Fanpop's Challenges With Organization

If any of you in our Writing for New Media Class were inspired to check out Fanpop after reading my previous post you might have noticed that the Social Networking site has some problems with organization. When I say problems with organization I'm not referring to the layout of the fan club pages or profiles dedicated to music artists, movies and TV shows nicely divided into sections instead I am referring to how the site encourages you to become a fan of your pop culture favorites. Based on this observation I figured the best way to discuss Fanpop's organization problems with all of you, the members of our Writing for New Media Class is by talking about the site's problems and then analyzing how they can be made better.

Fanpop's Problems with Organization
Fanpop's biggest problem with organization is that it does not encourage you to show personal fandom for your pop culture favorites by joining the fan club sites dedicated to music artists, movies, TV shows and more. Through the creators of Fanpop failing to do this all of you in our class checking out the site are forced to seek out these fan club sites through the use of a search engine.

Fanpop's Search Engine

This process of having to search for a fan club to add to your Fanpop profile makes the actual social network seem extremely overwhelming because you do not have an example of what types of fan clubs can be organized underneath the site's definition of pop culture. For instance I searched for something that was far away from being considered as pop culture like apples and sure enough there is a fan club for apples.

The fan club for Apples

The other problem with the search engine is when you search for a fan club for lets say Marvel Comics you will receive a result for a Marvel club but you will also receive results for fan clubs dedicated to Marvel Superheroines or individual Marvel Superheroes and it is hard to decide what club to join because there are so many options.

Some of the various results you will find when searching for the Marvel Comics fan club

The other problem with Fanpop's organization and some of you may consider this to be nitpicky is the Videos sections featured on the movie and TV show fan club pages. As I said before these fan club pages are nicely divided into sections but in the Videos section it is hard to tell the difference between what is a clip, trailer or homemade music video.

How Fanpop Can Fix Its Organizational Problems

Fanpop can fix its organizational problems by encouraging you as visitors to the site to join fan clubs dedicated to your pop culture favorites by placing a section on your profile that recommends fan clubs you might be interested in joining or maybe the site can require you to join a new fan club after logging in a certain number of times. Fanpop is all about getting as many people as possible to join the fan clubs featured on their network and these methods might be a great way to increase their numbers.

The Fanpop fan counter featured on every fan club page

As for the search engine, I would keep it, but instead of you searching Marvel Comics and getting results for fan clubs dedicated to Marvel Superheroines or individual Marvel Superheroes, I thought it would be better if these clubs were organized as sub fan clubs underneath the umbrella of an overall Marvel Comics fan club because it would make the number of clubs less intimidating for you to choose from. I feel the creators of Fanpop should also set parameters about what constitutes a fan club to fit under the organizational banner of pop culture because it would help visitors to the site which includes yourselves to get more direction on the types of fan clubs to search for making the network not seem so overwhelming. With the Videos section on the movie and TV show fan club pages I would suggest that the different types of featured videos to be divided into sub categories within their respective categories like in Fanpop's image sections.

Final Thoughts
In writing this post I hope you the members of our Writing for New Media Class as well as the people behind Fanpop will end up reading it because I believe Fanpop is a great place for different types of people to express their enjoyment for topics that suppossedly fit within the realm of pop culture using a variety of New Media formats. Based on this observation if the creators of the site consider my suggestions on solving their organizational problems they could make the experience of expressing your fandom even better.

Fanpop The Next Generation of Fan Club

Hey fellow Writing for New Media Class members do you remember the days of Fan Clubs? You know the Clubs dedicated to a kids Cartoon Show, Band or a Toy Line that you would fill out an application for and an official decoder ring would be sent back to you in the mail. Well, the Social Networking site that I am going to share with you entitled Fanpop is a website that is filled with fan clubs minus the decoder ring and the official aspect.

Comic Book Creator Stan Lee showing off the decoder rings for his Spider-Man fan club

What is Fanpop?

For those of you in our New Media Class who don't know Fanpop is a website featuring fan clubs dedicated to various avenues of pop culture including professional sports, TV, movies, music and individual celebrities. Based on this definition the object of Fanpop is different than let's say Facebook because it's not a social network all about adding friends that you can communicate with to your profile instead you are required to friend a profile or in Fanpop terms join a club dedicated to a form of pop culture like the TV show Supernatural and from there you can friend people by both of you sharing an interest in that show. However unlike the clubs of old, the people behind the clubs on Fanpop are not connected to the TV show or Music Artist like the employee hired to send out decoder rings, they are just like all of us in our Writing for New Media Class, average everyday Internet surfers. Due to this idea of fans creating online fan clubs, Fanpop at its heart is a social networking site dedicated to allowing its audience to express their enjoyment or dedication towards anything that exists within the realm of pop culture.

An example of a Fanpop personal profile

The Fanpop Profile or Fan Club Site

For all of you in our New Media Class to experience how Fanpop tailors to its audience I figured my best bet would be to go through each of the sections featured on every profile or fan club site like the upcoming example for the show Supernatural allows its audience to express their enjoyment or dedication towards an avenue of pop culture.

An example of a Fanpop fan club page

Videos and Images Section

The video section allows members of Fanpop's audience or those of you in our class who are not so much into writing express their enjoyment for a TV show on its fan club page by posting a self-made music video created by piecing together clips from various episodes or posting a full episode that you transferred on to the Computer. The video section on the movie fan club pages are similar to the TV pages by featuring homemade music videos dedicated to that particular movie but it differs in the fact that only trailers are posted not full length feature films. As for the music fan sites the video sections consists of an artists music videos and clips of them if they were a host on SNL. The image section contains images created by Fanpop's audience with the intention of allowing other audience members to use these images for showing their dedication to an avenue of pop culture on their desktop, cell phone background or Facebook profile picture.

Answers and Forum Sections

The answers and forum section in terms of the TV and movie fan club pages allows all of you in our Class along with the rest of Fanpop's audience enhance the viewing experience by allowing you to ask questions about something you missed when watching a movie or TV show episode and get an answer from a fellow fan. It also gives you the opportunity to ask what the name of a song was that might have been used in a certain scene. As for the music fan pages they are dedicated towards allowing you to ask questions about an artists' personal life or when their next CD is coming out. The other great thing about the forums is it allows you as Fanpop's audience to discuss the topic each fan club is focused on with thousands of users making it a great tool to hold yourself over until that movie, album or next episode comes.

Fan Picks Section

This section is similar to the answers and forum section in the sense that it allows you, as Fanpop's audience to ask a question pertaining to the fan club page that you are viewing such as what actor would you like to play Captain America, what was the best quote in a TV Show episode or which Taylor Swift music video is better? However unlike the forums section where you get an answer to these questions from individual Users, the Fan Picks section turns your question into a poll which lets Fanpop's audience to choose between different options allowing you to get an answer from several Users at once. Although, sometimes the polls have a tendency to get off topic for example on the Supernatural fan club page there is a poll that asks about the main characters who is hotter without a shirt on?

Links Section

This section allows Fanpop's audience which includes all of you in our Writing for New Media Class show their dedication towards their favorite TV show, movie or music artist by allowing you to stay updated on these topics with links to news articles featured on professional web sites and in the case of TV shows this section also contains links to full episodes in case you might have missed one during the week.

Articles Section

This section works like my own personal blog, Across The Airwaves in the sense that it allows you as Fanpop's audience to get up on a soapbox to discuss your favorite shows, movies and artists in a blog like format. However when looking at the articles section on the TV and movie based fan page I caution you to watch your step because this section exists as a minefield filled with spoilers.

The Bottom Line

Fanpop is a Social Networking site that is accessible to an audience of all Internet surfers including those of you in our Writing for New Media Class because everyone is a fan of something and if you want to show your devotion search something you enjoy in Fanpop's search engine and join its fan club. It should be there but if not I recommend you to create your own club.

A Video Tour Of Flixster

Hello Writing For New Class Members, this week I thought I could give you a tour of the Social Networking site known as Flixster. Originally I thought about giving the tour the traditional way with sections of text complimented by screencaps. However I figured that approach would be boring and you wouldn't get the full experience of the Flixster web site so I decided to create my own video tour. Check it out below...

Writing On Flixster

Alright Writing for New Media Classmates, now that you have watched my visual tour of the Social Networking site known as Flixster, I thought it might be interesting to have a discussion with you about the official and member-generated writing featured on this avenue of the web. On Flixster, there is no official writing created for the purpose of being on the Networking site's web page, instead they have a Movie News section filled with articles that Flixster users have borrowed from other websites. With that being said I want all of you to note that the reason why I refer to these articles as borrowed instead of stolen is that Flixster requires its users to give a link to the original place where the article was originally posted before posting it on their site.

An example of a News Story featured on Flixster

However as I investigated deeper into the Movie News section, I discovered that all of the articles were posted by the same user SexiVixxEN which means that she can very well be an employee hired by Flixster to assess what articles are worthy to be posted on their site and if the web pages they are coming from are legit a.k.a official. At the same time, despite the possibility of Flixster having a employee that decides what sources are official I advise all of you to take the Movie News that can be found on these web sites with a grain of salt. Although, that doesn't mean that all the articles found on Flixster are not legit, in fact one of the articles are linked to the web page for the popular magazine, People but the rest of the articles are linked to Movie News sites that pull their information out of the ether or at least appear that way because none of their articles come contain sources. Based on this perception the rule of thumb that I can give you, members of my Writing for New Media Class when it comes to Movie News is to think of it as rumor rather than fact unless it is found in a printed source.

An example of an article from People.com linked to a Flixster News Story

As for the member-generated writing on Flixster it exists in two places. The first place is the comments section on your Profile page where the typical lightly anally edited "hey, hows it going" message that exists on every Facebook can be found filled with Emoticons, LOL abbreviations and exclamation marks. However what makes the comments section on Flixster different than Facebook is that some of the comments are movie recommendations made by the people you have friended using your account. Each recommendation includes the users rating of the movie based on a five star scale and their own short review of the film.

The comments section featured on a Flixster User's profile page.

This leads to the other form of member-generated writing that can be found on Flixster, user based movie reviews which are located on a person's Profile page or on the website for a movie listed in the Flixster database. As for the actual writing behind the reviews it varies between users giving a lightly edited one sentence review on a movie or giving a well-considered tightly anally edited review complete with the actor's name in parentheses following the name of his or her character to educate the public on the art of film. Although, no matter which way these reviews appear on Flixster, I have to ask the question can I trust the people on a Social Network for an opinion on a movie as much as a close friend or a respected Critic like Roger Ebert? In my opinion, the answer is yes because if the majority of the comments on a Flixster page about a movie are favorable then I would probably watch it to see what all the buzz is about.

An example of a well-considered tightly anally edited review on a movie and a lightly edited review.

However, I don't feel like I can make this statement without peer support which is where you come in Writing for New Media Class Members. Basically what I want you all to do is answer the question can you trust the people on a Social Network for an opinion on a movie as much as a close friend or a respected Critic like Roger Ebert? Then I want you to place your answers in the comments section for this post. I look forward to hearing from you and don't worry I don't bite.

Adaptation; A Screenwriter's Word for Borrowing

Researching the concept of Creative Commons also got me thinking about how I borrow creative material in my professional life as a Film and Television screenwriter. Based on this thought I thought it might be interesting to share with you, the members of our Writing for New Media class how I borrow or build off of creative material in order to create a screenplay. First off, if you don't already know in both the TV and Film industry converting a book, video game, news article or any other creative material into a script is called an adaptation. I personally have never written a feature length script that is solely an adaptation because it sometimes takes a huge chunk of change to get the rights to turn a New York Times bestseller into a script.

A New York Times Bestseller that became a Feature Film

However, I have taken concepts or ideas from other types of media that I have enjoyed or were successful with audiences and compiled them into my own feature length script. For example I really enjoyed the story featured in Marvel comic books called Civil War where the superheroes turned against each other splitting into two factions that broke out in war. Based on my knowledge of the story, I took the idea behind my favorite female superhero Phoenix, the concept of the Justice League Unlimited episode Clash and my imagination to create my own feature length script about a war between superheroes.

Visual representations of the sources I used to create my feature length script

As for the TV scripts that I have written I would not classify them as adapted material, instead like created works under a creative commons license, they are products of building off of previous materials. This comes based on the fact that they are spec scripts which means that they are scripts for TV shows that are currently airing which I can use as a resume to get a job as a writer. With that being said I bet some are you asking how can I turn in a script to a producer of a TV show when I don't own the rights to the characters? Well, the answer is simple you send your spec script or episode that for me is Supernatural to a show that is similar to the one you wrote for which in my case would be Smallville. The reason behind sending my Supernatural script to Smallville is that the writers on Supernatural are contractually obligated to not read material for their show created by outside writers and my episode would not fit into the season long story arc which is planned months ahead of time.

The TV Shows I wrote spec scripts for

However even though my spec scripts are primarily created by building off of previous materials, that didn't stop me from adapting other sources into my script. For instance my Supernatural script used information on the Salem Witch Trials to help me formulate my story and the Smallville script was based on stories I read in Superman comic books.
Examples of sources used to write my spec scripts

Honestly, it is incredibly hard to write a script that is not adapted especially when there is a stat that says there are more adaptations than original script. I guess what I'm trying to get at, fellow Writing for New Media classmates is that my professional life requires a lot of adapting a.k.a borrowing and I'm curious how much borrowing you do in your own personal lives especially with those of you who are web designers, musicians or partake in something else besides creating TV and Film. So if you feel like it post a comment to reply to my inquiry about how much borrowing you do.

Important!!! A Warning About Copyright

Recently I was introduced to the term Creative Commons which refers to a license that an author of a creative work can set up to allow others to build upon or share their material without having to deal with all the legalities of copyright. While researching more into this topic I watched an informational video on the Creative Commons website which told me that whenever you take a picture or save a document onto a computer that automatically means your material is copyrighted.



The video I watched on the Creative Commons website.

This was completely new to me and instead of looking at the video saying to myself that's interesting, my gut reaction was to jump on this blog to warn you, the members of our Writing for New Media class that the video's statement about copyright is not totally accurate. Yes, there is a legal document like the one in the video which states works become copyrighted automatically the moment they're made but what they don't tell you is that the only way that can hold up in court when someone tries to steal your material is if you have the certificate that says your work is registered with the Library of Congress which you can receive by visiting their website.

The reason why I feel it is important to share this information with you, the members of our New Media class is that by us being students at a Fine Arts School like Columbia College we have been all been asked to produce some form of creative work such as a script, music composition, painting or film and I feel as one of your peers I have a responsibility to make sure that your material is protected in a way that will prevent some industry exec from stealing your idea leaving you screwed. Now I know by making this statement some of you think I'm being paranoid but according to many of the Professors that I have had here at Columbia not thinking your material is copyrighted until you receive a certificate from the Library of Congress is the way to go.

An example of a form you will recieve after copyrighting your work with the Library of Congress.

For example, my Television Producer teacher, Tracy Fetteroif told us a story that she had a friend that turned in a script for the X-Files without registering it with the Library of Congress. A month later, the episode aired on TV with writing credits going to another writer for just changing the names of the characters in the original script. Based on this story, the best advice I can give you when it comes to setting up copyright, creative commons or showing your creative works to a company is to consult with a professional if you are unsure about a decision that needs to be made. These professionals may include a friend or family member that is a lawyer or someone who is in the same field as your creative work but the bottom line here is that this person needs to be someone you trust because your creative work is your livelihood and I would hate to see something happen to it.

My Opinion On Citizen Journalists

I was recently asked how I feel about Citizen Journalists and I can't say that hate them because that would be an oxymoron especially since that refers to all of you, the audience following my blog. In fact that's why we are using Blogger to be reporters, writers, commentators and critics who express their opinions on the Internet about a variety of topics. However, as Citizen Journalists we have a responsibility to show that all of us are more than a pajama wearing army of people who spread gossip around the Internet by giving ourselves credibility as writers. Giving yourself credibility as a Citizen Journalist if you have a working career is just as simple as posting a link on the bio for your Blog that connects to your profile on the website for the company you work at or professional articles that you may have written.

The Blogger profile for professional TV Critic Alan Sepinwall linked from his Blog What's Alan Watching.

Although for those of us who are students in Writing for New Media Class the idea of giving ourselves credibility as Citizen Journalists or Bloggers is more complicated because we may say that we are film, sound or web site design majors but we don't have the credentials like a degree. This is where posting movies, pictures and hyperlinks comes in handy because we can use another person's credibility to back up our thoughts and opinions that we leave open to the audience of the world wide web, thus making us true Citizen Journalists.
A screencap of Beatnik Babble Broadcast a Blog that does a great job of backing up its information with movies, pictures and hyperlinks.

In a nutshell that is why I think that Citizen Journalists are needed to allow us, members of a Writing New Media Class and the rest of the world to see each others thoughts and opinions without needing to travel. With that being said there needs to be more true Citizen Journalists like our New Media Class who backs up their posts with sources and less of the Gossipers who live in their Mother's basement. This will benefit the Internet because if more Journalists like us come into existence we might force the Gossipers upstairs in to the world of backing up facts with sources.