Subject: Oh, it really is
Author:
Posted on: 2009-05-11 09:16:00 UTC
I am often tempted to delete my own in-progress fics because they read to me like utter wank sometimes.
It never is effortless to produce a good story. But that's no excuse for letting a bad one out, as you point out.
PS: you are often right when you correct me - otherwise would I ask you to beta for me so often?:P
Has anyone here ever hear of Independent!Harry badfic?
You know, where it turns out Dumbledore has been using Harry like a puppet all along, and Harry turns out to be the heir of multiple old families, AND he has tons of superpowers, AND he's involved in the political process, AND he's just a great big flaming Stu?
Why, just why? How'd this type of fic become so common in the first place?
Here's what I mean: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3190255/5/TheHouseofLords
And here: <a href="http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3661577/1/SummerofIndependence">http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3661577/1/Summerof_Independence
Okay, rant finished.
I think it says something that the author of the first one has Keiran Halcyon in his/her favourite authors list...
I answer that with my own question. How did Sues become so common? Because all these authors are too busy [unsure if I'd get into trouble if I post this word] over their supreme author skillz to notice that the only thing they should be writing is their signature on a court order forbidding them to come within fifty metres of a keyboard.
A lot of badficcers are just overenthusiastic kids. They eventually end up writing better fic, if they stick with it and don't freak out at concrit :)
It's a practice thing, don't forget. We spork the fic to fix the world, not to punish the author.
most people don't set out to write badfic EXCEPT goodficcers with too much time on their hands and a weird sense of humor :P
In my experience, about ninety percent of writers do freak out at concrit.
... that THIS time they'll take our advice.
We can't just write them all off as losses. That'd be throwing the baby out with the bathwater, to mangle a metaphor.
Some people do set out to write rubbish - crack fics and such - and trolls especially just want to provoke a reaction. But otherwise? Agreed, completely.
You are, as usual, completely correct. There are always exceptions. But most badficcers? Are completely unaware that they're badficcers.
"As usual"? That's quite a compliment, m'dear. *bows* Thank you. And it was just a nitpick. It really is sad that so many badfic writers are unaware of how terrible they are...
Though really, it's harder than most of us make out. Last week I spent six hours writing a cold draft of a chapter, and when I read it over two days later, I hated it. Things seem so, so, SO much better as you write, because you're seeing the story in your head without cumbersome words getting in the way. I'm not excusing all those thousands of badfics - the authors should have stopped, read them over later, redrafted, edited, and so on - but it's all too easy to see how it happens. :(
"Last week I spent six hours writing a cold draft of a chapter, and when I read it over two days later, I hated it."
I know the feeling with pretty much everything I write, but, as you say, the authors don't seem to reread it. A lot don't even bother looking for a beta (and the ones that do end up with god-awful ones, like the one I saw on FF.net advertising in chat speak).
I have an actual, real-life, paying customer who sends me emails with proofreading requests in chatspeak. He doesn't write like that in the essays themselves, thank bloody gods, but it irks me to no end that he can't be bothered writing full words in an email to a stranger. *grumbles*
I once used chat speak in IM and e-mails/PMs etc, simply because it was easier. Now, I've swapped to proper English for everything and I now find that easier. But yeah, that is a bit stupid really.
I still think advertising as a beta reader in chat speak is worse though.
I am often tempted to delete my own in-progress fics because they read to me like utter wank sometimes.
It never is effortless to produce a good story. But that's no excuse for letting a bad one out, as you point out.
PS: you are often right when you correct me - otherwise would I ask you to beta for me so often?:P
Oh, okay. I could have said 'wank' then.
That first one has to be a pisstake. No one in their right mind would call a house-elf Steve. And as for Harry being the Duke of sodding Windsor... And he gets "coronated"? In Azkaban? What the...?
I hardly dare click on the other one after that.