soricel

Today's Random Community:

style_system

Last summer I got really taken by the idea of learning CSS and building a website or at least playing around with my DW layout, but I quickly realized that I liked the idea of doing this stuff more than actually doing it. Anyway, this is a community for people who like tinkering with DW layouts and styles and stuff. Mostly seems like people asking how to do certain stuff and people trying to help them figure it out. Nice!

Random Community of the day!

fandom10in30

This seems like it would be fun for people who are into making icons! They run monthly challenges in which people try to make 10 fandom related to the month's theme. Looks like the current round is "Summer Fruits." Comm members can also vote on their favorite icons of the month. I saw some really pretty ones on my scroll through.

Today's Random Community, whenisitdue looks like another helpful one for fic writers. They post calendars full of the due dates for various fic events, challenges, exchanges, etc. A good way to keep track of what's due when, but also to find out about cool stuff going on that you might have missed!

I kinda struck out a few times before landing on today's Random Community (got a couple HP-related communities, which I don't really want to highlight, something in Russian, a closed RP community, and a few archives of individuals' fic, which, while cool, aren't really what I've been trying to promote here), but after a few more tries I found...

frillsofjustice

This is a community dedicated to all things magical girl-related. Interestingly, according to the Intro/FAQ post, there used to be another community of the same name, but "the original was deleted and purged by its moderator, for reasons unknown, and all content was lost." Whoa! Anyway, not really my thing, but on a quick skim through I saw some fic, news, discussion posts, links to meta articles, etc. I like stumbling on communities with that kind of range of content.

Random Community of the day...

iconpraise

So I only have this one icon, and it's the only one I've ever had. It's from a little comic I made for my partner. I like it, and I kinda like that it's my one and only icon. But I also get a kick out of seeing the different ways people use icons on here, and some of them are really nice-looking!

I don't think I really give icons the consideration they deserve; I suspect that a lot of thought and care goes into making them! So it was cool to stumble upon this community, which is entirely dedicated to showcasing and praising icons. Lots of cool stuff to look at!

Random Community of the day...

intw_amc

A community dedicated to the AMC adaptation of Interview with the Vampire. I've never read the book or seen the show so don't have much to say, but this looks like a fun community with a good sense of humor (the first "rule" on the stickied admin post is "Bring your shitposts"). On a quick skim through, I saw a WIP post, some fanart, a promo video, some recs, some icons, an Entertainment Weekly interview...all sorts of stuff! Seems like a pretty happening place!

Random Community of the day:

swbookclub

This is a community for people who want to read and talk about Star Wars books. They seem to have covered a *lot* of SW books over the years! It looks like they do a poll to choose each month's book, divide the books up into four chunks, and have discussion posts on weekends. That seems like a cool way to do a book club on here, actually...makes me wonder if there are any communities doing something similar! 

Today, my Random Community Quest has brought me to...

birdfeeding

This is cool! A community for people interested in all sorts of bird-related activities and issues. Lots of posts about bird spottings and weather reports, and some nice pictures too.

As with most nature-related things, I feel like I've always had a vague interest in birdwatching, but I've never really gotten into it...though there are some real cuties and beauties near where I live. I love seeing blackbirds running full steam ahead across my path, and catching glimpses of what I think are Eurasian Jays is always a treat. There's also a Scops Owl that I've gotten used to hearing on summer evenings, and I'm looking forward to hearing its distinctive, kinda sad call again this year. Anyway, peeking at this community just now was a good opportunity to reflect on these little sources of bird-related delight in my neighborhood.

Day 4 of Random Community Quest! Today I took a peek at...

c_ent

This is a community for fanworks and discussion related to all sorts of Chinese entertainment. It's pretty big--262 members as of this posting--and seems really active, with what look like pretty lively weekly chats and lots of rec posts, reviews, icons, art, fic, etc., and monthly round-ups of stuff people have shared in the community. Some other cool things I spotted as I looked around: a post asking for translation/subtitle help, and a Guardian-centric post about someone's visit to a the Shanghai Film Park. It's nice to see so many ways of engaging with fandom represented here!

On a personal note, I feel a lot of curiosity about the world of C-Drama, in large part because I lived in China for a few years, but I'm just not a huge TV/movie watcher, unfortunately. Maybe if I keep looking, I'll find something that grabs me though. Checking out this community has kinda made me want to try!

Oh and P.S., I just noticed the links in the sidebar: tons of resources for people (like me, possibly) looking to get into CMedia or deepen their understanding of history, culture, language, etc. Cool!

So I think for Three Weeks for Dreamwidth, I'm going to click on the "Random Community" link under the "Explore" tab everyday and write about the community I find. I'm psyched to maybe discover new, cool communities I might want to join, and introduce other people to stuff that might be interested in. I'm going to write about two communities today because I missed yesterday.

Day 1: filk

I don't really know anything about filk! My understanding is that it's fandom-inspired/related folk music? Maybe mostly for fantasy/sci-fi fandoms? I imagine it's popular at cons and stuff? Oh, I think I remember Howard and Raj doing a filky thing on Big Bang Theory. Anyway, one thing this community seems to do is promote a weekly podcast full of filk music. I'm listening to the latest episode now, and kinda digging it! So far, very traditional folk-style music with, yeah, some fantasy/sci-fi themes. Not quite my thing, but cool!

Day 2: bookcrossing

It looks like this is a community who participate in a kind of book exchange thing, in which people give away their books and keep track of where they end up. Like the Filk community, it looks like they have a non-DW site/web presence as well, and it all seems pretty active and well-organized.