Babylon 5
From Fan History Wiki
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| FanFiction.Net | Babylon 5 |
| FanDomination.Net | Babylon 5 |
Contents |
[edit] Introduction
Babylon 5 first aired in 1994. The community quickly formed by a base of fans, some of whom were close to the show's producer, J. Michael Straczynski. Because of this and the Marion Zimmer Bradley incident, the community tried to stay as underground as possible. They did not want Straczynski, known in the community as jms, to accidently stumble upon the material.
The Babylon 5 community had two mailing lists start up shortly after the show's creation. One was unrestb5, founded by Waldo. The other was b5creative. These lists generally had policies regarding secrecy and attempts to minimize their Internet presence. The lists were clearly marked not jms safe.
A large part of the community interacted on Usenet groups dedicated to the show. These communities were light on speculation and heavy on questions. The primary Usenet group was moderated so jms could avoid being exposed to story ideas.
Based on the Wayback Machine, the B5 Creative Works Archive came into existence in 1995. It was one of the first fan fiction archives to use a pseudeo database in the form of CGI. This fan fiction archive served the Babylon 5 fan fiction community.
Starting around 1996 and lasting till the late 1990s, Babylon 5 mailing lists reigned king in the Babylon 5 fan fiction community. The two big lists, unrestb5 and b5creative, maintained their influential status. There was also fan fiction archive at B5 Creative Works Archive that was important. Later, such groups as the b5teens, the John/Delenn mailing list and the jdstorybook would begin to impact the nature of the fandom. All of these groups had their knowledge base supplemented by The Lurkers Guide. It was the canon reference resource.
In the last season of Babylon 5, around 1997, 1998, Babylon 5 fen grew disillusioned with the canon after it transitioned to cable and start leaving the fan fiction community.
On October 10, 1997, the Pink Rabbit Consortium [1] was founded. This site was home to some of the best f/f on the Internet for a variety of fandoms including Alien, All My Children, Babylon 5, Buffy: The Vampire Slayer, ER, Law & Order, NYPD Blue, Star Trek: Voyager and Xena.
In February 1998, Sci-Fi Entertainment ran an article on fan fiction. It referenced the Babylon 5 fan fiction community. An extract of a relevant section of the article says:
- There's also high-volume activity associated with Star Trek (referred to here as a aggregate for all four series, although currently Voyager seems to be leading to the greatest fanfic response ) and Lois and Clark: The New Adventure of Superman. But there are other, too: Star Wars, Babylon 5, Sliders, Xena, Dr. Who, Quantum Leap, Highlander, SeaQuest DSV, Beauty and the Beast - all of these popular science fiction and fantasy series have sites dedicated to the stories and characters of those universes.
By 2000, the Babylon 5 community become much more fragmented. Parts of the community continued to be based at b5creative and Usenet but the influence of the John/Delenn site had waned. jumpnow.de became more influential. Parts of the community moved to LiveJournal and people created lists on services like Egroups, Coollists and YahooGroups. These lacked the traffic and excitement that the commmunity had generated during the show's initial run. When the show was released on DVD, it found new fen, many of whom were unaware of the show earlier and who didn't build on older resources created by the fandom.
Babylon 5 f/f fan fiction is also being archived on Passion and Perfection, a saffic site created by Ralst. This material was archived and predates August 2006. [2]
[edit] Terminology
Below is a list of terms and their definitions that are used in this fan fiction community.
This section needs more information.
[edit] Timeline
Below is a partial timeline of events that took place in this fan fiction community.
- On January 5, 1996, the b5teens mailing list was created by Michela Ecks on the babcom server.
- Agamemcon 11 was held from November 6 to 13, 1999. [3] Fandoms represented included Babylon 5.
- On February 5, 2001, the LiveJournal community babylon5 was created.
- On March 22, 2001, the mailing list milliways-L was created for the posting of science fiction related fan fiction and discussion. Fandoms represented included this one. [4]
[edit] Fan fiction policy and history
In a post on Compuserve during October of 1994, jms said he discouraged fan fiction whenever he could. The following is that note:.
- BABYLON 5: NO STORY IDEAS PLEASE #843490
- DATE: MON OCT 3, 1994 7:21:01 PM
- Fox doesn't produce B5; it's Warners/PTEN, so Fox can't "can" the
- show.
- As for fan fiction...I try to discourage it where possible, primarily if it's in a place where I can see it, to defuse any legal problems such as the one that killed one of Marion Zimmer Bradley's books. There are going to be some B5 novels from Dell, but we're working with the writers of those books to make sure they're *not* just unrelated throwaways, but are part of B5 continuity, and thus nominally canon.
- jms [5]
In Fan fiction is simple and complex, the author of the article states that jms "requested that separate e-mail mailing lists and newsgroups be created for fanfic, as to avoid lawsuits he could not participate in any forum that had fanfic." [6]
Valdron, in a post to Scifi.Com's message board dated February 23, 2000 states the following:
- But in the case of Babylon 5, Straczynski from day one recognized the importance of fans
- and what they could do for his show, and he courted them from the begginning. Before B5's pilot even premiered, he was trying to build a
- movement among fans. Straczynski treated fan support as essential to building an audience for his show, he encouraged fan clubs, websites and all that entailed. Fan support may or may not have gotten his pilot
- commissioned as a series after a lengthy delay, it may or may not have helped him make the jump and get his fifth season. But the bottom line is that after B5 had finished his run, Straczynski boasted publicly that
- his show had over 300 fan run web sites on the internet. And to be fair, this probably helped to publicise and promote his show, which probably actually helped him to make his money and achieve his visions. [7]
Henry Jenkins, in an article found here, says that when he brought J. Michael Straczinski to speak to one of his classes, a student asked jms what he thought of fans. jms replied "You mean, copyright infringers." [8]
jms in a post to rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated dated October 9, 1996 with a subject of "Re: How does JMS feel about fan fiction? " says the following about an incident regarding Babylon 5 staff run in with fan fiction and its impact on the show:
- When someone posted a basic story idea similar to what was planned for "Passing Through Gethsemane," that script went into cold storage for over a year; only when the fan involved offered (greatly chagrined) to write and sign a legal release, and delivered it to me, could that story be put back into prep. If he had not been this kind, THAT EPISODE WOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN MADE. Roll that one around for a while.
- It seems to me that if someone wants to write B5 fanfic, it's because that fan likes the show, appreciates what's done, and respects those who created it. And that selfsame fan would not want to jeapordize the continued existence of that show. And would, therefore, honor this request from those who make it for the duration of the show. [9]
The following information about jms and Babylon 5 related fan fiction is from a post to SlashDot.Org:
- Incidentally, JMS stayed/stays? in rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated to keep away from any fanfic in the non-moderated newsgroup; that way their could be no question that he did not pull from fanfic stories [10]
[edit] Kerfluffles
This section needs more information.
[edit] Influential Stories
This section needs more information.
[edit] Pairings
[edit] Het pairings
[edit] Slash pairings
[edit] Saffic pairings
[edit] Fandom Members
This section needs more information.
[edit] Fandom Size
There are 706 stories on FanFiction.Net and 3 stories on FanDomination.Net as of October 10, 2006.
[edit] External Links
This section needs more information.
[edit] See also
[edit] Sources
Below is a partial list of articles and academic sources to help you continue to learn about this community.
This section needs more information.
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