It's an interesting point about the equal vs. unequal relationship of fans vs. pro writers (though, in honesty, I've often considered that to be a false dichotomy, especially since some fanfic writers are also pros).
I'm up in the air about this. I think that in terms of talent there is little to no difference between fanfic and pro authors. But the communities have some substantial differences, the primary one being that pro writers are all doing it for money (to one extent or another), for a career to some degree; and fanfic writers are not, necessarily. Fanfic is "hobby" and how seriously people take their hobbies hugely varies. Some fanfic authors approach writing from very much the same perspective as a pro, but not everyone does, and I don't believe everyone should be expected to; the amateur aspect of fanfic is one of its appeals, to me.
--And you know this already; I'm still trying to sort out where I fall, and the recent debates just confused me more, because I can see both sides. There's a part of me that just wants to say, yes, in fandom, respect the author's wishes absolutely: if they don't want concrit and don't want their work reviewed, then don't review it (and I refuse to believe that will entirely stifle fandom discussion, because clearly plenty of fan authors are eager for their work to be critiqued; the debate always proves that.) But this goes against my own principles of published work and the right of a reader to react to a public creative piece...ahh, I don't know!
Most editors and many reviewers are also writers, and most writers who have blogs will talk about which books they're reading and what they thought of them. Naturally, this often leads to precisely the sort of infighting and accusations of favoritism that you'd expect, but, for better or worse, it's how the system works
But then, blogs are as new to the pro authors as they are to anyone; the etiquette is unclear because there aren't exactly established protocols. And pro authors don't have the same freedom readers do - reviews are one thing, but a pro who satirizes and eviscerates a 'rival' author's novel is going to be judged differently than if a random reader had made the exact same post. It's tricky ground to navigate (and at least some pros do seem to fall on the 'cult of nice' side - Neil Gaiman's blog praises far more than it criticizes...) And then, too, as you say, this is how the pro world works, but it's not how the fandom world works - whether it should work that way is another question, but right now, in most fandoms, it doesn't, so to behave as if they're the same is asking for trouble.
no subject
I'm up in the air about this. I think that in terms of talent there is little to no difference between fanfic and pro authors. But the communities have some substantial differences, the primary one being that pro writers are all doing it for money (to one extent or another), for a career to some degree; and fanfic writers are not, necessarily. Fanfic is "hobby" and how seriously people take their hobbies hugely varies. Some fanfic authors approach writing from very much the same perspective as a pro, but not everyone does, and I don't believe everyone should be expected to; the amateur aspect of fanfic is one of its appeals, to me.
--And you know this already; I'm still trying to sort out where I fall, and the recent debates just confused me more, because I can see both sides. There's a part of me that just wants to say, yes, in fandom, respect the author's wishes absolutely: if they don't want concrit and don't want their work reviewed, then don't review it (and I refuse to believe that will entirely stifle fandom discussion, because clearly plenty of fan authors are eager for their work to be critiqued; the debate always proves that.) But this goes against my own principles of published work and the right of a reader to react to a public creative piece...ahh, I don't know!
Most editors and many reviewers are also writers, and most writers who have blogs will talk about which books they're reading and what they thought of them. Naturally, this often leads to precisely the sort of infighting and accusations of favoritism that you'd expect, but, for better or worse, it's how the system works
But then, blogs are as new to the pro authors as they are to anyone; the etiquette is unclear because there aren't exactly established protocols. And pro authors don't have the same freedom readers do - reviews are one thing, but a pro who satirizes and eviscerates a 'rival' author's novel is going to be judged differently than if a random reader had made the exact same post. It's tricky ground to navigate (and at least some pros do seem to fall on the 'cult of nice' side - Neil Gaiman's blog praises far more than it criticizes...) And then, too, as you say, this is how the pro world works, but it's not how the fandom world works - whether it should work that way is another question, but right now, in most fandoms, it doesn't, so to behave as if they're the same is asking for trouble.