Introduction Post

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

I think we've been spending enough time together (and for me, it's been very enjoyable time) that we should get to know each other a bit more. So here's a post for that purpose. Some things I'd love to know about you, my fellow fen, are:

-Your name and a little about yourself. (Age, job, where you live, anything about you that you consider important)

-How you got here. (History of the path you took to finding this game, not just how you heard about it but what made you care enough to actually check it out. And what made you interested enough to want to stay and spend hours and hours discussing it)

ETA: I had more, but after writing my own answers I realized that this was plenty to start with.

I have put my own answers to the questions in a comment. I really look forward to seeing what everyone has to say.

Comments

My answers

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

My name is Kara, I live in Carrboro, NC, and I turned 25 last month. I went to Reed College (which I mention because I know one of the players did too, but I was older than you!) and then got my Masters in Elementary Education. I went off to find a job teaching elementary school, but instead ended up as a substitute teacher. This is my second year subbing, and I also tutor kids in the evenings. I thought of it as a dumb non-job at first, but now I sort of love it because it makes me feel like a roving adventurer who has lots of new and unexpected experiences, and also because I think it is a very challenging job and I feel proud that I am pretty good at it.

Part of the reason I mention this is that I think that my position as a teacher sometimes influences the way I see the kids in the game, especially those who are younger than 12 (which is the oldest age I sub for).

I do plan to get a full-time teaching job, hopefully next year. If I could choose any grade, I think I'd choose fifth.

I live with my boyfriend, who I met at Reed and have been with for five years. He got caught up in my excitement at first and was reading alternity, but I suppose it's not really his thing, because while he enjoyed it he also quickly fell behind and then stopped reading altogether. He is a grad student and a blogger for World of Warcraft. He has been playing WoW nonstop since the new expansion came out Thursday, which partly explains why I am spending my Saturday morning at home sitting on my own computer! Although it's enjoyable way to spend time, so I'm not really complaining.

I had no idea how much I'd have to say. I think I'm going to stop there for now.

And about the game

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

Here is my history with the Harry Potter fandom.

When I was in high school, I heard about Harry Potter and thought it sounded dumb. I tried reading the first 80 pages or so while sitting in a bookstore and hated them. But my friend, who would eventually become my first girlfriend, loved the books and offered to read them aloud to me. I agreed, she ended up reading the first three books to me that way, and it was one of those wonderful and perfect life experiences.

I loved the books enough to venture into fandom. I've always been a bit shy about the internet (I read a lot, but feel pretty nervous about saying anything), so I was mostly a silent participant. I talked to my RL friends about it, but from the computer I mostly watched. There was one fan whose livejournal entries I found particularly funny and interesting (her username was dorkorific). One day, she started raving about this thing called That Was Then. I didn't totally understand it, but I started to read it anyway. A few months later the game This Is Now started, and so I followed that from the beginning.

It turned out to possibly be my favorite sort of storytelling that I had ever encountered. Complex, interesting characters. First-person, real-time, full of subtle hints that rewarded a close reading. After it ended, I never completely stopped thinking about it. Every few months I would go on a grand and desperate search through livejournal for any trace of another game like it, but I didn't really find one. A couple of years after it ended, my boyfriend helped me with a project to list All the TIN posts in order (http://tinlist.nfshost.com/) so I could reread it. And I did. Every word. And was sad again, because by then I was pretty sure that HP fandom was dwindling, and maybe no other fandom would ever be that big again, and there just wasn't enough creative energy left in online fandom to create anything like TIN ever again. And then Alternity happened, and here we are. It's not the same as TIN, but some of the players are the same, and I think the fan community is actually much better, although smaller, and I think that it has the potential to be really amazing. And I also have something of the urge to nurture and protect it like some little sapling that could grow into a giant tree if it doesn't get stepped on first. Which is probably dumb. But I'm inches away from making my first actual post in my LJ for over a year, just to pimp this game. Because this is the sort of story I love maybe the most, more than TV or books or movies or anything, and for all I know this is the last one of its kind that will ever exist.

Re: My answers

[alt-player.livejournal.com]

I didn't realize you went to Reed as well! It sounds like we didn't overlap...? You ought to friend me on Facebook - my real name is, after all, very publicly attached to my journal.

- The player who went to Reed College

[lapin-agile.livejournal.com]

Name and a little about yourself:
I'm Deb. I'm 45 and teach. I have a commuter marriage, so I live in Texas and slave in Ohio, where it is currently doing this:

(http://pics.livejournal.com/lapin_agile/pic/000266z5/)

I'm especially likely to be seen here at alt_fen on days when I have a huge stack of papers to grade -- this weekend, for instance! -- and not at all during stretches when the teaching part of teaching is intense. (Clear as mud, that, I know.)

How you got here:
Ah, that's easy. I read Peg Kerr's journal and she's been talking up this game since the summer. I was a huge fan of Nocturne Alley and loved playing at Nraged. (I may well have been there with a different LJ name, though, I can't really remember the chronology. If so, I was conversant.) I'm hooked on this game for two reasons: (1) I'm engaged by the subtle and unsubtle shifts from canon to this AU, and (2) because I really like the playing style (the short dialogue-only comments; the parallelism from comment to reply [first line/pgraph responds to first line/pgraph and so on] -- this keeps things sharp and moving; it was true of NA and is beautifully true here, as well). I'm hooked on alt_fen because you guys are great!

Ideas for Growth:
I've got no good ideas about how to bring people into the fen, except that I think the expansion of players may bring some of their acquaintances along, which helps gradually through word of mouth. I hope, at least.

There are sometimes good plot moments for bring more folks on board, so we fen and the players might look for those opportunities for re-pimping the game.

And we might suggest to the mod (she said, suggestively) that in addition to the weekly updates, it might help to have periodic summaries of "the action to date" (after each term of school perhaps ... or after a major plot milestone passes). It's already hard to imagine anyone reading the whole game to catch up.

Maybe the mod would also consider adding a post-dated alt_fen entry with a regularly-update linked index of fen post topics: that could help us and any newcomers find explanations of those game issues we've discussed in the past.

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

What do you teach?

How long have you had a commuter marriage? I imagine that'd be very difficult for me, so I admire you for making it work.

So you never read TIN? And I never got too far in NA. Maybe we should trade favorite posts someday from our respective first games.

I think with other games, one of the things that got them an audience was being pimped by some of the more well-known people in fandom. Do we even have those anymore?

I was thinking about using a series of sample posts to give people a taste of the game so far, enough to motivate them to continue to read it. Like Hermione's first post (http://alt-hermione.livejournal.com/725.html), which introduces her role in the game. And about the Order Only spell (http://community.livejournal.com/hpalternity/898.html), so people won't be confused about that. Harry's sorting (http://alt-harry.livejournal.com/736.html), some in-game events that they would recognize because of similarity to the books (http://alt-harry.livejournal.com/1772.html), the Ministry (http://alt-terry.livejournal.com/2459.html) of (http://alt-terry.livejournal.com/2612.html) Magic (http://alt-terry.livejournal.com/2997.html) Declaration (http://alt-terry.livejournal.com/3326.html) transcribed by Boot... Things to pull them into the world and be motivated to learn more on their own.

[wintercreek]

Maybe the mod would also consider adding a post-dated [info]alt_fen entry with a regularly-update linked index of fen post topics: that could help us and any newcomers find explanations of those game issues we've discussed in the past.

I was just thinking that some kind of crack pot idea/red herring/brilliant theory index would be a great resource, both for us and for new fen.

[alt_moderator]

Why don't we start aggressively using tagging? We've already got the tagged weekly updates; if we tag everything, we can just link to the tag cloud page.

I like the idea of doing a periodic "action to date" summary. I had originally planned to do it once a year, but how about three times a year - Christmas, June, and September? That way, each school term + the summer is covered. And our first one is coming up, too, then: I'll have it for the New Year.

Old RPG favorite posts trade?

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

If you wanna play...
Here's an early post from TIN that makes me laugh:
http://obviouslynot.livejournal.com/1069.html

Got anything from NA?

[wintercreek]

Name and About Me: Hello! My name is Monica, and I'm a 25 year old Library Science/Information Policy grad student. This accounts for both my interest in fetching references from posts (librarian!) and my fits-and-spurts type involvement with the game (procrastinating grad student!).

How I Got Here: pegkerr, basically. I followed nocturne_alley and loved nraged, so when Peg said that a new game and fan community were opening in similar style I hopped on board. I started following NA part way through, so I'm delighted to be in on the ground floor with Alternity.

The Game: I really haven't the foggiest how to engineer greater publicity for the game, since it always seems to be Internet serendipity that brings these things to my attention. I have a relatively small flist and many of the people on it are RL folks in addition to the population of fannish friends (although there's some delightful overlap). I think the best thing we can do as fen is to be active and enthusiastic in our discussions, which includes being as welcoming as possible - commenting back to newcomers, et cetera. Maybe doing these introduction posts periodically? I'm assuming that this game will run for years (I hope so!) so a chance to meet new fellow fen once a year might be a good opportunity for helping new followers feel more connected.

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

Age twins! Virtual high five!

[muggleangel.livejournal.com]

Hooray! I want to go into LibSci right after I finish my undergrad! What school are you at? I'm currently at the University of Illinois U-C, and we have a really nice LibSci program here.

[borgin.livejournal.com]

Britney, 22. I'm not working as a temp but I consider myself to be in a temporary job while I live with my parents and save money to move out. I live in Pennsylvania, but graduated from Smith in May.

I learned of the game from flourish, and since I remember the original Alternity from back in the day (I *think* Alternity's been in fandom longer than I have, and it's one of the first fanfics I read) I thought I'd check it out. I too was a huge fan of TIN and miss it, and was ready for a new RPG to watch. I always wanted to play in TIN (and, to an extent, this game) but I don't have the dedication to show up on any regular schedule. :) From experience I've learned that I have more fun watching than I do playing.

I'm currently a week or so behind -- I've checked out the game a few times, but I haven't read most of the comments. I'll have more time to catch up next week.

[lapin-agile.livejournal.com]

*waves*

I've been missing you here. (But then I go AWOL, too, fairly regularly, so it could be more me than you.)

[muggleangel.livejournal.com]

I'm Denise, I'm a linguistics undergrad at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. I'm the president of UIUC Buddhist Club, I'm vegetarian, and I'm 20. I want to go to Library Science school after I finish my undergrad, and be a stay-at-home mom someday.

I found Alternity because of the post on Nraged, like a lot of people here I'm an old NA fan, and I never really found an rpg I could really get into after NA finished, so I'm exited by how good Alternity is coming along so far!

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

I'm vegetarian as well. Since I was six years old.

Was your mom stay-at-home? I know of some people who do pretty well being a substitute teacher and mom at the same time, since it lets them be home all the time their kids are home. I always sort of liked that idea. But hopefully once I get a full-time classroom of my own, I'll love it so much that I won't want to stop.

[jenett]

I go by Jenett pretty much everywhere except work these days. I'm 33, and live in Minneapolis in a tiny little house with a cat, a folk harp, and a bunch of books.

I'm a librarian at a private high school in the Twin Cities (I've been a paraprofessional there since 2000, finished my MLIS in 2007, wrangled some new duties to go with the degree, and now my boss - the MLIS requiring position - has taken a new job, so I'm sliding into his position in January for spring semester, and will be applying to keep it. (Said school believes in, shall we say, a far more diligent hiring process than Hogwarts appears to.) I am looking forward to Alternity keeping me somewhat sane in the process - it's going to be a busy spring for me.

I found the game through pegkerr and was delighted: I'd heard great things about (but hadn't followed) Nocturne Alley. I'm particularly taken by the meta-analysis options here (for similar reasons that I like Shadow Unit

-Your name and a little about yourself. (Age, job, where you live, anything about you that you consider important)

-How you got here. (History of the path you took to finding this game, not just how you heard about it but what made you care enough to actually check it out. And what made you interested enough to want to stay and spend hours and hours discussing it)

[muggleangel.livejournal.com]

How do you pronounce your name? My mom's name is Jeanette and she is very fussy about how it is said.

[wintercreek]

Hello, fellow librarian! A private high school library sounds like a nice working situation. :)

[queenbookwench.livejournal.com]

Woohoo, another Shadow Unit fan!

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

So... what is Shadow Unit?

[angstalaska.livejournal.com]

I'm Rob. I live in alaska, i work for a non-for-profit Adult Education company that helps people get GED's and Jobs.

I'm a gamer nerd from back in the day, and a Potter enthusiast. I read about alternity on a video game blog, however. Rest is history.

I'm apparently the only dude here.

I dig brevity.

[alt-player.livejournal.com]

We have some male players in the game. Just thought I'd mention that. :)

[alt-player.livejournal.com]

This is a cool thread! I'm loving reading and kind of getting to know you all, because, as in NA (I played Lucius in NA) the fen are a vital part of the game and add SO much to it. We're thankful for you guys. You keep us on our toes!

--Pansy's and Amycus's player

[aquagia.livejournal.com]

Haha, I do have to say--I loved that evil bitch Lucius in NA. It was one of those "Wait, but I'm not SUPPOSED to like him, he's a bad guy" kind of things.

So kudos.

[sugarjet03.livejournal.com]

Hi, I'm Erin. I'm 23, and graduated this year from undergrad with a major in English and a minor in Music. I was born and raised in NC, and currently live one town over from brimtoast (hi, neighbor!).

I heard about the game through flourish and heidi8. I hadn't done anything fandomy in a long time, but this seemed like it would be fun, and it definitely has been :)

[brimtoast.livejournal.com]

Oh! Do you live in Chapel Hill or Durham or what?

And you just got "What Do You Do With a B.A. in English?" stuck in my head.

[queenbookwench.livejournal.com]

I'm Erin, an almost-30 (like next week almost), currently unemployed and job-hunting librarian, living in the Washington, DC area.

--How I got here: Well, I discovered fandom during an emotionally exhausting period in my life, towards the end of my graduate program, and it helped me get through the writing of my Master's thesis. HP was my first fandom, and I mostly lurked, but it's still a fandom that I feel a real connection to. And one of the things I discovered (I don't remember how exactly) was a wonderful game called thatwasthen and this_is_now. I was so enamored of the humor, pathos, quality of writing, and multi-voiced nature of it, that I started following it regularly and commenting in the fan-comm. I looked into other RPGs when it ended, but nothing quite caught my attention in the same way. And then when I saw Peg Kerr posting about hpalternity, my interest was piqued, and then it was even more piqued when alt_moderator commented to say that there were several TWT/TIN alumni playing in the game. So I started following it and was quickly sucked, and then I was sucked all the way to the other side and became a player, which is why I haven't commented here recently. It's hard to comment to speculation posts without giving something away!

[queenbookwench.livejournal.com]

That should say "was quickly sucked _in_"....! Curses upon my too-fast commenting finger!