The OTW Open Doors Committee is pleased to announce two new developments: first, an expansion of its Fan Culture Preservation Project (FCPP) to include additional partner institutions; and second, the start of a new project, called the AO3 Fanzine Scan Hosting Project (FSHP), which will begin digital preservation of select fanzines and other physical fannish artifacts with permission from creators or publishers.
In this post:
- A bit of background explanation
- Information about Open Doors’ new FCPP partnerships
- What to do if you want to donate your fannish memorabilia or fanzines
- Information about the new AO3 Fanzine Scan Hosting Project
- What this means for fanzine creators and publishers
- And what to do if you still have questions
Background explanation about the FCPP
The Open Doors Committee launched the FCPP in 2009 as a joint venture between the OTW and the Special Collections department at the University of Iowa Libraries. The goal of the FCPP was to facilitate the preservation of physical fannish materials such as fanzines and to give them a safe home. The OTW will continue to work with the University of Iowa toward this goal, but Open Doors will be expanding the scope of the FCPP to provide donors more options for preservation.
How are Open Doors’ zine library partnerships changing?
Open Doors will continue to partner with the University of Iowa Libraries, but has updated its website to include additional institutions that house fanzines and other physical fannish memorabilia. These additional partnerships will provide fans who intend to donate their fanzines with more options, especially because different institutions accept different types of works, may or may not require donors to index their materials before donating them, may or may not cover shipping costs if that is a concern for donors, and may or may not be located near to the donor. This also provides donors with additional options if one institution already has a donor’s fanzines in its collection and so will not accept a duplicate donation.
A complete list of Open Doors’ current FCPP partners can be found on the Open Doors website.
What should I do if I want to donate my fannish memorabilia or fanzines to one of Open Doors’ partners?
The Open Doors website provides donors with information about each partner institution’s location, area of focus, restrictions, indexing requirements, ability to pay for shipping, and contact information. Prospective donors are encouraged to select an appropriate institution based on these criteria and reach out to it about donating their fannish materials. Donors are still welcome to contact Open Doors if they would like assistance selecting or contacting an institution to whom to donate their materials.
What is the AO3 Fanzine Scan Hosting Project?
While the FCPP focuses on preserving hard-copy zines, OTW also recognizes the value of digitizing fannish history. Therefore, Open Doors is pleased to announce the AO3 Fanzine Scan Hosting Project (FSHP), a new partnership with Zinedom, a fan-run preservation project, in order to bring digitized copies of fanzine works to the AO3.
With approval from OTW Legal and the OTW Board of Directors, Open Doors will collaborate with Zinedom volunteers to transcribe stories, scan art, and upload both to the AO3 with permission. Fanzine works will only be imported to the AO3 with permission from their creators and/or zine publishers.
What if my work has previously been published in a fanzine?
Please contact Open Doors with your fanzine pseud(s) and contact information, if:
- You’d like to give Open Doors permission to import fanzines for which you were the publisher or any fanworks of yours that were published in fanzines.
- You already have an AO3 account and have imported your fanzine works already yourself.
- You’d like to import your fanzine works yourself (including if you don’t have an AO3 account yet).
- You’d like to import your fanzine works yourself and need a copy of the story or art scan.
- You would NOT like your fanzine works moved to the AO3.
- You are happy for us to preserve your fanzine works on the AO3, but would like us to remove your name or prefer to use another name/pseudonym.
- You’re interested in helping Open Doors and Zinedom transcribe works from fanzines.
- You have any other questions we can help you with.
Please include the title of the project (FSHP or AO3 Fanzine Scan Hosting Project) in the subject heading of your message. If you no longer have access to the contact information associated with your publication(s), please contact Open Doors and we’ll help you out.
Please see the Open Doors website for instructions on:
- importing your works to the AO3
- adding your works to AO3 collections
If you still have questions…
If you have further questions, visit the Open Doors FAQ, or contact the Open Doors Committee.
We’d also love it if fans could help us preserve the story of any fanzines in which they may have been published on Fanlore. If you’re new to wiki editing, no worries! Check out the new visitor portal, or ask the Fanlore Gardeners for tips.
We’re excited to be able to help preserve these fanzines for future generations of readers!
– The Open Doors team