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TIME offers some fanfic search stats

Bill Tancer of Hitwise has a brief article just up at TIME that has some interesting stats about fan fiction on the net. Hitwise tracks over 700 Books and Writing sites. Fanfiction.net gets 34.7% of visits to the ENTIRE category, making it first by the longshot, doing better than even Apple.com (159th most popular of all websites they track):

Top 10 Internet Searches Containing “Fan Fiction” (12 weeks ending 8/25/07):

1. Harry Potter
2. Bonanza World
3. Adult
4. Gunsmoke
5. South of Nowhere
6. Clark and Chloe
7. Supernatural
8. Firefly
9. Triple H
10. CSI
Source: Hitwise

On adult content he adds:

Of the 40,491 sites in our Adult category, the site with the highest percentage of female visitors (64.3%) is AdultFanfiction.net (proceed at your risk).

Now can we stop pretending that fan fiction is a quirky tiny little corner of the net made up of weirdos? If that’s not mainstream, what is? I get a lot of hits on here just because I use the words “fanfic” or “fan fiction” sometimes.

And I don’t mind adult content, but the amount of searches that land on my site that also include words that describe criminal sexual activities is kind of disturbing. But hey, at least it’s fiction.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 31st, 2007 at 6:12 AM
and filed under Fan Creativity.

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Comments (3) to “TIME offers some fanfic search stats”

  1. Ron wrote:

    If #2 and #4 are the classic westerns, I’m shocked people a) remember them and b) write fan fiction about them. I’ve never heard of #5 and #6, but the rest of them (especially the Whedon stuff) doesn’t surprise me in the slightest. I’m actually surprised Buffy isn’t also on the list, since it has such a rabid, larger following than Firefly.

    Posted on 31-Aug-07 at 7:23 am | Permalink

  2. Robin wrote:

    I run a Duran Duran fan site (DuranDuranFans.com) and the fanfic is HUGE. I’ve had to add a “hidden” site for the adult-rated stuff to the message board. You’d be amazed at what people write fanfic about.

    Myself… I’ve dabbled in Harry Potter fanfic myself! :P

    Posted on 31-Aug-07 at 9:04 am | Permalink

  3. Liss wrote:

    Ron: Clark & Chloe is a popular pairing amongst Smallville writers. No idea about South of Nowhere, though.

    Posted on 31-Aug-07 at 11:15 am | Permalink