Changing genres, I believe all of these references* have both fans and “conventions”, and anyone would be hard-pressed to call any of them “bad” or flawed:
Architecture: Frank Lloyd Wright
Jazz: Davis, Coltrane, Peterson, Brubeck
Toys: Lego, Barbie, and Play Mobil
Military aircraft: P51 Mustang
Racing: Volvo Ocean Racing, F1, World Rally, MotoGP
Cars: 1955 Gullwing, 1965 Shelby Cobra, Enzo Ferrari
I can’t speak for most of the others you’ve cited (though the fact that I am not aware they have fanatic fanbases suggests they’re several orders of magnitude below, say, Star Trek).
I’d suggest that Bond didn’t restrict his comments to a degree of magnitude of fan base (or for that matter Eliezer with his reference to Vance’s books).
But I’m quite willing to state that the fan base of F1, many who spend hundreds if not thousands of dollars of year to attend a single race, and which attracts a global viewing audience of some 50 million per race (1 billon over a season) surely is in the same magnitude of Star Trek.
Or take Playmobil, with something like 2.2 billion sets sold and an annual turnover of close to Euro 500M, and which has inspired many annual conventions all over the world.
I’d, respectfully, suggest that your unfamiliarity with my examples speaks more to your range of cultural, artistic, sporting, and commercial, interests than it does their global fan bases.
I’d, respectfully, suggest that your unfamiliarity with my examples speaks more to your range of cultural, artistic, sporting, and commercial, interests than it does their global fan bases.
You’re almost definitely right.
Though I’m curious, do these see the same level of Han-and-Leia-wedding-style fanaticism, or is it just that such levels of fanaticism for these things are normal enough that they don’t make the news?
I’d say that the level of fanaticism can be pretty high in many of the examples I used. F1 fans travel all over the world, dress up in funny costumes, and parade around carrying massive flags showing which team or driver they support. Google “Tifosi” for a flavour.
Each of the other have their own version of fanatic behaviour … my favourite for sheer lunatic fun remains the annual Bloomsday celebration of Joyce’s Ulysses.
This seems to broaden the discussion considerably from works of art with fandoms to anything with a following. I think you’ll agree that there’s a noticeable difference between the attitude of otaku toward anime and F1 followers toward F1 cars and races.
Perhaps my error … I didn’t read anything in Bond’s article that suggested he was only referring to fans of fiction and movies. Are there differences between otaku and tifosi? What are they?
Bond’s article was mostly referring to fans of fiction and movies, but as someone who has spent time on fora related to both sports fandom and anime fandom, I can safely say they’re very similar. You see the same sort of memetics in both—sports message boards frequently fill up with people “quoting”(I don’t think this is the best word) the chants made in the stadium itself, much like you’ll often see anime-related boards fill up with people quoting famous lines from certain series. You see the same sort of provincialism in both—”If you’re a fan of X, you’re not allowed to be a fan of Y, and vice versa” is a common refrain in certain tvtropes pages about Fan Dumb, and that’s also pretty much the definition of a sports rivalry. And there’s also the internecine stuff, where you have endless debates over the worth of a player or the motivations of a character.
In the same vein as newerspeak’s reference to Proust, how about Joyce fans and their annual bloomsday celebrations?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloomsday
Changing genres, I believe all of these references* have both fans and “conventions”, and anyone would be hard-pressed to call any of them “bad” or flawed:
Architecture: Frank Lloyd Wright
Jazz: Davis, Coltrane, Peterson, Brubeck
Toys: Lego, Barbie, and Play Mobil
Military aircraft: P51 Mustang
Racing: Volvo Ocean Racing, F1, World Rally, MotoGP
Cars: 1955 Gullwing, 1965 Shelby Cobra, Enzo Ferrari
Birding: The Great Horned Owl
and many many more.
I don’t think many people would be hard pressed to call Barbie flawed.
I can’t speak for most of the others you’ve cited (though the fact that I am not aware they have fanatic fanbases suggests they’re several orders of magnitude below, say, Star Trek).
I’d suggest that Bond didn’t restrict his comments to a degree of magnitude of fan base (or for that matter Eliezer with his reference to Vance’s books).
But I’m quite willing to state that the fan base of F1, many who spend hundreds if not thousands of dollars of year to attend a single race, and which attracts a global viewing audience of some 50 million per race (1 billon over a season) surely is in the same magnitude of Star Trek.
Or take Playmobil, with something like 2.2 billion sets sold and an annual turnover of close to Euro 500M, and which has inspired many annual conventions all over the world.
I’d, respectfully, suggest that your unfamiliarity with my examples speaks more to your range of cultural, artistic, sporting, and commercial, interests than it does their global fan bases.
You’re almost definitely right.
Though I’m curious, do these see the same level of Han-and-Leia-wedding-style fanaticism, or is it just that such levels of fanaticism for these things are normal enough that they don’t make the news?
I’d say that the level of fanaticism can be pretty high in many of the examples I used. F1 fans travel all over the world, dress up in funny costumes, and parade around carrying massive flags showing which team or driver they support. Google “Tifosi” for a flavour.
Lego fans do things like build this 46′ self-supporting bridge http://gizmodo.com/5272536/46+foot-long-self+supporting-lego-bridge-to-set-new-world-record.
Each of the other have their own version of fanatic behaviour … my favourite for sheer lunatic fun remains the annual Bloomsday celebration of Joyce’s Ulysses.
A lot of people are critical of F1 for various reasons. At any rate it seems necessary to establish exactly what constitutes a true “fandom”.
This seems to broaden the discussion considerably from works of art with fandoms to anything with a following. I think you’ll agree that there’s a noticeable difference between the attitude of otaku toward anime and F1 followers toward F1 cars and races.
Perhaps my error … I didn’t read anything in Bond’s article that suggested he was only referring to fans of fiction and movies. Are there differences between otaku and tifosi? What are they?
Bond’s article was mostly referring to fans of fiction and movies, but as someone who has spent time on fora related to both sports fandom and anime fandom, I can safely say they’re very similar. You see the same sort of memetics in both—sports message boards frequently fill up with people “quoting”(I don’t think this is the best word) the chants made in the stadium itself, much like you’ll often see anime-related boards fill up with people quoting famous lines from certain series. You see the same sort of provincialism in both—”If you’re a fan of X, you’re not allowed to be a fan of Y, and vice versa” is a common refrain in certain tvtropes pages about Fan Dumb, and that’s also pretty much the definition of a sports rivalry. And there’s also the internecine stuff, where you have endless debates over the worth of a player or the motivations of a character.
So yeah, I’d say fandom is universal.