an experiment, or a sad trolling for reviews

[dbskyler]

I've had an AO3 account since Yuletide 2009, but I've never posted any of my non-Yuletide fic there. In particular, I've never put any of my Doctor Who fic there. I've always felt that the best place for Doctor Who fic is the Teaspoon, and the second-best place for my Doctor Who fic is my journal and sometimes certain LJ communities.

But, I realize that there might be a slightly different audience at AO3, so I've nevertheless toyed with the idea of putting my Doctor Who fic there. It's also occurred to me that some people who only know me from my Yuletide fic might be curious to see what else I have written. Unless they're big Doctor Who fans, they are unlikely to go looking for my fic at the Teaspoon. Actually, even if they are big Doctor Who fans, they are unlikely to go looking for my fic at the Teaspoon unless they happen to already know that I write in that fandom, which they would not know from looking at my AO3 account. When you put it like that, it makes sense to post all my fic in the same place at AO3. In fact, I believe that is one of the main points of having a multi-fandom archive.

But why am I feeling motivated to finally cross-post a fic or two now? Well, the sad fact is that I haven't written anything new in a really long time, and I am kind of missing reviews. I had been thinking that it would be nice to get another review. And then I thought, maybe putting an already-written story onto AO3 would be a good way to get a review.

So, I confess that I have gone and put "Spotter's Guide to the Doctor" up on AO3. This will be an interesting experiment to see if it's worthwhile to put all my Doctor Who fic up there.

And, perhaps I will get a review.

Comments

[shadowturquoise.livejournal.com]

I finally got an AO3 account set up last week (it was a 2 month wait to get it). And I have almost abandoned reading off of Teaspoon while making my way through all the AO3 goodies. Their search engine is far better than the one at Teaspoon. I, for one, would certainally be rereading over your stuff to see if I missed anything.

Be aware, however, that they are having a few problems right now with system crashes because they have doubled their membership since March. They do have the money and intention of installing a new server and they keep a very active Twitter account to let everyone know minute by minute what is going on if the server is down.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Two-month wait?! That's annoying. I guess I'm lucky that I got to jump the line by participating in Yuletide.

You really think you'd have more luck finding my fic at AO3 than at Teaspoon? That's interesting. I think Teaspoon is an easier archive to search, at least when it comes to searching for fic by a given author. But AO3 does have a far better tagging system, true.

For now I only have the one Doctor Who story up at AO3, so you won't have a lot to look through. ; ) I'll probably eventually put it all up there, though.

[lolmac]

Ao3 is apparently getting flooded because someone at ff.net woke up and started actually enforcing a few guidelines. So lag times have mushroomed from the sudden demand.

However, the folks at Fanfic Flamingo have been accepting and redistributing donated Ao3 invite codes for quite a while. From what I can see, if you contact them with the necessary info, they can get you one pretty much right away.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

You mean ff.net has guidelines?

I know that comes across as sarcasm, but I'm being serious. What guidelines? In particular, what guidelines are being enforced there now that are not in place at AO3? I'm really curious.

I'm never going to post at ff.net, though. I can't even read fic over there. I don't know if it's an association with bad!fic or what, but every time I cruise over for a peek, I get the hell out again as quickly as I can.

[lolmac]

*snortle*

The Pit has guidelines, and every single time you post a fic there, you are forced to sign off on them, no matter how many times you have already done so. Even though (last time I looked) they haven't been updated since 2008.

Things That Are Forbidden include: smut; anything that isn't a fic; RPF; works that don't fit the category where they're posted; items on the List of Banned Authors (authors who, prior to 2008, publicly stated that they will not countenance fanfic).

I don't spend a lot of time there -- although I do post there, because, like it or not, it's where the bulk of the readership is. But even I have been able to notice that every one of their guidelines is constantly violated, especially the one about smut. Personally, I decided early on that the very very small and feeble amount of smut I wrote myself was not going there, because it would be stupid -- what if they actually enforced their guidelines someday?

Well, the day has arrived: apparently the smut is being deleted. I only know this second and thirdhand, but there seems to be a lot of deletion happening; there is certainly a lot of lamentation.

By not posting there, you're probably missing some readership, but you're also missing a lot of aggravation. The author side of the user interface is -- let's call it "user-hostile".

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

No smut allowed?! Ah, that would definitely drive people elsewhere.

I suppose I am missing some readership by staying away, but I'm willing to live with that. I already can't stand the reader side of the user interface, so if the author side is even worse, I doubt I'd survive it.

[thisbluespirit]

let's call it "user-hostile".

LOL, yes. I'll say. After finally getting on it, and managing to navigate the unhelpful interface, and posting three stories, when I came back, it had eaten my scene breaks. My scene breaks were important. I gave it up for good after that - and someone - oh, dbskyler got me an invite onto AO3, and I rejoiced, for I never needed to return to ff.net again.

I occasionally read fic on there, but rarely even attempt leaving reviews, let alone anything else. And I only dive into the pit in desperation. Even though there are some marvellous stories and authors on there, of course.

I think us DW fanfic writers are probably a little bit spoiled by Teaspoon, though, really.

[lolmac]

God, don't get me started on the scene breaks. Yes indeedy. Somewhere in the depths of The Pit is a monster they keep around just to eat scene breaks.

The POS interface parses them out. Just in my brief time there, they've tweaked it two or three times so that it parses out the workarounds as well (ASCII characters, dashes, etc.)

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

p.s. -- just noticed that you friended me (circled me?) on Dreamwidth. I should warn you that I hardly ever visit over there anymore -- don't even bother to crosspost unless I have a new fic. But it's still a nice thought to be friended. : )

[lolmac]

You betcha. I finally gritted my teeth and got the RDA Daily comm imported, and while I was there it made sense to stalk look up some of the folks I know on this side of the alternate dimensional interface, so there you were!

[thisbluespirit]

Yes, and it deceived me. It let me think they would be there, and stay there. And then when I came back a few months later, all the scene breaks had gone.

Next fic_rush, how about we set the Ninja Penguins on the scene-break eating monster from the pit?

Which sounds like crack fic of the fic rush variety, really. :lol:

I'm probably unfair to ff.net, but, as I said, with being a DW fan, we've got a big central archive - I didn't get more reviews on anything at ff.net than Teaspoon.

[lolmac]

I'm probably unfair to ff.net

Careful analysis determines that this sentence is meaningless. ;-)

Let's definitely send the Ninja Penguins after the Monsters of the Pit. A fine way to celebrate our Rushiversary!!

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

No scene breaks?? What do they have against scene breaks? I love scene breaks!

Yes, in DW we are spoiled by Teaspoon. <3 <3 <3

[pitry.livejournal.com]

It's just their awful site configurations - they disallow regular scene breaks like * (it eats them), and you can't have more than a couple of blank lines before it starts eating your lines too, and I'm sure there are other characters it eats!

I'm more annoyed with them for disallowing brackets and dashes in the fic's title. I just posted a fic that has a dash in the title and it ate it, too :(

[lolmac]

The only way to get more than a single blank line is to use a letter character: EVERYTHING else is parsed out. I use -x- as my placeholder. Because my scene breaks are important too, damn it.

And yes, I've had top work around the dumbed-down titling, too. Gack.

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Oh! You're the person I stole the -x- from :D

- x - marks the spot where the narrative breaks

[lolmac]

Curiously enough, I still have plenty of them left even after your theft.

[thisbluespirit]

Aw. Well, I'm writing some ficlets again now, but while I've been ill I've been gradually putting my DW fic on AO3 and the occasional reviews and slightly more frequent kudos is something I've found v comforting. Especially since Teaspoon seems to be quieter. I think the Classic Who fans who use Teaspoon tend to also use AO3 so there's a lot of the same readership - but I'm sure you will pick up new readers, or people who missed some stories. Pretty much all your fic is so great, anyway.

I think it's worth having things on both, because they can be searched in such different ways. Teaspoon is easier for just sort of wading through a Doctor or author, while the way you can just click on any character or pairing - and not only the few major characters who are listed - and see what else is there, and crossovers and things on AO3 is nice, too. It's v good for browsing (or time-wasting, :lol:)

It is pretty busy at the moment - I'm midway through really getting a lot more of my Teaspoon on it & it keeps crashing. I think, from what I gather, there was the Avengers, and now there's a huge influx of people from the ff.net thing that's going on.

I did use ff.net once, but found it counter-intuitive in every way. Whereas, posting-wise, AO3 has quite a lot of similarities to Teaspoon, which helps a DW fan. :-)

(I've subscribed to you, anyway, now.)

Also, I do hope you feel able to write something again soon - for you, and also because I really miss your fic.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

At least you have a good excuse for not writing! I've been feeling the need to write, but it's still not quite happening. I'm really looking forward to the next fic_rush round, because I will finally be around for most of it, and I think a concentrated weekend of trying to write is what I need to kick-start myself again.

Good point about AO3 being so different from Teaspoon for browsing through fic. Very true.

I got one review already! And it is obviously from someone who hadn't read the story before. Which makes me happy that I posted it over there. Strangely, my happiness is more like Calufrax-reccer-happiness (this person who didn't previously know about the story now knows about it and likes it!) than author-happiness, I think because it's been so long since I wrote the story. But happiness is happiness. :D

I also got kudos from some random person who seems to like a lot of my fic for some reason. I think they're on my flist or something . . . ; )

[thisbluespirit]

:-)

Aw, that would be great if that works out for you. I'm sure it will! After all, once the whole fic_rush menageries gets at you, there'll be no escape... (And there are all sorts of things that get in the way of writing. *hugs*)

[pitry.livejournal.com]

It's definitely worth having the fics on both - first, there are people on AO3 who aren't on Teaspoon - not a lot, but there are. And second, new users don't always fnd the oldest fics. So reposting also opens your fic for a bunch of people who have never heard of you because it's been a while since you posted.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

It does feel a little like I'm being one of those people who cross-posts the same fic to 20 LJ comms, but you're right, there are plenty of perfectly legitimate reasons to cross-post to AO3 that are not about banging people over the head with the same fic over and over and over again.

[thisbluespirit]

:lol: At the most, a fic is only in 3 (or 4, with DW?) places - and there are people who only use each one! And lots of people like stuff being on AO3 as well, because it's got an easy option for downloading to e-books (so I gather. Not that I have one of those).

there are plenty of perfectly legitimate reasons to cross-post to AO3 that are not about banging people over the head with the same fic over and over and over again.

I'm now v amused at the idea of you going round banging people over the head with The Spotters Guide to the Doctor. Or Fallacy Somewhere... Yes! If they won't read them, why not!? Heh.

And I'm in all the threads now, sorry. *slides away*

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Hee, yes, I need to print them out and roll them up and go whacking random people on the street with them. Actually, maybe I should do that the next time I go to Gallifrey One. Other people hand out ribbons; I could hand out fic! Plus a whack on the head. ; )

[thisbluespirit]

They'll certainly remember you...

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Looks like the experiment was a success :D

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Not really, to be honest. In three days, it's only gotten 33 hits. Only one new person responded to it, although that person really liked it (leaving me a review, and kudos, and bookmarking it).

But since this is my first non-Yuletide fic there, I don't know how to judge the hit rate / review rate. Also, I assume that a lot of Teaspoon readers have already seen the fic; a brand-new fic might get a better hit rate.

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Wellllll... I only have my experiences with AO3, but to compare it to my uploads there, then yes, I'd call it a success. Yuletide fics really do get a lot more love than regular fics.

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

I just sneaked a peek at your AO3 fics, and OMG, "But, Oh, Those Human Women" only has three hits? THREE??!!! But that's a GORGEOUS fic! GORGEOUS!!!!!!!! And it was recced on Calufrax, and deservedly so! I must have read it through at least three times myself the first day you posted it.

I think I see a problem with the AO3 tagging system. Sure, it's great for finding the specific characters / pairings you're looking for, but it's harder to come across the unique gems.

[pitry.livejournal.com]

Haha, yes. Are you suggesting Bran/Valerie isn't the most popular pairing in DW?! :D

But yeah, you're absolutely right about the tags. At least it seems they're solving the 1000 fics limit now - until now you would only get the first 1000 fics on any search. So it perhaps allows people to view more fics. Hopefully. :D

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Well, it's one of *my* favorite pairings! Ooh, I should search AO3 for more Brannigan/Valerie fics!

[pitry.livejournal.com]

... there are none. ;) For ages my Bran/Valerie tag was unverified and unsearchable. :D

Also, LOL! You kudos'd it! Now there are four hits! ♥ ♥ ♥

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

Well, I had to do my part for the Branerie shippers!

If it makes you feel any better, I have just verified that I am the only person to have fic at AO3 based on Gilbert and Sullivan's "Iolanthe." I think we should both be proud!