A Network Of Our Own

A Network Of Our Own (ANOOO, or NOOO), sometimes referred to as a Social Network Of Our Own (SNOOO), is a term for a possible centralized social network that would be set up with the purpose of providing a safe, maximally inclusive, optimized, and functional space catering to fandom and fans. The term takes its inspiration from the Archive of Our Own, as ANOOO would see to do for fanworks and fan communities what AO3 did for fanfiction.
The concept has been discussed by fans repeatedly over the years in response to censorship by commercially-driven social platforms. It gained particular momentum following the Tumblr NSFW Content Purge of late 2018, which saw vast amounts of NSFW, art and other fan blogs removed from Tumblr, which was previously a popular fandom social space. Amid the discussion about where fans could go after being driven from Tumblr, discussion re-ignited around the idea of fans owning the servers and building their own social platform.
==Fandom Migration==
Fandom migration refers to the mass movement of fans between communication platforms.
During Strikethrough and Boldthrough in 2007, LiveJournal permanently suspended over 500 journals based on the users' interest lists, which affected fannish groups and lead to fandom migration away from LiveJournal.
On August 7, 2007, femmequixotic commented in their post Open social networking & how to work around that problem nowarchive link
In May 2013, Yahoo! bought Tumblr for $1.1 billion,Yahoo to Buy Tumblr for $1.1 Billion dated May 19, 2013; [Yahoo to Buy Tumblr for $1.1 Billion reference link]. leading some fans to predict a slow and gradual demise of the platform as a fandom community.Tumblr sponsors post about advertising on Tumblr dated June 3, 2013;reference link.
A 2014 tumblr post, All this leaving tumblr talk is making me hark back to the LJ days of old, man oh man., detailed LiveJournal's downfall, the migration it caused to newer fan platforms like Dreamwidth and Tumblr, and the fatigue that comes from migration:
On the post, user [doctorscienceknowsfandom] replied:
==Fandom and Profit==
==Tumblr NSFW Content Purge==
As Tumblr's initial purge of NSFW blogs (prior to the adult content ban being officially announced) gathered steam, some fans raised the need for an "AO3 for communities",Note by amaluelmwood: What’s pillowfort? I only started hearing about it when this purge started, I feel like I missed something - though I do feel like we need something like what AO3 did cor fanfic, but for art and community…Reblog by samshinechester: I’m considering going back to DW or LJ, but as I was saying yesterday, an Ao3 based social platform would kick ass. I’m really tired of packing & moving every X years, ffs. referencing the way that Archive of Our Own was set up to provide a safe, maximally inclusive space for fanworks and allow fans to own the servers, on the heels of incidents like FanLib and Strikethrough and Boldthrough.
For more on this, see: An Archive Of One's Own (post by astolat).
Eventually a full ban on visual NSFW content was announced by Tumblr, furthering discussion about the necessity of fan control of Terms of Service.
===Fail Fandom Anon Discussion===
On November 25, 2018, a user on Fail Fandom Anon started a discussion around building a "Network Of Our Own" specifically for fandom, which would be set up as a US-based non-profit, again in the vein of the Organization for Transformative Works. They shared a test/proof of concept site they had built and invited other users to play around with it and offer feedback:
Other anons weighed in with feedback on the features and support for the idea, as well as suggestions for launching the network as a sustainable, long-term project.
===OTW Official Statement===
On December 4, 2018, the day after Tumblr announced its ban on adult content, the Organization for Transformative Works' Tumblr posted an official statement in response to the many calls for the OTW to develop a social network:
The post continued with some advice on how to preserve and archive endangered Tumblr blogs.
However, some fans remained dissatisfied with the OTW's response, believing that it had a unique responsibility to use its position in fandom to galvanise fans into creating a Tumblr alternative.
===Fandom Platform of the Future Discussion===
On December 5, a user named pearwaldorf tweeted, initially jokingly, about reaching out to Pinboard to develop a new space:
Pinboard developer Maciej Cegłowski, who became a respected figure in fandom after demonstrating a willingness to listen to and cater to fans who used his website for bookmarking after the fall of Delicious in 2011, then contacted pearwaldorf via direct message indicating a willingness to help.Tweet by @pearwaldorf, December 5, 2018. pearwaldorf created an editable Google Doc entitled "Fandom Platform of the Future✨: Requirements Gathering and Features Discussion." for the purposes of brainstorming what the ideal fan-run social network might look like. The document grew to 133 pages in length before it was put into read-only mode.
Later that same day, Greywash's post, State of the Migration: On fannish archival catastrophes, and what happens next, spun off into a Dreamwidth community, post_tumblr_fandom, created to discuss building a fannish social network. A Fandom Platform of the Future Dreamwidth was also created to serve as a central source of information and discussion around the various initiatives related to the "Fandom Platform of the Future/Network Of Our Own".
==Distributed/Federated Fandom==
Intertwined with the Fandom Platform of the Future discussion and movement was a growing movement towards a distributed, or federated, fandom social network. Another "post-Tumblr" blog, Fandom After Tumblr, run by Sareniel, carried prominent header links to explanations of federated social networksFederation: social media potlucks! by fandom-after via Tumblr. Published December 19, 2018 (Accessed December 27, 2018). and Hubzilla, a favoured decentralised open-source social media platform.Update on Hubzilla! by fandom-after via Tumblr. Published December 19, 2018 (Accessed December 27, 2018). The post_tumblr_fandom Dreamwidth also began serialising a newsletter, 'Fandom gets closer to the metal' (cross-posted to Fandom After Tumblr), which contained regular updates about Hubzilla and federated fandom. Mastodon, Plume, and PeerTube are another federated social media platform that has been used by fans.
pearwaldorf and demitas created a Federated Fandom Wiki to provide information to fans on what federation is and how it could be useful to fandom, how to find federated platforms and fandom-friendly instances, and how to contribute to the federated fandom movement. It described the advantages of distributed social media for fandom as follows:
Fans also gathered, discussed ideas and co-ordinated their efforts on the distributed_fandom Discord.
==Additional Reading/Meta==
* Fan fiction archives, and the opposing natures of the Internet
* All this leaving tumblr talk is making me hark back to the LJ days of old, man oh man., 2014
* Fansplaining: The Money Question, 2018
* State of the Migration: On fannish archival catastrophes, and what happens next, 2018
==References==
Category:Glossary
Category:Fandom Migration
Category:Social Networking