Lumos report #2: The crack panel

I had hoped that this would be a fun panel, and it was -- for me, certainly, and it seemed for everyone else. The idea for the panel came about during The Witching Hour, actually, when I was going to lots of great panels and trying to think of something that hadn't been discussed yet but would make an interesting topic. I had just started seeing the term "crack" used a lot on my flist, and I started playing with the idea of putting together a panel discussion about it.

Frankly, I was surprised that the proposal was accepted, because I thought it might be a little to "inside" a thing for such a large symposium. And maybe that's why they put us in the smallest possible room in the Marriott? But of course, at least a quarter of the people who wanted to come were turned away at the door, so we could have gone a little bigger. On the bright side, our panel didn't get any anti-slash shit from Emerson. (On second thought, that would have been fun to watch.) Yay for the recording, though -- I can't wait to get that CD in the mail!

The makeup of the panel was originally quite different, but due to people having to cancel their trips to Lumos, in the end it was furiosity, geoviki, and scarah2. And they were, all three of them, amazing. I can't thank them enough for doing such a great job! They were witty and thoughtful and even occasionally brilliant, which considering the topic, is pretty damn cool.

It was so much fun that I thought I'd give those of you who didn't get to go to Lumos (or those of you who did, for that matter) join in the discussion.

But It’s Just Crack! The Role of Crack Fiction and Art in Subverting and Contributing to Fanon

( My opening opinion/statement on the topic )

Following that, scarah2 started us off by showing some examples of crack art she had drawn the night before. geoviki read an excerpt from Never Mind The Bollocks, It's Draco/Harry, giving it quite a poignant introduction. furiosity read from My Big Phat Hogwarts, and I followed that up with an excerpt from phaballa's The Death of a Soul, A Blowjob Beneath a Table, and the Rain of Toads That Followed. And then we all wiped our eyes, picked our asses up from the floor, and settled in for a surprisingly meaningful discussion about crack fic.

I don't think a consensus was really reached, and I didn't expect that to happen. The original idea for the panel was to put together people whom I knew would have very different opinions on crack and get them to argue with each other. And that's pretty much what happened, with great commentary from Scarah along the way! Rather than rehash the discussion here, I thought I would try to get some of y'all involved and see what you think about crack.

( Crack poll! )

Please feel free to add any comments below. Let's pretend we're all still at Lumos and talking about fun things (instead of wanking about meaningless things)!

Thanks again to the panel and to everyone who attended for making it a fantastic time. And hey -- how many panels generated their own icons (courtesy of coffeejunkii and fiona_fawkes) and FANFIC (courtesy of mijan)? *grins*