New to Dreamwidth ! Confused on how and where to post to a fandom ?

[blood_pomegranate]

Hello ! As I mentionned, I am new here.
I wish to connect with people who dabble with dark themes in fiction, like fanfictions or art, but most specifically with Transformers characters.
How does posting work here ? Is there a "general" place to browse tags of a fandom / theme , aside from communities ?
Are the devs planning on adding a feature where you can share other people's posts/ journal on your profile ?

I appreciate all help, thank you !

Comments

[yourlibrarian]

Hello! Unfortunately a lot of communities are inactive (both fandom and not), so connecting to people by posting at them is possible but not guaranteed, since there may not be many subscribers still watching. However it's still worth trying.

One thing you can do is fill out the Interests section in your profile with the sorts of topics (such as Transformers and dark themes) you want to connect on. Then after you've saved you can reload and click on your interests and see what people and communities pop up who have also listed them.

"Are the devs planning on adding a feature where you can share other people's posts/ journal on your profile ?"

I'm not entirely sure I understand what you mean here. Can you say more?

Try this ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

Tedious but effective: go to a community whose topic you like, click the profile page, and use the member list to visit blogs and see which ones are still active.

[malymin]

Hello! Unfortunately a lot of communities are inactive (both fandom and not), so connecting to people by posting at them is possible but not guaranteed, since there may not be many subscribers still watching. However it's still worth trying.

What does one do if all the communities are dead, and they want to attract new people? Yes, one can make another community themselves, but it feels like the graveyard of redundant dead comms is enormous; eventually, whatever I might decide to make could eventually join that graveyard of taken, abandoned usernames/community names. Moderation of an old community also can't be transferred over to a more active user if the original moderator simply no longer uses the site.

[yourlibrarian]

Yes, it's really unfortunate that communities aren't transferrable here. However they can be revived by regular posting, and a number of communities both here and at Pillowfort have continued on despite the absence of the original owner.

As ysabetwordsmith said, one value of old communities is that they can be starting points to finding other users with similar interests who are still active, although I think an interest search is quicker, because they automatically show you how recently someone posted.

For example: https://www.dreamwidth.org/interests?int=transformers&page=4&type=C turns up both individuals and communities interested in Transformers. However the news there is not great as neither people nor communities connected to Transformers have been active in some time.

However there are a lot of fanfiction writers here and there may be other communities focused on darker themed fiction or types of stories that interest you. Specific fandom communities have generally not survived long because people either move on or there aren't enough to keep regular activity going.

Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

>>Yes, it's really unfortunate that communities aren't transferrable here. <<

If a community owner knows they're going to leave, they can make other people into moderators. It's not the same rank but it can do most of the same things.

>>However they can be revived by regular posting, and a number of communities both here and at Pillowfort have continued on despite the absence of the original owner.<<

I did that with followfriday.

>>Specific fandom communities have generally not survived long because people either move on or there aren't enough to keep regular activity going.<<

What I have observed is that a catchall community has a better chance of surviving because its potential audience is bigger. There are a good handful of catchalls for fanfic which is great.

I made allbingo because I saw a lot of older bingo comms dying out. It's quite lively, and anyone can host a fest. Come to think of it, I don't believe we've done Transformers before, if anyone wants to run that theme. Signups for 2027 will open soon, probably in November.

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> What does one do if all the communities are dead, and they want to attract new people? <<

Not all the old communities are dead. Yes, there's a huge graveyard, but there are also active communities. You can find active communities via followfriday and dw_community_promo among other places. fandomcalendar is good for fannish and fest comms.

There is also Community Thursdays, where people make a point of posting in communities to keep them active. This matters because when you search for Interests, blogs and communities are listed in the order of most recent posts.

A handful of folks go around reactivating older communities with posts. I'm one of them. If you see a post by me, and the one below it is more than a few months older, then you can help by making a new post above mine. The alternation matters because some people won't join a community that has only one person posting, and most people won't join a community with no recent post. But there are a lot of great communities that are dormant and could be revived.

>>Yes, one can make another community themselves, but it feels like the graveyard of redundant dead comms is enormous; eventually, whatever I might decide to make could eventually join that graveyard of taken, abandoned usernames/community names.<<

It is easier to make a community with a team of people, but it can be done alone if a person is determined enough. I've got a whole handful of them.

>> Moderation of an old community also can't be transferred over to a more active user if the original moderator simply no longer uses the site.<<

Yeah, that's a problem. I consider it a design flaw. It's not something I can fix. However, if an abandoned community is set so that anyone can join, all members can post, and moderation is turned off then people can still use it. They just don't have the moderation tools.

Welcome!

[ysabetwordsmith]

>>Hello ! As I mentionned, I am new here.<<

newcomers has lots of resources about how to use Dreamwidth and where to find things you'll enjoy here. If you're coming from Pillowfort, see Pillowfort Is Closing. Find your Pillowfort friends here.

The Follow Friday Master Post has lists of active communities by topic where you can look for some based on your interests, including some of the Most Useful Communities. Many bloggers use recurring posts to pin down their key interests and maintain activity, which is also a good source of inspiration if you aren't sure what you want to post yet.

>>I wish to connect with people who dabble with dark themes in fiction,<<

You might like terror_sffa, horror_of_horrors, or thefreaksclub.

>> like fanfictions or art, <<

Find fandom in general at fandomcalendar and fandom_on_dw.

There are lists of communities for Fanfiction and Graphics. Some welcome posts of fanworks. See also Full Content on Dreamwidth at goals_on_dw for people posting actual fanworks, not just links to some other site you may or may not be able to access.

>>but most specifically with Transformers characters.<<

See tf_icons, robotemporium, tf_meta, tfmegaratch, tfanonkink, tf_rare_pairing.

allbingo is currently running Gothic Bingo if you like dark prompts.

>>How does posting work here ? <<

https://www.dreamwidth.org/support/faqbrowse?faqid=5

>>Is there a "general" place to browse tags of a fandom / theme , aside from communities ?<<

Interests will let you search for things you like, using tags other people have put in their profile. That page has a Common Interests option that will show you tags getting the most use.

Latest Things shows all the most recent public posts. At the top is a list of currently common tags.

>>Are the devs planning on adding a feature where you can share other people's posts/ journal on your profile ?<<

Not that I have seen.

Dreamwidth for New Users has many resources you may find helpful.

[arcanetrivia]

I wish there were a way to easily browse public posts that use a certain tag, but no, there isn't. You can use a site search for keywords, but you have to re-perform it manually and it's a pretty clunky way to discover posts from people you don't already know. The general way is to find a community devoted to the topic, which you might be able to do via an Interests search; but many communities unfortunately are not very active. (Transformers might be popular enough to stand a better chance than some of my own niche interests, at least.)

The reshare/reblog/retweet thing is generally not a feature that has been wanted by the userbase here. Dreamwidth (and formerly, years ago, LiveJournal) users tend to resist changes that are perceived as "trying to turn the site into some other site".

[soc_puppet]

Welcome! I hope you like it here.

I'm afraid there's no built-in Reblog feature, but some fans came up with a workaround a while back; I'm away from my computer for the moment, but I can share a link later today.

[soc_puppet]

Here we go! The reblog work-around, developed by melannen, astolat, and ljwrites.

While most people on Dreamwidth will typically just share a link to a post if they think their reading circle would be interested or want to connect it to their own account (perfectly normal for all public posts), that post up there will take you through what those gracious users have set up as a basic equivalent to reblogging. Another option for if you just want to keep track of a post that was made by someone else but don't necessarily want to add it to your own journal is to save it to your memories (effectively Dreamwidth-specific bookmarks).

I hope that helps!