Why "Pull to Publish" Bugs Me

[lovetincture]

Considering I've already made myself super unpopular by having issues with the monetization of fanworks, let's just go deeper into this rabbit hole. We're coming out of pandemic season with no friends:

I also have issues with the "pull to publish" / "filing off the serial numbers" phenomenon.

Here's an excerpt from an essay, "Fifty Shades of Exploitation: Why the Pull-To-Publish Harms Fans and Fic Alike" by axanthou, posted for the purpose of discussion.

The problem here lies in monetizing works that previously existed within a gift economy[2] —different from commodity culture in its ability to establish a relationship between members, a gift economy is based entirely upon the giving and receiving of goods without financial incentive (Jones 2014). Where The Bunker Babes’ free labour was totally acceptable when Fifty Shades was a work of Twilight fanfiction (entitled Master of the Universe) functioning within a gift economy, it becomes more complicated when dealing with a traditionally published title: suddenly, the relationship between the reader and the work has changed (Jones 2014).

[...] This complaint is one that ultimately gets to the heart of one of the major problems with the pull-to-publish model: the creation of fanfiction is a collaborative practice, and the current authorship model of traditional book publishing is not. If fanfiction truly is part of a gift economy, and if the shaping of a fic is a collaborative act, how can it be ethical for one person to profit from a potentially multi-authored piece (Jones 2014)? Filing off the serial numbers flips the question of exploitation and fandom on its head: rather than fans taking from commodified culture in order to write new stories—a radical act referred to as “poaching” by media scholar Henry Jenkins (2006)—capital steals fan labour in order to create new content from its cultural commons (Jones 2014).

I'm deeply skeptical of work that begins as an act of fanfiction then gets pulled to publish (usually in reaction to popularity, more on that in a second). I understand the impulse; I've felt it too. You put so much of your heart, soul, and time into a novel-length fic, and you feel like you want something to show for it, a real book, some real legitimacy, some money. God knows times are hard and we could all use the money.

But I think that ignores the context in which fanworks are created. They're created by authors as part of a community, usually in partnership with that community. I'm sure somewhere out there, there is one single person creating fic in a vacuum without drawing on fan labor, but I'm skeptical. That's just not the nature of the beast.

For instance, I don't use beta readers. My writing process is pretty self-contained, but even I'm not an island unto myself. I talk about fic ideas with Tei and Bees. I browse the kinkmeme. I used to discuss ideas with a wider group of people in Discord, when I was still active in a Hannibal server.

Even for those of us without beta readers, who are perhaps not using fan labor directly, fanfiction draws on shared headcanons. We absorb ideas through one another's work. Characterization is built through a million conversations, Twitter threads, Tumblr posts, and sessions spent shooting the shit with our writing friends. That's beautiful when it's an act of friendship and community—freely offered, freely received. It begins to feel exploitive when one person then turns around and sells the result of a community's labor of love.

Now more on "popularity"— The fics that are pulled to publish are usually those that received an excellent reception from readers, but can we just dig at that for a second? A fic was written and presented to a community. Upon realizing the fic was more popular (and therefore more marketable) than expected, it's yanked away from the community for monetary gain. That sits uneasy with me. It suggests that authors believe the only fics that should be given to fellow fans are the "unmarketable" ones, and it feels a little bit like the rug being snatched out from beneath feet; if fans love a piece of writing too much, it might signal marketability, and the loved work will be taken away. That precedent isn't one I love.

Pulling to publish takes away a gift that was formerly offered to a community for free, out of love, and slaps a price tag on it. That doesn't send a particularly warm and fuzzy message to the people who are part of that community. I'm not sure how it says anything but "You're second-rate readers, and I prefer to share this work with people who will pay me for it now."

Which is the author's right, of course. I'd never suggest that a writer owes fic to anyone, for free or at all. And yet pull to publish flies in the face of the things I'd like to believe about fandom, and it robs fandom of the ethos that I love best.

If you know me, you know that I'm not against people making a living from their writing. I'm in favor of people writing original fiction for original fiction markets, if that's something they're interested in. I think it's just good practice to let fanfiction be fanfiction, to let it be a gift to the community where it was made, for whom it was made.

Comments

[tei]

It's a beautiful day in the fandom, and you are a terrible goose with no friends.

I do think there is a slight distinction between the two ways of this happening.

The first, which I assume is that you're referring to, is when an author takes a story down from AO3 so they can scrub it and publish it. And... yeah. I'm pretty much on board with your interpretation of that-- particularly because it's not just community building and beta work and the work that goes into creating the fic before it's posted-- it's also what happens after! One of the most unique and wonderful things about "popular" fanworks is that well-loved fic tends to inspire other creativity. So... if an author removes the fic, what happens to the podfic, the art, the other fic inspired by the first one? Suddenly all this stuff that other people have put work into on the assumption that readers/listeners/viewers will be able to understand the thing they made in context... has no context. And people joining that fandom in the future are going to find these bizare contextless fanworks and try to find the thing they're referring to, and that thing just won't exist. Those kinds of "what happened here?" holes in the fabric of a fandom are the kind of thing that the OTW exists to prevent; preserving the stuff fans make because we all acknowledge that stuff is valuable.

The second category of published fanfic (which... I don't know that I've ever seen outside of Sherlock fandom, I assume because Sherlock Holmes fandom in general is less worried about being nailed for copyright infringement, in some cases, for some stuff, depending on the content) is the stuff that's scrubbed and published and sold, while the original remains up in its original form.

Which I don't have a problem with in the same way that I do with the "oops, it's popular so now I'm taking it back" model, but I do think it's an interesting phenomenon in that it illustrates the extent to which the scrubbed fanfic really does lose something in the process. How even stories that are highly AU, and feature pretty much none of the same content as canon, fundamentally work as stories because of the assumptions that readers come into them with, and the way those expectations are either met or subverted. I've tried reading scrubbed fanfiction a few times, and it's never been an interesting reading experience-- and I've also accidentally read scrubbed fanficiton a few times, and in reading had the distinct feeling that something was missing, and then later learned why.

I'm sure it is possible to do well-- but probably only if you rewrite and fundamentally rethink so much of the characterization and the things about the setting that refer to assumptions about the characters that it isn't actually the same thing any more. At which point you're just writing a whole different story based on themes and thoughts that you have also written a fanfiction about, in which case-- great, awesome, do that!

Maybe this gets entangled with the insidious idea that you can only "use" each idea once, so once you've written one thing on a particular theme you can't write another, and that's... just not true! Artists paint the same shit over and over again all the time, and writers are allowed to do the same-- turning over an idea in our heads and seeing how it grows with us as we grow.

[recently_folded]

I've also accidentally read scrubbed fanficiton a few times, and in reading had the distinct feeling that something was missing, and then later learned why.

While this is a bit tangential to the original point—which I agree with for the most part—it's something I've been noticing lately as well. With the closure of our library, I've been reading a lot from their digital catalog, which you can't really browse by anything much more than cover and blurb. Naturally, the service is going to push a lot of B list stuff along with the recognizables, and while I've found a few very enjoyable reads I wouldn't otherwise have (especially novellas that wouldn't appear on their own in paper on library shelves), I've also found works that were clearly scrubbed from somewhere in fandom. There are distinctive grammatical and usage errors broadly found even in well-betaed fic, things that have somehow become embodied in this style of writing, and they tend to be clear indicators for fic origins or writers who put in a mostly-fic apprenticeship.

Weak characterization, sure. Style cues, absolutely. Also, I feel, an over-reliance on tropes to tell the story without challenging them or particularly setting a foundation for why they're in the story at all. In other words, a story that doesn't bring much other than the retelling of the story. Please don't get me wrong: I've read some dazzlingly well-wrought fics and I really enjoy how fic's emphasis on character over plot event is contaminating commercial fic. But there are common weaknesses in many recycled fics that make them less than compelling when the fandom engagement is lost.

That doesn't negate the original point of how scrubbing affects the fandom economy, but I think that it adds to the sad aspect of it that the scrubbed versions so often just aren't as good in their new context as they were in the old.

[lovetincture]

Maybe this gets entangled with the insidious idea that you can only "use" each idea once, so once you've written one thing on a particular theme you can't write another, and that's... just not true! Artists paint the same shit over and over again all the time, and writers are allowed to do the same-- turning over an idea in our heads and seeing how it grows with us as we grow.

Yes! And I have felt the same strange pull to do things differently this time, especially when writing the 92349th post-fall fic in Hannibal fandom. But... why? I mean, obviously do it if you wanna, but we all read and write post-fall fics for a certain experience and theme, presumably. It reminds me of that Tumblr post I loved a while back that I can never find again, the one that's like "If you're worried about your fic being too unoriginal, consider every time you finished a fic you loved and thought 'That was great! Now I want to read another fic that's exactly like that one, but different.'"

[armoredsuperheavy]

Dang, I hadn't really thought that deeply about the practice before. But you raise some very good points. Oof. I don't know if I'll look at the same way again.

Some other thoughts this brings up:

I don't have any firsthand experience with the scrubbing process but I imagine it's a lot more onerous than one might expect. It's probably a significant barrier to this becoming a more widespread practice. Fanfic relies to some greater or lesser degree on the collaboratively-built fanon (especially when it comes to deep characterization and set relationship dynamics). It's probably just the stuff that can get you sued (canon) that gets scrubbed, and the fanon lingers on in the commercial product.

One thing in favor of the practice though, perhaps, is that it could raise the profile of the genre and establish evidence that it's something people want and are willing to pay for. I'd like to see original "fic," as a genre of writing, available in bookstores just like romance novels are. (I consider it a unique genre but it's so new we don't even have a name for it beyond "fic")

[lovetincture]

I'm glad to have given you some food for thought! I'm never particularly invested in people agreeing with me on these things. More just... starting a discussion and putting my own thoughts out there.

As someone who's got one foot in the world of writing as business and the other foot firmly in the world of writing as art, I'm constantly trying to negotiate the boundaries of those two worlds. I think about this stuff so much because I'm always trying to find the edges of what I think is acceptable for my own work: how is it presented, how is it sold or not sold, etc.

I agree that fanfiction is its own genre, in a way that means more than "stories written using someone else's IP"! Here's a really fantastic essay/conversation on Tumblr that put my thoughts about it into words better than I could have. I feel like the original fiction I write is very much "fic" in the same way that my fanfiction is. I think it occupies the same genre space, and I think we'll probably see more of that in self-publishing spaces. It's a great time to be a writer. No one can stop you from just writing books and putting them in the world. 😛

[armoredsuperheavy]

Thanks for that link, it was a great convo and I actually just linked it in a Tumblr x-post (that "I am a Guerrilla publisher" one) to get some more eyes on it!

[yourlibrarian]

It's interesting that I should read this just when the NY Times article on the Omegaverse lawsuit has finally come out after a year in production. For many years fans assumed that fanfiction would be dragged into court due to lawsuits from copyright holders, but I'd bet relatively few ever expected it to come from former fanfic writers suing one another over fanfic tropes and headcanons. And as the article points out, this is going to be the first legal case actually involving fanfiction as a genre as opposed to cases which have been fanwork adjacent in the past but were actually commercial productions.

Upon realizing the fic was more popular (and therefore more marketable) than expected, it's yanked away from the community for monetary gain. That sits uneasy with me.

I think this overlooks the key factor, which is not just that the work itself is unavailable (it can often be retrieved via Wayback) but that popular works engender a lot of comments and sometimes even discussion. And all that sort of community interaction gets wiped out when the attached work is deleted.

[lovetincture]

Yes, I was actually just thinking about this in relation to the Omegaverse lawsuit that crossed my TL last night. It made this particular rant feel especially timely.

I think this overlooks the key factor, which is not just that the work itself is unavailable (it can often be retrieved via Wayback) but that popular works engender a lot of comments and sometimes even discussion. And all that sort of community interaction gets wiped out when the attached work is deleted.

This is a really good point, that I had totally neglected to consider. It's something that's lost even when authors give readers notice that they're going to delete their work and give them an opportunity to download it if they want it. So much of fandom and fannish history is ephemeral by nature of the platforms we use, and this perhaps just speeds up the rate of loss.

[armoredsuperheavy]

As I am apparently stuck on ranting about all week, fandom as a community is constantly endangered and it's up to us to maintain it, through a million micro decisions! We get out what we put in.

[pennypaperbrain]

This is a fascinating debate, and it’s better when people can have it without getting too defensive.

I exist in both worlds as well, mostly as an editor in origfic land. I do quite a lot of manuscript appraisal and while I don’t think I’ve seen a scrubbed fic – I get the impression most go into adult romance, which I don’t deal with – certainly I come across writers who, by my best guess, have written a lot of fic and therefore their characterisation game is a bit weak.

On the other hand, I also come across writers who are clearly genre fans and are so heavily influenced by their fave that they’re not going to get near publication until they overcome it. I think – and this is actually the first time I’m making the connection – I would see patchily scrubbed fic, and writing that is too much in the shadow of someone else’s established voice, as part of the same phenomenon. I think it’s aspiring and new-to-pro writers who are more likely to be scrubbing their fic, because once you’re established and your editor or the marketing department are clamouring for something specific from you, it’s relatively unlikely that your fic novel from five years ago will happen to match that demand. So one reason why scraped fic is often a bit weak is because it’s new starters who are most likely to be doing it.

Guesswork there, of course (do you know lots of examples that prove me wrong?) and that’s a side issue from the question of ethics.

I guess instinctively I feel that ‘publish’ is OK, but ‘pull to publish’ is a bit dodgy. On the other hand, I wonder if some writers hope they won’t have to pull, then when they find it’s a condition of their publishing deal, can’t bear to give the deal up? I suspect that might be me in that situation. Or a fic might have been wildly popular in its day, but readership is down (because the canon is no longer being produced, being the most likely reason) so why not extend the life of the story in a way that only inconveniences a few in the fandom because the fandom is moribund.

I have seen authors make the mistake of thinking that AO3 kudos will translate directly into high book sales, or even unrealistic levels of extravagant levels of Patreon/similar support, and then get decidedly let down. Perhaps people in that position assume that people are invested in their personal success because they like the story; as perhaps a few of their close friends are.

The publishing industry is pretty hard to understand from outside – in large part because, as my husband says after observing it through me for 10 years, it really is ludicrous in a lot of respects – so people’s expectations of what they’re getting into, and how they will be regarded as an individual as a result of transferring from fan fave to ‘official author’, and how that transfer will be regarded, may be off base.

Plus… I spent a year of writing time reshaping a novel-length fanfic into an origfic, and I had what’s probably a minority motive; crusading. Four Corners of the Western World (with which tei is familiar, not sure if you are) is about two subjects that I feel are misunderstood, bipolar and (SSC) BDSM, and part of the reason for doing a scrape was to try to get the story out to more people. I certainly didn’t do it with high expectations, and sure enough what I got from my agent was a month’s silence followed by something amounting to to ‘er… this is the best thing you’ve ever sent me but halp it’s scary’ and largely silence from publishers. The most significant piece of feedback I got was that the thriller element wasn’t strong enough, which supports your hypothesis: even though I’m relatively experienced and put a lot of time into it, I wasn’t able to wrest it far away enough from canon in every suspect. (The amusing aspect is that my agent informed me that it was far too heady for the American market, which kind of explains why millions of American women spend their time on AO3 instead of digging through mainstream beige…)

So I wonder how many people are trying to do pull to publish but it’s not market-slick enough so that never actually happens?

Not all of which relates to your original question – some does – but I have a lot of thoughts on the subject.

[yourlibrarian]

Interesting to read your take. I also snorted at this:

I wasn’t able to wrest it far away enough from canon in every suspect. (The amusing aspect is that my agent informed me that it was far too heady for the American market, which kind of explains why millions of American women spend their time on AO3 instead of digging through mainstream beige…

More like too heady for American editors who continue to gatekeep themselves into poverty. 50 Shades would never have opened up potential for the erotica market had it not first been published by a fandom-based press, and only later gotten the big book deal. The trilogy took up 3 of the top 10 spots for the last decade's worth of book sales. While a lot of its success was just people jumping on the watercooler bandwagon, that doesn't explain the sales of books 2 and 3 nor the decent showing of the films. Whatever its debatable value it proved that the mainstream publishing industry simply will not innovate unless it's forced to from outside industries and ground shakers.

[pennypaperbrain]

Oh god, gatekeeping in-house editors... There's a couple of subjects that I'm 90% certain will sell (for me or for clients) because I actually have some contact with the market concerned, and just get told 'We can't sell that kind of book without a romance in it'(i.e. vanilla by-numbers het romance)... and behold the number of potentially interesting books I see marred by tepid romances.

[yourlibrarian]

Probably similar to the number of movies with unenthusiastic and underdeveloped het romances shoehorned in to "attract women" to the theater.