Bruce Charlton explains why fandom is not beneficial for either the author or the creation:
I recently attended a talk, reading and book signing done by Sanderson; which was packed with hundreds of fans who turned-out and paid money to be there… and I say fans, because in the Q&A session every single one of the couple of dozen questions was related to the most trivial, ephemeral and superficial aspects of his work. There was not one single interesting, insightful, or challenging question asked by this mass of people; not the slightest indication that the novels were anything other than depictions of magic systems and ‘cool’ personalities.
Sanderson is an active Mormon, and all of his work is permeated with a serious consideration of religion and spirituality; both on the surface and as underlying structure. But it was clear that for Sanderson’s fandom this was of sub-zero interest – invisible and irrelevant.
The phenomenon of fandom is therefore at best trivial and fashion driven, there being more incommon between fans (regardless of what they are fans-of) than between fans and the subject of their fanaticism. Fandom is corrupting and destructive of whatever is good in the authors and works that get caught-up by it; and in its advanced form, fandom embodies subversion and inversion of whatever is specific and distinctive in its subject matter; the aim being to reinterpret and rewrite it in line with currently-dominant, top-down, manipulative social campaigns that ultimately emanate from (and are funded by) the global Establishment elites.
So the phenomenon of fandom is a product of evil purpose; and has a malign influence all-round.
My own experience with various fandoms does tend to support this negative view of it. This is why I prefer not to refer to the Ilk, the Dread Ilk, or the VFM as fans. They are certainly destructive, but not of me or my works, and they tend to be refining rather than corrupting.