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marchmetamatterschallenge2023-02-28 09:08 am
yourlibrarian) wrote in marchmetamatterschallenge2023-02-28 09:08 am
Entry tags:
March Meta Matters Challenge, Check-in No. 1
Welcome to year 4 of the Meta Matters Challenge! I'm your moderator, yourlibrarian.
These posts will be used for us all to check-in with one another, offer encouragement and answers to questions, and maybe tips we come up with as we copy our work to another location.
Before we begin, some reminders. Please look over the FAQ as there are some important bits for everyone to follow, namely:
Remember to tag all your posts with the "Nonfiction" tag (in the "Additional Tags" section of the posting form if using AO3 or SquidgeWorld).
Remember to add your meta to the March Meta Matters Challenge community on either AO3 or Squidgeworld (if posting on those sites).
If you've already begun copying over your meta, you can always edit the files to add in the tags and collection assignment.
Also, as stated in the previous post, it's a good idea to glance over the FAQ as there have been changes made this year.
Since this is our first check-in, please comment with one or more of the following:
1) Details about you: This could include canons (if any) you've written meta in, years in fandom, things you tend to write about (if you've noticed themes), or whatever else you'd like to share.
2) Details about your meta: How much of your past work are you going to be looking through? Have you already started reviewing fandom accounts? Have you archived a lot of it already in past challenges?
3) Goals you have: Maybe you want to back up a certain number of posts. Maybe you want to update older meta. Maybe you're looking forward to writing new meta. We all have hopes of what we can accomplish this month. Feel free to share them!
Also, if you have any questions not already covered in our introductory post or in our FAQ, include them here.
Remember, this account accepts anonymous comments, so if you don't have a Dreamwidth account we still want to hear from you and have you take part. Just sign your messages with your username and we'll all get to know you!
yourlibrarian. These posts will be used for us all to check-in with one another, offer encouragement and answers to questions, and maybe tips we come up with as we copy our work to another location.
Before we begin, some reminders. Please look over the FAQ as there are some important bits for everyone to follow, namely:
Remember to tag all your posts with the "Nonfiction" tag (in the "Additional Tags" section of the posting form if using AO3 or SquidgeWorld).
Remember to add your meta to the March Meta Matters Challenge community on either AO3 or Squidgeworld (if posting on those sites).
If you've already begun copying over your meta, you can always edit the files to add in the tags and collection assignment.
Also, as stated in the previous post, it's a good idea to glance over the FAQ as there have been changes made this year.
Since this is our first check-in, please comment with one or more of the following:
1) Details about you: This could include canons (if any) you've written meta in, years in fandom, things you tend to write about (if you've noticed themes), or whatever else you'd like to share.
2) Details about your meta: How much of your past work are you going to be looking through? Have you already started reviewing fandom accounts? Have you archived a lot of it already in past challenges?
3) Goals you have: Maybe you want to back up a certain number of posts. Maybe you want to update older meta. Maybe you're looking forward to writing new meta. We all have hopes of what we can accomplish this month. Feel free to share them!
Also, if you have any questions not already covered in our introductory post or in our FAQ, include them here.
Remember, this account accepts anonymous comments, so if you don't have a Dreamwidth account we still want to hear from you and have you take part. Just sign your messages with your username and we'll all get to know you!
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1) I'm Coyote, and my applicable works are kind of all over the place. This year though I'm thinking of creating a "metafandom" series to categorize some of my existing works and a couple of new ones. This would be a grouping for my metacommentary on general stuff spanning multiple fandoms, like fandom terminology, fan-focused web platforms, and that kind of thing.
2) I've participated in MMMC before and, overall, I don't have much of a backlog. However...
3) This year I aim to copy over my AO3 works to SquidgeWorld, as well as archive some new stuff written in the past year. That's 23 existing AO3 works to bring over, which is a lot more than I've tackled in the past.
Given the discussion about what is or isn't allowed on AO3, I also have some uncertainty about which new pieces to upload there. Right now I figure Sexless Menace and Dogmatic Positivity are probably in the clear, but what about Reading a Moral Panic? On the one hand, I think the fandom relevance is definitely there. On the other hand, the connection might be too implicit for AO3, so I might port that one to SW only.
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I don't have nearly as much to work through this year as in years past. Last year was the big one, as I got through a few years with lots of episode reviews. However I still have at least 4 years, so we'll see if I catch up.
I mentioned this on another post, but one thing I'd suggest re: copying from AO3 to Squidge World is that the AO3 tags will be helpful. Because it's a far smaller site, a number of tags, including fandoms, don't exist there yet. However I found that the canonization is very fast, usually in a day or two. So especially if you have a lot on a particular topic or fandom, you'll likely find if you do one that by the next day the autocomplete will work for the rest of your posts.
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2) I plan to archive my meta from the past year of posting it, since I began to actually write and post meta last year. I've archived a couple pieces, but primarily I've been waiting to do the rest for this event!
3) Goals are to update some past meta a bit when archiving such as adding context to each archived post, and writing new meta as well! :D
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And it's such a good topic! Either people who have also noticed the changes comment or people who didn't know about it are interested 😉
Great to hear that you've started writing it and that we'll help keep it around!
Yes, I notice that unless it started out as a formal essay, I tend to have to do some editing as I copy things over. Sometimes I even merge things if they were shorter pieces.
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(this will supersede the such a thing I already have in the MMMC AO3 collection, largely because I revised the episode order analysis for S1–2, and partly because there's been a couple seasons since then)
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for S3–5, trust production code episode order only. (here's S3's on the fandom-dot-com wiki, you can find the others from there, or it'll be in my meta when that goes up.) watching these seasons in either world-premiere order or any particular network's airing order is guaranteed to screw things up. for S1–2, I still think episode order matters a lot, but I am explaining my reasoning for episode order precisely because there is no official episode order and all the networks contradict each other. in particular, the showrunner's assertion that production code order is chronological order for the entire series is false for S2 (helpful when there's no clear plot reason to distinguish which of two episodes is earlier, but false), and for S1 it's really thoroughly false.
it is my strong opinion that first-watch order puts the earliest two chronological episodes after the rest of S1,as a flashback two-part season finale, and before all of S2 except the Christmas special (which kind of has to go two-thirds of the way into S1 because S1 starts when the school year does and S1 has a Valentine's episode). also that first-watch order includes the webisodes in several chunks between seasons in approximately the order aired, instead of slotted in individually where they fit chronologically. the Shanghai special goes somewhere between 3x14 and 3x20 (and I'm putting it between 3x14 and 3x15), even though it aired rather after the New York special (which is unambiguously between 3x26 and 4x01).
if you're cool with sailing the high seas,
5x11 has only aired in Brazilian Portuguese, but everything else through 5x12 has aired in English somewhere in the world. as have 5x16 and 5x18–20, but we do not speak of them until they can be watched in production code order without skipping unaired episodes. we also do not speak of the leaks, which include a shitton of S5 storyboards and the through-S5 series bible.
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Introduction
I typically post my meta on Dreamwidth, and some of the older stuff is on LiveJournal. Some is in notes under fiction I've posted on AO3. I'm not on SquidgeWorld and after reading about AO3's erratic handling of meta I'm not inclined to post it there either. But if anyone wants to copy it to another site, that's fine as long as you leave the credits intact.
One of my goals this year is to do more archiving through sites like the Wayback Machine and Archive.fo so that is where I will probably be copying my meta.
My Meta tag (or the older one on LiveJournal) includes descriptions of genres from another world, meta about some of my other writing worlds, links to other other people's meta often with discussions, meta about fanfic/fandom in general, some musings on how to handle particular topics, identity literature, and a few bits that touch on some particular canon. A lot of it involves me poking holes in other people's arguments, pointing out how suggestions are troublesome, and suggesting other alternatives instead.
I just realized that, while I have a lot of discussions and link lists that started as answering a friend's question, I don't tend to tag these as meta even if they are. Bother. Those more often land in my How To tag, so you can skim that for the meta entries if you wish. I should probably go through How To and add Meta tags where relevant. I did just go back and tag as Meta several major pieces that lots of people refer to, like Nonsexual Intimacies and Skills Heroes Need. So that's one thing accomplished.
>>1) Details about you: This could include canons (if any) you've written meta in, years in fandom, things you tend to write about (if you've noticed themes), or whatever else you'd like to share.<<
Canons: I have a lot of original writing and I write meta for most of it. Hardcore meta. I mean I have oopsed a book repeatedly doing that and not all of them were even dictionaries. I have Tolkienesque amounts of notes and other meta. A Conflagration of Dragons and Daughters of the Apocalypse are a couple original series where I've posted substantial amounts of the meta because those settings really benefit from seeing their background materials.
I wrote massive amounts of meta for the Torn World project but that website is no longer visible to the public. :( I did most of the work building three related languages and several ecosystems, and other folks did different ecosystems and scads of other worldbuilding entries, how-to-write guides, etc.
One of the bigger pieces I've posted about someone else's stuff is a guide to The Ursulan Cycle, which is genderbent King Arthur. The Shared Worlds page has links to other background materials.
I've written fanfic in many canons. *chuckle* Some of my earliest hardcore meta is still being passed around the Valdemar fandom, because they're demifiction guidebooks on how to do stuff. If I remember right, there was one on games and one one dyes/disguises. My biggest fanseries is Love Is For Children (The Avengers). That landing page has a bunch of meta in it along with links to the entries.
Time in fandom: I have decades in fandom, and more before that when I was a fan but had not yet discovered fandom as a community.
Things I tend to write about: I have a bunch of recurring themes that I address both in meta and fiction/poetry. These include but are not limited to adoption (including found-family and interspecies), boundaries and consent, ethics, family of choice and diverse family shapes, fish out of water, how to make the world a better place, identity, implications of special abilities, languages-linguistics-xenolinguistics, sex/gender dynamics (especially alien/fantasy iterations), sociodynamics, spirituality, trauma and recovery.
>> 2) Details about your meta: How much of your past work are you going to be looking through? Have you already started reviewing fandom accounts? Have you archived a lot of it already in past challenges? <<
I hadn't really focused on this aspect before, but I probably should go through and archive my previously posted meta. And try to remember other stuff that is meta but not tagged as such, and tag it.
>> 3) Goals you have: Maybe you want to back up a certain number of posts. Maybe you want to update older meta. Maybe you're looking forward to writing new meta. We all have hopes of what we can accomplish this month. Feel free to share them! <<
What I really want to do, if I can squeak in the time for it, is write several new pieces of meta about Wednesday. I think I made notes for three: the series as a whole, Wednesday, and Thing.
Finally, my next Poetry Fishbowl will be on Tuesday, March 7 with a theme of "Crafts." If you want to drop by and leave me meta-related prompts, I can write characters talking about meta; I've done a few pieces of that in the past.
Re: Introduction
Yes! I've found so many references in my meta to another person's post. Sometimes it wasn't even a response, as that they made me think about something I wanted to discuss.
Guides are something so useful to fandoms and yet so rarely thought of for preservation so it's good yours will still be found 🙂
Nothing like a large body of work to make you recognize themes. I don't know as I've seen something in my own work but as discussed with osteophage above, I can at least classify them in groups.
Good that you'll be writing some new works as well, especially for such a new fandom. I plan to address that in our next check in.
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I'm Six (or Archer, that being the pen name under which I've composed a bunch of meta.) Adult on the internet, native English speaker with a strong second language in Japanese and a growing interest in Latin. I've written meta and spoken at cons about Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and written and started a website to archive meta for Dark Souls series. (You can find it at https://anorlondoarchery.club. Heads up: the DNS is currently a bit shaky, and it may not always load on the first try.)
I didn't actually realize AO3 permitted meta, and will have to examine their terms to figure out whether my stuff is allowed. I don't think it's ephemeral, buuuut...
2) Details about your meta:
I like to play in the linguistic side of things, examining the translation from Japanese to English. Lost nuance, gained nuance, and sideways references to (particularly Shinto) cultural themes are common objects of focus.
Eventually, I want to touch every named location and character in Dark Souls 1. I'm currently working up a spreadsheet with some initial commentary that should make tracking that easy.
3) Goals you have:
- Get my seven existing essays onto my website. Possibly set up an AO3 alias to handle them separate from my fic? If so, mirror them there too.
I've already revisited the six I posted prior to March, updated and edited them for greater clarity (and in one case, new information!) So that should be just a matter of formatting and posting, whenever I've got the time.
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Sadly, I think the fact that a lot of people didn't know AO3 accepted meta 10 years ago has led to the dearth of it at the site. However, unfortunately there's a whole segment of it which seems to be excluded, so perhaps a lot of past contributors ran into that issue as well.
Sounds like a really interesting focus for your meta work 🙂
Definitely having a separate account for meta is sounding like a good proposition for AO3 users, particularly if they have an active account for fiction or other fanworks. Sounds like you've got a clear plan for the month!
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Hi, thanks for organizing this! I'm atamascolily on AO3, tumblr, and Dreamwidth--I write a lot about Star Wars (especially Legends), Puella Magi Madoka Magica, and various small fandoms. I'm especially interested in symbolism, worldbuilding, and the unexpected connections, influences, and references that shape a work and/or transform my perceptions of it.
A lot of my meta posts fall into the "review" category and thus would not be acceptable by AO3's current rules, so I'm still thinking about how and what I want to do with them--it's challenging to find things on tumblr and it would be good to have them in a more accessible form. I'm probably not going to sign up for a Squidgeworld account this year, but it's good to know that option is available. Many of my tumblr posts are also very image-heavy, which is its own challenge.
To be honest, going through the backlog of stuff on tumblr and DW is honestly kinda intimidating, so I am trying to take it slow and simple instead of trying to do everything at once. So far, I've posted one new meta essay for PMMMM and one revised and expanded tumblr post about Kushiel's Legacy series worldbuilding to the AO3 collection, which feels like a good start!
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Personally glad to hear about the Star Wars meta 😉 It's always interesting to discover what spurs people to write.
Yes, images can be so relevant for reviews or particular types or meta (such as lighting, costuming, etc.) yet can make it so difficult to duplicate the post in other places. And most places which do image hosting no longer have free tiers or they're very restricted 😞 And some which are free (like Google Photos) make it very difficult to embed them. (I've done it, but it's slow).
I completely understand how daunting the task can seem when you start out. I had done a little crossposting prior to the MMM challenge starting, but most of it has been done in these last 3 years and the first few in particular felt very slow to me. I had over 15 years of work to go through and a lot meta wasn't even tagged as such so I had to do it entry by entry. I also ended up piecing together or expanding different things so it sometimes felt like I was making no headway.
What I hope you'll find is that as you start getting pieces copied, you start feeling the urge to keep at it. I know that it has happened to me just this week. Also I'd say set the bar low the first year. I know that for some just identifying the posts in question was the whole task for their first year (I don't know how it was done, whether through bookmarks or making a doc with links in it). But what I can say is that however much you do, it's more than you'd done before!
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Thank you, this is all so encouraging!
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2) I'm aiming to crosspost my meta posts from Tumblr over to SqWA and Ao3.
3) I want to write 1 new piece of meta this month.
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Two things I'd really like to accomplish for MMM: I've been thinking about a set of Demacian funerary practices it would be fun to write up, and also there's this... Cinematic Universe of three unrelated songs (other than all being from the "Gunfighter Ballad Parody" genre) that I want to share with the world. XD
I will reblog if you post March Meta Matters announcements to the tumblr!
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Also, thank you for asking about Tumblr. We had an RSS feed of this account to Tumblr at https://www.tumblr.com/marchmetamatters but I'm guessing the changes Tumblr made this past year broke it. I checked the IFTTT applet and it seemed to be gathering the DW post but couldn't get it posted at Tumblr 😞
For now, I went ahead and crossposted this entry there so that you can circulate it, but unless a fix can be found for the automation I don't plan to continue crossposting there by hand as last year's posts didn't seem to get any circulation on the site.
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