Mod Post: I'd Like Your Input! (Please?)

[chispas]

Hello everybody~.

I've been thinking about what I can do to increase the liveliness this community. I'm super, super, seuperrr psyched about how successful it is already, but I'm curious as to if anyone has any ideas to encourage growth within the community. I have a couple of ideas I want to put forth. Anon commenting will be on, so feel free to

Comments

[kthxrawr]

YAY FOR THEM ALL.

I'd also suggest doing a round robin fic, but that would just be cracky and very silly and many possibilities for it to go badly wrong.

[alt_reayoon]

YAY for all. Haha. :)

I wouldn't mind joining the mod team... I'm around lj quite a bit and I have nothing to do, so keeping this place (where I must admit I creep around a lot) tidy would be somewhat fun ^^

[anonymous]

Gonna spoil the party here and say nay to the prompt tables and nayish to the challenges (weekly and bi-weekly is definitely too much, monthly could work maybe

[anonymous]

I don't know if there's a solution to the feedback question - I mean, you can't help what pairings and characters are popular, and with the best will in the world, I'm afraid I for one am not going to be able to leave a comment on a brilliantly-written fic if it's about people I don't really care about, even if I read it in the first place

[anonymous]

First anon again:

Re: commenting
I'm afraid I for one am not going to be able to leave a comment on a brilliantly-written fic if it's about people I don't really care about, even if I read it in the first place.See, this is something I don't understand. I'm not saying you should leave 500+ words feedback, but just a short 'nice story' or 'liked it, even if i don't care about the pairing' is all the feedback people need to keep writing and branch out. I've heard people say that they won't even try writing in small fandoms because they won't get comments anyway. Which is just sad

[anonymous]

I'm afraid I for one am not going to be able to leave a comment on a brilliantly-written fic if it's about people I don't really care about, even if I read it in the first place.

Just to clarify, what I really meant by this remark about commenting is that it's very likely I *won't* read it in the first place if it's characters I don't know anything about. So of course it's a real shame for people who write more obscure pairings, and I wish I liked them because I do always try to comment if I've enjoyed a fic! But more popular pairings are going to get more comments because more people read them, and I don't want people to be put off just because their fic doesn't get as many comments as someone else's - it's not a judgement of quality! But if people get put off writing obscure pairings because they don't get as many comments as more popular pairings, then the only things that will get written are popular pairings, and it's just self-perpetuating, if you see what I mean!

I bet most of the annoyed people would have been less annoyed

[anonymous]

Wall of text coming up here, and feel free to disagree with me - it's a discussion after all!

We seem to have got off topic here slightly, but I'm replying to the commenting issue anyway...:
I'm afraid I for one am not going to be able to leave a comment on a brilliantly-written fic if it's about people I don't really care about, even if I read it in the first place.
I don't get that either - when it comes to commenting, if I read it (for whatever reason, whether that's style, scene, or pairing) and like it I comment. If I don't, I don't. Comments feed the muse and all that jazz, and let's just say, on an entirely personal level a particular fic of mine would never have got even slightly as long as it had it people hadn't commented (and kept commenting). In fact, if I hadn't received such lovely feedback on one of my very first fics I doubt I would have kept writing. Writing on here for the first time in particular can be bloody terrifying, and feedback means the world, so I always try to leave it, even if it's just two words or so!

[kinkmodhat]

I've read all your comments (and all of the comments of other Anons, hi guys!), but what caught my eye specifically was your last point - the posting fills from older posts. Fills are kept track of on a delicious archive: http://www.delicious.com/f1slash_kink - there wonderful, dedicated, amazing person behind this who isn't me and she has each prompt post tracked (imagine the barrage that must happen in her inbox at times! I cower to think!) and updates it every time she's able, so new fills, regardless of the post, are kept tabs on. Plus, most anons I know track their own prompts (at least, I do) so I get notifications when I get a fill.

That's the only way we can work out to keep people updated on new fills. If anyone thinks a weekly / monthly update of new fills posted to the main comm would be beneficial, please let me know!

[jenner_ginnis]

I've certainly found lots of new fills for old posts thanks to that. One of the great things about the delicious archive is that you can narrow it down by pairings/people, so if all you want to do is just read one pairing, well, then you're sorted. (Of course that doesn't really help those wanting to avoid a particular pairing, but hey, it's better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick?!)

[jenner_ginnis]

Yeah, I can see how people like me are annoying. We read it, we think "Great" and never tell you about it. {:) TBH 90% of the time I'm reading on a Kindle & so the idea of typing out a comment is not fun. I'm also not an effusive praise kinda guy, so lovely writers, would a comment consisting entirely of "That was good" or "Not bad" (the latter from me being akin to getting 2nd place in WDC!) be better than nothing? I shall happily try & encourage with short-but-sweet comments if so. (Hmmm, of course now every time an anon leaves a pathetically brief comment it'll look like it's me, ho-hum!).

[kinkmodhat]

Quick thought, team!

Reiterating what I wrote to two anons above:

First, if there is any support I can offer to you, I am happy to be contacted here or on my personal LJ, or even via Twitter / Tumblr / AIM / email. Details are in the Mod Contact post. Please, please, please do contact me, even if you just want to rant to get it off your chest