what was your very first fandom and are you still in touch with people from that fandom?

My very, very first one was General Hospital, and no I'm no longer in touch with anyone from that fandom. I was very young (about 14/15 when I found that fandom), and the friends I made there were much older than me.

My second fandom was Dark Angel, and I am still in touch with a lot of people from that one. That show ended in 2002, and I had joined late in 2001, I think. So about 14 years of friendship with them - some of us are Facebook friends, some of us still talk on the phone. :D

Awwww, that is so epic ♥ I hope it's gonna be the same for our White Collar fandom... looooong-time friends :D

Heee we should rename this the never ending meme.

What makes fandom so essential to you?

It's awesome! I keep thinking of things to AMA about :D

Fandom, to me, is about finding really great people with the same interests as you. I struggle with that in 'real life' because I'm pretty introverted and quiet, and fandom provides almost an instant friendship bond with people. I mean, there are definitely people that you get along with and people that you don't, but there is a very quick connection with the people who like the same characters and the same genre of fic and writers with similar styles.

I love the friendships I've made in fandom, and I love that there are probably six or seven countries and many cities I could go to right now and have a place to stay and someone to show me around. It's really a very special form of friendship that is hard to duplicate outside of the internet.

Very true!
and very handy for travelling LOL

Have you ever left a fandom and if so, why (if you can share - I know the subject might be painful)?

Well, I left General Hospital fandom when my favorite actor/character left the show. Other fandoms I've just kind of drifted away from when the show ended (Dark Angel) or the fandom just grew way too large and focused on something I wasn't interested in (Supernatural and Wincest).

Any bad experiences I've had in fandom have not been bad enough for me to leave, and in the grand scheme of things were more stressful than 'bad'. That's definitely a side of fandom that I've managed to stay away from, and I'm thankful for that. It's so much more fun and rewarding when it's a positive experience.

How has fandom in general changed over the years you've been involved in it?

It hasn't really changed that much, which is weird because I've been in fandoms for roughly 17/18 years.

I tend to gravitate toward the fanfic writers, so fandom, for me, has almost always been IRC chats and sharing fic cookies and leaving reviews. I've really never known any other way of doing fandom, and I'm totally okay with that. I like the niche I've carved out and snuggled up in :)

What's important to you to get involved in a fandom?

Fans who are welcoming and want to have a community. WC fandom is awesome, and we develop that community by having different challenges and through chat and meet-ups. Not all fandoms have that, so I definitely look for those things.

I also need the show to have elements of drama and humor - I want it to be fun to watch and also fun to write. And the characters have to speak to me in some way. That's definitely a more subjective thing, but it's very important.

It mostly boils down to fan community and good characters :D

Speaking as a person who understood sex better through fandom, any comments on fandom's sex positivity?

This is an interesting question, because I've learned a lot about being comfortable with sexuality from being in fandom. I'm asexual, so I tend to shy away from the sex portion of fandom - I don't read it in fic, and while I have tried a couple of times because I felt pressured in some way, I've never been able to write it.

I've met some awesome people in fandom with such varying views on sex and sexuality that it's really been eye-opening for the girl who grew up on a farm in the middle of nowhere. I don't think I would have met a group as diverse as I have outside of this, and that's really helped me understand my own feelings, and for those reasons, I'm glad that fandom is very sex-positive.

I agree with a lot of what you just said. I learned a lot about sex through fandom and Google searches. I'm from a family that prefers not to talk about the big things till they're staring us in the face, so I'm endlessly grateful for fandom.