As was wisely pointed out by Elcalion, the more recent thread "If you can stomach the Inheritance Cycle..." pertains pretty directly to this discussion, especially on the idea of rigidity. As you can see there, not everyone in the PPC shares the same opinions of badfic, and we aren't so 'rigid' that we'll spork a fic that doesn't truly, truly, truly deserve it just because of canon breaks, SPaG errors, clichés, OOCness, and other elements that could be charges should a fic actually be sporked. In fact, as is also exhibited in that particular thread, we often go by how something makes us feel as opposed to strict, 'rigid' analysis.
The PPC is fun, as many others have already said. It's not a real organization, and it's certainly not rigid- or if it is, it's not meant to be.

-- Len

Hey. I see where you're coming from, I think. If I'm understanding what you're saying, it's that you don't like that we snark at stories rather than just review them.

The thing is though... there really isn't a "PPC Organization". We're a community of writers who enjoy reading fanfiction and writing fanfiction, and just being fans in general.

Bad fanfiction doesn't NEED to be dealt with; we do what we do because we care about the canons, we enjoy good stories, and we just like having fun. By writing missions, we basically combine writing a story and writing a review of a fic while doing it in a way that makes people laugh.

You say you despise 'their' totally rigid view of canon. Who are you referring to? The PPC started in the early 2000s with two writers. Since then, there have been many many spinoffs, each with different writers behind them.

Yes, most of us consider the author of the work's word on their creation to be the final one. If it's up in the air, then we -or at least me, personally- take fanon and fan theories into consideration. Like, a character's motives, for example. If they aren't stated in canon, and it's just guessing on the fanon's part, then we take that into consideration.

Yes, people DO interpret stories differently. But we aren't telling people what to think. If that person thought that Snape was an abusive teacher, then fine. Good on them! But where we draw the line is when Snape stops acting in-character. In the books, Snape never physically attacked a student. If he's doing that in the fic, then we comment on it.

And yeah, we do need a better messaging board. I agree.

So, Polite Dissent, have our responses been what you thought they were going to be?

Finally, thanks for telling us what you think in a respectful manner like you have. To me, the PPC is about writing fun stories with friends and poking fun at bad fan fiction, while improving our own skills as writers.

I really shouldn't even comment on this because I haven't been active in this community for years now, but it seems kind of bizarre to take the PPC so seriously. I mean... it's an 'organization' devoted to getting a laugh out of bad fan fiction. At the end of the day it's fan fiction about fan fiction. It's fun, but not exactly earth-shattering.

Got a chuckle out of your suggestion to get a better message board. We were having that debate here 10 years ago, so I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you. Hopefully you can continue to voice your polite dissent on this old shoddy one. ;)

I think that what you're missing, as Lenore said below, is that not every AU and crossover are bad. Take "Game Theory" for example. It's an AU - there's no doubting that - but it's such a well-written, engrossing AU that I doubt that any of the resident Nanoha fans (me, Sergio Turbo and firemagic, IIRC) would ever dare to mission it. Or, for example, "Faker of the Rings", which is a Fate/stay night x Lord of the Rings crossover. It's crack, and it exaggerates the characters quite a lot, but, again, I doubt anyone would spork it, because it's well-written and funny.
That said, kudos for being reasonable and listening to what Nesh had to say.

Having not written any missions myself, my feedback doesn't really hold a whole lot of weight experience-wise, but I can see why you'd think that PPC methods are a little caustic. I've thought it, too. The point of the snarky sporking missions, I believe, is simply to make elimination of badfic more entertaining than writing review after review that the author won't listen to nine times out of ten. And in fact I've seen PPCers leave long, detailed, and cheerful critical reviews on stories, before or after sporking. We do that too.

You have a point about canon. The rigidity doesn't really allow for things like AUs, but then again, the PPC wouldn't spork a well-written AU. I think that breaking canon as a charge is used more to show that a Mary Sue (or similar offender) is disproportionately warping the plot, which is often what makes a character a Sue. (Since that didn't make much sense right there, I wrote an article explaining that theory. It's on my blog.)

So I suppose what I'm saying here is that I can perfectly sympathize with you, and I'm glad that you openly criticized the PPC if you had an issue with it. I think it was brave, and I admire you for being able to say "I hate you." and then proceed to offer reprimand that was not a flame. But in general I think the reasoning on our side can be explained- if not by me, because I'm not the best at explaining these things.

Yes, the methods are a little harsh. Maybe too harsh. That I can agree on, to an extent.

-- Len :D

This is very strange. I did find what I thought was the fic that was sporked here on FF.net: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5176787/Thou-Shalt-Not-Suffer .

However, the paragraphs that were misinterpreted are missing, suggesting that it was either edited afterwards, or I am thinking of a different fic. I'll describe what I remember anyway:

There is a Christian who gets her letter to Hogwarts. Obviously she is conflicted over this with the titular quote. Anyway, the important bit is that after she gets her books, her dad comes in to her room, and asks her not to read such things, which she agrees to. Later at Platform 9 3/4, she displays knowledge of the Wizarding World - I think the barrier. Her dad asks her how she knows what with her supposedly not reading the books, and -this is important- she replies "Magic?", innocently. Key word there, innocently. The Agents went NUTS. They immediately and incorrectly assumed that she literally meant that magic reached out and put the knowledge into her head, screaming "MAGIC DOESN'T WORK THAT WAY!". I on the other hand got a totally different message - she read the books anyway and lied, hence the fic specifically noting the adjective 'innocently'.

Anyway that's the fic I hold a grudge over, and it's why only now am I thinking of the PPC again. From what I recall, she went on to get a telling-off from McGonagall on diversity (pointing out that the Patil twins follow Hinduism, for example),and after agreeing that that was the best bit the agents tossed the protagonist into a volcano.

This wasn't some random, ill-spelt-and-grammared flame, and wasn't a passing troll. It was someone who took the time to write up a well thought out message to the lot of us. I have tremendous respect for that.

As for the community...stick around, eh? Visit the Board from time to time, come on the IRC and say hi. We're fairly personable, and we hardly ever bite, we swear.

OK, so I'm new (relatively) and I may not speak for anyone else with what I'm going to say but this is how I feel.

My main problem with your post (if problem is the right word) is your fourth paragraph (the one starting with "I despise their totally rigid view of canon") As a RPer and a writer I use AU's and OC's on a daily basis, yet my stories haven't appeared on the PPC, nor have several of my favorite stories that are severely AU and breach Canon in way too many places to take count. Why? Because there are pieces of good fanfiction on the internet, stories that you can read and enjoy, stories that have a clear well defined plot, use Canon as enough of a basis to keep people happy and have decent SPaG. To be honest the majority of fanfiction breaches away from canon at some point or another, for whatever reason. You can't blame a fanfic for not complying with a canon Seventh Year and Epilogue for Harry Potter if it was written before the book came out can you? Nor can you really blame a writer if they want to explore a specific What If? question that could change all of Canon.

I personally think that as the Authors have finished each book they've let us the readers play around with Canon as we want. But with this and posting your stories on the internet comes the responsibility to make sure that the stories are good enough for the internet, to be read as a whole. If it's good then that's fine, however it's only if it's quality is subpar that means the PPC get involved. I think you've forgotten that, that the PPC does not restrict fanfictions from moving off of Canon in anyway, what it does is merely raises awareness of the bad fanfiction of the internet, and along with the OFU's gives those who have written the bad fanfics every chance to redeem themselves and tidy it up. OK so not everyone agrees and not everything will always work out, that's the way of life.
The other thing you've got to remember is that the PPC Missions aren't deadly serious they're meant to be humourous parodies of the fanfiction, no matter how bad the fanfic is, take it with a pinch of salt and laugh if it's your sort of thing or turn away if it isn't.

I think I've rambled on enough and possibly gone slightly off topic but anyway.
Two additional points.
1) Looked for 'Shalt Not Suffer' on the wiki, couldn't find a fanfic with that name, but there was a Mission title with those words in it, it was for a fic named 'A Christian At Hogwarts' didn't read the mission, but is that the one you were meaning?
2)I've seen a lot worse discussion boards than this. Besides it does what it needs to do. I think the quote is "If it ain't broke don't fix it" which funnily enough pretty much sums up my base point (and makes the previous two paragraphs look silly in hindsight). The PPC isn't broken, people may not like it, but you're unlikely to find anything in the world that everyone likes. What matters is that something continues doing the job that the PPC is doing, so why change it?

As I said at the top, this is my opinion and whilst it may not be shared by anyone else it doesn't matter to me, because as has been repeated, everyone has their own opinion. If I do turn out to be a loner amongst Boarders then so be it, and if people want me off of here ASAP then fair enough.
Final point before I shut up (and everyone starts celebrating) I don't mean to offend anyone with my above post, if I have I'm sorry and if alerted I won't do it again.
Storme Hawk

(Wow, this reply took a while to write. If anybody else has said this, don't mind me.)

Um... Yeah, I think you'll forgive us if we don't take your assertion that this is "polite dissent" at your word, sir. Even if you meant the organization rather than the people in the PPC, it's still rude as hell to open an argument with "I hate you".

Also, I'm pretty sure that "you dun goofed" is only used in an ironically back-talking sense that is in no way meant to be polite.

Oh, and that "expect the typical whiny response in 3, 2, 1"? Also very rude, and almost kind of elitist in a way.

Oh, and the "message board" comment? Totally uncalled for. (By the way, we have had many debates about moving it. Many, many, MANY debates, some of which have caused blood to be shed and tears to be cried. Honestly, I don't care either way, as it's actually not a horrible message board.)

Yeah, you come in here saying you're "polite dissent" and then you go on to insult certain facets of the organization in a passive-aggresive manner. That's honestly not polite at all.

Just saying.

Of course, that has nothing to do with the argument you're postulating here, so we'll leave your wording choice at the door. So let's go down your points, shall we?

"I hate their methods, of making sarky comments rather than sitting down to review a work. (...just being able to riff on something doesn't make it bad)."

Roger Ebert would oftentimes review a bad movie by dealing snark at its general direction. You make the point of "snark is independent from criticism", which is a valid point.

However, what you seem to miss in your point is an important distinction about quality: even when the work as a whole is good, there are sometimes still things about it that aren't really that great. You're arguing that making snarky comments about a work that is of overall high quality is the same as making snarky comments about a work that is of overall low quality.

To that end, let me ask you this: when some people make snark at something that's good, why is it that they generally go after the bits of the whole piece that don't work? Is making fun of the flaws of a good work fundamentally different from making fun of the flaws of a bad work? It's exactly your point, I know, but that's just the problem: when you snark at the flaws of a fundamentally bad work, there's much more to work with than there would be in something of higher quality.

I wonder what your opinion of stuff like the Nostalgia Critic and the Angry Video Game Nerd is. By the argument you present here, I get the feeling you don't like anything from those kinds of people.

"I despise their totally rigid view of canon, which refuses to consider any opinion other than the author's to be of any worth."

This whole paragraph ignores one simple issue: while it is true that art does "grow up and talk back to you", there is a limit to which you can stretch that quote. That point comes when the author produces information that points to a certain interpretation of anything relating to that canon. Hell, you even acknowledge this point when you say "if you want your audience to believe something about your story, put it in the story".

The problem is that most authors of bad fanfiction choose to ignore when an author puts something into their story to steer an interpretation of a part of canon, whether it be conscious or not. That is the kind of interpretation we normally go after here at the PPC. Is it possible to come up with a fanfic that has good alternate interpretations of things found in the canon? Of course, and I have yet to see a fic that was sporked here in the negative because it just violated the canon. (Hell, we've even had a mission that highlighted goodfic that involves an AU (and also MPreg) when the mission writers initially thought they found badfic. See here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1K33i4NbxNThKEdfmacAA8pY04qPmENbAT0lBLaJoSXs/edit ) But that doesn't always happen with fanfiction, and it almost never happens in bad fanfiction.

Hence, our position of sticking mainly to what the author intended with that. Oftentimes, the fic authors will spend so little time justifying in-story decisions that contradict information the original author explicitly spelled out in the canon (that is, if they don't completely disrespect it entirely) that it will get to the point where the fic and the canon from which the fic derives inspiration don't seem to fit within the same universe. And when that happens, it's more like the kid that murders the parents rather than the kid who talks back to the parents.

"I don't know how long ago this was written without anyone catching it, but in a spork of a HP fic called I believe 'Shalt Not Suffer' (I couldn't find it on FF, so the story may have been taken down, and there were too damn many HP sporkings for me to find it on your end), the writers totally misunderstood the fic and I believe persecuted it unfairly. I know that people make mistakes, but that sporking was written years ago and still stands uncorrected."

For that spork... I take it you're referring to this Foxglove and Laburnum mission, of which the full title is "Thou Shalt Not Suffer A Sue To Live": http://www.keldale.f9.co.uk/tabularasa/mission2.htm (The fic being sporked is actually still up on FF.net, by the way: you can find it here: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/1485826/1/The-Christian-at-Hogwarts The reason you couldn't find it is probably because it's hard to find Harry Potter fics that were published in 2003, so I won't dock you for that.) If this isn't actually the mission that you're referring to, you can skip this next part as it only applies to that. So to that end... cue the scene change things I use in my missions!

----**----

If you do say that the mission missed the point of the story, I can see why you might say that: the mission does show a scene later in the fic that actually isn't that bad. In fact, it involves something that could've been interesting to explore: the identity crisis a Christian might undergo if sent to Hogwarts. I will admit, that is a very interesting concept to explore, and it could've made for a great fanfic if handled right.

I say, "if handled right". Unfortunately, the fic bungled the execution in a few critical ways. The mission mentions that the scene that brings up those ideas doesn't really make sense with anything that came before it. If McGonagall says that the students that fill the halls of Hogwarts are Christians, why did the Sorting Hat flip out about that when it was put on the head of the main Sue? If there are in fact other Christians in Hogwarts that the Sorting Hat would've sorted by the time Ariana comes around, why did it single her out? If Ariana was having an identity crisis with herself, why would the Sorting Hat say that she had "a thirst to impress"? From what we read of the rest of the fic, there was inadequate and/or no actual build-up to that scene, not to mention that the scene itself goes against the implied logic that the story runs on. So that's a sign of bad storytelling in and of itself.

And that doesn't mention the other canon violations that occur that are explicitly spelled-out facts from JK Rowling.
Like, you know, Potterverse spells suddenly being incantable in German (they're only incanted in Latin). Or some girl from Portugal being able to go to a school in England, when it has been established by the canon that there are schools in other parts of the world and that there thus might be a school she could go to closer to home. And having a judgmental Gryffindor student. And having Ariana feel the location of Platform Nine and Three Quarters. And having Hagrid freak out about Muggle parents when he was fine with Hermoine's.

And let's not forget the inconsistencies within the story, such as Ariana suddenly becoming a pureblooded witch when she was formerly Muggle-born earlier in the story. And then there were all the grammatical errors involved.

So, to reiterate, the idea wasn't bad itself. It was just a badly-told story that did not meet up to the author's admittedly admirable intent.

----**----

Of course, if this isn't the mission or the fic you're referring to, feel free to disregard the above two paragraphs.

The PPC isn't about attacking stories that don't follow the canon with funny comments: it's about pointing out the flows in badly-told fanfiction. And I think that, at least on some level, you have missed the point of the PPC.

I personally am here for the setting that is being used itself and the concepts behind it, which I find have an unusual appeal to them.

My opinion is no more valid than anyone else's except when it comes to my own characters and other things I create myself, and I admit this. Trust me when I say that I don't see myself as any higher or better than any other writer out there, because I've seen things in both perspectives.

I'm not sure what you're hoping to achieve here, though. Do you want to have a conversation, or did you just want us to know some people don't like us, or are you actively seeking that "totally predictable response" you mentioned? I'm confused.

I applaud you for being coherent in your dissent and not insulting us as people, though. I don't hate you or any of the authors whose writing I've PPCed, either, just for the record.

~Neshomeh