Storytelling Social Net FanLib Launches With $3 Million In Funding
Until it launched this past week, FanLib, a site dedicated to showcasing fan fiction, had been working in stealth mode after raising a previously unannounced $3 million from H.I.G. Ventures at the end of last year. Fan fiction is “a broadly-defined term for fiction about characters or settings written by fans of the original work, rather than by the original creators. Fan fiction usually describes works which are [generally] uncommissioned by the owner of the work, and usually (but not always) works which are not professionally published.”
In FanLib’s case, it launches with co-promotional partners including HarperCollins, Penguin Books, Showtime Networks, Simon & Schuster, and Starz Entertainment. The launch partners are heavily featured and have customized marketing integrated on the site while providing promotion for the site. Release
Posted In: Entertainment, Media & Publishing, Books, TV, Cable & Telecom, Social Media
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Comments (4)
May 19, 2007 1:08 PM
Nice do I need to say more
May 22, 2007 11:41 PM
i suggest you go here: http://icarusancalion.livejournal.com/626928.html
for some indication as to how FANLIB is being viewed by, you know, actual fanfic authors. a pathetic attempt at making a buck off-of other people’s work. i am only comforted by the fact that it will be sure to fail.
May 23, 2007 12:42 AM
Yeah, there’s nothing as awesome as writing for free so that other people can a) make money from your work, and b) expose you to all legal liabilities. Their TOS is one big “hold harmless” clause that no professional writer would ever sign.
Web 2.0 my asterisk—this is old-school robber-baron nonsense at its finest.
May 26, 2007 8:59 PM
Um, yeah, I have yet to find an actual fan who thinks this is a good idea.
Then again, we all know that turning underground creative movements into mainstream capitalist ventures is always a good move, especially when an all-male board claims to provide validation to an overwhelmingly female community that has operated independently and successfully for at least forty years.
Or you know… not.
p.s. Crappy adds with overtures of homophobia and sexism which belittle the kind of men its target audience is most likely to identify with and want to write about? The glue is not for eating boys. Makes the brain meats sad.