Fanfiction.net Discussion

[LeoCSnora]

amarzyciel

Oh yeah, AO3 is starting to become in so many ways better than ff.net (even if they have certain things also, which I don't like, but still... Plus, ff.net still has more stories to choose from...). I admit that at first it took some time trying to figure out how certain things on the site works, but it's much easier now.

Renkon Root

Hah. Yeah, I noticed that too. I was gone for a few months or so and when I come back, they've done something stupid again... I don't know, I've kind of stopped trying to find any reasons behind some of the things they do.

28Puri

I made one a little while ago also, but I'm not too sure if that place is good or bad... I'll maybe first try asking some people (readers/writers) what they think of it and only then decide if I'll even use it...

[Renkon Root]

LeoCSnora

Renkon Root

Hah. Yeah, I noticed that too. I was gone for a few months or so and when I come back, they've done something stupid again... I don't know, I've kind of stopped trying to find any reasons behind some of the things they do.

I am all for updating the site and trying keep up with their main competition. But I just can't imagine how changing the image dimensions would help increase traffic and compete with AO3. In fact, it might even chase more users away from them.

I managed to edit my profile image so that it fits the new dimensions (it actually does look a little better now). But some of my fic covers can't be edited and will have to be redrawn all together, and that's something I just don't want to take the time to do. They were perfectly fine before. There was no reason for ff.n to change it. Its the old cliche "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."

Anyway, the change was weeks ago, so overall I guess I don't really care anymore. I'll just be sure to make any new covers conform to the correct dimensions. I just can't wrap my head around how they thought it was a good move. I mean really. What was the point?

[LeoCSnora]

Renkon Root

I haven't bothered editing or changing my images. Thankfully, for now, they don't look so bad. Unless, of course, they decide to change things again (I'm pretty sure they did a change like that only a while ago, and it was much better than what it looks like now). Yeah, I've seen plenty of bigger sites doing things like these. While trying to "fix the image" or whatever the reason may be, they end up ruining something else instead. I only noticed it last week, I think.

[amarzyciel]

LeoCSnora

Oh yeah, AO3 is starting to become in so many ways better than ff.net (even if they have certain things also, which I don't like, but still... Plus, ff.net still has more stories to choose from...). I admit that at first it took some time trying to figure out how certain things on the site works, but it's much easier now.

I am not sure of the difference much. I do notice how troublesome it is to join through invitation.
And as a result there's fewer people on ff to read.
I do like the tagging system that let me find or know what I should expect in the ff.

I would have preferred to have access to both, which unfortunately I don't
Still AO3 is the better alternative compared to the other.
I am glad this thread informed me of its existence.

Also, how to use this bookmark thing in AO3?

[LeoCSnora]

amarzyciel

Surprisingly, for me joining the site wasn't hard at all. Maybe it was during the quiet time or something, but when I sent my request/invitation to join, by the next day (if not sooner) I had my account up. I haven't tried yet sending any invitations myself (might try it with some friends of mine at some point though) so I don't know if that makes any difference. I think (until they figure out something better, if there is such) the best way to do that is to simply go through the invitation system and forget the whole thing until you get the email notice. Other than that, I don't really see it as that big deal. Not too long ago there also was some trouble with either spammers or something else, where they had to turn off the entire invitation/joining system.

I originally went there in case ff.net is acting stupid again for one reason or another. Now I'm enjoying AO3 more and more. Both as a writer and reader. The tagging system was at first hard to figure out since I wasn't used to it, but now I'm in love with it (not counting those authors who add so many tags that I lose all interest by the time I make it to the actual story summary...)

I found out about AO3 through ff.net. At first I had no idea what people were talking about, since they weren't even using the actual name. It took some searching through the search engine, before I found out what on earth they were talking about...

The way I've used the bookmark is by simply clicking it when I want to "favorite" someone's work, when simply giving kudos or comments isn't enough. When you click it, it opens the "save a bookmark" thing. I usually don't bother going through all that in there and I simply click "create" and then it can be found through my own profile. It looks though that you can also make it private, add it to some collections, add some tags, write notes/summary etc... I don't know, maybe I'll use this as more than simple favorite system one day.
...Basically, this is useful only if you have account where to save that bookmark.

EDIT: It looks like this: LINK

[Renkon Root]

amarzyciel

Also, how to use this bookmark thing in AO3?

The Bookmark feature on AO3 is almost exactly the same as the Favorites feature on ff.n. The only significant difference is that when you Bookmark a story, you are also given the option of tying in a little blurb about why you like this story. This actually helps me a lot because I favorite so many fics I sometimes forget WHY I liked it so much and the story summaries don't always help because I can favorite a story for really random reasons like "narrator uses 90s pop-culture references" or "ALL OF THE PUNS". Things like that won't show up in tags or a summary, so it helps to remind my of why I favorited a story in the first place.

[amarzyciel]

LeoCSnora

Surprisingly, for me joining the site wasn't hard at all. Maybe it was during the quiet time or something, but when I sent my request/invitation to join, by the next day (if not sooner) I had my account up. I haven't tried yet sending any invitations myself (might try it with some friends of mine at some point though) so I don't know if that makes any difference. I think (until they figure out something better, if there is such) the best way to do that is to simply go through the invitation system and forget the whole thing until you get the email notice. Other than that, I don't really see it as that big deal. Not too long ago there also was some trouble with either spammers or something else, where they had to turn off the entire invitation/joining system.

I originally went there in case ff.net is acting stupid again for one reason or another. Now I'm enjoying AO3 more and more. Both as a writer and reader. The tagging system was at first hard to figure out since I wasn't used to it, but now I'm in love with it (not counting those authors who add so many tags that I lose all interest by the time I make it to the actual story summary...)

I found out about AO3 through ff.net. At first I had no idea what people were talking about, since they weren't even using the actual name. It took some searching through the search engine, before I found out what on earth they were talking about...

The way I've used the bookmark is by simply clicking it when I want to "favorite" someone's work, when simply giving kudos or comments isn't enough. When you click it, it opens the "save a bookmark" thing. I usually don't bother going through all that in there and I simply click "create" and then it can be found through my own profile. It looks though that you can also make it private, add it to some collections, add some tags, write notes/summary etc... I don't know, maybe I'll use this as more than simple favorite system one day.
...Basically, this is useful only if you have account where to save that bookmark.

EDIT: It looks like this: LINK

ooh, thank you. I got confused by the form that pop up whenever I want to bookmark an ff, furthermore the error thing I got...
It's resolved now and I can move stuff in my subscribe to bookmark.

hahaha, true. that paragraph long tag just makes me not want to even check the ff.

I hope the place get more popularity though, so there will be better story to read.
FF.net has so many stories due to how old the place is, it is why I kind of miss the place.

Renkon Root

The Bookmark feature on AO3 is almost exactly the same as the Favorites feature on ff.n. The only significant difference is that when you Bookmark a story, you are also given the option of tying in a little blurb about why you like this story. This actually helps me a lot because I favorite so many fics I sometimes forget WHY I liked it so much and the story summaries don't always help because I can favorite a story for really random reasons like "narrator uses 90s pop-culture references" or "ALL OF THE PUNS". Things like that won't show up in tags or a summary, so it helps to remind my of why I favorited a story in the first place.

thank you for the helps C:

[LeoCSnora]

amarzyciel

You're welcome. smile I'm pretty sure AO3 is getting more and more people going in there. Either to use it as an alternate site or some even moving everything there. While I don't agree about their policy to approve almost all kind of stories (some are very wrong and disturbing, I can't even... There should be at least some bigger rules, just for morality reasons alone. I won't mention the kind of stories I'm thinking about, because they are that bad and frankly some of those people should be put to jail if they can even think of such things... Thankfully this is the more extreme example and doesn't happen everyday that I see one), it keeps improving and could very well become much bigger and more popular fanfiction site than ff.net in the future. Especially if the ff.net doesn't start working on making things better on their site... And compared to how well known and popular this site was only in year 2013 when I found it, it's become so much more popular and well known in that short time alone. So, if they keep up the good work and basically don't piss off a whole lot of people, they'll keep doing even better in the future...

[amarzyciel]

LeoCSnora

amarzyciel

You're welcome. smile I'm pretty sure AO3 is getting more and more people going in there. Either to use it as an alternate site or some even moving everything there. While I don't agree about their policy to approve almost all kind of stories (some are very wrong and disturbing, I can't even... There should be at least some bigger rules, just for morality reasons alone. I won't mention the kind of stories I'm thinking about, because they are that bad and frankly some of those people should be put to jail if they can even think of such things... Thankfully this is the more extreme example and doesn't happen everyday that I see one), it keeps improving and could very well become much bigger and more popular fanfiction site than ff.net in the future. Especially if the ff.net doesn't start working on making things better on their site... And compared to how well known and popular this site was only in year 2013 when I found it, it's become so much more popular and well known in that short time alone. So, if they keep up the good work and basically don't piss off a whole lot of people, they'll keep doing even better in the future...

ah, yes. I spotted some that makes me frown, especially when I still have trouble differentiating type of ff.
also when they have no tagging or warning... that is a problem.

[LeoCSnora]

amarzyciel

Yeah. That's one big thing which they should improve, unless they want to put some higher age limit on their site, but at this point it wouldn't be good with so many members that they already have. Plus an account or not, kids still would go there to read stories and someone could truly be traumatized for life if they came across one of those... I don't even know what to call the horror which those stories are. Then of course, there will always be those few who simply don't put any proper rating on their story... That kind of makes things even harder... *sighs* There's always something... Maybe in another generation or few, things could be more easier and better... Or they could also be worse, with different/new kind of problems...

[amarzyciel]

LeoCSnora

Yeah. That's one big thing which they should improve, unless they want to put some higher age limit on their site, but at this point it wouldn't be good with so many members that they already have. Plus an account or not, kids still would go there to read stories and someone could truly be traumatized for life if they came across one of those... I don't even know what to call the horror which those stories are. Then of course, there will always be those few who simply don't put any proper rating on their story... That kind of makes things even harder... *sighs* There's always something... Maybe in another generation or few, things could be more easier and better... Or they could also be worse, with different/new kind of problems...

inappropriate rating/tag report maybe?
though that can also be used to harass author...

[LeoCSnora]

amarzyciel

Oh, I'm pretty sure something like that has already happened, without any big red report button (I think I just read about something like that not too long ago, somewhere on the site even). It wouldn't be good to make it too easy either. If they do make one of those, it should maybe be only for the other members and possibly not in a place that makes it too tempting to go and harass authors. There are trolls everywhere... And jealousy can be real nasty too. I've myself come across at least plenty of trolls, that much I do know. But on AO3 I don't allow guest comments and on ff.net guest reviews won't show until I let them through. Positive criticism can be good, and it usually is, but those trolls and other people with nothing better to do... Or people who hate the character I write with/for and that I don't love their favorite. I guess they are the ones that are called Bad apples.

[Renkon Root]

Not having anything to do with anything, I just want to say how awesome it is to get a PM from a new reader praising a story you finished three years ago. Not just for the praise itself (although the praise is great) but because it shows that new people are still reading your old fics. That's really awesome!

[LeoCSnora]

Renkon Root

I can imagine and that's awesome. ^^

[Kadaj5]

Renkon Root

I get faves every now and then on my works even though they're all pretty much stalled with my sporkings taking all my time. I haven't gotten any reviews except for when I last updated my fics, and I need to update a chapter in said fic so as to avoid a plothole!

*goes to update story chapter*