Pre-emptive suggestion: Guardian Drama Six Degrees tag on AO3

[glymr]

So, I posted the first chapter of what I believe is the very first Time Engraver fic on AO3, and it got me thinking.

Due South fans have been crossing over characters played by the actors in Due South for quite awhile (ie "Hard Core Logo", etc). I understand that the tag C6D (meaning Canadian Six Degrees) is used to identify such fics on AO3. This way, people interested in these rarepairs and microfandoms can find each other.

After a little bit of wank/angst, the same thing happened with the Hannibal fandom. Initially, people were slashing characters played by the leads from Hannibal, and were tagging these stories with "Hannibal (TV)", which muddied the Hannibal TV tag for people who weren't interested in non-Hannibal TV content. The ultimate solution was to tag the stories with "Hannibal Extended Universe - Fandom". That way, people looking for ONLY Hannibal TV content wouldn't see them, but people who were looking for them could find them.

I'd like to propose something similar for Guardian fans. There are stories it wouldn't be appropriate to tag with "Guardian Drama", but which still might be of interest to Guardian fans. For example: a crossover between Time Engraver/Detective L would be very interesting to some Guardian fans, but not at all to others. Having a tag to identify such content would help both people who were looking for such microfandom content, and also people who wanted to avoid it. For clarification, fics that were actual fusions or crossovers with Guardian would and could be tagged "Guardian" (as well as with the 6 degrees or extended universe tag).

What do all of you think? The main drawback I could see would be people mis-using the tag (particularly Chinese users who might not understand what it was for?) This might be mitigated by making the tag more obscure, ie GD6D (for Guardian Drama 6 Degrees) or similar, but that also makes it less accessible. I hesitate to use "Guardian Six Degrees" or "G6D" because there is a visual similarity to Canadian Six Degrees/C6D that some might find confusing. "Guardian RPF Extended Universe" and "Guardian Extended Universe" could both be misinterpreted. I'm not certain what the best solution would be, but I'd love to get suggestions!

ETA: Naye has suggested "Guardian Derivative", which is apparently what Chinese fans use, which is my current favorite. I can't edit the poll, but let us know if you want to +1 that suggestion in the comments.

Poll #22809 What would be a good tag for non-Guardian fics featuring Guardian actors?

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 15

View Respondents

What would be a good tag for non-Guardian fics featuring Guardian actors?

View Answers

GD6D
0 (0.0%)

Six Degrees of Guardian
2 (13.3%)

Guardian Drama Six Degrees
2 (13.3%)

Guardian RPF Extended Universe
1 (6.7%)

Guardian Extened Universe
2 (13.3%)

Other (see comments)
7 (46.7%)

None, there's no real need for such a tag
1 (6.7%)

Comments

[trobadora]

The Chinese side of fandom use 衍生, which means "derivative". I've gotten so used to it I'm kind of partial to the tag "Guardian Derivative"

+1

I got used to seeing that in the tags, and it works well for me.

I don't know if AO3 canonises fandom tags like that, though - all the Guardian-related ones are synned to Guardian at the moment. Perhaps a freeform tag would be more useful?

[glymr]

I have a friend who volunteers at AO3, I suspect she can help us get it canonized in the same way that C6D is canonized (whatever way that is). Whether it ends up being a freeform tag or a fanon tag, it could be useful.

FYI, for freeform tags, I understand that only three usages by different users are required for canonization.

[trobadora]

Oh, neat! Maybe you could ask your friend what would be easiest to get canonised? Because yeah, that owuld be super useful. (To me. It would be incredibly useful to me! So yes, please. :D)

[lannamichaels]

Existing canonical freeform (496 works): https://archiveofourown.org/tags/Bai%20Yu*s*Zhu%20Yilong%20Character%20Combinations/works

Would this work for y'alls purposes?

[glymr]

This is really interesting! I like this solution, but I also see some drawbacks.

The first and biggest drawback is the question, will it include one of the actors but not the other? In my Time Engraver story, for example, Zhu Yilong is one of the characters, but the other is an original character only modeled on Bai Yu very loosely. This tag seems very narrow and specific, only allowing for a pairing between these two actors, whereas some might want to read stories pairing, say, Detective L with some other non-Zhu Yilong character.

I'm not tossing out the idea, especially since this has the huge advantage of being an already in-use tag, but I wonder if it's broad enough. (On the other hand, the vast majority of the time we're going to be shipping ZYL/BY, LBR. So this may be totally fine. :)

[qikiqtarjuaq]

Indeed, the problem with that tag is that it is only ZYL/BY derived pairings. 巍澜衍生 is used for that in c-fandom. And the only other tag that gets any real traction is 朱一龙水仙, which is "self-cest" pairings between Zhu Yilong characters.

I feel like Luo Fei/Other would just go under the Detective L tag?

[glymr]

Yes, that is the problem, as it won't cover things like characters played by Bai Yu/non-Zhu Yilong characters. But overall, I'm starting to think it may be our best option.

...You're right, of course one would just use Detective L. ^_^; I was tired when I wrote that!

[mekare]

I think we are talking about freeform tags. The C6D tag is not a fandom tag, it is used like a freeform tag. ETA: Although I did find one fandom tag: Canadian Actor RPF (C6D).

Since I don‘t read the Chinese fics I haven‘t encountered the derivative tag before. Just on gut instinct, it doesn‘t sound right, but unfortunately I don‘t have a better idea either.

[glymr]

"Hannibal Extended Universe" has also been canonized as a fandom (and has 43 PAGES of fics! WOW!)

I can understand the resistance to the term "derivative", since technically it should mean "a derivative of Guardian". But I really like the fact that it's 1) differentiated from other 6 degrees or extended universe-type tags (so it won't be confused with them) and 2) Already in use by the Chinese fandom for this purpose, which means its usage will be roughly consistent across both languages and for both sets of fans. It's definitely getting my vote.

[ranalore]

Guardian-adjacent would really be more accurate, but I feel like it might be worth sacrificing a little accuracy to better sync with the Chinese side of the fandom.