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Aja
(FYI, in answer to a frequently-asked question on meme, the name is pronounced like Asia-the-continent, and it's actually not her fault; her parents named her after the Steely Dan song.)
Aja, Aja. Also known as Bookshop, Architect, and BNFshavemorefun. Where to begin with Aja?
Namely because both of those emotions — an inflated sense of self-importance and a weirdly messianic and protective affection for all fic, anywhere, ever – are very quintessentially Aja.
— Source.
She appears to be a naturally over-caffeinated person with no filters anywhere, especially between her hyperwired brain and her keyboard.
She's like of those giant bouncy dogs who runs from room to room grabbing a toy, shaking it psychotically until it flies out of her mouth in pieces and then runs in crazy circles, confused, wondering what happened to it before she runs to the next toy and does it again. And again. And again.
The trick is take Aja in very, very, very small doses and not take her too seriously. I don't think she even remembers half the stuff she's said and done.
— Source.
Except that the puppy can't help posting in super-excited ALL CAPS and ajskdajskldjaslkdjalk keysmashes, the puppy has a huge flist plus major writing gigs on influential websites, and people take the puppy seriously when it metas about Fandom As A Whole and generalizes its own experiences as universal. A full and detailed explanation of Aja's past can be found in the F_W wiki.
On Dec. 12, 2013, Aja delighted FFA by dropping in to defend Big Bang Press and her involvement therein. Much laughter and snark were had before threadfreeze.
Some of her other appearances on f_fa:
- Nov. 11, 2011: "Aja has Opinions about the OTW elections."
- Mar. 15, 2012: Aja was mentioned in a thread titled “The most toxic people in fandom.”
- Aug. 19, 2012: Gentlefailers discussed (1) Aja's post complaining that a vid called “Fifty Years of Fandom” (set to Billy Joel's “We Didn't Start the Fire”) touched only on Western sources; and (2) her open letter to the meme protesting the fact that a couple of people have said she's in MSF/ATG because she migrates her slash fandoms.
- Sept. 6, 2012: Gentlefailers discuss Aja's Daily Dot article on the decline of LJ, expressing exasperation at her srs tone and mentioning her infamous t-shirt video.
- Sept. 12, 2012: "Reporting on fandom = creepy?" thread about Aja. One nonny wrote,
“… I'd say she excels at expressing her own ideas (whatever you think about the quality of them), but she isn't so good at understanding the viewpoints of others. This was one reason why she was the locus of a lot of bad feelings in fandom, because people were offended by her actions/words, and her defenders pointed out that Aja had never intended to cause offense, so she did have people on her side. And then she would continue to do this. … Her difficulty with this is why I think she'd be better off as an opinion writer on fandom, vs. a reporter.”
- Sept. 13, 2012: sunnycamehome2u alerted the meme that Aja had interviewed ur-Sunny for The Daily Dot and that the article was up.
- Sept. 16, 2012: A Gentlefailer alerted the meme to Aja's "Fandomspotting - Ep 1: Fandom and the Fourth Wall" video. Unfortunately both video and sound are botched.
- Oct. 2, 2012: Gentlefailers are appalled that Aja now has a gig writing about slash for After Elton.
- Apr. 5, 2013: Aja complains about being “fandom-shamed” because someone else has the temerity to point out SJ problems in a show she loves. More here. Meme discussion.
- Apr. 26, 2013: //"What's the deal with Aja/Bookshop?"// Nonny gets answers.
- Apr. 29, 2013: Nonnies discuss another //Daily Dot article// for which Aja does not appear to have fully acquainted herself with the canon.
- May 2, 2013: A nonny wants to know where the expression “Writing female characters is like eating your veggies” came from. Aja, of course!
- May 26, 2013: Aja lacks self-awareness, part ten billion (Kindle Worlds discussion)
- Jun. 2, 2013: “Aja is such a flailing dweeb. Nothing she posts really annoys me per se, I just feel horribly embarrassed on her behalf because she has so much enthusiasm and so little grace and self-awareness.”
- Jun. 5, 2013: A Hannibal nonny who's never shared a fandom or interacted with Aja “want[s] to scream at her to STAY THE FUCK AWAY … I don't want to share a fandom with Aja. I don't want her bringing over her squeeing, bland, ATG slasher friends with her. I don't want to read posts about “gay serial killers <3.” I just want her to go back to Inception or something and leave me alooooone.” (See also the slightly earlier "Gay serial killers?" discussion.)
- Jun. 5, 2013: Aja (again) takes on K-Pop
- Jul. 9, 2013: Aja stages an intervention for Sterek "slashtivists"
- Sep. 8, 2013: Mortal instruments and the 'confounding problems of fanfiction'. Nonny brings over a wank report thing about this article calling The Mortal Instruments “nakedly derivative” (i.e., plagiarized). Aja shows up in the article's comments to defend her BFF Cassie Clare. (Additional FFA thread here.)
- Sep. 30, 2013, in a thread titled "Random/Dumb Questions": “Who is this “Aja” person everyone mentions?” Nonny gets answers.
- Oct. 1, 2013: Aja's Appearance Here, referring to a year-old IO9 article.
- Nov. 8, 2013: Aja does triple back somersaults on liking SPN. “How can she possibly like Supernatural when it's such a massive failbag of queerbaiting, misogyny, geek-shaming and wall-to-wall white dudes? Because it has a good beat, and you can dance to it she likes the characters, she ships it, and sometimes it's good. That took about 3000 words.”
- Jan 17, 2015: Aja "defends" Gyllencest and incest fanfiction.
