Fandom, after all, is born of a balance between fascination and frustration: if media content didn't fascinate us, there would be no desire to engage with it; but if it didn't frustrate us on some level, there would be no drive to rewrite or remake it.

The worst thing a kid can say about homework is that it is too hard. The worst thing a kid can say about a game is it's too easy.

The key is to produce something that both pulls people together and gives them something to do.

If old consumers were assumed to be passive, then new consumers are active. If old consumers were predictable and stayed where you told them, then new consumers are migratory, showing a declining loyalty to networks or media. If old consumers were isolated individuals, then new consumers are more socially connected. If the work of media consumers was once silent and invisible, then new consumers are now noisy and public.

In a hunting society, children play with bows and arrows. In an information society, children play with information

...Fan fiction is a way of the culture repairing the damage done in a system where contemporary myths are owned by corporations instead of owned by the folk.

Piracy often reflects market failures on the part of producers rather than moral failures on the part of consumers.