Non-LJ lurker, here *waves*. The fan analyses of FanLib have been very interesting. One point I'd like to suggest as a cautionary contribution: when we oppose "social network" to "product", we're essentially adopting the *same* presuppositions that FanLib (and most of the world) accepts: namely, that you *can* radically isolate one from the other because they're not inherently connected.
A classical Marxist perspective on this (and here I mean Marxist ontology, not the political systems that tried to build themselves up based on some reading of Marx's corpus) is that the "product" is inherently non-isolable from social relationships. Why? Because a "product" is nothing more than a materialization of interpersonal relationships. There is NO SUCH THING as a non-social product. Likewise, there is NO SUCH THING as a purely social (i.e., non-embodied, non-materialized) relationship. There are only different forms of embodied sociality, some more intense, some less so; some alienating (in the sense of trying to cut the product out of its context and ignore or demean the ties and productive relationships it embodies), some less so. Capitalism is the advent of a form of alienation which assumes you are a radically private individual with *no* inherent tie to anyone else whose product suits your needs, and yours alone; only later on is an exchange established between other persons based on objects that are isolated from their productive, i.e., social, contexts.
FanLib assumes this model. We assume it, too, if we try to oppose social relationships to the product we produce, we just value the other end of the opposition. Personally, I prefer not to accept that opposition in the first place. I don't have to choose between sociality and the quality of the product (or its lack thereof); I only have to choose between alienating and distorting forms of interpersonal relationships, which the fanfic object (and the group discussions, and the LJs, and the site designs, and the arguments, the meet-ups, etc.) embodies, and relationships that are less alienating - that recognize to a more or less adequate degree that my 'product' would not exist but for a particular set of relationships I have with others, the full dimensions of which I am not always aware of. The joy of telling a good story and of realizing my relationship with other like-minded readers and fans is the discovery of what exactly it is that I'm involved in - a good story, yes, and a good story whose worth is understood in a certain set of contexts.
FanLib isn't ever going to grasp that, as angualupin says, because the business model they depend on cannot accommodate it.
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timeasmymeasure
product versus social network
Date: 2007-05-27 06:46 pm (UTC)A classical Marxist perspective on this (and here I mean Marxist ontology, not the political systems that tried to build themselves up based on some reading of Marx's corpus) is that the "product" is inherently non-isolable from social relationships. Why? Because a "product" is nothing more than a materialization of interpersonal relationships. There is NO SUCH THING as a non-social product. Likewise, there is NO SUCH THING as a purely social (i.e., non-embodied, non-materialized) relationship. There are only different forms of embodied sociality, some more intense, some less so; some alienating (in the sense of trying to cut the product out of its context and ignore or demean the ties and productive relationships it embodies), some less so. Capitalism is the advent of a form of alienation which assumes you are a radically private individual with *no* inherent tie to anyone else whose product suits your needs, and yours alone; only later on is an exchange established between other persons based on objects that are isolated from their productive, i.e., social, contexts.
FanLib assumes this model. We assume it, too, if we try to oppose social relationships to the product we produce, we just value the other end of the opposition. Personally, I prefer not to accept that opposition in the first place. I don't have to choose between sociality and the quality of the product (or its lack thereof); I only have to choose between alienating and distorting forms of interpersonal relationships, which the fanfic object (and the group discussions, and the LJs, and the site designs, and the arguments, the meet-ups, etc.) embodies, and relationships that are less alienating - that recognize to a more or less adequate degree that my 'product' would not exist but for a particular set of relationships I have with others, the full dimensions of which I am not always aware of. The joy of telling a good story and of realizing my relationship with other like-minded readers and fans is the discovery of what exactly it is that I'm involved in - a good story, yes, and a good story whose worth is understood in a certain set of contexts.
FanLib isn't ever going to grasp that, as angualupin says, because the business model they depend on cannot accommodate it.
/two cents
Dwimordene