The New York Times Sent Me a Press Release to Prove They Just Discovered Erotic Fanfic.

They’re promoting their magazine redesign, and boldfaced the parts of the press release they thought would interest me:

One of the new columns, Search Results by Jenna Wortham, is an annotated guide to things of interest on the Internet. Jenna will be diving into online culture to report on the trends, styles, new forms of expression and content-making. It will run twice a month. Jenna will also be writing frequently online.

The first Search Results column, running this weekend, is My Dear, Dear, Dear Watson, which examines the weird, wonderful world of “shipping,” or imagining romances between fictional characters.

Okay, let’s see what you have…

Part of the Internet’s beauty is the space it affords people to take an idea and run with it .?.?. and run with it and run with it, until they end up miles away from where they started.

I think Avenue Q actually said what you’re thinking a bit more honestly.

This sort of wholesale invention, by viewers, of a romance between fictional characters who are not romantically linked on-screen is a form of something known as “shipping” (short for “relationship-ing,” the term can also refer to rooting for actual fictional couples).

Is it really “wholesale invention” if one argues that a subtext is there already? Male bonding exaggerated into gayness is a trope at least as old as Achilles.

It is by no means limited to “Sherlock” — any form of pop culture, from “Scandal” to One Direction, is fair game — but that show has inspired vast and vivid fictional worlds

“It is by no means limited to Sherlock, but that’s all I was prepared to look for.”

Three words for you: My. Little. Pony.

For example, one offshoot of Johnlock, known as Fawnlock, imagines Cumberbatch as an ethereal deer, complete with graceful antlers and a speckled coat — and of course his lover, Watson, cradled in his forelimbs.

This is her CONCLUDING SENTENCE. As an editor, I’m more offended that she concludes with a first example than that she thinks Sherlock has the only richly imagined fan-fiction universe.

Back to the press release:
** Please Credit The New York Times Magazine and link to article**

No problemo.