retrocirce

do you ever cry because you’ve somehow managed to gain a truly fucking amazing person as your friend? and just think about how fucking blessed you are for their existence and how in some previous life you must have done something fucking amazing to deserve them in this life? DO YOU?

(via andrwgarfield)

Fandoms, relationships, social network sites, and privacy

Hi everyone! Here are the questions for my research project, if anyone is interested in participating.

Feel free to message me with responses, anon or not. You can also e-mail answers to retrocirce@gmail.com. If you prefer your answers to be more interactive, please message me and I will create a Google Doc for your responses, and message you a link.

Everything will be kept completely anonymous, including the name/details of fandom communities.

 Questions:

-What social network sites (SNS) do you use (Facebook, Twitter, LiveJournal, Tumblr, etc)? How often do you visit these sites, and what do you use them for?

-Are you involved in any fandoms? If so, which ones (you may include old fandoms, but please indicate whether you are active in the community).

-What is the level of your participation in fandoms (lurker, reader, commenter, beta, author, etc)?

-Do you use a particular SNS for fandom activities or content? Do you prefer specific SNS sites over others for fandom interaction? Why?

-Have you developed any significant relationships/friendships through your participation in fandoms?

-If yes, please tell me about the relationships you’ve made within fandom communities (keep in mind that names will be changed and everything will be kept completely anonymous. You may want to focus on a specific relationship, or write more broadly on multiple relationships).

-Did your relationship(s) keep you engaged within the site? That is, did you continue using a particular SNS because your friends/fandom were active in it?

 -Do you follow your friends to new fandoms when they move on, and/or vice versa?

-Do you follow your friends to new SNS? (from LJ/MySpace/Facebook to Google+, Twitter, Tumblr, etc?)

-Have you left any fandoms? Why?

-Do your RL friends/family know that you are involved in fandoms?

-How would you feel about your fandom activity becoming public (or public to your friends/family/co-workers)?

-Are there certain SNS you feel are more private than others? Does this affect your engagement with the site?

-Is the ability to remain anonymous/pseudo-anonymous important to you and your involvement within fandoms?

The Social Network Fandom:

-Were you involved in the fandom before it was exposed to Gawker?

-If so, how did you feel after?

-Did you leave the fandom as a result? Did you become less active or lock/delete content within the community? Why or why not?

-If you would like to add any additional comments about your fandom participation, your relationships with other fandom community members, or any thoughts about maintaining privacy within fandoms, please post them here:

Thanks so much for your participation!

so i’m working on a student research project about persistence of social networking websites, and whether there is any correlation between user engagement and the strength of relationships within fandoms.

basically, are you on lj/tumblr for fannish reasons, and how many amazing, awesome friends have you met on these sites?

i would really, really love to have some testing interviews for my paper, so if you are interested in filling out a questionnaire, or even just doing a poll, please let me know! 

everything will be COMPLETELY anonymous (including the names/defining traits of the fandoms). this paper will (hopefully) get me into graduate school and i would appreciate any input from anyone involved in fandoms!

if you know anyone who may be interested, please let me know!

[edit]

i just wanted to clarify on the reason i chose to research fandom communities in particular. i’ve been involved in fandoms for 10 years, and it is an experience that is very dear to my heart. i hope to represent the fandom community in a positive light, and to demonstrate that healthy and stable relationships can be built from these communities; that distance to one another does not necessarily affect said relationships in a negative way. 

cannibalcoalition:

You know what?

I don’t care if being a lesbian isn’t natural.

Its 2013. Oreos don’t have a single natural ingredient in them that isn’t distilled out of recognition. People get their vegetables from cans. They have made cruelty-free, lab-grown BACON. People fly around in big, metal machines.

I. AM. TALKING. TO SOMEONE. ACROSS THE WORLD. IN A MATTER OF SECONDS.

Not natural. Is not bad.

Your rhetoric is no longer a valid excuse for hate.

(via dinosaursandwich)