Not always. I know too well that it can be the start of gatekeeping misery. But it is an invitation to share joy regularly enough that I feel safe saying it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a thing that happens.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.amberbird.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/maxresdefault-300x169.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
When I met Ernest Cline, we talked about a thing we were both huge fans of. He didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t do any gatekeeping. Instead…You know how we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re always saying, \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Instead of being a gatekeeper, just be thrilled to find someone who loves a thing you love\u00e2\u20ac\u009d? Yeah, he did that. And, when I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know about some trivia, he didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t sneer. He was excited to fill me in, to make the glee and the knowledge mutual.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
Requiring people to know facts to win a contest isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the same as being against, for instance, fan fiction.<\/p>\n
People wanting to know what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s canon isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the same as being against fan fiction.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
For as long as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve thought about virtual reality, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve imagined doing there what I do in my imagination: filling it with things\/people I love from fiction and hanging out with all that. I know others who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve thought the same way. So, yeah, of course the OASIS is filled with all the cool media and culture people love. And to not mention that would be to leave out one of the cool aspects of being there.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
All those people running around the OASIS with their media interests? Driving the robots and the cars and hanging with their fictional friends? Lived fan fic, baby. And I think most of us, including authors, just sort of assume you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll all be doing that…We\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll probably do a little of it with you.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
As a creator of things, I do understand why you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d want people not to disregard your canon or to treat your characters as if they know those characters better than you do. I feel torn; I want people to respect that I know my characters best and I want them to love them so much (so much that it leads to fanfic).<\/p>\n
But, also, I have friends who write fic and there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s this one idea that I sometimes play with in my head. So, I guess I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m saying that I feel like living proof that you can strongly value canon and the facts about a fiction whilst thinking it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s great your friends write fic. I think I lost the plot on this particular random pondering observation…Sorry.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
If you were\/are a geek, someone has probably told you that you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re wasting your time with all that geek stuff that makes your heart happy. Learning facts, playing video games, maybe even reading\/writing fic as a supplemental source of joy, etc. And you know what would be the dream come-uppance? If it was the opposite of a waste of time. If, in fact, it was what let you win a life-changing prize. Yes, please!<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
But, listen, if a book or film just isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t to your tastes, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s okay too. We can like different things without either of us being bad. What makes you bad is if you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re a jerk to other people for having different tastes.<\/p>\n
Also, you can dislike a thing without that thing itself being bad. Maybe it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just not to your taste. That\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s okay. Few things are for everyone.<\/p>\n
***<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.amberbird.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/5a-1200-300x300.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Ready Player One<\/em> was for me.<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n Maybe it was for you too, and you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re looking at the impending film and you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re worried. Neil Gaiman has said that a film doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t ruin a book; the book is still on your shelf. (Though author\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s are allowed to feel some worry, because people will tie their book to the film, especially since people seem more wont to watch than to read. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s definitely possible the quality\/qualities of the film will impact how people see their work. For example, I was given the Magicians trilogy when I mentioned to a friend that I love the programme but hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t had a chance yet to read the books. And I had to work hard to get rid of the TV image of the characters and explore Grossman\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s world as he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122d written it. If the TV version had sucked, the books might not even have gotten a chance.)<\/p>\n Plus, there are some great reviews and a friend who saw it already LOVED it. So, optimism!<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n Maybe RPO was for you too, and you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re already criticising differences in the impending film. I have definitely done that. And then I realised that the novelisation of something from TV or film and the dramatisation of something that was first written is like a remix.<\/p>\n Remixes are never exactly like the original. But that doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t mean they suck. (I mean, sure, sometimes they do…) They\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re just different. They explore a different aspect of the original, or they allow the song to serve a different purpose (e.g., make it better for dancing). And that film that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s coming out? It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a remix of the book, meant to fit the cinema. Meant to explore the themes that most appealed to the filmmaker.<\/p>\n You\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re smart. You get what I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m saying.<\/p>\n And maybe, like me, thinking of the film as a remix will make it easy to just let go of the original and enjoy what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s good in the film.<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n I expect, when I see the film tomorrow, that I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m going to enjoy it. I do so love a good remix.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" (I no longer enjoy, nor have time for, arguing with people online. Especially given what a nasty place the internet has become for any conversation where you don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t agree. So, yeah, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m talking around a thing.) *** Before there was an internet, if you wanted a list of all giant robot films, you wrote it yourself. You didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t have any guarantee that anyone else would have done that, but you knew you wanted to know and, if you were lucky, your friends wanted to know. So, you became the Wikipedia article. (And, even now, the information on the internet doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t just appear; someone writes it.) So, there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s one reason someone might memorise a lot of facts and trivia about a thing. One reason whole generations of people might see that as a desirable thing to do and to share. *** It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not just us Autistic people who often have brains that enjoy cataloguing thing. Kids will memorise all the characters in the latest toy-selling TV programme. Sports fans will memorise sports stats. Etc. We like to carry that knowledge around in us. We like to have it to share and to think about. We like not having to look stuff […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":892,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,11,6,8,9,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-891","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-actually-autistic","category-artists-life","category-inspirations-influences","category-pondering","category-relationships","category-writing"],"yoast_head":"\n