It interesting that the thrust of attention in this article as proposed is on fan-editing but that is just one aspect of a much larger phenomena, that of fan craft in general.
The act of making something because you are a fan of an already existing story is by no means new.
I suspect it has it's origins way back in the spiritual and sacred pre-history of story telling (the first cave painting based on one stone ager's account of his grapple with his prey, that sort of thing).
The myths we still enjoy weren't just tales to the ancients, they were tied into religious rites and a temple industry providing objects to extend those stories lift side by side with objects made by ordinary people to make those epic tales something personal, to put themselves into the story.
In a modern sense this can be seen as duplicated in both the wide range of official products which tie in with films like the Star Wars series as well as scratch built models, costumes, fan-fiction and un-official audio plays and fan films.
So fan-edits are merely another extension of that human urge to paint yourself into the picture, to make and hold a part of the story, to participate in an emersive other world rather than just sit shore and watch through a telescope.
The same is true of fan-documentaries, preservations and restorations.
This site was set up because something that fans wanted to buy and own was not being made available (the original Star Wars films restored and presented to modern standards) and it's still not available.
This mirrors another set of stories spanning time and space.
Doctor Who has been running (off and on) since 1963. When VCRs made it possible to collect that series the BBC had a bit of a problem, they had taped over or thrown away a huge portion of the show's history. Also they took the show off the air in the eighties but there was still a large demand for the show and nothing new to sell.
Some of the missing shows were tracked down by recalling overseas copies sent to broadcasters around the globe.
Others have turned up as fragments in private hands.
But there was one resource that few people would have counted on, the fans.
Before video was commonplace fans had put microphones next to their television speakers and had archived every single story (including the ones with missing pictures).
Other fans had created telly snaps by photographing their sets to produce in still images the general look of almost every scene.
This has been used not only by the Doctor Who Restoration team :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doctor_Who_Restoration_Team
to produce audio versions of the missing shows and to create documentary extras on the DVD's but also but also by various teams of fans who are working together to animate the missing visuals in a variety of styles.http://www.orangecow.org/who-sprites2/1guide/
When the show went off air groups of people made audio and later video dramas sometimes using the original actors (often changing the character names to stay within the law).
One such company was Big Finish productions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Finish_Productionswho later won the official license for Doctor Who audio dramas (which now out number the original television episodes). People who have worked on have also gone on to work on the revived series.
If you look around this site you will see much of the same kind of work for much of the same reason.
Not only are people attempting create new work, but also restore and archive what is no longer or never been made officially available.
If Lucasfilm (and the other companies who's output is receiving fan craft attention) treat these people well and not just listen to their requests but consider throwing a bit of money at their efforts they may actual have a lot more to gain than lose.