000. welcome & faq

[tozka]

This Week in Meta is a pan-fandom meta newsletter. It collects links from: Dreamwidth, LiveJournal, Tumblr, Twitter, Youtube, blogs, and anywhere else people may be writing and talking about meta. Newsletter guidelines, linking rules and etiquette, as well as posting policies and moderator accounts can be found here.

Anyone can join and anyone can comment, but only editors can post.

FAQ

What is meta?
"In fandom, meta is used to describe a discussion of fanworks of all kinds, fan work in relation to the source text, fanfiction characters and their motivation and psychology, fan behavior, and fandom itself.

Meta or a meta essay can also be a fan-authored piece of non-fiction writing that discusses any of the above topics."
-- via Fanlore

What is linked here?
Meta about: fandom as a whole/concept, fandom history, fannish activities/experiences, fandom statistics/polls, acafan writings, fandom-wide news and resources.

We will (probably) not link to: memes, headcanons about specific characters or fandoms, episode reviews, book reviews, movie reviews, homework help, troll comments/deliberate wank.

Why don't you link to meta about specific fandoms?
Sometimes we do, if it's the kind of meta that could apply to multiple fandom genres, character types, tropes, etc. Also most fandoms have a newsletter or noticeboard of their own, so if you're looking for meta about one specific show, you can usually find it easily enough.

Who runs this thing?
Right now it's tozka, who started it after realizing that all the old meta fandom newsletters had died several years back.

I want to add my link!
Leave a comment on the newest newsletter post, or email the editor.

I don't want my link here!
Leave a comment on the newsletter post your link appears in, or email the editor.

I have other questions or comments!
Leave a comment on the newest newsletter post, or email the editor.

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-- Last updated January 24, 2019.

Comments

[muccamukk]

I will pass that along. I knew she'd done it, and thought she'd have some insight into it.

(I admit that I didn't follow metanews, mostly because I was already following most of the people who got linked there anyway.)

I also, as a separate issue entirely from the_rck's post, wrote about dreamwidth pile ons, and how they've happened in the past: https://muccamukk.dreamwidth.org/1190836.html

I really don't want you to think that I'm not supportive of this project! I think it's great! I'd really like to see it do well.

[tozka]

Thank you! And yeah, everyone's been really excited about the newsletter, which is great-- and also nerve-wracking, because it's a lot of pressure when I'm the only one doing the thing and there's no OTHER thing for people to look at in case they don't like my thing, and there's bad memories from previous things which are making people nervous, and potential for MORE BAD MEMORIES to start with the new thing.

I would like to NOT be in charge of a thing which propagates bad experiences, and while nothing's happened yet (as it's only, uh, three days old), fandom DOES have a bad history of piling on and "calling out" people and it's probably only a matter of time before something blows up.

But I'm trying to think positively, ha. And figure out a set editorial guidelines/policy manual, and post it here for people to see. If anybody is seeing this, and is interested in a still-in-process early version of the guidelines, I have it up here: https://pastebin.com/PmRz2Zc7

[muccamukk]

I like those! I do think it's okay to just link if someone has a "It's fine to link!" thing on their profile.

Thank you for all the thought you're putting into this. I really appreciate it.

[havocthecat]

No one wants that, and I'm sure everyone understands it's a work in progress! I'm sure it'll all get smoothed out and refined as you go on.

[tozka]

<3