Category Archives: The OFIC Forums

The OFIC Forums: The Early Days

Hey all,

 

Welcome to the site, and we’re very happy to have you here! :) However, if you’re a general checker-outer and stumble-across-er, the test forums are going to be in beta mode for a while. The idea is that mods and admins will do their work behind the scenes, plotting world domination and eating lots and lots of virtual chocolate cake. (No calories, you see… ;)

So there just won’t be that much to see for a while. If you just happened to find this site, we’re happy that you did! I’m mulling over the idea of putting everyone on guest status (can read but can’t post) for a while, though, until we’re really ready to open. Once we are, these forums will be moved to the actual permanent forum site. Because I want this to be for ALL fandoms, well… it can’t really be a D/G blog page, can it? ;) Also, the mod forums will be closed to everyone except potential mods and admins. I’m trying to find out if people who register now would just have to register again when we move to a different site… that’s the only thing I’m afraid might happen. (But early register-ers will  still get a very special prize! ;) (No, I’m not going to tell you what it is!!) So just sit tight and wait for a little bit… and when the test forums are moved to the actual page, we’ll open everything up to everybody. Yay!

 

Anise, the Admin

The Manifesto, Yay

SHORT MANIFESTO

 

Hi! I’m Anise. (waves)

I’ve been writing fanfic for a long time. When I started, I’d just had FOUR (count ‘em, four) original novels rejected. This was before Kindle, before Amazon, before any kind of realistic option to self-publish online… and thank GOD, I at least had enough common sense to not go old school and self-publish in print. (Unless you were writing niche non-fiction, that was almost always a BAD, bad idea.) Fanfic really brought me back to writing fiction at a point when I seriously never thought I would do it again. And I’ve come to realize a few things over time.

 

  • Fanfic teaches writing like NO other resource I know of. Authors who don’t write fanfic, who’ve never written it, and who’ve never been part of a fandom community have missed out on so much. I’ve seen this over and over and over again in F2F groups. They may be great technical writers, but they have rarely been taught how to tell a story. Fanfic writers get this (especially if they’ve been around long enough…) And it’s for one simple reason. We’ve been “writing” for about 7,000 years. We’ve been telling stories as long as we’ve been human. And the last “original” story was probably told by Ug the Caveperson in front of the campfire about 75,000 years ago. All writing is fanfic because all storytelling is fanfic, and as fanfic writers, we tell stories to each other. So are constantly perfecting what our brains have evolved to do—there are even theories that human consciousness itself evolved through storytelling! And we’ve learned how to tell these stories.

 

  • Fanfic communities are unlike any other in their quality of support and encouragement. We write together, read together, and cheer each other on! We’re united by a common love of writing, reading, and creativity, and while it all starts with a specific fandom, that’s really just the beginning. The ethos of fanfic communities is the key to supporting writers, creating a learning and growing atmosphere for all of us.

 

  • And, oh yeah… Your work in fanfic holds the secret to success with your original writing. THE secret and THE key. Understand, this doesn’t come first. The writing and the support come first. And it doesn’t work automatically; we don’t reach readers with our original fics simply because we wrote fanfic first. There will be MANY essays on this secret, based on all the time I’ve ever spent in publishing and writers’ groups, all the weird marketing attempts I’ve ever seen, all the desperate writers who couldn’t figure out why things weren’t working for them… all the techniques that failed… and the secret of what finally worked. No, I’m not going to tell you what it is right now!! Wait for the essays. And the podcasts. And we’ll all work it out together, too. J A big part of the secret is that “marketing” and “selling” have to come LAST (and it’s a whole lot better to never think in those terms at all.) That’s not what works. We are here to write and to support each other.

 

  • Finally, I want to help authors who are ready to go with their ofic work (or ononfic!) This isn’t something I’ve really seen before, especially in the context of everything else we do. Ofic authors will have their own page, links to find and buy their work, their own podcast, and so on and on.

But this is NOT self-promotion. I will say that I really need writers to not go over the top with self promos and to keep them limited on this site, and it’s BECAUSE we do this very labor-intensive thing that will help you. If you have writing ready to go/already published/about to be published, then help us to help you.

Apply for our help. There will be a special thread and an application process—we need to know if the writing’s any good and we need to be sure that authors are the real thing.

 

I have never seen this process really happen on another site, and I think it’s desperately needed.

 

I guess that overall, I have a dream. I want to do something a little different from what I really see any other writing site doing. More than anything else, I want a writing site that brings in all the strengths of fanfic, acknowledges them, and knows that the last thing ON EARTH or in the universe a writer should do as they move into original writing is to “leave fanfic behind.” We have to bring the strengths, the unique qualities, of fanfic and fandoms into our original work… and into sharing that work with a larger audience.

 

We are a community. We bring everything we are as fandom communities into original writing. And those are priceless gifts, indescribably valuable qualities, in every way imaginable. We have the potential to create something unique. And with your help… we can do it!

Working on the test forum for the OFICS…

Hey all,

I know, I haven’t posted anything here in awhile… but there’s a new announcement! I’m really intimidated by the idea of starting the OFIC forums… SO much work… so I’m working on some SimplePress test forums first, and those will be right here. 🙂 It’s just kind of a head’s up. More updates as events warrant.

D/G Blast from the Past! Yay!

dec_2004_archive of fia

And now it’s time for another episode of “Guess What This Is,” aka “Reason #83479204.pi Why It’s Totally Pointless To Take Down Your Fanfics In An Attempt To Pretend You Never Wrote Or Posted Them.” Because The Wayback Machine knows. That’s why.

Yep, y’all, it’s Dec 28, 2004. All of these lovely fics are still with us, to the best of my knowledge; this is a date randomly chosen to make a point.

Also, it’s fun to look up old web pages. Wow, there’s a lot on there. 🙂

New Discussion Site for the OFIC Forums!

OFIC FORUMS

Hey all,

So I’ve thought about this a lot. The ofic forum idea has been on my mind for about a year. And I’ve never really done anything with it yet. There’s so much going on right now, including the D/G fic exchange (only 19 days left, people!!) But I realized something: there will never be a perfect time!! Or maybe right now is ALWAYS the perfect time. 🙂 Sometimes you just need to carpe that diem.

What exactly IS an ofic forum? It’s all explained right here—and even a little bit about why it’s so important for the future of the D/G fandom. Whether you’re a writer, a reader, or both, you REALLY want to be involved with this. I’ve decided to have the discussion board as part of the FIA forums, because they’re already there and set up. So come and join in!