Fandom
Canon and fanon: the argument that cannot be settled and does not need to be
Every fandom eventually fights about what is really true in a fictional world. The dispute is genuinely unresolvable, and knowing…
Fandom
How audiences organise, argue and keep things alive long after release.
21 articles · updated August 11, 2026 · page 1 of 2
Fandom
A fandom is an organisation, and it has the same problems as any other
Groups that form around a work develop structures, roles and governance without anyone designing them. Understanding the structure explains most of the behaviour.
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Fandom
Fan fiction is the oldest way of reading, and its structure is more interesting than its reputation
Writing more of somebody else's story is treated as a modern curiosity. It is an ancient practice, and it does specific things that…
Fandom
A cult film is made by its audience, and it takes about a decade
Nothing is a cult film on release. The status is produced afterwards by a specific sequence of circumstances that can be described…
Fandom
Aggregate scores are more fragile than they look, and organised campaigns exploit that
A single number summarising thousands of opinions feels authoritative. How it is constructed determines how easily it can be moved…
Fandom
Spoilers change what a story does to you, but not by as much as the argument suggests
The fight over revealing plot is conducted as though surprise were the only pleasure a story offers. What the research suggests is…
Fandom
Campaigns to save cancelled shows sometimes work, and the successful ones share a pattern
Most revival efforts fail. The ones that succeed tend to have provided something a rights holder actually needed, rather than…
Fandom
Cosplay is a construction discipline that happens to be about characters
Making a wearable version of a costume designed for a camera means solving problems in fabrication, engineering and materials that…
Fandom
Rewatching changed what gets made, because a show that survives repetition earns more
When a work is watched once, only the first impression matters. When it is watched ten times, density and detail become…
Fandom
Conventions are trade shows, meeting places and economies wearing the same badge
The gathering that looks like a single event is several overlapping ones, each with different participants, different economics and…
Fandom
Fans end up preserving what rights holders lose, and the legal position is awkward
A great deal of surviving material exists only because somebody recorded it, catalogued it and kept it. That work is essential and…
Fandom
Fandoms fracture at the exact moment they get big, and the mechanism is predictable
A community that grows past a certain size stops being one community. The split is structural rather than a failure of anyone's…