I still vehemently disagree, as fandoms are "safer" in that their audience is already established, the material already created and much of the tenants of the plot laid out. [quote=@tsukune] Seeing all the complains about "lack of creativity/originality", "no diversity", "annoying fandom spams"... Creativity only can arise through inspirations of existing things - meaning, you cannot create something from absolute nothingness. No matter how "original" you claim your idea is, there's always someone out there who will shoot you down with, "Hey, isn't this idea very familiar? Haven't I seen this somewhere before? Isn't this based on/inspired from ?"[/quote] This is not a matter of "absolute originality", for as you have said that's not something to come. What it is a matter of, is that there's a stark contrast between "original content" and building directly off a framework that has come before. It is as simple as asking one's self if it is more difficult to build a house of sticks while they are all in a pile versus one wherein you would be building on top of existing framework. [quote=@tsukune]Instead of just making sweeping statements such as "fandom is killing creativity", "fandom is limiting and stealing attention away from potentially good original RPs", why can't people try to think out of the box: who says you can't be creative even within an existing work's world?[/quote] I cite my earlier example in that a fandom requires significantly less effort than constructing an entire world. At most one simply needs alter the existing format, moreover fandoms are usually exceptionally well documented by their fans; pages, Wikis, general circulation of the media. The two are not the same and I do not believe them directly comparable, as while both creative, one is constructive and the other dabbles far more in alteration. [quote=@tsukune]Or be more ambitious enough to work even harder to be able to shift their attention away from all these "hateful fandom whores" by making people to get inspired by [i]your[/i] "original" ideas instead?[/quote] An unrealistic expectation when fandoms are entrenched and as popular as they are. It would take a major change in the social dynamics of the Guild abroad to turn this into a credible factor. To steal a quote from a fandom, [i]"Quicker, easier, more seductive."[/i] They are hardly difficult to build up by having already ample source material available, just as easy to recruit for by having a vast audience, and lastly by being inherently more marketable to an audience. Because that audience is such a high concentration, you get great overlap so one fandom is likely to attract other, similar fandoms; it feeds itself and you create a microcommunity which often has intense activity. While I cannot speak for those of us who write [i]everything[/i] ourselves and purposefully skirt fandoms, I admit the idea of "just try harder" is almost insulting. You would be just as successful attempting to rouse independent small business owners to dive into the general market arena and throw themselves against some giant corporation, choose any of them you can think of for reference. Why would people risk their time on a roleplay they are not sure of when they know a genre they like is always thriving? Truth be told, many of these topics rise and fall just as quickly as they began, but for some reason that feels safer and more rewarding. Not many original works last long either, most tending to die out because the Guild has one of the highest turn over rates I have ever seen for roleplays. [quote=@tsukune]Also, it's people's freedom to be interested in whatever they want to like as much as you hate what they like, and they are free not to be interested in whatever your "original" idea is because they simply don't click with what you like.[/quote] This is the only matter I can safely agree on that people have the right to choose. My issue is and will remain that they're over represented, seldom of quality, and not meriting their popularity. No, I do not hate them explicitly because they are successful - that's a foolish notion - but I do dislike them that they are something so easy and all feeling quite the same. I ceased reading a few here that even held the faintest of my interest because they all just devolved into the same thing.