Partly_bouncy argues for the "right" to link fan pseuds, LJ username, and legal names in some cases because otherwise it would not be "true" history.

As both are BNFs and influence peddlers in fandom and people stepping out publicly to represent fandom to the media and academics, you can't really present their identities as separate with out perpetuating a false history.

Given the amount of incorrect information tolerated in her wiki, I find her usage of the term "false history" to be bizarre: for one thing, it assumes that there is a "true" history. I have also learned in the past few days that the wiki outs more people than I'd realized, and at least one person I know was told her outing would not be removed from the wiki because it would not be true to history.

( And that false idea is the subject of this post: History: I do not think that word means what you think it means )

¹( The Oxford English Dictionary's definitions and history of usage, cut for length )

OTW=Organization for Transformative Works

Disclaimer: I am a volunteer in a minor way (have worked on editing *one* section of TOS, and am on the Board for the academic journal--which is *not* a journaling service).

Am still seeing lots and lots of misinformation about OTW being spread around the internets. Some of it's getting even weirder than before.

It's a stupid name that will turn fans off!

That's understandable (although clearly it does not turn all fans off!), but it's a question of audience and purpose.

( cut for length )

OTW is perhaps unusual in fandom but not unique (there are other non-profit organizations--you need a larger group with stabilizing elements to achieve certain types of tasks).

However, the one thing OTW is not and never meant to be: a business.

They are not in this for the profits (monetary).

They are not a corporation.

They have to meet certain legal and financial requirements or lose their non-profit status: at this point, they been recognized by the state, but not yet on the federal level, so they're not "tax-exempt" -- i.e. a donation to them cannot be deducted *yet*.

( cut for length )

Here's the transcript of the second chat

Behind the cut are excerpts from that log supporting what I've said above.

( excerpts from second chat log to back up what I said above )

( specifically, the question of Heidi )

OK, and finally to two of my pet peeves: the issue of RPF/RPS *not* being part of media fandom, and "jargon."

Media does not mean "fiction."
( cut for length )

"Pot calls kettle jargon": if I have to read any more complaints about the horribly awful language/jargon used by OTW, I may just have to smack somebody.

Fans do not get to complain about academics using specialized language or terminology.

*Every* word above links to a *different* fan glossary/fandom terminology.

All human interest groups/sub-cultures develop specialized terminology, from wine-makers, to knitters, to truckers, to fans (multiple terminologies actually!). Academics, ditto.

People are lazy and abbreviate terms liek whoa, and abbreviations are not jargon.

And please don't give me the "we're all fans here we should be able to understand everything OTW says," because dude, there are lots of areas of fandom where I don't understand diddlysquat, whether it's because of the different technology, the different source text, the different generations, the different nationalities, or who knows what else.