Fandom Facts

• Relative to Mushrooms (general), not a lot of folks are looking up information on magic mushrooms (Psilocybin), or even mycology and are getting more interested in mushrooms over time
• There are at least five different subreddits on mushrooms, all tackling a different aspect of mushrooms (identifying mushrooms, psilocybin, anything mushrooms, etc.), the largest being r/mycology (but just by a few thousand)
• In _Star Trek: Discovery_ there is a character, Lieutenant Paul Stamets, who is an astromycologist and is named after a real U.S. scientist of the same name who is investigating how mushrooms might be able to save the world in different ways (e.g. treating disease, cleaning up oil spills)
• ...His obsession with mushrooms started at age 19 where he ate an entire bag of magic mushrooms.
• Only about 5% of the world's fungi are thought to be identified

First Impressions

Z:

Ever since I had a mushroom dipped in ranch dressing at some sort of party when I was a kid, I've enjoyed their texture. And, as I tried things like portabellas, and shitake, and cremini, and beech mushrooms, I found that there was a whole world of mushrooms out there. So, when it came to mycology, my impression was that people interested in it were either foodies looking to explore perhaps the most varied, unprocessed, vegetarian/vegan(?) food, or scientists classifying them.

T:

I put mycology up there with philatelists and numismatists; something that you can go quite deep into, but that I know nothing about. I've heard bits and pieces about it (pressings, how the mushroom responds to metal, etc.) and I know friends with an interest in wild mushrooms (not for use as a drug, but as general survivalist interest)... but beyond that, it's mostly been an unknown (popularity-wise) known unknown.

Famous Last Words

What did we have to say about an upcoming topic, _Digimon_, with only our first impressions? \

G: How do fans of Digimon feel about it being diet Pokemon?_ \ _

T: What is it about Digimon that helped it stand above some of its contemporaries?_ \ _

Z: Do fans of Digimon hold any sort of grudge against fans of Pokemon? Have any Digimon fans proposed a blending of the two? Is there a fan-approved crossover?

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What is "Fanthropological"?

Every week, Fanthropological delivers about an hour of fandom-rel