Kirok of L'Stok
06-04-2008, 09:49 AM
[This is a copy of a thread that I started on the TrekUnited fan
productions forum <http://www.trekunited.com/community/index.php?
showtopic=17077> as the first of what I hope will be a monthly
spotlight on the many and varied Star Trek fan fiction archives
currently available to fanfictioneers. This is my first post here so I
hope this comes out 70 characters long: was I supposed to leave the
forced carriage returns in on the message input box on the Google
Group page? Sorry about the BB Code but there are a lot links in here
that add to the usefulness of the article. I would appreciate
comments, additions, corrections ... - K]
[Snip]
alt.startrek.Creative, or ASC, is a newsgroup (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Newsgroup) - news:alt.startrek.creative - for the
posting of creative Star Trek fan fiction, poems, documentation, and
other such works. Started in 1990 it's archive, The Trekiverse Archive
has two mirrors, here (http://www.trekiverse.us/) and
here (http://www.trekiverse.org/), which were started in
1991.
The main newsgroup has spawned various daughter groups ...
alt.startrek.creative.erotica (ASCE) - Star Trek erotica fiction,
was not available in all areas, Defunct.
alt.startrek.creative.erotica.moderated (ASCEM) - Moderated
replacement of ASCE due to spam. Star Trek erotica stories and
discussion.
alt.startrek.creative.all-ages (ASCA) - A family friendly,
moderated version of ASC. Stories limited to PG-13 and no slash. All
stories posted to ASCA are allowed on ASC
alt.startrek.uss-amagosa - TNG-DS9 time frame stories on the USS
Amagosa or associated Universe.
alt.fan.q (AFQ) - for discussion and creative stories on Q from
either Trek or Bond.
A Yahoo Group, ASCL (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ASCL/),
was created in June 2000 as "an experimental, stories-only mailing
list version of ASC, alt.startrek.creative, to provide an interim
solution for people with poor newsfeeds in the absence of an up-to-
date ASC archive..." Although it is still open (with 541 members!) it
was last posted to in Dec 2006.
Newsgroups are a bit before my time, so I access ASC through it's
Google Group, whose home page is at
http://
groups.google.com/group/alt.startrek.creative (http://groups.google.com/group/alt.startrek.creative), and it's posts
are delivered by email. I often wish that I could get my PDA linked up
to my personal email account so that I could read the stories on the
go but unfortunately my boss is unreasonable enough to expect me to
just use it for work! The average story is generally short, what I
would call a drabble or flash fiction, and there are links to fiction
on other sites and fanzines.
The newsgroup runs an annual competition, the archive page (http://
www.trekiverse.us/ASCAwards/index.html) shows the
results between 1995 - 2004, and as it stands all stories, poems and
filks posted to the newsgroup between Feb 1 and Jan 31 the following
year are in the running unless an author specifically opts out. "The
ASC awards are feedback-based," according to the organisers, "which
means in order to "vote" for a particular story, you write a comment.
It can be as simple as 'I really loved this story because it showed
Picard in a whole new light' or a lengthy, detailed analysis." In
order to comment on a story, you must first register and this year
registrations opened on Feb 25 although you can register at any time
during the awards season, which ran from Mar 2-23, with the results
being announced on Mar 31.
Sadly the reduction in numbers of fan fiction posted on ASC means that
the 2007 awards could be the last. The coordinators, Rocky and
Stephen, posted, "Serious consideration was given to not having Awards
this year. Some series, in fact, barely had enough stories to warrant
even one category. If this trend is not reversed, this could be the
last year for Awards."
I really like the idea of voting by comments! Although you could say
it is forcing comments out of people who would not normally do so, I
prefer to think of it as more of an encouragement for people to
comment. Feedback is the lifeblood of writing and anything that
creates more interaction between writers and readers - or writers and
writers - is well worth encouraging!
Note:
- For a snapshot of mailing lists, newsgroups, ftp sites, telnet (http://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telnet)
(MUDS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUD)), gopher (http://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_%28protocol%29) and websites
from 1998 see <http://rec.horus.at/trek/
star_trek_resources.html"]http://rec.horus.at/trek/
star_trek_resources.html>
[EndSnip]
Kirok of L'Stok
Fan Production Curmudgeon
productions forum <http://www.trekunited.com/community/index.php?
showtopic=17077> as the first of what I hope will be a monthly
spotlight on the many and varied Star Trek fan fiction archives
currently available to fanfictioneers. This is my first post here so I
hope this comes out 70 characters long: was I supposed to leave the
forced carriage returns in on the message input box on the Google
Group page? Sorry about the BB Code but there are a lot links in here
that add to the usefulness of the article. I would appreciate
comments, additions, corrections ... - K]
[Snip]
alt.startrek.Creative, or ASC, is a newsgroup (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Newsgroup) - news:alt.startrek.creative - for the
posting of creative Star Trek fan fiction, poems, documentation, and
other such works. Started in 1990 it's archive, The Trekiverse Archive
has two mirrors, here (http://www.trekiverse.us/) and
here (http://www.trekiverse.org/), which were started in
1991.
The main newsgroup has spawned various daughter groups ...
alt.startrek.creative.erotica (ASCE) - Star Trek erotica fiction,
was not available in all areas, Defunct.
alt.startrek.creative.erotica.moderated (ASCEM) - Moderated
replacement of ASCE due to spam. Star Trek erotica stories and
discussion.
alt.startrek.creative.all-ages (ASCA) - A family friendly,
moderated version of ASC. Stories limited to PG-13 and no slash. All
stories posted to ASCA are allowed on ASC
alt.startrek.uss-amagosa - TNG-DS9 time frame stories on the USS
Amagosa or associated Universe.
alt.fan.q (AFQ) - for discussion and creative stories on Q from
either Trek or Bond.
A Yahoo Group, ASCL (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ASCL/),
was created in June 2000 as "an experimental, stories-only mailing
list version of ASC, alt.startrek.creative, to provide an interim
solution for people with poor newsfeeds in the absence of an up-to-
date ASC archive..." Although it is still open (with 541 members!) it
was last posted to in Dec 2006.
Newsgroups are a bit before my time, so I access ASC through it's
Google Group, whose home page is at
http://
groups.google.com/group/alt.startrek.creative (http://groups.google.com/group/alt.startrek.creative), and it's posts
are delivered by email. I often wish that I could get my PDA linked up
to my personal email account so that I could read the stories on the
go but unfortunately my boss is unreasonable enough to expect me to
just use it for work! The average story is generally short, what I
would call a drabble or flash fiction, and there are links to fiction
on other sites and fanzines.
The newsgroup runs an annual competition, the archive page (http://
www.trekiverse.us/ASCAwards/index.html) shows the
results between 1995 - 2004, and as it stands all stories, poems and
filks posted to the newsgroup between Feb 1 and Jan 31 the following
year are in the running unless an author specifically opts out. "The
ASC awards are feedback-based," according to the organisers, "which
means in order to "vote" for a particular story, you write a comment.
It can be as simple as 'I really loved this story because it showed
Picard in a whole new light' or a lengthy, detailed analysis." In
order to comment on a story, you must first register and this year
registrations opened on Feb 25 although you can register at any time
during the awards season, which ran from Mar 2-23, with the results
being announced on Mar 31.
Sadly the reduction in numbers of fan fiction posted on ASC means that
the 2007 awards could be the last. The coordinators, Rocky and
Stephen, posted, "Serious consideration was given to not having Awards
this year. Some series, in fact, barely had enough stories to warrant
even one category. If this trend is not reversed, this could be the
last year for Awards."
I really like the idea of voting by comments! Although you could say
it is forcing comments out of people who would not normally do so, I
prefer to think of it as more of an encouragement for people to
comment. Feedback is the lifeblood of writing and anything that
creates more interaction between writers and readers - or writers and
writers - is well worth encouraging!
Note:
- For a snapshot of mailing lists, newsgroups, ftp sites, telnet (http://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telnet)
(MUDS (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUD)), gopher (http://
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gopher_%28protocol%29) and websites
from 1998 see <http://rec.horus.at/trek/
star_trek_resources.html"]http://rec.horus.at/trek/
star_trek_resources.html>
[EndSnip]
Kirok of L'Stok
Fan Production Curmudgeon