^+1. None of what 5FDP said came off as being elitist to me, and if anything he's been trying to rationalise/defend the actions of people who follow popular trends.

Whether someone became a Transfan long ago or recently, I think the key factor is commitment to the franchise. Those of us who've been active in the fandom long enough have seen plenty of people come and go, and almost everyone claims to be a 'die hard fan' when they sign up. But actions speak louder than words; if we're all still here in 10 years' time and we're still just as passionate about Transformers, then we'll know that we're absolute fanatics (which is what the word "fan" is short for).

I met 5FDP 10 years ago at the OTCA booth at Sydney Supanova 2003. Here we are 10 years later and we're both still absolutely nuts about Transformers. So IMHO time will be the ultimate judge of who the truly committed fans are, irrespective of when you started.