For most consumers of this site, it is not a surprise that AFF has now been reduced to a market with authors fighting it out with their karma points (and at times, story lines) to get the “coveted”, “much envied” advertisement slot. Fanfiction has become a commodity and karma, our virtual currency.

Hence, technically speaking, fanfictions have been commodified and the community has been virtually monetized and this article hence, has no relevance whatsoever. However, the commodification I am referring to is not of the virtual, “karmic” sort but of the real, crisp paper currency sort.

Fanfictions, over the time, have gained unmatched popularity. What began as a mere, often guilty, indulgence of anime fans, winging mangas in different directions and creating “just for fun” stories, the fanfiction has now become a worldwide forum inclusive of several fandoms and is home to an overpowering and overflowing sea of talent of various sorts. Fanfictions are no longer only an indulgence, a tribute to artists we love and books we cry over, a gift or privilege given to us by our biases but an actual profession. It is a job which several authors take seriously, spend hours researching over, taking into account readers’ reviews, innovating and creating works of impeccable quality. The only thing missing from this “job” is the payment.

Considering how fanfictions are not a recent fad or a passing phenomena but a growing institution and maybe, even a genre of writing, it is time that authors demand payment for their work. These are not mediocre works; these are genuine works of literature. Indeed, most of the works are created without the intention of actually writing a “good” novel or for pleasing a publishing house and is written more because one has a brain buzzing with innovative ideas which blossoms only when we have our biases as the characters but it cannot be denied that taken out of the sphere of the derivative genre of “fanfiction”, these stories stand as independent works of literature absolutely capable of tearing down the literary world.

One may argue that if the authors want to make it big they can always write fiction instead of fanfiction but the issue here is not merely about shifting to a market which will recognize your talent but about transforming your current platform into a proliferating market in itself. It is not about restricting talent to one market but creating several markets to tap talent. The amount of talent that goes untapped and unpaid for is shocking and disheartening. Several authors may not feel the urge to write mere fictional novels and in such cases, it’s time for the fanfiction to step in and get monetized.

The risks that the fanfiction community can run into if fanfictions are not monetized are several, the number one being someone else may decide to take the initiative to monetize fanfictions. This someone else will most probably not belong to our fandom (for e.g. the whole of k-pop fandom) but will instead be a business minded, money maker. Such intrusion is unhealthy, absolutely unhealthy. The fanfiction community has unwritten laws of its own and a definite code of conduct and an outsider will never understand that, much less respect it. In such a situation, even though authors will get paid, their views and working patterns will be disregarded. The risk of abusing talent is way too high. If you believe such a case is not possible then let me prove you wrong.

Abigail De Kosnik writes in her essay Should Fanfiction Be Free, “In fact, an attempt at commercializing fanfic already has been made by the company called FanLib, which was largely excoriated by existing fan fiction communities because, as Henry Jenkins wrote, it "didn't emerge bottom-up from the fan culture itself. ... It was a business, pure and simple, run by a board of directors which was entirely composed of men. This last point is especially relevant when you consider that the overwhelming percentage of people who write fan fiction are women."

FanLib ceased to exist in 2008 but the backlash it received opened up the debate of monetization and its consequences for the first time with many users agreeing that monetization was ineveitable reality of fanfictions. It is completely on us whether we want to create that reality or allow someone else to do it.

As compared to other fanfic communities, asianfanfic has a better chance in being commodified with lesser issues because the biggest obstacle of “copyright infringement” can be quietly smothered with a pillow. The issue of copyright infringement is faced by most harry potter fanfiction authors and the day, J.K. Rowling runs out of money (which I doubt), and decides to sue these young authors, the fanfic world shall bleed tears. But we can still sit back and relax, simply because the kind of fanfic we write does not base itself on a published story but employs members of our biased group as characters. These characters on one hand, our members of an idol group but on the other hand, are just fictional beings leading fictional lives.

However, if there is an issue of infringement the court most probably, won’t rule against us. Quoting once again from Abigail De Kosnik’s above mentioned essay,

 “If a case involving fan fiction and copyright infringement ever results in a court ruling, that ruling may agree with this framing of fan fiction as productive and non threatening (or even promotional) rather than derivative and competitive. However, to date, no court case involving either printed or online fan fiction has yielded a judge's decision establishing whether this type of work constitutes fair use or infringement, or whether guidelines for licensing fees must be established before authors can sell appropriations of copyrighted works. Fanfic authors who think that selling appropriative art is always and absolutely against the law are mistaken. No such case law exists, and many appropriating artists make money from their work today without constantly encountering legal trouble.”

You see?

Monetizing fanfictions will not only help online authors get a secured source of income but also the k-pop production companies to find a highly productive form of advertisement and sales promotion. Imagine the SM pop-up store selling copies of Arbitrage or Anterograde Tomorrow along with the (useless) stationary and EXO albums, the sales will shoot up, tear the sky and create some magical portal. However, the condition is that the members of the fanfic community have to be the ones controlling and organizing the market  leaving only the distribution to outsiders. This will reduce the possibilities of corruption or slow down the process of the inevitable corruption and no third person will liquidate major portions of the profit for doing nothing.  

I have lost my trail of thoughts which kind of . . .

Ah! The fanfiction community is not a monetarily beneficial opportunity only for authors but also for reviewers, graphic arts and others. Recognition of talent only comes through a monetary benefit especially when the talent has already been commodified. It is criminal to let go so much talent right into the waste bin when there several fictional authors getting paid for writing utter bull. It is also important to note that most authors here are women. While you may think that writing fanfiction is not a gendered issue but as a matter of fact it is, just like writing manga is. Remember ia Woolf saying “For most of history, Anonymous was a woman”. It would seem that the same stands true for the present. The “Anonymous” of the past was bound by social conventions but the “Anonymous” and “Psuedonym-ous” does not need to bow down to social conventions when it has successfully extricated itself from a gender biased society and created a society of her own. Do not even for once think that I consider the fanfic community an “only female” zone; it is welcoming to all genders but what I am implying is that it is majorly dominated by women and in many ways women exercise a greater agency in this society. It is important to encourage such a society because it gives women the freedom to express her views in the most unadulterated fashion through fanfics.

J.K. Rowling or Joanne Rowling had to resort to a “male” penname because she believed boys wouldn’t read her book otherwise. My point is, in the fanfic world one does not have to make such changes. One does not have to fear that a “male” audience won’t read it because the fanfic community so far hasn’t created any gendered divides when it comes to choosing authors they like. We cannot remain anonymous, our talents need to be watermarked with something more concrete and identifiable and we need to be paid for it.

50 Shades of Grey may serve as a ray of hope considering it is one of the few fanfictions which were not parodies but pure which stormed the bookshelves. It is important that 50 Shades . . . is because one of the major reserves people had about monetizing fanfiction is that the amount of and homouality is overwhelming. We are not talking about merely homouality but something like OT12 getting down and dirty. Even if GG and OT12 got down to doing it, it would still challenge the hetero-normative and apparently, not sell well.

50 Shades . . . came and proved most of it wrong. There are several buyers of and Literature is now a growing sphere of literary studies. As for homouality and homophilic behavior, I say fanfictions can actually revolutionize the fight for homoual rights. I think the best part of or shounen ai fanfictions is that they normalize homouality which is what is needed. This topic is open for debate though. Ofcourse, homouality and fanfictions are a rather complicated issue with many reading them as a moment of ersion and titillation and not because they genuinely support homouality. But the fanfic still proves an effective medium to address the issue.

The monetization of the fanfic will not end up in shooing away amateur writers but it will in fact, provide them an incentive. Most authors anyway begin as amateurs, perfect their work and become recognized authors on AFF. This will give the authors a desired push in professionalizing their work. Review shop and graphic shops will finally function as genuine shops where people buy their work and not order and receive it.

I think most of you may find this article unnecessary and dramatic because fanfics are just a fun thing to do and its leisure but to me, it’s unfair that such a large source of talent is enjoyed by scores of people and none of it is given monetary appreciation. Truly speaking, fanfictions still serve as advertisements for idol groups and helps increase sale of albums. Many readers got into EXO after there was a splurge in good fanfictions coming from the fandom.

I have again lost track of my thoughts and consequently my points, so I’ll just stop here . . .