I'm not sure what I think about breaking "Marvel" and "DC" out as subcategories for comics, since they are companies. "Disney" isn't broken out that way, for example, nor are specific TV channels, even though I would say Disney has the same weight in describing its movie universes as Marvel or DC do. Perhaps it should keep strictly to format? I'm not necessarily comfortable with two brand names being given that kind of weight over other brands
Graphic Novels
Serial Comics
Comic Strips
Should really be added in either case.
So should Films and TV Series under the animation/comics category, otherwise animated films and cartoons have no categories of their own.
Books and Literature should have a subcategory for Picture Books and one for Nonfiction, because you can write a fic that is related to a non-fiction book without it being an RPF.
Those would be my only suggestions. Otherwise, looks great!
I'm also unsure about Marvel and DC being fandom categories. (OTOH, people do treat them like fandom groups, in ways that they do not treat "Disney" as an umbrella fandom.)
I could also see categories of "Superhero" and "Other comics/cartoons."
Yeah, superhero is big enough it could have its own category, for sure. Part of what I'm reacting to is definitely the idea of promoting some brand names over others on a NFP website.
I would definitely prefer the use of a "Superhero Comics" category, and I have both Marvel and DC fandoms. It's not going to make the titles I'm interested in significantly more difficult to find, and it's more in line with the other categories already present.
Yeah, I'm also in DC and Marvel fandoms and "Superhero Comics" or simply "Superheroes" would make more sense to me (and would also include other comics of the genre that are not from the Big Two). It would still be easily browsable without seperating the titles by company.
And with Vertigo being owned by DC would Vertigo titles be found in the DC subcategory or would they go with the rest of unspecified titles?
That doesn't make any more or less sense to me than singeling out DC and Marvel as subcategories, instead of having a Comics & Graphic Novels or a Superhero Comics subcat.
Not all potential subcategories will exist — not necessarily even all those we've used to illustrate the system. All fandoms that don't fit any submedium will just be placed in the category (or categories) they belong to, and will be filterable by language and country of origin.
Thanks for your feedback; I've recorded it to use it in our discussion.
Thanks! It definitely makes sense that things that would go in a subcategory that would tiny are better off just being in the parent.
My biggest objection right now is to brand names as categories. Those get tagged as fandoms and I think it's fine that way. I liked the suggestion of breaking superhero comics out as a subcat.
Superhero comics is kinda wishwashi, too. Sailor Moon, Naruto, Luffy and a bunch of others can easily be counted as superheroes. Should they get in there, too?
I'm getting the feeling that this re-categorisation is trying to transport apples and bananas in the same boxes and expecting both of them to be still be sell-able at the end.
While they definitely can easily be counted as superheroes, in practice no one I'm aware of in anime and manga fandom as it currently exists would classify them that way, not even series like Dragonball Z that are deliberately inspired by American superheroes. It's a theoretical overlap, but one that no user I'm aware of would have difficulty with. So it's really a question of whether in this case we're looking for a user-driven set of categories, or an archive-driven one that makes clearer distinctions. Both are totally valid organizational schemas.
Also, I should note that I'm not aware of any classification system that eliminates ambiguity. Both Library of Congress and Dewey cataloguing allow for significant variation based on individual decisions by librarians, and I wouldn't expect the AO3 not to either. To some extent, you're always going to have judgement calls that require decisions by your staff, and it's just a question of where you want those to happen most often -- we've already raised the question of whether imprints owned by DC and Marvel that are traditionally mostly or entirely separate from their main universes belong in those categories as things currently stand.
Comment on Call for Feedback on Category Change Proposal
teaberryblue Wed 18 Sep 2013 07:19PM UTC
Last Edited Wed 18 Sep 2013 07:28PM UTC
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