today's silly etiquette question

[p_zeitgeist]

If people have written you gift stories and posted them on AO3, and you have hit some sort of fest jackpot and gotten stories that make you totally happy, do you leave kudos after you have commented to say so? Or is to leave both comments and kudos violating some unwritten rule of manners that I'm too dense to have divined on my own

Comments

[semyaza]

Comments only, no kudos. :D I bet I'm in a minority of one.

[p_zeitgeist]

Actually you're not. Or, not if you're flexible on whether it would be proper to do both, but don't consider it remotely mandatory. (I hope it goes without saying that kudos only would be very wrong, under any circumstances short of not having sufficient use of one's fingers to do more than hit one button. And would then require an explanation and apology later.)

Most of the responses to the question are on the DW mirror, and the strong consensus there is that while it's okay to do both if you want to, there's no reason one should. I have one vote for both, but otherwise the consensus seems to be that kudos are for people who're too shy to talk. Useful placeholders sometimes while one intends to talk later, sometimes, but otherwise there's not a lot of reason for doubling up.

[semyaza]

I don't see any reason not to click on 'kudos' - or whatever one does (I speak from ignorance as I haven't been on AO3 since last year and don't see my stats so I presume I wouldn't see kudos either?) but not as a substitute for a comment. I couldn't leave kudos and not a comment no matter how shy I was. I'd feel like a swine. :D

Yes, I really ought to finish uploading my stories. *sigh*

[lady_ganesh]

Some people do both, some people just do one or the other. I sometimes do kudos and then come back and comment, which is dorky, but I'm dorky, so.

[daegaer]

I leave one, the other or both as the whim and comment-inspiration take me!

[p_zeitgeist]

I knew I was over-thinking this. Thank you! And especially, thank you on behalf of the primitive, reptilian-legacy part of my brain, which finds this infinitely soothing, and is considering going back to sleep and leaving me alone about the whole silly issue.