Fandom

Having been a very active member of the Potter fandom for many years now, I occasionally use my column at Mugglenet to reflect on the fandom itself.

Guide to HP Conventions is a guide about everything an HP fan needs to know about going to HP cons. I wrote this in spring 2012, having attended two cons already, and knowing they are an amazing but somewhat intimidating experience.

Are We Victims? is an opinion piece written in June 2012, about how the HP fandom seems to take horrible offense at nearly everything done by the people in charge of the HP brand - WB, Sony, and Jo. I think people just need to chill out.

Fandom Five Years Later is exactly what it sounds like. In summer 2012, I realized with a jolt that five years had passed since Deathly Hallows was released, and I decided to take a look at the journey our fandom has taken the last five years. I talk about all the different aspects of fandom, significant events, and overarching trends.

Why Potter Fans Are Awesome is a piece I actually wrote for Hypable, because it pertained more to the fans on that site than any others. After a huge debacle surrounding tickets to a Jo Rowling event (September 2012), I was very appreciative of how well the fans handled it and didn't turn on each other. I wrote this to remind us all that the Potter fandom is awesome.

State of the Fandom: MISTI-Con 2017 is hopefully the beginning of a new series, where I report back on what trends I've observed at the latest HP conventions. Written May 2017.

In Jo We Trust… Or Not is a reflection on the disintegrating of the fandom's relationship to Jo Rowling. This article went viral beyond any reasonable expectation - one of the top 10 things MuggleNet ever posted, seen by over a million people. I just kept getting flabbergasted by the response to this, but it really struck a chord with people. Written February 2018.

In Jo We Do Not Trust is a followup to the above piece, the third of my November 2018 posts raging about Crimes of Grindelwald. It delves into what our relationship with Jo Rowling looks like after the travesty that was CoG. Like its predecessor, it really struck a chord with people, helping them reconcile their love for Harry Potter with their disdain for Rowling's latest output.

A Reckoning at the Three Broomsticks concludes my November 2018 series about Crimes of Grindelwald, and talks about how I am exiting the Fantastic Beasts fandom to focus exclusively on Harry Potter.

MuggleNet and Me is a sentimental retrospective on my history with MuggleNet from 2003 to 2019, timed to be the very first thing posted when MuggleNet returned from its 2019-2020 hiatus during a change in ownership.