#state of podcasting

[mauricecherry]

Come hear me talk shop about the state of podcasting with this virtual panel from the Signal Awards! Managing Director Deondric Royster will be moderating a discussion with Joni Deutsch and myself about some of the biggest topics in the podcasting industry right now.

This is a free talk, so register below so you can be part of the conversation. (And if you're not able to make it, leave me some topics or questions that you'd like to hear answered during the event!)

[soupdwelling]

seeking refuge

closeup under cut!

[qcomicsy]

If the batkids had a podcast

Redhood: I was a pretty easy child-

Nightwing: You were.

Redhood: Straight A's and everything. Like, I would be hanging out with Batman- (laugh) I would be- You know right?

Nightwing: Yeah.

Redhood: Just chilling. No patrol day. And he would be like "what do you want to do?" and I would be like- "Read! :D"

Nightwing *chuckles*: "Homework!"

Redhood: "Homework!". And then- And then I fucking died-

Red Robin: WHEZE.

Redhood: I fucking- Don't be a easy child.

Red Robin (chocking): Don't be a good kid.

Redhood: Don't be a good kid. Start- I don't know– Start throwing shit on fire or something.

Next post

[arthur-lesters-right-arm]

Didn't we fucking all.

[under-lok-n-ki]

tits out for Lunadeyis

[mewy101]

You find me a mess but I'm a better man

[franks-arms]

The really great part about Malevolent by this point is that Arthur and John have completely given up on what is essentially the primary plot of the show - getting separated. You are in the middle of an investigation to get your body and sight back Arthur, what do you mean you just want to drop everything and go back to England?

[do-you-know-this-queer-character]

Do you know this queer character?

Martin is MLM and uses he/him pronouns!

[glendover]

two things all podcast men have in common: they are miserable and they are gay

[alatariel-galadriel]

Juno and Peter deserve at least one (1) more ball dance before their Penumbra saga ends

Based on this Linedecker painting

[osteochondraldefect]

"Hope" is the thing with feathers...

+some of my favourite frames, this whole thing in itself took me like. 2 and a half days? i was on a non-stop grind though

[chronically-ghosted]

i totally agree that it’s ridiculous for people to write fics for films that haven’t been released yet, but the problem isn’t the smut itself. people have every right to write porn if that scratches the itch.

i think your main point is the most important: it’s impossible to write a thoughtful, inspired fic when we don’t even know the story it’s based on. no one knows who this character is or what he’s like.

at this point, everyone should just call a spade a spade and write pedro rpf. all they care about is seeing his face in different situations.

so my earlier post was not so much a statement on Pedro Pascal Character fanfiction/porn, but the commercialization of art and I interpreted the thoughts and opinions of others through the lens of the medium I most often express myself with, which is fanfiction.

let me be clear: i have no problem with smut - pwp or otherwise. people are allowed to write whatever they want, about whoever they want, with whatever tropes make them happy.

my overall focus (and granted it was probably very muddled by the end of those - what, like three reblogs?) was an interrogation of fanfiction as art, and the state of art in this modern era. and after doing some more thinking and listening to more people much smarter than me (thank you to everyone who dm-ed me directly to talk further about this), my opinion is thus: the creation of content (not art) is more ubiquitous today is not because we are getting more stupid as a society, not because of our failing attention spans, not because we are on the brink of moral collapse but because we physically do not have the mental strength to be intellectually curious as a direct result of constant, distracting, emotionally-draining stimuli.

i can explain what i mean below the cut with two primary examples, specifically regarding the shift in fanfiction cult, and yes, the prominence of smutty oneshots in the pedro pascal character fandom of which this blog is a part of.

I have been in various fandoms for almost twenty years. I have been writing fanfiction for almost that same amount of time. In recent years, I've noticed two trends that initially discouraged me, but that I now believe is a symptom of our adjustment to a modern, constantly online era.

A severe lack of engagement within the artistic artifacts of a fandom

The quality of the fanfiction itself (because yes I do consider fanfiction to be an artform) has gone down hill - mostly.

Lack of engagement:

Art is inherently created to be shared. This is especially true for fandom because the community lives or dies by how many people are interacting with each other and sharing ideas (news, theories, fanart, fanfic, etc). If you say a fandom is dead, it means there haven't been any new posts or fic about it in years. So I don't wanna hear it when people say, "oh write for yourself, you shouldn't be chasing engagement" because that is antithetical to the very concept of fanfiction.

In recent years, I have seen and experienced myself engagement in my work only so far as a like or kudo. This is not how it used to be. Message boards (yes I am that old) and niche fandom sites were constantly abuzz with media sharing and excitement, and everyone enjoyed some version of praise (unless you got hit by the antis but they're never fun anyway). Initially I blamed this drop in engagement on laziness: people just want the next thing, they can't be bothered to appreciate the hard work writers put in and they just see content and art as the same thing - stuff to consume.

But I myself am GUILTY of minimal reblogs and comments and I LOVE what I'm writing - the impact certain works leave me with is long, long lasting but for some goddamn reason, I can't sit down and praise the author's works. Am I lazy? Possibly, but this is also not an isolated behavior and it's on the rise: people do not have time to engage with fandom/fanfic like they used to. Most people I know have worked at least two or three jobs at some point in their lives to just to make rent. This gen z is the first generation in DECADES to be worse off economically than their parents. With an interest rate at 8%, who the fuck can afford the security of a home anymore? We work ourselves to the bone for scraps and the realization that The Dream has officially died. And so what do we want to do in the free time we do have? Engage with the very bare minimum. We want to read things that we can at best skim, things we don't have to think about or engage with in any meaningful way. We want a way to turn off the noise of the next apocalypse and sometimes the best we can do is the tap of a thumb.

Which brings me to my next point: what the fuck happened to thoughtful fanfiction?

But this question is inextricably linked to the points above: oneshots are easier to write, faster to write, and if you write fic that is basically "Mad libs porn" (without ever engaging in the actual medium because it is literally not released yet), you are doing the most minimal work for the most amount of engagement. But I can't fault ANYONE for doing that. It feels good to be told your smut is "so hot" or "this exploded my panties" and in this era where the time available to create is so fucking small and minimized of course you're going to write for the most popular character, whether or not you're interested in the source material because we want our art to matter to someone. Intellectual pundits loooove to lambast our "shorter attention spans" but fuck, when are we allowed the time to think - in between this "100 year storm" that's happened twice in the past five years, or the global pandemic that turned millions of deaths into a political punching bag, or the next video of a white woman crying wolf to the police over an innocent black man, or - or - or - or

In a day where reality and the world as we know seems to be holding onto a thread, we turn to comfort: comforting tropes (dbf to rape/kidnap fantasies), comforting fanfic (pwp), and comforting ways to engage with fandom. There is nothing wrong with wanting your art to be appreciated and there's nothing wrong with inherently wrong with pwp - but I do believe its symptomatic of a MUCH larger and more sinister movement within ALL art right now.

I come from the generation who banished fanfic authors for scrubbing off the filing numbers to their fics and publishing it as original content because, in our communities, they were selling out. Fanfiction is inherently an act of rebellion. Every time you write fanfiction you break canon, an established structure with its own rules and boundaries. So by trying to appeal to the masses, to curb your own writing to fit whatever is mainstream, you are doing a disservice to yourself AND to the art of fanfiction. If something you write becomes popular, wonderful, great, you are very lucky and there is nothing wrong with that either. But do not sell out your 13 beloved fans who WILL take the time to leave a comment, who WILL take the time to reblog because your weird little fic spoke to them on a fundamental level and now is with them for the rest of their lives - in favor of a 100 thumb taps.

If you've made it here, thank you very much for reading. I've added some links to some additional references to see how this concept of "populist" art is having a serious negative down turn in the quality of art, but is also not any one individuals personal failings:

Why the world is addicted to background tv by Kayleigh Day

How Modern Audience are failing cinema by Like Stories of Old

Rupi Kaur episode of Rehash podcast

I'm always here to talk fic and art and what makes you excited about your writing. Much love and please rest. We need you here.

[bitchesgetriches]

In light of the election results, a lot of folks are looking at fleeing deep red states. Here is our advice. (Transcript in the link)

[juricore]

ok to be fair when i watched utena for the first time at 16 i definitely didn't fully Get It. like i still walked away like Woah that was life changing but i missed some very big themes/points and that's why i think rgu really really improves upon and deserves multiple rewatches. and i also think that watching the apocalypse arc for the first time becomes very personal, you take away what you need to take away from the show (or at least i did at 16). so i WANT to give grace to people who may have misinterpreted rgu because it's a complicated show but if people are writing blogs or videos or putting out long form media called stuff like UTENA EXPLAINED 😱 and still fucking miss the point um lol actually

[chiropteracupola]

"I think Maturin as a naturalist kind of verges on the profound... together these two men are a dialectic which will deliver the world we live in, for better and worse. ...you have the scientific, rational, and you have the, y'know, martial... you can plug it into whatever fuckin' dichotomy you want, Dionysus and Apollo..."

— November Kelly, Kill James Bond! s3e8.5: Master and Commander

[sunshine-girl-shines]

If I had a nickel for every time a mortal was in love with an Eldritch god named Jo(h)n in podcast, I’d have two nickels; which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice.