BNFs

[Ashleigh]

So, apparently in every fanfiction fandom there is someone (or maybe multiple someones) called a BNF. "Big Name Ficwriter" is how it was de-acronymned to me, and I'm wondering what is up with that. LOL. Anyone here care to shed some light on the whole BNF mystery?

[Silversun]

Huh. Very interesting! I had no idea what a BNF was until I clicked on the thread, but as soon as I saw the explanation my mind immediately went 'Kerching! Cassie Claire for Harry Potter'. Will be much interested to hear about other fandoms, and whether other people share my opinion about CC being BNF for HP.

[NaijaChiqa]

I believe that BNF means Big Name Fan and they write fanfics or create fanart.

I am new to fandom as a whole but apparently, they are the fans whose work is rec'd by every and anyone, whose LJ is friended by each and everybody and who's pretty much known by everyone in the fandom.

[Crossbow]

It's also used to describe fans who are considered such "experts" that no one is allowed to disagree with them.

[Silversun]

Originally posted by Crossbow
It's also used to describe fans who are considered such "experts" that no one is allowed to disagree with them. That's a bit scary.

[L u x i e]

Mm. That is freaky. BNF's tend to be a bit elitist as well.

[Ashleigh]

Whee! Now I am real scared, because I don't think it was a compliment now. LOL. (Apparently I am a BNF. Sigh.)

[Silversun]

Originally posted by Ashleigh
Whee! Now I am real scared, because I don't think it was a compliment now. LOL. (Apparently I am a BNF. Sigh.) I think it needs to be read in context. I can certainly see how the label could be used as something good, too. :look:

[Catalinay]

Yeah, a BNF isn't necessarily a good thing. But I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing to be called a BNF, either. They probably just meant that you're one of the most-read authors in the fandom.

[Ashleigh]

LOL. No, when I went back and took it in context it was definitely an insult, but oh well. I'll just keep writing and not care what said group thinks about me.

[Catalinay]

Hmmm...might I ask what the context was? I think that's the first time I've heard of someone being called a BNF in an insulting way to their face.

[Ashleigh]

It's complicated, but there's a group of 'haters' in the swimslash fandom. Sad, but true. And basically all the bad stuff about BNFs said above? Elitist and snobby and all that? Basically what they meant. *snort* Clearly they do not know me. *diva hand* :D

[shazaam]

I only really know about the HP fandom, so I won't say that this applies to every fandom.

There are BNF's that are pretty much infamous within the fandom (or the Internet in some cases!)- famous for "wank" or arguments that arise whenever their name is mentioned. Cassie Claire falls into this category. Because of her backstory (the whole FF.net plaigerism thing), CC is the fandom's biggest name. She makes a post on a subject, you can guarantee there will be someone who bitches about something. She is one of the people who is recognised for her BNF-ness rather than her writing.

Then there are BNF's based on a subset of fandom. The Death-Eater part of fandom (Snape/Lucius/Voldie etc) have their own BNF's, for example Amanuensis, McTabby and Isis. You have BNF's based on writing fanfictions, based on artwork (Glockgal, Fiendling) or organizing fandom activities and running websites (Heidi)

Shaz

Disclaimer: Based on the HP fandom only, and mainly on LiveJournal interactions. I have no grudge with any of these people.

[Crossbow]

I read that one of the "symptoms" of being a BNF is if you have more than 50 people reading your livejournal. Someone said I was a becoming a BNF, but I just checked and I only about 36 people read my journal, and only about 3 of them read it because of my fan fiction.

[Silversun]

Originally posted by Crossbow
I read that one of the "symptoms" of being a BNF is if you have more than 50 people reading your livejournal. :lol: Cute. And whoa, twisted. Thanks for the insight shazaam. It's very weird that fandoms are so hierarchical. Huh. Fanfic royalty.

(What is this thing with CC and ff.net? I've never heard of it.)

[Catalinay]

Yeah, I've always thought the whole BNF thing was interesting. It seems like there are BNFs who don't really care about it, and BNFs who love being well-known. I think there are different BNFs for the different Roswell genres as well, or at least there used to be.

[Crossbow]

Originally posted by Silversun
(What is this thing with CC and ff.net? I've never heard of it.)

She plagiarized a whole scene in the story where Draco dies. If you look at it now, she credits the original author, but apparently she didn't when she originally posted it.

[Ashleigh]

Originally posted by Crossbow
I read that one of the "symptoms" of being a BNF is if you have more than 50 people reading your livejournal.

LOL. I have 115. At least 40 of them friended me 'cause of fanfic. *creeps away*

:D

[shazaam]

Originally posted by Silversun
:lol: Cute. And whoa, twisted. Thanks for the insight shazaam. It's very weird that fandoms are so hierarchical. Huh. Fanfic royalty.

(What is this thing with CC and ff.net? I've never heard of it.)

Hehehe no problems. Fandom is weird like woah :P

Crossbow was right on the mark with her description. Plus there was a whole bunch of inter-fandom politics and flame-wars and much "I'm a friend of CC so nyah." Rather amusing to watch, not so fun to be involved in.

BNF = people with 50 friends or more on LJ? I'd never heard that one before. But congrats to Crossbow and Ashleigh on their BNF status ;)

[Silversun]

If you need 50 friends on LJ to be a BNF, my fandom is officially too small to have a BNF at all. I think there's maybe 20 of us left in the entire world. :lol:

[Catalinay]

Well, I still consider myself a YA fan...I just don't read it all that often anymore. (Except for Nicky's episodes.)

[Candice L.]

Well, this is generally coming from my experience with pop fic, including (but not limited to) popslash.

BNFs there tend to be people who have, as someone said, at least fifty or more people who read their LJ. They cling onto almost every word said BNF says. Some of them are really quite nice and funny, but all hell tends to break loose if someone says something particularly slanderous about them. Then there's the BBNFs (big big name fans), who have over 100 people who read their journal, have boards, and so on and so forth...

The only prime case of that that I can think of is FictionLyn. She wrote *NSYNC fan fic a few years ago and it was insanely popular. So many people gushed and gushed about her fic that I went and read it. They were these ridculously long epics and I didn't think too much of them. :rolleyes: Yet she got all this love from people and when she started her LJ, something like 400+ people friended her. I didn't get it. But such is fandom.

[shazaam]

Candice: I've only just got into Popslash this past month. I've basically stuck to rec'd stories, because I've seen some shocking RPS before :P I'm reading lots of Reese's (http://www.illuminations.nu/experimentv/) fics, do you have any other recs for me?

Yeah, the LJ-friends is usually a pretty good indicator of BNF-ness. I think Cassie Claire has like 2000+ people friending her :eek: Sometimes though, the hype just isn't worth it.

[Silversun]

Originally posted by shazaam
I think Cassie Claire has like 2000+ people friending her :eek: Sometimes though, the hype just isn't worth it. I know, the amount of friends on CC's LJ is crazy. And yeah, sometimes people don't live up to the hype. But for me, at least, Cassie is the one fic writer who really does deliver. The Draco Trilogy is unrepresentative, especially the first two fics. But read A Season In Hell/After The Flood (http://www.diagon.org/library/fic/cassie_siege.html), read Mortal Instruments (http://www.livejournal.com/users/epicyclical/174739.html), and I defy you to find a better fic writer in the entire fandom. She is a constant source of awe and amazement for me.

[NaijaChiqa]

Okay, I just went to check out this Cassie person's LJ and damn, 2770 people friended her. Wow.

[Crossbow]

Originally posted by Silversun
I know, the amount of friends on CC's LJ is crazy. And yeah, sometimes people don't live up to the hype. But for me, at least, Cassie is the one fic writer who really does deliver. The Draco Trilogy is unrepresentative, especially the first two fics. But read A Season In Hell/After The Flood (http://www.diagon.org/library/fic/cassie_siege.html), read Mortal Instruments (http://www.livejournal.com/users/epicyclical/174739.html), and I defy you to find a better fic writer in the entire fandom. She is a constant source of awe and amazement for me.

Not to mention The Very Secret Diaries. (http://homepages.nyu.edu/~amw243/diaries/) I don't think I've ever laughed so hard at a fic!

[Ashleigh]

Originally posted by Crossbow
Not to mention The Very Secret Diaries. (http://homepages.nyu.edu/~amw243/diaries/) I don't think I've ever laughed so hard at a fic!

I know nothing about that particular fandom, but I read that a couple months ago as the swimslash fandom has been working on their own version of the Very Secret Diaries. It WAS highly amusing.

And the swimslash fandom? Very very small. Maybe 300+ people and probably 25-30 writers. Very very small.

[shazaam]

Silversun- I love A Season in Hell, it's one of my favourite H/D fics. I just don't get the hype over the DT anymore. I read the first two, started the last one and thought "meh"

I know it's het (ew :P), but have you read a lot to be upset about (http://www.astronomytower.org/authors/cassie/ALTBUA.html)? it's Draco/Ginny and so hilarious.

My latest fandom is Ocean's Eleven. Seriously. There's not many fics out there, but damn, the ones that are... :drool:

[Crossbow]

Originally posted by shazaam
Silversun- I love A Season in Hell, it's one of my favourite H/D fics. I just don't get the hype over the DT anymore. I read the first two, started the last one and thought "meh"

Aw, you quit before it got good.

I wish I could recommend DV to everyone without them having to read DD and DS, but there is just too much backstory.

[Silversun]

Originally posted by Crossbow
Aw, you quit before it got good.

I wish I could recommend DV to everyone without them having to read DD and DS, but there is just too much backstory. Pretty much what I was going to say.

But I have resigned myself that the DT has just gotten too hyped for its own good, and it's not fair forcing people to trudge through the 16 chapters of the first two just so they could read the lovely DV. Thank god for Cassie's recent short stories, that's all I can say.

And yes Shazaam, I did indeed read A Lot To Be Upset About. It's hilarious! :lol: Harry speaking in capital letters all the time is just a stroke of genius.

[Crossbow]

I'm looking forward to seeing CC's original stories some time. Imagine what she could do with a real editor.

[Kath7]

Originally posted by Catalinay
Yeah, I've always thought the whole BNF thing was interesting. It seems like there are BNFs who don't really care about it, and BNFs who love being well-known. I think there are different BNFs for the different Roswell genres as well, or at least there used to be.

There definately are. There are as many shipper groups for Roswell as there are fans, and there are BNF's for most of them (first time I've heard that term btw - I love it). In fact, there are even BNF's for various segments WITHIN shipper groups in the Rosdom, particularly Dreamer, which is the Max/Liz coupling group. There are people who support certain writers because they write Liz more strongly, and some who support other writers because they write Max in a certain way, etc. etc. etc. It's actually quite out of control.

Most of the BNF's I know are great people though, and are mostly surprised that their fics are so popular. Or that they inspire so much vitriol from others (I think mainly because of jealousy). Whatever it is with these authors, whether they be the most talented or not, (often they are, sometimes not) people feel passionately about them, either one way or the other, and their fics inspire people to talk. If you see a writer mentioned on a thread on a NON-Fanfic board for Roswell, you can pretty much guess that they're a BNF.

The other interesting thing about BNF's in the Roswell fandom is that they can be BNF's for one fic, but their next one can totally bomb. It's really weird. And then there are other people who hit with everything, even if it's nowhere near up to the standards of things they have written before, or things that other non-BNF's are writing.

[Orton]

Wow interesting topic. Never knew BNFs existed I guess people make them up as you go along ;)

I never liked LJ's... I've only ever joined two, and they were my friends, but I only ever posted once on them :lol:

[smeagolkitten]

I think the 50 LJ friends rule is really interesting, but I have to ask? Is having an LJ a requirement to make BNF status? :P I don't think all fandoms are that well-repressented on LJ as some are :P

[Thetisಌ]

I didn't know BNFs existed. I havent written much to be one though :lol:

[colorblind]

i never heard of BNF's and i'm definitely not one so.. :lol:

[Rhiannon]

I don't think they're such a phenomenon any more. :lol: I don't know any anyway.

[sweet_zelda]

:lol: So, does anyone know any BNF's anymore? Who would you want to be "famous" for their fan fic writing?

[Cold-Blooded Piece of Toast]

I can't really think of any BNFs of the sort that would get iPods and laptops the way Cassandra Claire did (I remember that fiasco and reading the Draco Trilogy!).

More big website owners having some clout in fandom but fanfiction writers? Not really. The ones I follow may be prolific and get dozens of replies on livejournal but I don't see them getting free stuff.

Then again, I'm not really active in any fandom these days.

[sweet_zelda]

I didn't even know about Cassandra Claire :lol: