help me brainstorm -- should I hold a "50 Years of Doctor Who" ficathon?

[dbskyler]

Hello, internet! (Well, probably my flist, but you guys are all AWESOME.)

As we know, Doctor Who is about to turn 50 years old! We've had Eleven Doctors so far, and lots of assistants/companions, and boatloads of villains, and TARDIS-loads of one-off characters. And that doesn't even count spinoffs and other media, like Sarah Jane Adventures and Big Finish. As far as fanfic goes, the Whoniverse fandom is a character extravaganza!

However, a quick look at the Teaspoon category counts shows that certain characters are written a lot more often than other characters. Well, that's natural, and there's nothing inherently wrong with it. But wouldn't it be great to have a ficathon that celebrates the upcoming 50th anniversary by encouraging fic that comes from all 50 years? (Okay, 36 years of actually being on the air . . .)

What do you all think? If I were to host such a thing, would you be interested in taking part? Also, any ideas on how best to run it? Here's what I'm thinking so far:



-- No word minimum (some of my favorite fics are under 500 words, take a look at my Calufrax recs for proof), and no time limit. Because there has to be some sort of cut-off, I will post a master list of fic that gets written by the anniversary on Nov. 23rd. But if people are inspired by the ficathon to write fic after that, hooray!

-- Organize the ficathon by broadcast year. Basically, any characters who appeared during that year on Doctor Who are fair game! The ultimate goal of the ficathon will be to inspire at least one fic for all 50 36 years of Doctor Who by Nov. 23rd.

-- What qualifies as a fic for a given year? Right now, I'm thinking it would have to feature at least one character who appeared on the show during that year. That one character could be the Doctor, a companion, or anyone else who appeared on the show, even if it was for only one episode. This means, of course, that we could have multiple Tenth Doctor fics (and probably will), and part of the impetus for this is to get away from the most popular characters, but I'm thinking that's okay, because we will also hopefully have lots of Fourth Doctor fics, and Second Doctor fics, and every-other-Doctor fics. As I'm currently thinking about it, this is more of a celebration ficathon than a "rare characters" ficathon, but hopefully it will also ultimately increase the number of fics out there with rare(r) characters.

-- There will be a prompting post where people leave prompts for every year. This will also hopefully increase the diversity of the ficathon fic. I will note when someone has claimed a prompt so everyone can see how we're doing on the prompts, and which years are getting covered. I will also make a note once a finished fic has been posted (hopefully with a link). Since many of the characters appear in more than one year, people will also be able to prompt a character instead of a specific year, and I will note the possible years that could be covered. It would be up to the author to decide which year their fic "counts" for if it could go under more than one possible year. (Although I might do some modly re-arranging at the end to get to coverage for every year . . .)

-- There will be no limit on prompts, or claiming prompts, or claiming years. While the overall goal of the ficathon will be to cover every year with at least one fic, no matter how small, I'd love lots of prompts for every year -- especially the 60s :D -- and if more than one person writes to a given year, I figure that's okay. Not sure if I want to allow more than one person to write to the same prompt, but, well, if someone really wants to, why not?

-- While I'm thinking of limiting the main category years to Doctor Who and broadcast years, I am also thinking of having extra categories for the spinoff shows and other media, so there would be a category for SJA, and one for Torchwood, and one for Big Finish, and one for the books (I know there are different series, but I'm thinking of putting all books together into one category). These can be the "bonus" categories, but I wouldn't split them up by year. We would hopefully get at least one fic for all of these as well.

-- Crossovers between eras would be allowed, but would count as coverage for only one year, chosen by the author. Crossovers in general would be allowed. A fic for a given year would have to include as a major character someone who appeared that year, but the fic would not have to take place during that year. So, for example, someone could cover 1988 by writing a fic about Ace (who appeared on the show during that year), but the fic could take place before Ace met the Doctor, or during an episode that was broadcast in 1989, or after Ace left the Doctor. Alternatively, someone could cover 1988 by writing fic about anyone else who appeared on the show during that year, including Davros (who appeared in Remembrance of the Daleks) or that undertaker guy (from Remembrance of the Daleks).

Thoughts? Comments? Ideas to make it better / manageable? Does this sound like something you would want to take part in?

Comments

[aralias.livejournal.com]

i don't have much to add about practicalities - i think it sounds like it'll work really nicely (although, i guess, you could also team up with calufrax to try and REC something for every year - that might be nice). but i would participate :D

i would split books off into NAs and EDAs, though, as they are quite different. although equally obscure...

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I like the idea of a recathon! I don't think I could manage to run that and this at the same time, though. But if you wanted to do it in association with the ficathon, we could team up . . . ; )

I don't know much about the NAs or EDAs, so that's useful feedback, thanks!

[thisbluespirit]

It sounds like something that could be very cool! Good luck! :-)

I think my only comment is if you want to let the spin-offs and DW in other media be included, why complicate things with another category for them? Why not have all the years and all the things? People still won't prompt very much for rare things, so they won't take over. And you could always bold or highlight the TV broadcast years, or make sure they get claimed first or something. If the years thing is the theme of this ficathon, then why not? DW has never not had new stories coming out in some officially licensed format for all 50 years, which is amazing. In the hiatus, there was Slipback, and in the gap between 1989 and the NAs, there was the DWM comic strip, from then on there's an unbroken line from the NAs through to BF and New Who - and don't forget in the absence of TV, some of them were officially given as canonical continuations of the show at the time. Why shouldn't 1996 be for Lungbarrow prompts, or for Grace Holloway, or Sam Jones? (And DW is so well served online, people will easily be able to find year of publication info.)

It sounds like it could be cool, though. :-)

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

I am not very familiar with the non-TV material, which is why my first thought was to stick it all off to the side, but you raise a very good point. It would be great to organize this completely by year, and truly get all 50 years covered. DW has been off the air, but it has never been gone, and that's what we're celebrating, right?

It will definitely mean reliance on internet sources to find all the years of publication, though. I figured I could supply all of that for the televised episodes, but there's no way I can go through and find it for all the other material. The best I can do is supply links to help prompters and authors look it up (after I find those links myself!)

I've been wondering about whether or not to include the spinoff TV series, but they're part of the Whoniverse, so why not invite them to the celebration party? I like to be inclusive. : )

[thisbluespirit]

It would be great to organize this completely by year, and truly get all 50 years covered. DW has been off the air, but it has never been gone, and that's what we're celebrating, right?

\o/ Well, I think so.

Compiling a list of Everything would be a bit much for a ficathon, I completely agree, so I'd certainly think links and trusting people to get it right (or spot the mistakes!) would be reasonable. Mind you, knowing DW on the 'net, I wouldn't be surprised if someone hasn't already tried to make a list of all the things somewhere... :-)

[lolmac]

I have nothing to offer except an enthusiastic cheer, so, hurray!! Go for it!!

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

I've decided to give it a shot!

[lolmac]

Hurray hurray (x2)(x50)!!!

[thisbluespirit]

Okay, looking for lists of x on google:

From wiki, all inc. pub. date:
List of BFAs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Doctor_Who_audio_plays_by_Big_Finish (overall running from 1999-to date)
List of NAs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_New_Adventures (ran from 1991-1997; Bernice range from 1997-99)
MAs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Missing_Adventures (1994-1997)
EDas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Doctor_Adventures (ran from 1997-2005)
PDAs: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Past_Doctor_Adventures (1997-2005)
Comic strips stories (of all kinds): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Doctor_Who_comic_stories (Links to each Doctor's page which then has the dates).
DW Audios/Radio plays: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who_audio_productions (Has links for the BBC radio plays, BF, Kaldor City, faction Paradox.)

Also:
Dimensions in Time (1993)
Curse of Fatal Death (1999)

The BBCi Webcasts - Death Comes to Time (2001/02), Real Time (2002), Shada (2003)& Scream of the Shalka (2003)

The BBV/Reeltime stuff is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBV (not with dates on the list, but there are links, so there should be some.)

Basically, I think the info is Out There. :-)

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Oooh, thank you! Is this a complete list of the "other media" authorized by the BBC? I've never even heard of some of it! BBV??

I think I'm going to go for it! At the least, I'll organize it for the prompting, and then if no one prompts, then I guess I'll know it's a dud ficathon. I'm starting to re-think the no limit on claiming years, though -- I think I'll impose a "one claim per year" rule until all 50 years have been claimed. I'll also impose a "one claim at a time" rule. Once a fic has been posted, an author will be free to claim another year. Or do you think those are bad ideas?

[lolmac]

I think the one-claim-per-year-while-openings-last and one-claim-at-a-time rules are very good ideas -- fair, and they'll nudge the ficathon towards completeness, which would be Truly Awesome.

Will there have to be a prompt for each year, or can people write fic for a given year without anyone having submitted a prompt?

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

People can write fic without a prompt! The prompts are just to get ideas out there. People can also prompt without writing fic. And, I'm going to allow people to claim their own prompt.

And hey, do you know how to create those advertisement things where people click on an image and it takes you to the community? I'm trying to figure out how best to spread the word.

[thisbluespirit]

I think it covers most of the officially licensed stuff between those lists (and some of the more well-known unofficial stuff). BBV is Bill Baggs Video/Reeltime Productions - they did the Stranger videos, PROBE, Downtime and Shakedown in the 90s. I'd imagine you've probably heard of Downtime, because of Sarah Jane! (And since Downtime and Shakedown became novelised as NAs/MAs, it all got very incestuous, anyway!)

That sounds cool to me - after all, once all/a reasonable coverage of years are claimed, you can have a free for all, then, if you want. :-)

Oh, and seeing your comment below, I have a template for that from the Obscure & British commentfest I did - you'll need to replace with your own links, obvious, but hopefully this should work:

<center><a href=><img src=http://i757.photobucket.com/albums/xx218/lost_spook/Banners/obbannergen_zps8c53858d.png></a></center>

(Basically that's [a href=yourlink here] [image link here]

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!

You wouldn't also happen to know how to mirror a community at Dreamwidth, would you?

[thisbluespirit]

Well, you can back-up a community at Dreamwidth if you have a paid account, but if you want a mirror comm, you just create two comms with the same name - one on LJ, one on Dreamwidth! There is no magic way of doing it, as far as I know. :-)

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. I think I'll just run it on LJ. The last thing I want is to get into a mess of trying to piece things together across two communities, one at LJ and one at DW.

[clocketpatch]

This sounds very cool and I would definitely be up for playing. It makes me sad how little participation the 50th anniversary is getting in fandom. At least, in the corner of online fandom I frequent.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Yay, I'm glad you're up for it!

[honeynoir.livejournal.com]

This sounds like an excellent idea! The 50th needs all the love!

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

It does!!! :D