The clothes make the fan:: Fashion and online fandom when 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' goes to eBay

The public's reception of eBay's auction of Buffy the Varnpire Slayer wardrobe items marked an instructive collision Of online fandom, television production/consumption and e-commerce. As opportunities for critique and fantasy production, the clothes crystallized tensions within the series and among fans: between ownership and authorship; a viable feminist politics and the sexualization of cast and characters; the perceived egalitarianism Of online communities and eBay's explicit competitiveness.