Well, yes, you are keepking something from people who prefer text. You're assuming that there's a text version of the audio. I'm not saying this has happened (although I really want to try it now!) but it's totally possible for someone to just sit down in front of a mic and tell a story without having anything written down (or maybe only crib notes or an uncompleted draft). In which case creating a text version could be a lot of extra work.
But whether or not there is a written version that just hasn't been released, I still don't think it's wrong or anything for it to remain unreleased. People make decisions all the time about how accessible they want their fanworks to be to their audience. Many authors choose to lock their fic, limiting who can read it. Lots of people choose not to include ratings or warnings with their works, making it inaccessible to those with triggers (or making it difficult to access). Hell, fandom, pairing and, yes, medium will affect what kind of audience their work will get. No one has to make their work universally available and accessible to everyone. In fact, it's kind of impossible.
Sure people are used to getting their stories in text format. But it's becoming more common for vids to tell full stories. Or, would people really be demanding a text version if we were talking about comics, or other visual & story based fan arts?
With the rise of the internet, fanfic that was published in zines became something that was only accessible to a limited number of people while everyone else had to wait for the net release. I actually thought about zines too when reading the discussion, however I think there are some key differences between the two. With zines the limiting factor for accessibility was money and distribution and that's not a limiting factor for podfic. The limiting factor with podfic is that many people prefer to read stories over hearing them (with some people who are unable to listen to stories). If we're talking about preferences, I prefer to listen to my stories over reading it (and some people are unable to read stories) but I don't think anyone would ever demand authors provide podfic just to please me and make it extra accessible. Lots of authors even read their fic aloud before posting, so they'd just have to turn on a mic and it wouldn't even be extra work on their part!
I think the real issue here is that releasing stories as podfic isn't something we're used to. Online fandom is largely text oriented and we're not used to having to cope with fandom outside of that (never mind that we mostly leave those unable to handle text to figure it out how to get around that on their own or go somewhere else). And it gets me because fandom is largely text oriented, if that's what works for you (general you for this entire paragraph) and audio does not, there's sooooo much available in text format that why are you freaking out/complaining/getting annoyed that such a small percentage isn't catering to you. Sure you'll miss out on a story, maybe even a great one, but there are hundreds, thousands more that you don't have to miss out on. It's like complaining that someone wrote a fic in French instead of English so you can't read it, when everyone knows that English is the dominant and most accessible language for fandom. Sometimes, it just wasn't made with you in mind.
Sorry frogspace, this isn't really meant to be a rant at you (your comment was just the one I could get my thoughts out most clearly in response to).
no subject
You're assuming that there's a text version of the audio. I'm not saying this has happened (although I really want to try it now!) but it's totally possible for someone to just sit down in front of a mic and tell a story without having anything written down (or maybe only crib notes or an uncompleted draft). In which case creating a text version could be a lot of extra work.
But whether or not there is a written version that just hasn't been released, I still don't think it's wrong or anything for it to remain unreleased. People make decisions all the time about how accessible they want their fanworks to be to their audience. Many authors choose to lock their fic, limiting who can read it. Lots of people choose not to include ratings or warnings with their works, making it inaccessible to those with triggers (or making it difficult to access). Hell, fandom, pairing and, yes, medium will affect what kind of audience their work will get. No one has to make their work universally available and accessible to everyone. In fact, it's kind of impossible.
Sure people are used to getting their stories in text format. But it's becoming more common for vids to tell full stories. Or, would people really be demanding a text version if we were talking about comics, or other visual & story based fan arts?
With the rise of the internet, fanfic that was published in zines became something that was only accessible to a limited number of people while everyone else had to wait for the net release.
I actually thought about zines too when reading the discussion, however I think there are some key differences between the two. With zines the limiting factor for accessibility was money and distribution and that's not a limiting factor for podfic. The limiting factor with podfic is that many people prefer to read stories over hearing them (with some people who are unable to listen to stories). If we're talking about preferences, I prefer to listen to my stories over reading it (and some people are unable to read stories) but I don't think anyone would ever demand authors provide podfic just to please me and make it extra accessible. Lots of authors even read their fic aloud before posting, so they'd just have to turn on a mic and it wouldn't even be extra work on their part!
I think the real issue here is that releasing stories as podfic isn't something we're used to. Online fandom is largely text oriented and we're not used to having to cope with fandom outside of that (never mind that we mostly leave those unable to handle text to figure it out how to get around that on their own or go somewhere else). And it gets me because fandom is largely text oriented, if that's what works for you (general you for this entire paragraph) and audio does not, there's sooooo much available in text format that why are you freaking out/complaining/getting annoyed that such a small percentage isn't catering to you. Sure you'll miss out on a story, maybe even a great one, but there are hundreds, thousands more that you don't have to miss out on. It's like complaining that someone wrote a fic in French instead of English so you can't read it, when everyone knows that English is the dominant and most accessible language for fandom. Sometimes, it just wasn't made with you in mind.
Sorry frogspace, this isn't really meant to be a rant at you (your comment was just the one I could get my thoughts out most clearly in response to).