the rec50 fanfiction recommendation community. Ironically, the story that is being recommended only carried a PG rating.

"McKay has a linking policy. All links must be to the warning page. To read the story: 1.Click the big ENTER, after reading all the warnings of course. 2. Then click Fiction. 3. Scroll down and click HP FICTION: SLASH, GEN & HET. 4. Scroll till you see Love (Actually) Is All Around, click, and enjoy."

Vids

In the early 2000s, vidders who were slow to embrace YouTube and other online streaming sites would make their vids available on a limited basis and with the following caveat:

"PLEASE DO NOT LINK TO THESE PAGES OR FORWARD THE URL TO ANY NEWSGROUP OR PUBLIC MAILING LIST. Really, we're serious about this. If you're not sure whether a list is public or not, ask us."

RPF

And finally, in the case of many RPF fan websites and communities, there are pleas for fans to not link or share their websites with the actors, sportsmen, celebrities or their agents:

"Please do not link to or share content from [our community] with the players or mainstream baseball blogs (Baseball Prospectus, Fangraphs, Deadspin, RiverAveBlues, MotownSports, etc.) via Twitter/Tumblr/email/blogs/links/websites/etc. Obviously, we can't know for sure if you're linking our content, but we would appreciate it greatly if you not do that. If it's discovered that you've shared content from this community with blogs or sites, you'll be removed and banned."

Fandom Positions On Linking/Privacy/Visibility

One of the difficulties in finding posts that speak against public linking is that such posts are often locked or the owners cannot be reached to obtain permission to link publicly. This irony somewhat skews the representative examples listed below. Additional cites and links always welcomed.

Pre-2000: See Slash and the Arrival of the Internet

From 2000: Some fans conflated linking and unauthorized archiving:

One fan said: "Please do not link to or take stories from Keep the Faith for other archives without the permission of the author as well as the webmistress (Marlen)."

From 2002: some fans could not understand how there could be any online discussions without linking:

Dictum the fourth: If you're going to talk about something specific on the web, link to it.

Livejournal threads. Challenges. News articles. Essays. Rants. Stories. So many things that have a URL provoke us into saying something. That's great, fantastic, wonderful and terrific.

What is not so good is the strange reluctance to share the original provoking item with our reading public. Really, people, what are you hiding? If someone's arguments in a livejournal thread piss you off, why don't you point your readers to the livejournal thread so they can share your outrage? (Or, perhaps, they'll decide you're overreacting. Happens sometimes.) If someone has written something so brilliant and thrilling you think everyone should know, tell us how to see it for ourselves. If something made you think and inspired you on to further revelations, please, please, please share the original with your readers. It will help us better understand what you're saying and why you're saying it. It will save you the trouble of having to summarize the provoking incident. And it prevents those of us with minds both inquisitive and suspicious from suspecting that you are deliberatley mischaracterizing what was actually written, so as to make your argument stronger.

From 2002: always requiring permission limits discussion, but it would be nice to be asked:

"This is a fascinating discussion. It's interesting that it comes up as a contentious issue because the nature of blogging is linkage. If you look outside fandom one of the main - if not the main purpose of blogging is to create links and networks and communities, to talk to other bloggers and have them talk to you. LJ is even more focused on community because of the inbuilt Friends function. Someone recently said that friendsfriends was the new crack.

You control what you put in your blog. I, for example, never really talk about my offline life because relative anonymity is important to me. I don't want any offline friends or acquaintances stumbling across it and realising it's me too easily. I know there are other ways they can work out it's me but that requires intent to discover and if they're being that kind of freaky then there's whole other issues that are more important than the nature of my hobby.

But I keep an LJ because I like the conversation, I like the community, I want to leave comments and I want to get comments. I want to add to the fun. I want to have fun.

Never link without permission? Why would you take part in a community focused communication while intending to not communicate? You want to share your life with only a select number of friends? Start a mailing list, ring them up but don't be complaining when people assume that because you're on the field and you're wearing a jersey you want to play ball.

All that being said, it seems courteous to tell someone you've posted a link to their words if you've done it outside the LJ/blog system, say to a mailing list. After all, if you're so interested in what they've got to say why not invite them to talk about it elsewhere?"

From 2002: Some fans confused linking to fanfic to unauthorized translations of fanfic:

"PLEASE DO NOT LINK TO MY FICTION WITHOUT MY PERMISSION. This includes posting translated versions to non-English forums. Thank you."

From 2002, a fan points out that diaries were never meant to be published or posted online:

"Peggy has been talking about blogging as performance art, and the veneer of privacy blogging has to it....

The thing is this: You're only ever 6 clicks away from someone you know, or who knows you. You may think you're sharing your innermost thoughts with only a few close friends, but newsflash, braintrust, you're putting your thoughts on the INTERNET.

That means random strangers, people who knew you in high school, fellow fans and people with axes to grind are also reading your diary....

Nothing on the Internet is private, and woe unto they who think that it is.....

The thing I learned - and it's a salutary lesson for all - is that you have to take responsibility for whatever you write.

Yeah, you can say, "It's my diary, I'll write what I want" and it is, and you can.

But it's not.

It's not the diary you keep in your night table drawer, that no one will ever read. You're publishing it on the Internet.

You have to be willing to own, to take responsibility for, anything you write for public consumption."

From 2002, given that the way the Internet is structured, linking is necessary and the norm and it should be up to the blogger to signal to their readers if they expect something different:

"But all that said, at least here on the list, we should be ethical and courteous in our behaviour towards our fellow Onions. So that means not posting any text or link to someone's blog or LJ unless they've given permission or unless it's stated on their blog/LJ that anything there can be publicly forwarded anywhere else. It's like stories, authors put in archive permissions and generally the rule is "Ask before taking". I'm not sure I agree with this because I think there is a difference between posting a link to something and posting the thing itself. In the latter case, I agree that (except for the usual fair use/quoting a few lines for the purposes of review thing), people's blog & lj entries should not be posted elsewhere without their knowledge or permission, and that it's just as inappropriate to do so as it would be to do it with their stories. But in the case of linking, I believe the burden should be on should be on the blogger, as it is on the author, to let the public know if they don't want to be linked to given the implicit assumption that the Internet is understood by everyone to be a public place. For instance, when I see a note telling me to only link to an author or archive's front page and/or to write them for permission to link directly to individual stories (or in the case of one author who doesn't want her fan fiction site's URL made public, to the site at all), I will always always try to respect wishes of that nature because as alice says, that's simple courtesy... but in the absence of such a note I figure that the author knew what they were doing when they posted that story and were aware that people might read/link to it, and act accordingly. And I don't think that's necessarily unethical or discourteous, although other people's MMV."

From 2002, blogging often requires ignoring the fact that you are publicly posting. It is when we forget this fact that fans experience conflict between reality and illusion:

"As far as the privacy issue, I would have to agree that there is no such thing on the Internet.... I think it's the difference between illusion and reality that is so troubling for people, perhaps. Because intellectually I believe that most people do know other people are seeing what they write, but for a variety of complicated psychological reasons being confronted by the reality of that may be really upsetting.... And it's not a rational thing, because again, intellectually most people know other people may be reading what they write--but as with so many emotional things there may be a certain amount of denial going on; I can also see....why it might be necessary to have that kind of denial in order to blog in the first place.... So I don't think it's so much that most people really are so naive as that it's just not something it's always easy for them to deal with."

From 2003: others pointed out that online fandom life was rapidly changing with little to no control over who read or linked to your content:

When I first got on line and stumbled over the thing we now ubiquitously call "media fandom", the huge brouhaha at the time in HL fandom was a disagreement some fans had with a single individual who had compiled a massive amount of links, trying to bring a central location to all of the HL sites from archives to script transcripts sites and everything in between, including a lot of people's individual sites and homepages.

Now, while online fandom had come into being and was steadily growing, there was still a lot of nervousness by fans who came in from off-line fandom who had been involved in or witnessed any number of unpleasant examples of TPTB flexing their muscle a bit. Or who had only heard about them -- friend of a friend of a friend was C&D'd and dire consequences awaited them.

It was scary stuff. It still is. Not so much because of the (mostly) idle threat of having your site (or your press) shut down, or the fear of actual court litigation, but in terms of exposure and potential liability, most fans reacted with a certain amount of skittishness. Being sued is absolutely a possibility. It doesn't seem to happen very often -- even for people who are C&D'd in the case of Trademark violation.....

Back to the King of Links. A lot of people objected to this, because he would include links without permission. And upon being requested to remove a link, he would refuse. Threats were made, arguments were voiced, flame wars erupted, and the King of Links held fast. There was nothing, nothing anyone could legally do to enforce their will on him. He baited and dared people to take him to court. He posted his own legal defenses comments on the then very sketchy approach to copyright, privacy and the internet.

It went on for months. Eventually people lost interest, or he did, and as far as I know, the link page is still there but most, if not all, the links are worthless. I doubt seriously that anyone ever took him up on his invitation to court. And shortly thereafter, Geocities appeared on the scene and a few other free hosting services and on-line fandom pretty much exploded across the internet.

But his argument then boiled down to something that still holds true. If you put it on the net, and someone can find it, be it a homepage, a picture, artwork, vids, stories or your personal resume, you have pretty much lost the ability to maintain control over that bit of data You can put up all the warnings and pleas you like, you can password protect your site, you can make it unsearchable by search engines and robots, but if one person posts that picture elsewhere, or that story, or that password…you've lost the battle. Oh, you can take your stuff and move it. You can scream and shout and stomp your feet and threaten to have them TOS'd by their ISP's. You can defame their name from here until kingdom come. But in reality, your methods of control are limited and rarely infallible."

From 2005, a contributor to metafandom newsletter explained her approach to linking:

".....because the author of a post always has the choice to lock or filter it, my default assumption is that a public post means that someone wants more readers and more comments (obviously no one wants rude attacks, but unfortunately, that's part of the risk of a public post).

Things I assume are perfectly ok to do with content from a public post:

1. Comment on it politely (including politely disagreeing)
2. Discuss it in my own journal, whether or not I comment on the original post (including polite but negative reviews of fanfic, or polite disagreement with meta)
3. Quote credited selections, either in support or in order to dispute them
4. Link to it (in my own journal or in a community) without explicit permission from the original poster, or even without a warning.

Things I view as impolite, but which can't be stopped, once a post has been made public:

1. Rude or abrasive comments to the original post (which can be controlled in so far as the poster can screen/delete/freeze comments)
2. Excessive mocking of the post in another journal or community (I realize this is a subjective thing, but for me, there's a line between disagreeing/negatively reviewing and mocking. Mockery becomes a sort of implied personal attack - "look how stupid this is, the person who wrote it must be an idiot.")
3. Personal attacks on the original poster, either in the comments to the original post or in another venue (this includes the sort of implicit "anyone who believes that is a moron" kind of personal attack)
4. Linking to a post with the explicit purpose of stirring up trouble (for ex. "here's the link - go give her hell!)
5. Linking to or quoting a post when the poster has specifically asked you not to
6. Appropriating significant portions of the original poster's words or ideas without giving credit
7. Deliberately taking words out of context in order to misrepresent the original poster's position

So, what do y'all think? What of this jives with your perceptions? What seems nuts to you? What's appropriate and what's not?

From 2007: some fans pointed out that blogging was fundamentally changing how fandom interacted with one another:

When fandom uses mailing lists to talk to one another: "... we all head over to someone else's house (some by invite/some by word of mouth). We party according to a set of rules set by the homeowner (moderator). Some parties are great and under excellent moderation. Some are lame with no moderation. Sometimes we get drunk and make asses out of ourselves. And sometimes we head off to the kitchen to do some down and dirty gossiping about those drunks in the living room. But we all know that this is someone else's house and we're guests (even if we don't behave like ones). Blogging is like hosting a party in your own home. Sometimes you own (blog on your own website using your own server). Most of us here on LiveJournal are renting. We often party with the windows and doors open. Sometimes the doors are closed and the curtains are drawn. But we set the tone, the topics and lead the discussions. When you are in your own home you have sense of ownership, security and freedom. This means we feel free to discuss controversial topics or personal issues - but we fully expect that everyone who is on the outside looking in knows that this is our house and that it is just plain bad manners to try to stop someone else's party or toss rocks. And because it is our home, we often forget that we are dancing naked to Madonna with the windows open. So when our asshats of neighbors or the casual passerby call the police (think of the children!!) we're shocked and hurt and pissed off. Because - "hey wait, this is my own home. I am not harming anyone. And stop looking in my windows, you pervert!"

From 2008, after fan fiction was featured on a National Public Radio program:

"We went from the fear of outing fans to fears about outing fandom? It makes me smile because we've been sitting here on the Internet with our asses hanging naked in the breeze for years now. Why I remember in the early days on the Internet where fans only used mailing lists, you had to be recommended by someone to join the list and had to send them a notarized picture proving you were female before they'd let you online to whisper softly about fandom. Nowadays you young whippersnappers have blogs and websites full of fan fiction and you sprawl your vids all across Youtube. And now there is NPR. It's like the end days of Sodom and Gomorrah in Technicolor.

....there is no way I can control the outing of the existence fandom when we do this ourselves each of us every day when we post online. Scarily, some of us have this 'outing' thing down better than others "Hey Mr Kripke, would you like a copy of my DaddyCest story? It's hawt!!"...

But the visibility worry is shared by many marginalized/fringe groups so know that we're not alone - just think about the outing of the existence of furries. They had their own CSI [TV] show, and we all know that, when you show up on CSI, that's when you've arrived. In comparison, all we got was an NPR interview. Thank God no one listens to NPR.

And what about the BDSM and poly people and the hentai crowd? You think fans have got problems? Try explaining to Peoria why it's OK to grab a few of your best poly friends, tie them up and then turn tentacled monsters loose to perform godless sex acts on each other.

The thing I love and hate about the Internet: It's like you're sitting there, mouth agape going: "Hee hee, I can see you and dude, you're *so* weird. But wait....that means.... Oh shit, people can see me!!!! "

And then we runs away screaming.

To which I'll add - if there is going to be a outing firing squad, it is always preferable to have *other* people stand in front of you. Lots and lots of people. So come by and visit any time. I'll save you a spot.

From 2008: and to deny these changes was futile:

People keep forgetting that blogging is like dancing naked to Madonna's Vogue in your living room with your blinds open. People!! there are people watching you! And people in the street - stop peeping in those windows and complaining. I miss mailing lists where the dancing/peeping space was more of a neutral ground and you had to at least pretend to discuss topics or else lose the moral ground and end up worrying that everyone was secretly snickering at you. Now there seems to be little incentive to pretending at discourse and we spend too much time being outraged that someone actually thinks differently!!!!! Of course it may also be due to the fact that most of us fail at math.

From 2010: other fans still struggled to keep up with fandom's constant migration towards less controllable forums:

Please do not link to my posts, locked or unlocked, on Facebook or Twitter. My LJ and my Facebook/Real Life are kept separate for a reason, and I'd prefer to keep them that way. I have disabled this feature on my own journal. and will never intentionally crosspost any content from your journals.

From 2013: often linking policies are intertwined with the debate on the need to maintain the Fourth Wall:

"Also, and I know I’ve said this in a bunch of different ways so bear with me, for people who are invested in either the reality or the fiction of the fourth wall, IT ISN’T JUST ABOUT PROTECTION. IT ISN’T JUST ABOUT ~SHAME. That’s like saying that the only purpose doors serve is to keep burglars out and to keep people from finding your porn collection. Do they function that way? Yes, of course; lots of people will walk right on by a closed door without trying to get in. If there’s a likelihood that someone’s going to try to sneak into your home, of course, I find that doors function much better when they are locked — which is why some people choose to keep their AO3, LiveJournal, and Twitter accounts locked, as is their right!

But. Doors, even when they are not locked, also serve to indicate to people who are willing to respect the gesture (not an insignificant population) that they are not currently welcome. They serve to afford us privacy, and quiet, and darkness when we want it, and to keep the leaves from blowing into our living rooms and the dog from running away, and to delineate boundaries for us so we remember to put our pants on when we leave the house. Many people who have doors do not have them only — and some indeed at all — because they are afraid and/or ashamed.....

We’re not all scared and short-sighted and unaware that the times, they are a-changing. To bring up the door thing again (sorry, I know I said I was done with it), none of us are obligated to invite anybody we don’t like or trust into our personal or shared spaces, or to go out and meet them on the sidewalk, just because one of our neighbors insists there’s a chance that if we don’t they’ll knock our doors down and do whatever the fuck they want anyway."

Linking to Sites Using the Wayback Machine or Permalinks

There has been a lot of discussion about whether it is okay to provide links to other fans using the Wayback Machine or other services that can be made to make permanent links to fanworks.

One fan's opinion in 2008:

A week or so ago, there was some discussion at Haven about whether or not it's okay to post public links to stories that are no longer easily found online because their authors took them down. Many people, mostly writers I suspect, felt it was disrespectful to do this, as it went against the known wishes of the writers. I am going to quote what I wrote there, cutting out the part that was a response to a specific post.

I am going to go out on a big limb here and come out on the side of the reader, on the one hand, and the work itself, on the other.

It seems to me that once a piece of writing has been posted, it takes on a life of its own, apart from whatever the author's intentions may have been. It still exists, whether it is on someone's harddrive or merely in someone's memory. It is a part of our collective fan history, too.

I am one of those people who goes around hunting down stories that are no longer easily found. I spent hours and hours hunting for a working link to "God's Breath" by Jintian so that I could post it at crack_van at Live Journal. When Jintian let her site go down and posted everything except her XF fic at Live Journal, I did send her an email, twice, asking why. She never answered me. I don't feel guilty in the slightest for posting that link to a wonderful story that deserves to be read.

I admit it freely, it is ultimately the work that matters to me, more than anything else. The work. The story. Not the storyteller. Not their feelings or their "rights." If that makes me a crummy fangirl and an untrustworthy fan of your work, then so be it. I love the art, not the artist. My feelings about the series are quite parallel. I love Fox Mulder. I think DD is an okay guy. I love Dana Scully. I think GA is a lovely woman and a wonderful actress. But I love their work in The X-Files. I love fan fiction, I love reading it and writing it. I love writing about it. Still and all, I have to admit my allegiance is to the work itself, and I think it always will be.

So that is why I am not going to take down my story, even though I have thought seriously about doing so. Because even if I do, the story will still exist, if only on my hard drive, and in the memories of the people who read it.

'Studying' Fans or Text?

In the academic world, different ethical rules apply to studying people (anthropology, ethnography or psychology) or studying texts (literary analysis, commentary or criticism). While these standards apply to only a small subset of people (acafans or academics who study fandom), a similar conceptual approach may help frame some of the ongoing debate within fandom about linking to public fandom posts. In other words, if fans are to be treated as research subjects (even by other fans), permission to link before discussing would be required. If fans are to be treated as content creators (stories, vids, and art), then permission to link before discussing would not be required.

This conceptual approach (people vs. text) was discussed in fandom circles on tumblr following an incident where Caitlin Moran, a UK writer, asked the actors of a popular TV show to publicly read slash fanfiction excerpts. The overall perception among the fan community was that this was done to mock fans who wrote slash fanfiction.

On December 17, 2013, annejamison wrote a tumblr post titled: "What I have in common with Caitlin Moran, and what I don’t." In the post she compared her critique of fanworks to what Caitin Moran did in order to point out that Caitin's actions were not isolated and therefore not deserving of the high level of fandom criticism:

"Things I have in common with Caitlin Moran

1) reproducing and sharing fan writing for my own purposes, for a public audience, without asking the writers involved.

2) fan writers furious with me for the same.

3) considering myself a fan without exactly identifying as part of fandom. Not fully participating in fan culture, but trying to engage it.

4) holding fanworks up to a kind of criticism and scrutiny the authors/creators of such work did not understand themselves to be signing on for."

Some fans appreciated annejamison's observations.

"This is a really important set of points. I feel very differently on some, but I’m not at a place to reply just now. But yes, some tasty food for thought."

And

"I particularly respect your discussion of the issues of quoting works without the writer’s permission; I hadn’t thought about it from an academic perspective before. Of course I’m not necessarily sure how I would feel if it was my work involved, but I appreciate the weight you give to the fan works concerned by equating them with any other source that an academic might use, whether primary or secondary."

Others did not and honed in on the part of annejamison’s post where she stated that she treated fanworks like literary works, instead of looking at fanworks as part of human research:

“….when I have [quoted] fanworks without seeking authorial permission or consent, it has been with the full knowledge that the authors/creators might not like it, might disagree with my use, and in some cases *would* be very angry with this use. I have done it anyway. I made a decision, as a writer, to treat fan writers as writers rather than human experimental or anthropological subjects. That’s my intent—but my intent doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt or anger anyone. When I undertook to engage and present fan writing to a broader audience in print form, in a non-academic for-profit book, I made a bigger commitment to my treatment of the subject matter than I did to individual fan feelings. If I believed a fan writer’s role or story was too important to be left out of a narrative, I wrote about it even with the full knowledge the writer didn’t want me to….”.”

In her tumblr, annejamison then went on the explain her process for quoting from fanworks or public posts:

“Where fanworks or fan comments were decades old, I didn’t ask permission. I quoted everything from old archived chatrooms without permission. Not to have done so would have significantly diminished the intellectual and historical value of the book. Where other fan writers on blogs publicly commented on fan issues, I quoted them without permission. Where fanwriters were commenting or outing on other fan writers’ works in non-fan blogs …or on goodreads, and I quoted or paraphrased those fan comments and it never occurred to me to ask permission… In the case of discussing the literary merits of fanworks by quoting from examples of novel-length works: I stopped asking when someone said no, and then I felt I couldn’t discuss that person’s work. In fact, it did diminish the book, in my opinion. Fanworks are not interchangeable—not from the kind of literary-critical perspective I was working from in certain sections of the book. At this point—not for the first time—I had to really think through what I was doing as a critic, and where my priorities were. I’m not an anthropologist, I’m not a social scientist, and I am not, as most acafans insist of themselves, a fan first. I am a critic first. My responsibility is to my subject matter and my argument.”

Some fans disagreed and felt that because literary or critical analysis also involves living people (the writers), it should be held to the same ethical standards as medical research. This meant that commentators should obtain consent from all who are being quoted or discussed:

“I understand that the standard, again, in literary academia might be different but that doesn’t mean that literary academia shouldn’t be subject to ethical review when dealing with living subjects, like science is, especially when it comes to respecting a subject’s persons rather than just their works….”

The follow-on argument was that if all forms of critique (both literary and scientific) were subject to the ethics of science research and those ethics require informed consent, then the failure to obtain consent shows a lack of respect to others. Furthermore, not obtaining consent is at odds with fandom community privacy norms.

“There is a whole area of science research — and I don’t even mean psychology/sociology/anthropology, I mean health science too — that is predicated on the furthering academic knowledge by talking to and interacting with participants. ….Except the only difference here is that we respect people’s requests not to participate. In a classroom observation, we’ll still observe kids whose parents said we can’t use their data. It sucks because we’re still gong through all this effort, but you know, sometimes that’s what academia is about: respecting other people’s boundaries. This is the last I’m going to say on the subject. You have a right to your position, but all your arguments so far indicate it’s rather untenable. Drgirlfriend and I aren’t the only science academics in fandom who see consenting in this fashion — if you, or anyone else, wants to continue writing about fandom in this fashion, you’ll just have to keep arguing for your position. But to be honest, fandom values the right of its own to privacy and autonomy, and especially if you don’t see yourself as “one of us” [ie “considering myself a fan without exactly identifying as part of fandom”], then you’re just making yourself an enemy of the rest of us.”

Another point raised by annejamison was that quoting from text in the context of reviews and discussions is well established fair use:

”….In my discipline, we don’t ask, we adhere to fair use guidelines. So no—I don’t reproduce whole works. Yes, I do quote from work for the purposes of argument without permission in accordance with my training, discipline, and critical project.”

However, to some fans, the issue was not so much as fair use but inaccurate representations. One fan, who was quoted by annejamison over her objections , felt that the quotes, when taken out of contest, cast her in an unfavorable light.

”This isn’t just an issue of fair use, but of accurate representation. I, like many of the other people Jamison also misquotes and misrepresents in the book, are real, living people. We should be free to enjoy fandom and expressing ourselves online without fear of being exploited for profit.”

While inaccurate representation is a problem in any context, to many scholars, the idea that they would not be allowed to quote because they may *possibly* misquote, is unthinkable:

“From my disciplinary position as a literary critic, I’d note that it seems to me the people commenting from a science/social science perspective in this thread are talking about people. But we (where we [equals] professional literary/cultural critics) are talking about works, or texts. Once you create something and make it public, it’s not about you any more. Your work will be interpreted in ways you can’t control, and read and used in ways you can’t anticipate, and it is freely available to be considered in any way that a critic sees fit. If I post a giant disclaimer on all my fic saying that I do not want it to be the subject of criticism, that disclaimer itself is now part of my publicly available text and can legitimately be discussed and analysed. And because this blog is published under the same name as my fic, if a critic wanted to write an essay called ‘Academics on Tumblr who also write fan fiction: A Study’, then they could freely quote from it in that study, on the grounds that I identify myself as an academic here. If they want to link anything I may have said here to my fic, or discuss it in relation to another topic, they can. If I sent them 25 emails begging them not to, the morally right thing for them to do would be to ignore them. Even if I thought they were misrepresenting or misinterpreting my works, or my words. This is scholarship. It is not personal. “

The applicability of these discussions to fandom in general may seem tenuous at first in that most fans who are commenting on one others blogs and websites are not doing research or literary criticism. However, the discussion does highlight some of the different approaches to fandom and how these differences frame the “obtain consent before linking” debate. For some, fandom participation is seen to be membership based with the emphasis on person to person connections, a shared consensus and the existence of community norms that can be used to police the conduct of others. Phrases like “respect”, “boundaries”, “privacy”, “autonomy” and “consent” point towards a more intimate and personal connection between members of the community.

For others, fandom is more like an ongoing public debate with fanworks and blog entries being interchangeable components of that public debate. To hold that there is an expectation of privacy in public Internet posts which requires fans to “opt in” before being publicly discussed, does fandom a disservice by restricting community interaction and limiting thought and speech.

“It’s nice and well and good to ask for permission, and I respect the kindness and good intentions behind the drive to ask for that permission. But to require that someone give permission to critique publicly posted, unlocked work seems diametrically opposed to the sharing of fanfic online. In my mind it’s the difference between participating as a fan within a fannish community and participating as someone studying that community. Within fandoms, we tend to aim for supportive, permission-sharing types of dialogue. But, as is so clearly evidenced by all the emotions being raised by this very interesting debate, that does not lend itself to the kind of impartial/unbiased view that makes for good critical writing.”

Livejournal Newsletter Communities

As fandom migrated away from mailing lists to more decentralized blogging platforms such as Livejournal, finding fannish discussions began much more difficult. Hundreds of fandom themed "newsletters" sprang up where volunteers would collect links to public fandom discussions and post the links on a daily, weekly or monthly basis. See List of Newsletter Communities.

Most newsletters would only link to public posts and many limited their links to posts made to Livejournal blogs. A few newsletters would only "watch" or monitor journals that had been submitted by the journal owner. And finally, many newsletters would remove links to posts upon request of the blog owner.

Interestingly, a number of these community newsletters have not opted out of Google's search index, thereby making the posted links more visible outside the fandom community.

Meta Linking Communities

There exist numerous Livejournal and Dreamwidth communities that focus on collecting links to meta fan discussions. Below is a list of some of the more popular communities. However additional communities can be found in the 2005 LJ Meta Fandom Primer post.

Metablog Linking Policy

Metablog was founded in 2002 with the goal of being a "resource for linking to blogs and LJs that discuss issues of importance to fandom. It is multifandom and metafandom. Metablog is not meant as a discussion forum; rather, it's meant to help fans find current discussions elsewhere." It had no linking policy and any member was allowed to add a link to any interesting discussion on LJ. However, a closer reading of some of the posts that are still public indicate that members were only allowed to link to public posts.

Very little public discussion of Metablog's linking policy survives. There are references on the community journal to debates taking place elsewhere, but those posts, dating back to the early 2000s have since then been locked or removed.

Metaquotes Policy

Founded in 2002.

Metaquotes is a LJ community that allows members to quote and link back to any public post on Livejournal.

"To address some drama that's arisen: 1) Anything posted on a public post does not require permission to quote. Let me repeat that again. DOES NOT REQUIRE PERMISSION TO QUOTE. Coming here and complaining or demanding that we take something down, or lecturing mods about how we need to 'follow our own rules' about requiring permission goes over better if you in fact know those rules. If you deleted it afterwards, whatever. It still doesn't require permission to quote."

What little discussion there is on metaquotes has less to do with linking and more to do with their Rule 9, the limit on how much you can quote from a blog post. However, in one 2006 discussion on fandom wank the issue of metaquotes linking policy did arise:

"I've been getting the whole 'you must ask for permission!!eleventyone!1!!!' vibe for some time now. It's annoying, because I read quite a few LJs with funnies in them, and I don't quote, because of the hassle of asking fo permission. A lot of the quotes I read are just spur-of-the-moment things and for some reason, I feel that asking for permission makes the whole thing less...erm...funny. If that makes sense in any way at all."

"It still states in the FAQ that permission is required for locked posts/communities, but mentions nothing about public posts. (Last time I checked anyway.) The QWP [Quote with permission] public posts seems to be a recent spate of carefullness/paranoia."

Metafandom Linking Policy

Founded in 2005 and active through 2011. The discussion that led to its creation can be read here.

"Metafandom links to public posts and does not notify people as a rule. Content published openly on the internet is available to all those with internet access. We do not link to access locked entries.

You can find out how to lock your entries here.

If you want us to take the link to your post down, simply comment on the relevant entry and we'll do that as soon as possible. It is no problem. Alternatively, email the compiler whose post you want editing."

Discussion of the policy:

"There is an old adage that once something is put out on the internet it can never be destroyed and that adage proves true despite precautionary measures like flocking and reactionary measures like deletion of an entry. Due to the capacity every computer has to take screenshots, i.e. real-time images of what is being displayed on a computer screen, and then redistribute those images there is no such thing as completely secured. For hypothetical example, one might flock an entry bashing another journal user and only allow five people access to that entry, but one of those persons could take a screenshot and post that screenshot in public or secretly give that screenshot to the person being bashed. Thus, any statement made is open to criticism by both one’s peers and random passersby.

This is further convoluted by the presence of fandom wide or multi-fandom communities which collect links on purpose. Above I discuss a series of links collected on Metafandom. Like most fannish newsletters,” Metafandom has a policy not to link flocked entries regardless of content (Metafandom, User Info). This is for two reasons: one, it respects the desired privacy implied by flocking a post and, two, posts which are flocked and therefore not widely accessible do not engender fandom discussion as is Metafandom’s mission statement. The vast majority of the single fandom, i.e. focusing on one television show such as sga_newsletter does for the Stargate: Atlantis fandom (sga_newsletter, User Info), newsletters employ the same policy for the same reasons. This has not halted the discussion as to whether that is enough or should these collection communities seek permission to post the links in the first place. Metafandom’s User Info specifically states “Metafandom links to public posts and does not notify people as a rule. Content published openly on the internet is available to all those with internet access. We do not link to flocked (friends locked) entries).” Yet it is a regular occurrence for a user’s post to be linked to metafandom and for that user to be surprised at the sudden influx of people, primarily strangers (i.e. not on the user’s friends-list), commenting on that particular entry.

Furthermore, this has incited discussion about fandom as a safe space and whether that is possible (untrue_accounts, “Safe Space”), and whether one has the right not to be criticized on their own journal or about their own personal fantansies (Umbo, “Meta thoughts”)."

""I'm here from Metafandom" is the shark jump of livejournal."

Linkspam Linking Policy

Linkspam was founded in 2009 with the goal of highlighting social justice issues in fandom. It was active until 2010.

"Linkspam's goal is to serve as a resource for anti-oppression efforts. We do not subscribe to the belief that there is an objective perspective on any oppression. We believe attempting to be "objective" often results in contributing to the oppression. We will not try to present "two" sides equally. We hope to present resources for people to follow multiple perspectives expressed in anti-oppression discussions relating to fandom online, but we do not pretend to present resources in a neutral context. The organizing principles for Linkspam posts will be roughly chronological."

Because their stated goal was to call out and highlight injustice, their linking and take down policies were more rigid and less accommodating than some meta fandom communities:

"When we link to a post, we (where practicable) leave a comment stating that we have done so. If a post is particularly offensive, the linkspammer may at hir discretion decide not to leave such a comment.

6) As we exist in order to provide an archive and record of discussion, we do not remove links to posts, except in exceptional circumstances. While we discourage requests to take down a link, we will consider them on a case-by-case basis. We are very unlikely to remove links to posts that were made from a position of privilege.

7) We do not link to posts that were locked from the start. However we do not remove links to posts that have since been locked. (Except in exceptional circumstances, see above.) Where practicable we will add a note saying that the post has been locked."

and

"REMOVING LINKS: Linkspam exists in order to provide an archive and record of discussion. Therefore, we will not remove links to posts except in exceptional circumstances. While we discourage requests to take down a link, we will consider them on a case-by-case basis. We are unlikely to remove links to posts made from a position of privilege."

Discussion of the policy:

"I certainly don't ask anyone for permission to link to Pat Robertson's blog when I rebuke or mock him. He posted publicly."

Metanews Linking Policy

Founded in 2013.

From the profile page:

"Meta News is a panfandom meta newsletter. It collects links from all over the web. The main site is metanews at Dreamwidth, this is the LJ mirror.

No meta content is hosted on here, this is a newsletter, not a community, all meta is linked and off-site. We don't link to locked content, and we try to warn where content may be NSFW, triggering or contain spoilers.

Where possible we will ask if posters want to be linked here. (i.e. on DW and LJ. Public blogs are assumed to have given blanket permission, likewise tumblr, where reblogging is the norm.) If you want the link to your content removed, please email/PM us and let us know."

The FAQ goes into greater detail:

"Do you ask before linking to meta?

Yes, we have an always ask policy. If we get a positive reply, we link, if we get a negative reply, we don't link. If we don't get a reply, we don't link. So if you want your meta linked, please let us know. Silence doesn't constitute consent.

We don't always have time to check profiles or sticky posts. We will always assume lack of consent. Even if you say we can link at the top of your post, we will err on the side of asking as reposting something in a personal journal isn't necessarily the same as linking it publicly. The only times we won't ask are if you submitted your link to us yourself, or if you've given us permission in the Blanket Permissions post.

Why do you only ask permission on journalling sites? Because tumblr, by its nature, is a site with blanket permissions to reblog, so we don't think it's an issue. And public blogs are also, by their nature, public.

I changed my mind, can you remove my link?

Sure, you can revoke permission at any time, just let us know what the link was and we'll remove it."

Discussion of the linking policy

To date public discussion of the metanews linking policy has focused on their decision to *not* ask permission before linking to a tumblr post:

"Context: http://metanews.dreamwidth.org/5800.html

Do you really want to spotlight posts like "On female characters" that brought the OP a world of harassment, which then died down, and open them up to more of the same with increased exposure?

I mean, I suppose if the answer is "yes" then that is your prerogative, but how much does it actually cost you to extend the same courtesy of asking to link to tumblr/wordpress users that you extend to people on journal platforms, especially considering that a non-insignificant number of people are only there because that is where their fandoms are, and rely to some extent on security through obscurity (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security_through_obscurity) to have conversations without worrying too hard about being dogpiled."

The moderator's response:

" see your point, but how would you suggest we get permission from the tumblr OP? They have no ask box and no contact details.

That is the main reason we have a no ask policy with tumblrs, because most of the time there's no way to get in touch. The second reason is tumblr reblogging culture. I do understand the obscurity argument, but tumblr is based around reblogs. A tumblr post is far more likely to be raised out of obscurity than any other platform simply because it's being reposted often rather than linked to once or twice.

Ultimately we don't want anyone to be harassed, and of course we don't want to be signal boosting in a negative manner. But without the OP contacting us and asking to have their links taken down, we won't know there is a problem.

As for blogs - the majority we follow are not 'personal' blogs in the manner of LJs or DWs but open fandom blogs and much more public. We decided asking in each case would be obsolete as those posts are written to be read.

Thank you for your feedback, this is something we've put thought into. Tumblr is a difficult platform, not just for this reason. We had to make a decision that would work across the board and allow us to link as much meta as we can, even if it does have flaws for the occasional individual."

thisweekmeta Linking Etiquette

Founded by DoctorSidrat in January 2019.

• Locked, private, and otherwise hidden posts will not be linked to.
• For Tumblr, Twitter, Reddit, Mastodon, and other microblogging sites: if there is a way to ask for permission to link, ask.
• For Dreamwidth, LiveJournal, InsaneJournal, and other amateur/personal blogs and sites: ask first, through comments, private message or email.
• For professional blogs and sites, academic publications: assume permission given, until otherwise notified.
• Links may be removed through request of link owner and only the link owner.
• Any “do not link” notices on either single post or overall journal will be respected by the editor.
• Blanket linking approvals/disapprovals will be respected by the editor. Link owners may revoke or change their linking permissions at any time.

After a Fanlore article that discussed a fan's 2006 meta post was linked in the newsletter, the fan and several friends objected to the linking policy. The editor set up a poll asking for community feedback as to when and how to (a) link to websites and blog posts and (b) whether it was OK to link to Fanlore: "It asks about etiquette regarding Dreamwidth/LiveJournal communities, Fanlore pages, Fanlore-found links, and what to do when an Original Poster is not available for contact."

The editor then summarized her opening thoughts:

My own answers are currently along the lines of: community posts are probably fine to link because they were posted widely to begin with; Fanlore pages made through explicit permission of OP is best, but for certain historical meta it's okay to link anyway; linking to Fanlore to provide further context is fine; no way to ask for permission means no link; if the OP has completely disappeared from fandom and/or online, it's fine to link their stuff."

Fanlore Linking Policy

You can read Fanlore's Citation Policy here. Additionally, individual Fanlore editors are working on a draft list of suggestions and best practices here.

Fanhackers' Linking/Quoting Policy

Fanhackers is a OTW-sponsored fandom news blog that was launched in 2012 and is the successor to Symposium. The linking/quoting policy as it was originally announced:

"Can people post quotes from my fannish meta or links to my fannish meta here without my permission? What about if you reblog my meta from my Tumblr?

Nobody is allowed to quote or link to fannish meta without permission here. Quotes from or links to good fannish meta are very welcome, but because some fans are uncomfortable with the idea of all and sundry coming over to read their meta, we ask that posters get explicit permission from any fannish meta’s creator before linking to or quoting from it. We may reblog meta on Tumblr without asking permission because reblogging is a normal thing to do in that space, but we don’t crosspost reblogs to the WordPress site.

If you see any of your fannish meta referred to here without permission and you’re uncomfortable with that, please contact the mods. Even if you’re fine with your meta being referred to here without your permission, we’d appreciate a heads-up anyway so we can make sure that the poster involved doesn’t do it again."

Some fans expressed concern that the requirement to obtain permission from fannish sources was artificially limiting fannish discussion and also erasing large portion's of fandom history:

"The most recent posting, a quote from Lessig's Remix about Star Wars licensing & copyright stuff, caught my eye. I've been looking at old Star Trek letterzines, which include some of the drama between Paramount and fanzines, wherein Paramount insisted that all fanstuffs cease and desist (except the ones they recognize to be fair use, which they don't want to indicate by name). With the similarity between Lessig's quote and a couple of letters in Interstat #12, I was going to post or submit an excerpt...

The Fanhackers site says "(don't quote fannish meta without permission)." Well, so much for that. I'm not likely to get permission from the author of a 35-year-old letter.

The more I see this whole "do not quote/link/share the fact of the existence of my works without permission," the less sense it makes. We're not protecting fandom from the public; we're just making sure that when those works *are* publicized, they're promoted by people who have no idea of their context and no sensitivity to the issues that are important to us.

I can understand it for fanhackers, especially if its "main" presence is tumblr. Tumblr-fandom uses different standards from LJ/DW, different from the email groups that those replaced, very different from single-website fandoms. Posting to tumblr means allowing your whatever-it-is to be crossposted all over tumblr, possibly with all attribution removed, because that's how tumblr works. I can see a policy of "because any post *could* be the next tumblr craze, we're not posting controversy that could backlash against our community."

Others worried that by making it easier to quote or link to non-fannish sources, fandom's voices would be drowned out:

"In general, I'm troubled by moves to accept a more stringent protection for our own works than we practice in creating transformative works. If there is a conversation about fans, fans should be able to participate, and that includes the right to quote and produce new commentary. I also think there is an unintended consequence here, which you allude to below when you point out that this allows free quoting of academic and journalistic sources - and indeed, from what I've seen, so far those are the sources most often quoted on fanhacker. If fanhacker makes it harder to quote fannish meta about fans than academic/journalistic pieces, likely it will more frequently amplify the voices of academics and journalists (because it is easier), and that imbalance may make it appear as though fans producing knowledge about fandom are less important/influential. As noted by the OP, this is especially the case for older works, orphaned works, and the works of fans who have died. Many of these pieces helped shape what fandom has become. These works should not be lost to history, but more importantly, they should not be forgotten in our contemporary conversations due to a collective pact of silence."

Some fans agreed pointing out that the default should be "link/quote without permission" with a focus on allowing fans to "opt out" (to state in their blog or website that linking/quoting requires permission):

"I think that things are evolving in a direction where people will be less wary of having their meta linked to or quoted elsewhere without their knowing about it. People's attitudes to how much is allowed in terms of quoting, reposting, and archiving change all the time. It's been so often that I've seen an online service create some sort of new tool or bit of functionality, thought "Oh crap, that's going to cause an uproar about fannish privacy or whatnot", and then saw exactly nothing happen. Still personally speaking, I think it would be healthier if we had a climate where the default is that any fannish meta can be quoted or linked to freely, and people who do want to keep their fannish spaces entirely private indicate that on their journals/tumblrs (and have that respected).

In response to the criticisms, Fanhackers requested input on a proposed change to their quoting/linking policy:

"Quoting and linking to fannish meta without asking permission of the author is absolutely okay. We want to make sure that fannish meta gets as much of a place on here as other kinds of meta, and that means making it easier for people to quote. We leave it to individual posters to judge whether they believe the author of the fannish meta they’re quoting wouldn’t mind having outside attention drawn to their fannish space. If someone’s fannish meta is quoted or linked to on Fanhackers and they’re uncomfortable with that, they can contact us with a link to said meta in said fannish space. Then we send them a message through there for verification, and after we’ve received a reply to that, we turn the Fanhackers posts in question private and invisible to all. We also alert the person who made those posts, in case they want to contact the meta’s author themselves and see if they can work something out. If we never hear back from the meta’s author that they’re okay with the Fanhackers posts staying up after all, the posts stay private forever."

Twitter/Tumblr

Like Livejournal, neither Twitter nor Tumblr have policies regarding linking to public posts - in fact, Tumblr operates on the assumption that every post is designed to be reblogged and disseminated far and wide. Twitter, like Livejournal, does enable its users to lock or privatize their tweets but this is an affirmative step the user must take on their own.

In spite of the openness and accessibility of both platforms, many in fandom still feel uncomfortable and unhappy when their posts are shared beyond their immediate circle of friends. And, when that circle includes TV show creators or actors or other celebrities, many feel that fannish etiquette is being violated and fandom as a whole is damaged.

For example, after Tyler Seguin tweeted a picspam that had links to RPF fan fiction, the Hockey RPF fandom reacted with dismay and many writers began deleting or locking their fanfic, journals, and tumblr and twitter accounts.

Main article: Hockey RPF and the Fourth Wall § Tweet from Tyler Seguin

Fan A: "My real issue was that I think the enthusiasm for Open Fandom goes beyond that, and will in the long run do more damage than it will good, because other people already in the fandom will lock down (as is already happening on AO3) and make it less accessible to new fans, and that potential new fans will avoid a (visible, because the rest would be locked) fandom whose openness was beyond their comfort level, which seems to be the exact opposite of what you hope for. I think keeping things as low-key as possible allows us to stay visible to those potential fans in a way a lot more people are comfortable with. Fan B:"I think there’s a balance somewhere that we’re never going to get exactly right, just teeter-totter around. I’m not concerned with fourth wall breaking in an “OMG, they know about me!” way, but I do share your concern that fourth wall breaking means fandom, or at least parts of it, dives underground and makes it harder for new people - and even for some of us who aren’t new, if we aren’t already friends with people who lock things - to participate. There just doesn’t seem to be a technically viable way to make things only visible to the right people (including new people who aren’t yet part of the community but would like to be) that doesn’t also make them potentially visible to people the posters don’t want to see it."

Or as one fan succinctly said on twitter:

"Well, my Tumblr's been linked on Fanlore. Time to burn it down now, I guess. #notreally #maybejustsingeitalittle."

Others see the positive side of being linked to a wider audience:

"....so glad to think Fanlore links are tempting sometimes. :D one of my very favorite OTW projects."

Meta/Further Reading

• Meta, meta, who's got the meta?, ^{Archived version} by cereta (August 12, 2002)
• thisweekmeta Special Edition: TWM Content Poll, ^{Archived version} (After the most recent kerfuffle, I thought I would take this opportunity to ask what folks felt would be the best practices for the newsletter regarding certain sites and types of links) (Jan 26, 2019)
• New Meta Newsletter, Signal Boosting, Linking, Dogpiling, and History, ^{Archived version} (I've been thinking for the last couple weeks about call out culture and dog piles, vs. linking and discussion, especially on DW) (Jan 2019)
• Linking to fanworks, and meta specifically, ^{Archived version} (I always felt that meta, like any other fanwork, was free to link to (assuming unlocked post), but there's a lot of discussion in thisweekmeta that suggests otherwise.) (Jan 26, 2019)
• This Week In Wank, ^{Archived version} (To be honest, this whole debate about linking has just...killed my desire to engage with fandom meta on this site) (Jan 28, 2019)