Balkanization

Balkanization is used in fandom to describe the de-centralization of fandom and fannish communities, in various different contexts.
In the history of online fandom, many fans consider it something that mainly happened in between 1998 and 2005,From Media Fandom Oral History Project Interview with Jan Levine (2013) but the term was used as early as 1997. During this period, the creation of mailing lists became accessible to everyone with the advent of Onelist and eGroups (later Yahoo! Groups), resulting in what had previously been a very centralized fannish experience increasingly splintering off into more specialized discussion groups and topics. 
The term was applied again to the fandom migration to LiveJournal, on which fans were even more able to curate their own "bubble" of fandom by creating and joining communities, or by fine-tuning who could and couldn't access their journal. However, it largely fell out of usage as this way of doing fandom became the new norm, and the number of online platforms available to fans only increased.
The term was also used in convention culture to refer to the increasing separation of con-going fans along interest/fanac lines, dividing comics fans from sci-fi fans and cosplayers from filkers.
Balkanization was perceived by some at the time to be an elitist or pejorative term, and many used it with negative connotations, despairing of the increasing siloing of fandom into corners where everyone agreed with each other, instead of being exposed to a variety of opinions and takes on fandom. However, others regarded it as a positive, finding it to create a more positive atmosphere in which fans could find and inhabit the niche they enjoyed.
==Examples of Use==
===Online Fandom===
A 1997 use of "balkanization": 
Another 1997 use: 
Another early use of term is from a 2001 Escapade panel discussion was "I'm Taking My Ball and Starting a New List: or, The Balkanization of Fandom by Kat Allison, Carol, Merry Lynne ("Why the proliferation of ever more numerous, smaller, more specialized, often private mailing lists in slash fandom? What effect does it have on the fannish community and on the quality of on-line discussion?")
LiveJournal is often cited as a source of balkanization in fandom, but the drift of fandom was already happening; LJ only increased it.
Today, the practice of balkanization is expected as the multitude of fannish platforms and spaces has exploded, and when the term is used, it is usually with a specific historical meaning. Fandom migration has effectively succeeded it as the preferred term (without any potential negative connotations) to describe the mass movement of fans between platforms, although with less of a "decentralization" connotation because it is already accepted that fans are dispersed across a number of platforms.
===Convention Culture===
Within Science Fiction Fandom and sci-fi & fantasy conventions, balkanization has its own meaning that is used to refer to the splitting of different fannish groups along interest lines - dividing comics fans from literary SF fans from movie fans - and also along fan activity lines, with cosplayers, filkers and fanziners all becoming more dispersed and less intertwined. 
Unlike the online fandom balkanization that began in the late 90s, accounts indicate this may have begun as early as the 1970s. In a 2007 account of the origins of BayCon, a San Francisco Bay Area regional sci-fi & fantasy convention, Randall Cooper and John McLaughlin wrote,
In A History of Canadian SF Fandom, Garth Spencer recalled,
The term was used in 1998 in a panel discussion at Worldcon: 
It also appeared on a programme for Loscon 29, which took place in 2002, with the panel description:
===Furry Fandom===
The term has also made an appearance in furry fandom, primarily in a 2008 essay by Harry Underwood, Furry balkanization. In this essay, Underwood uses the term "balkanization" to describe the creation of furry fandom-specific social networks as alternatives to "mainstream" social networks. In a sense, it refers to both the splitting of furry sub-communities away from mainstream fandom, and also the decentralization of furry fandom across numerous different social networks, forums and websites.
In a comment on the post, one fan provided a counter-narrative to Underwood's speculated reasons for furry fandom balkanization, insisting that it had merely happened because of an increasing ease of creating individual groups - similar to the causes that gave rise to general online fandom balkanization - and also drawing a link to convention fandom balkanization.
==Online Fandom Balkanization: Some History==
In her Dreamwidth essay Fandom 1994-2000-ish, Arduinna recalls the situation in online fandom before balkanization took place, the advent of mailing lists that anyone could create, and how that changed the fandom experience.
 
==Some Comments==
A 1997 comment on the alt.fan.furry Usenet group, framing balkanization as a positive:
Is "balkanization" an elitist term? A 1998 comment: 
Another fan commenting on how this dispersion of fans could improve the fandom experience, from a 2003 Media*West con report: 
A fan comment from 2005 on the impact on fanfiction: 
Another comment from 2005 about LJ and balkanization: 
From a fan in 2005 who was very thankful for the trend towards balkanization: 
From a fan in 2013, bemoaning the impact of convention culture balkanization on fannish values:
A 2014 comment regarding fandom cohesion and cons: 
A 2017 fan comment on how the rise of anthropomorphic fandoms who distanced themself from furry fandom was balkanizing the furry community:
== Pro-Balkanization ==
In the late New Tens and 2020s, fans began to miss the decentralized nature of fandom due to its centralization leading to more arguments.https://www.reddit.com/r/FanFiction/comments/x06xow/things_that_bother_me_about_the_newer_people_in/ Tumblr and Twitter were a prime hub for antis harassing fans over ships and kinks due to the lack of privacy; a person could either privatize their entire account or let it all be seen, as opposed to Livejournal or Dreamwidth allowing people to customize their privacy. The lack of communities also made it difficult to find exactly what one was looking for in terms of fan works and discussion, and tags could easily be misused.
Other fans feel social media sites harm visibility of fan works due to their insistence on algorithms and recommended lists, which try to push fans in certain directions based on what's the most popular or the nature of their posts rather than letting them make their own discoveries.https://www.wired.com/story/aoc-fanfiction-algorithms/
==Meta/Further Reading==
* by cereta (2005)
* by Ptyx (2005)
==References==
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