[ SECRET POST #2955 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #2955 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 01 pages, 014 secrets from Secret Submission Post #422.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

04. http://i.imgur.com/3tqhoV5.jpg

[(Anonymous)]

On the one hand, I think that's kind of gross. I've never understood hate-reading stuff. Life's too short, IMO.

On the other hand, if you're encouraging writers, I guess...that's good? Even if it's for the wrong reason?? I'm digging here.

[(Anonymous)]

That's actually a really cruel and awful thing to do.

[(Anonymous)]

Agreed.

That would the absolute worst. It's like how those people get up on American Idol, and believe they have an amazing voice, and nobody EVER told them they were terrible. And then they get laughed at on national television.

Horrible.

[kallanda_lee]

To be fair, I think that a lot of fanfic authors just end up getting the audience that relates to their style, instead of actually changing their style.

[(Anonymous)]

Well, when I wrote fanfic, I sure didn't want to have to change my style so the "important people" would read it.

[(Anonymous)]

I don't think you're really lying to anybody but yourself. You enjoy reading the fics, for whatever reasons, you leave positive comments. So far, so usual.

Just come clean to yourself that you love the fics and dispense with the 'I'm only enjoying them ironically' thing. It sounds tiresome and can't be good for your self image if you are telling yourself repeatedly you're doing something you despise.

[cloud_riven]

Is that technically gas lighting? I mean, the author assumedly keeps writing (possibly improves the more they write?), and you still get your fic (until the off chance it surpasses the bar of low quality?).

Everyone wins, but it's kind of sketch?

[(Anonymous)]

Ironically reading things is whatever but it seems overly mean to leave two-faced reviews. I guess the authors will never find out though, so that's good at least.

[(Anonymous)]

Eh, on the occasions I write fanfics, they're probably rather pretentious and definitely overly wordy.

I'm probably in a minority of one here, but honestly? - I'd be happy to think someone is enjoying my writing even if it is for all the wrong reasons. I write primarily for my own amusement after all, but being able to entertain other people (even at my own expense) is still what makes it worth giving my limited free time to writing, rather than to any other hobby that I could do purely for my own amusement.

Either way, I'd rather have insincere praise than no feedback at all! (Of course I'd rather have flames than no feedback at all... personally, nothing is more disheartening than feeling like nobody's paying attention.)

[(Anonymous)]

I agree. I tend to think the OP is doing it right since at least they're being polite in their comments. At the moment it's win-win for everyone.

[(Anonymous)]

My writing tends towards the overly wordy, and I'd be so fucking hurt and mortified if I found out that someone had left a glowing review on one of my fics just because they wanted to laugh at my writing some more. I'd rather not get any comments at all than get one from someone who's trying to trick me into repeatedly humiliating myself for them. Hell, I'd rather get straight up rude comments than get comments from someone like OP.

[(Anonymous)]

This makes me paranoid every time someone confesses that they do this. I'm not a pretentious wordy author, but I actually had someone do that to me once. So it brings up bad memories and sometimes makes me wonder if some reviewer who seems to like my work more than I suspect it's worth liking is really doing it to mock me.

[(Anonymous)]

Only leave writers praise if you've:

a) Read the fic (because we had someone a while ago who just copied the tone of other reviews on fics and posted them without even bothering to read the fic itself) and

b) Enjoyed the fic.

In many years of writing both fanfic and original fic, I've never once met a single writer who would want insincere or mocking praise. If you're going to praise us, then you praise what you've liked and you do it for the right reasons. If you haven't enjoyed it, then offer concrit if the writer's open to that, but fake praise? Please don't.

And not knowing whether or not someone does this to your reviews only devaules all the other feedback you get, because it's impossible to differentiate the insincere and mocking praise from actual praise. The fact that writers have to second guess their good feedback is a pretty shitty position to put them in.

[(Anonymous)]

LOL!

Why lie?

[(Anonymous)]

Why can't you just write "I got a huge kick out of your story. Please write more."?

[(Anonymous)]

I don't really get why some people in this thread see this as a terrible thing. OP genuinely seems to enjoy the fics even if it's in a "I watch this show because it's terribad" kind of way and overly pretentious/wordy fics tend to get a fair amount of fans anyway, so I doubt OP's feedback is the only thing keeping these authors from reaching their ~full potential~ by writing better fic. OP gets to read fic they enjoy and some fanfic author gets to read a nice review from someone who likes their writing (even if it's not in the way most people want their writing liked). I don't see the crime

[(Anonymous)]

You lack empathy, is why. It's mean-spirited and two-faced and OP is an ass.

[(Anonymous)]

But they don't like the writing, that's the whole point.

They like laughing at how shitty and overdone it is, that's not the same as 'liking' something.

[(Anonymous)]

They enjoy making fun of the writer, not the fics. And they certainly don't like the writing.

Imagine you've invited a friend over to dinner. You've made something pretty elaborate, for whatever reason -- maybe you're trying to impress, maybe elaborate and experimental dishes are just what floats your boat, who knows. Your friend eats it, and tells you it was amazing, the best thing they've ever eaten, and you should totally keep making more of it every single time they come over.

Truthfully your friend thinks your food was disgusting, but keeps telling you it's great because they find it endlessly hilarious that you're putting so much effort into your elaborate dishes only for them to be abysmally awful. They go home from every dinner you throw laughing their asses off at you, not only for your craptastic food, but for the fact that you keep making it without realizing you're awful, just because they keep encouraging you.

Still don't get it?

[(Anonymous)]

Hmm... how pretentious and wordy are we talking? It's common enough for writers when they start out to overdo the description. It kind of gets in the way of the reading experience. You know you might actually be doing your favourite fanfic writers more harm than good by not pointing it out? In my time in fandom, I probably fell into this category of fanfic writer. (I haven't been active in any fandom for a couple of years. I only started reading this journal again recently.) I didn't get a lot of reviews in the end. (The ones I did get were pretty demented. I had to block a few people.) I wondered if the friends who said they liked my fic in the beginning were just saying that to humour me. (After the first two or three chapters, they stopped commenting.) Other fics that I wrote, many of which I thought of as awful crap, got much more positive reviews. (It's crossed my mind that maybe my writing style actually deteriorated over time. Either that or my perception of what actually constitutes bad/good writing has become skewed. I gave up in the end.) When I look back on it, I think my friends did me a disservice by not saying anything, and that's a pretty crappy feeling.

That said, I think I can understand your inclinations a little bit. Watching TV shows that probably jumped the sharked way back is something a lot of people do, myself included. (Or, they might have been so bad they were good from the start.) I enjoy the schlock. If there's hot guys and some humour, that's even better. (I do enjoy a bit of slapstick, intentional or otherwise.)

If you ever tire of your little hobby, maybe you could leave them an anonymous comment, telling them what they could do to improve?

Transcript

[(Anonymous)]

Image: gray text on a white background, there are great blocks of text, and the first of those blocks ends with a quotation mark.

Text: N!S: I love to read super pretentious fics, or even just overly wordy ones. It’s my favourite kind of badfic. I get a huge kick out of it.

S: Sometimes, I’ll write reviews for these fics where I’ll lie and praise the authors’ writing. I’ll encourage them to write more of the same so I can have more badfic to amuse me.

Re: Transcript

[(Anonymous)]

I find grey on white hard to read. Jane Austen wordy or Anne Rice wordy?

[(Anonymous)]

sometimes I wish I could be entertained and enjoy really terrible things ironically like this, but I suspect it's mostly about feeling superior to other people. Yes you have correctly identified terrible writing/acting/storytelling! Very clever!

[(Anonymous)]

and posted 'encouragement' to deceive them into doing it again! I'm genuinely worried by the number of people in this thread thinking this is fine. Yuk.