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life_wo_fanlibAh, man. So, this post of jdsampson's was linked in the comments of scarah's latest post. Although it is way too easy to point out the flaws in her arguments-- kind of like kickboxing a hamster-- I am compelled to take a couple of shots. (Warning: this got very, very, very lengthy.)
eta 1: OK, so I was typing on VERY low blood sugar this afternoon & attributed jdsampson's post to Naomi. Naomi didn't write it; jdsampson did. I can't even blame anyone else, because the comment on scarah's post clearly cites jdsampson as the author, and I must have just read some other comment along the way and gotten jdsampson and Naomi mixed up. I have edited the post to replace all occurrences "Naomi" with "jdsampson," but some of the comments may still say "Naomi." Sorry about this.
eta 2: It appears that jdsampson has deleted the post I responded to. It was originally the very first post in the thread. The thread is still there, but her post has disappeared. However, I did quote 90% of it in my own post, so simply by reading the statements in italics, you can piece it together yourself.
I have inserted my comments in between jdsampson's statements.
In general, fandom seems to have a low tolerance for beginners. Which is odd if you think about it because we were all beginners at one time.
jdsampson is wrong. Fandom doesn't have a low tolerance for newbies; it has a low tolerance for careless, lazy writers. Admittedly, confusing the two groups is often an easy mistake to make, since newbies are more likely to make more classic beginner mistakes. But the fact is, not all newbies *are* lazy writers-- and not every lazy writer in fandom is a newbie.
jdsampson is conflating the two groups into one-- lazy/careless newbie writers-- and acting like fandom has a low tolerance for these authors' stories just because they're *newbies*. The fact is, there's no cabal and it ain't personal. What fandom actually has is a low tolerance for *lazy writing*.
(And actually? In my experience, if you are an okay writer, and you show up somewhere new and your first story shows promise, you will often get more love and fb than you otherwise would have, simply *because* you're new. People aren't stupid. They don't want to drive potentially good or even *decent* writers out of their fandom. Often, people will make an effort to leave a positive comment especially in order to encourage a talented newbie to *stay* in their fandom and write more. Thinking back, some of the most popular stories I've ever written have been "first" stories, and I think that the "encouragement" factor has a lot to do with that.)
I give props to ANYONE who puts their thoughts on paper and shares it with the world.
Ah, the old shell game. I have to hand it to jdsampson-- her post here is *such* a great example of an incredibly common logical fallacy that always seems to come up in discussions of criticism (whether the discussion is about criticism of fanfic or original fic.) Go back to her original post (eta: now deleted, it appears?) and watch how often-- and how subtly-- jdsampson switches back and forth between talking about STORIES and talking about PEOPLE.
The thing is, looking at her statement that I just quoted there? I agree with her, one hundred percent. I think it's awesome that fandom *creates writers*-- whether they're 14 or 45, I love that fandom takes people who have never written before, and infuses them with such energy that they just have to create something. I *love* that fandom gives people a chance to experiment and play and have fun with *making art*, regardless of quality.
However.
There's a subtle, yet vital difference between praising a *person* and praising a *story*.
I will give a *person* props for doing something she's never done before, like writing a story and sharing it. Way to go, newbie writer! I remember how scary it is to do that. Way to be brave!
But the thing is? If you expect me (or anyone else) to actually give your STORY props-- then that story has to deserve it. The story has to be GOOD. Or at least not terrible. And that means more than just having a thought, putting it on paper and sharing it. Making something good that deserves praise *all on its own*-- well, that takes some effort. And if it's completely obvious that there has been no effort at all to actually try to make a story worth *reading*, well. Then no matter what jdsampson says, that story does not deserve "props."
In effect, what jdsampson does here is to try to erase the distinction between an author and her work-- this will come up again later as well.
Fandom driven or original - fiction is a very personal thing and so offering up our work is like offering up a piece of ourselves that might only otherwise be revealed in therapy!
Yeah, hm. You know what therapy is? Therapy is when you PAY people to listen to you ramble. If I have to listen to your therapeutic rambling, I had better be getting paid for it.
The other thing about therapy is that it's not one-way communication. I mean, think about it. In *real* therapy, when you spill out your troubles, the therapist doesn't tell you that everything you say and do is absolutely wonderful and perfect, does she? That wouldn't be helpful at all. The whole point of a therapist, as far as I know, is to help you solve problems and/or improve something you're having issues with. Sometimes this involves closely examining aspects of your life that are unproductive, or even self-sabotaging. If you thought that you were absolutely perfect in every way, and didn't need improvement or help at all, then you wouldn't go to a therapist.
Therapy is *all about* the idea that talking about problems, examining them, understanding them, and trying to *do better* in the future is a worthwhile and *achievable* goal.
Apply this metaphor to writing and the implication should be obvious.
Going back to jdsampson's statement, I think it's also worthwhile to examine her assertation that "fiction is a very personal thing."
The thing is, it's not. Writing fiction, like any other form of art, is a means of *communication* between two or more people. If your story is full of errors and typos and plot holes, so that the reader has to struggle to understand it, then you've failed at being an effective communicator, and you've failed at being a good artist. (Of course, some artists do produce works that are *deliberately* obscure or hard to understand, in order to *force* the audience to struggle and think and work things out for themselves. But if you are not actually *trying* to produce a sense of confusion-- then no, sorry, you've still failed in your attempt to create good art.)
If you really want your writing to be a "personal thing," then keep a diary and don't show it to anyone. But if you want to write fiction and share it with others-- if you want to create fiction that can be fully appreciated by your audience-- then you have to *do the work* to make sure that it effectively communicates the ideas and emotions that you want to get across.
And yet time and time again I see writers slamming other writers to their face or behind their backs. Why? Is it fear of being caught hanging with the "no so cool kids?" He who laughs first laughs hardest? What?
And here's the shell game again. First we were talking about people-- and then stories-- and now we're back to people again. Suddenly, criticism of *fiction* has become slamming *writers*. When all else fails, remember: treat criticism of your work as if it's a personal attack. If you act as if the author and the story are the same thing, then it's easy to get people to agree with you that criticism is wrong. After all, nobody supports personal attacks! That's just flaming, and flaming is bad.
However, the fact is, criticising a piece of fiction is *not the same thing* as insulting a real person.
If I say "This author's story is full of typos, the plot depended entirely on unlikely coincidences, and the hero was whiny and unsympathetic," then I am criticising a story. If I say "You're dumb and ugly and you stink," *then* I am slamming a person.
Once a piece of fiction has been publically posted, people are going to react to it. If you are not prepared to deal with a full range of reactions-- postive, negative, expected or unexpected-- then you simply should not post fiction in public. Furthermore, if you cannot separate criticism of your fiction from criticism of you as a person, then you should not post fiction in public.
But again: criticising a story? Not the same as insulting a person.
Sure it breaks tons of the fanfiction rules but I can feel the effort.
And now that jdsampson has established that all criticism = flaming, note how quickly she switches us back to talking about *stories*, not *people*.
I can feel her joy in the story and that, to me, is worth way more than twenty pages of properly formatted text with no soul.
This is a logical fallacy known as the "false dilemma," and it's another *classic* anti-criticism argument. jdsampson is describing two types of fanfic here-- one type that may be full of errors, but can still be appreciated because the author wrote it with a soul full of joy, and one that is properly formatted and yet soulless.
Now, it's true that these two types of fanfic probably do exist. However, jdsampson's implication is that these are the ONLY two types of fanfiction that exist. There is only: (1) "joyous, soulful" stories that do not emphasise technical correctness, and (2) stories that are dead and soulless and boring, that *do* emphasise technical correctness.
The "false dilemma" is often also called the "law of the excluded middle," because it ignores that there can be a middle ground in between two stated options. jdsampson is purposely ignoring a huge middle ground here. The type of fanfiction she's ignoring is probably the most common type of fanfiction that exists; a story that has soul, and yet has ALSO been spell-checked, because the writer cares deeply both about the "soul" of her story AND its technical presentation.
Now, we *also* have an example of a fallacy called "false cause" here. jdsampson is implying that boring yet technically correct stories are boring BECAUSE the authors care about technical excellence-- and that soulful yet sloppy stories are wonderful BECAUSE the author does not waste her time worrying about technical excellence.
In jdsampson's worldview, the act of running a spell-check would actually strip a story of all its joy and soul. It does not seem to occur to her that one could be a joyous, soulful writer who writes down her deep, personal fantasies-- and then checks her story over for obvious, glaring errors before posting. She's got a completely backwards view of writing, where the author who cares about being an effective communicator is the author who doesn't understand the "soul" of writing at all.
What if you were to find a poorly written story on the "featured" section of Fanlib. Would you think, geez, look at the junk they're promoting. Or wow, someone's slipped a screw.
Or would you think - hey, that's terrific. That newbie writer really deserves the encouragement and the additional eyes that the "featured" section brings. That's cool.
Well, personally? I'd think that maybe FanLib didn't quite understand the meaning of a "featured" section, or the purpose of having one. Everyplace else on the web that I've ever been, the "featured" or the "editor's choice" or the "x of the week" spot is reserved for *great* examples of whatever the site is about; it's not meant to spotlight newbies who don't understand the basic rules and guidelines of whatever craft it is they're practicing. Encouraging people, even if they're not incredible super-geniuses, is a valid and worthy goal! However, it's not what a "featured" section is for.
Now, if FanLib changed the title of its featured section to something like "New Writers To Encourage" instead of "Featured," then I doubt anybody would have a problem with it presenting stories that weren't absolutely excellent. I mean, I'd *still* like to think that in order to be worthy of being featured, a story could at least show that the author wasn't completely careless in how she wrote and presented it. Not having spelling errors in the summary would be one hint of that. But I do think most people would cut the stories in a "New Writers to Encourage" section a fair amount of slack.
However, if FanLib's featured stories are going to continue to be called "Featured" stories, then FanLib's site readers are probably going to continue to expect that section to feature stories that are *outstanding, excellent* examples of the content FanLib hosts. And if the "Featured" section instead features carelessly written, unedited stories, then that's going to have two effects.
First of all, it will have exactly the *reverse* effect that jdsampson thinks it will. If you "feature" stories that are full of errors, authors will *not* be encouraged to improve their work. Why should any author actually bother to spell-check or edit her work, if it turns out that any old thing dashed off in five minutes is good enough to be a "featured" story on the front page of the site? Why bother working hard if you can write something totally random, not even edit it, and get it "featured?"
The second effect of putting carelessly written stories in the "Featured" section will be this: FanLib readers and new visitors to the site will see those listed stories and assume that the mediocre, slipshod stories being "featured" are, in fact, the best that FanLib has to offer. They'll be unlikely to read further if they think that FanLib's *best stories*-- the stories that the site itself chooses to feature as examples of the fare it offers-- are carelessly written and basically half-assed.
The only potential positive effect of featuring crappy stories is as follows-- bad authors will be encouraged to post more slipshod, messy stories to FanLib in hopes of getting them featured. How is this a positive effect? Well, it's not positive for the readers, who are going to have to sort through even more junk in order to find the few gems that may exist on FanLib. But it *is* positive for FanLib's bottom line, which depends on the *number* of stories being posted-- as shown by their "post lots of stories, get an iPod" campaign. Once again, it seems clear that quality isn't an issue for FanLib. *Quantity* is. And that's why you'll probably continue to see crappy, careless stories featured in the "Featured" section.
eta 1: OK, so I was typing on VERY low blood sugar this afternoon & attributed jdsampson's post to Naomi. Naomi didn't write it; jdsampson did. I can't even blame anyone else, because the comment on scarah's post clearly cites jdsampson as the author, and I must have just read some other comment along the way and gotten jdsampson and Naomi mixed up. I have edited the post to replace all occurrences "Naomi" with "jdsampson," but some of the comments may still say "Naomi." Sorry about this.
eta 2: It appears that jdsampson has deleted the post I responded to. It was originally the very first post in the thread. The thread is still there, but her post has disappeared. However, I did quote 90% of it in my own post, so simply by reading the statements in italics, you can piece it together yourself.
I have inserted my comments in between jdsampson's statements.
In general, fandom seems to have a low tolerance for beginners. Which is odd if you think about it because we were all beginners at one time.
jdsampson is wrong. Fandom doesn't have a low tolerance for newbies; it has a low tolerance for careless, lazy writers. Admittedly, confusing the two groups is often an easy mistake to make, since newbies are more likely to make more classic beginner mistakes. But the fact is, not all newbies *are* lazy writers-- and not every lazy writer in fandom is a newbie.
jdsampson is conflating the two groups into one-- lazy/careless newbie writers-- and acting like fandom has a low tolerance for these authors' stories just because they're *newbies*. The fact is, there's no cabal and it ain't personal. What fandom actually has is a low tolerance for *lazy writing*.
(And actually? In my experience, if you are an okay writer, and you show up somewhere new and your first story shows promise, you will often get more love and fb than you otherwise would have, simply *because* you're new. People aren't stupid. They don't want to drive potentially good or even *decent* writers out of their fandom. Often, people will make an effort to leave a positive comment especially in order to encourage a talented newbie to *stay* in their fandom and write more. Thinking back, some of the most popular stories I've ever written have been "first" stories, and I think that the "encouragement" factor has a lot to do with that.)
I give props to ANYONE who puts their thoughts on paper and shares it with the world.
Ah, the old shell game. I have to hand it to jdsampson-- her post here is *such* a great example of an incredibly common logical fallacy that always seems to come up in discussions of criticism (whether the discussion is about criticism of fanfic or original fic.) Go back to her original post (eta: now deleted, it appears?) and watch how often-- and how subtly-- jdsampson switches back and forth between talking about STORIES and talking about PEOPLE.
The thing is, looking at her statement that I just quoted there? I agree with her, one hundred percent. I think it's awesome that fandom *creates writers*-- whether they're 14 or 45, I love that fandom takes people who have never written before, and infuses them with such energy that they just have to create something. I *love* that fandom gives people a chance to experiment and play and have fun with *making art*, regardless of quality.
However.
There's a subtle, yet vital difference between praising a *person* and praising a *story*.
I will give a *person* props for doing something she's never done before, like writing a story and sharing it. Way to go, newbie writer! I remember how scary it is to do that. Way to be brave!
But the thing is? If you expect me (or anyone else) to actually give your STORY props-- then that story has to deserve it. The story has to be GOOD. Or at least not terrible. And that means more than just having a thought, putting it on paper and sharing it. Making something good that deserves praise *all on its own*-- well, that takes some effort. And if it's completely obvious that there has been no effort at all to actually try to make a story worth *reading*, well. Then no matter what jdsampson says, that story does not deserve "props."
In effect, what jdsampson does here is to try to erase the distinction between an author and her work-- this will come up again later as well.
Fandom driven or original - fiction is a very personal thing and so offering up our work is like offering up a piece of ourselves that might only otherwise be revealed in therapy!
Yeah, hm. You know what therapy is? Therapy is when you PAY people to listen to you ramble. If I have to listen to your therapeutic rambling, I had better be getting paid for it.
The other thing about therapy is that it's not one-way communication. I mean, think about it. In *real* therapy, when you spill out your troubles, the therapist doesn't tell you that everything you say and do is absolutely wonderful and perfect, does she? That wouldn't be helpful at all. The whole point of a therapist, as far as I know, is to help you solve problems and/or improve something you're having issues with. Sometimes this involves closely examining aspects of your life that are unproductive, or even self-sabotaging. If you thought that you were absolutely perfect in every way, and didn't need improvement or help at all, then you wouldn't go to a therapist.
Therapy is *all about* the idea that talking about problems, examining them, understanding them, and trying to *do better* in the future is a worthwhile and *achievable* goal.
Apply this metaphor to writing and the implication should be obvious.
Going back to jdsampson's statement, I think it's also worthwhile to examine her assertation that "fiction is a very personal thing."
The thing is, it's not. Writing fiction, like any other form of art, is a means of *communication* between two or more people. If your story is full of errors and typos and plot holes, so that the reader has to struggle to understand it, then you've failed at being an effective communicator, and you've failed at being a good artist. (Of course, some artists do produce works that are *deliberately* obscure or hard to understand, in order to *force* the audience to struggle and think and work things out for themselves. But if you are not actually *trying* to produce a sense of confusion-- then no, sorry, you've still failed in your attempt to create good art.)
If you really want your writing to be a "personal thing," then keep a diary and don't show it to anyone. But if you want to write fiction and share it with others-- if you want to create fiction that can be fully appreciated by your audience-- then you have to *do the work* to make sure that it effectively communicates the ideas and emotions that you want to get across.
And yet time and time again I see writers slamming other writers to their face or behind their backs. Why? Is it fear of being caught hanging with the "no so cool kids?" He who laughs first laughs hardest? What?
And here's the shell game again. First we were talking about people-- and then stories-- and now we're back to people again. Suddenly, criticism of *fiction* has become slamming *writers*. When all else fails, remember: treat criticism of your work as if it's a personal attack. If you act as if the author and the story are the same thing, then it's easy to get people to agree with you that criticism is wrong. After all, nobody supports personal attacks! That's just flaming, and flaming is bad.
However, the fact is, criticising a piece of fiction is *not the same thing* as insulting a real person.
If I say "This author's story is full of typos, the plot depended entirely on unlikely coincidences, and the hero was whiny and unsympathetic," then I am criticising a story. If I say "You're dumb and ugly and you stink," *then* I am slamming a person.
Once a piece of fiction has been publically posted, people are going to react to it. If you are not prepared to deal with a full range of reactions-- postive, negative, expected or unexpected-- then you simply should not post fiction in public. Furthermore, if you cannot separate criticism of your fiction from criticism of you as a person, then you should not post fiction in public.
But again: criticising a story? Not the same as insulting a person.
Sure it breaks tons of the fanfiction rules but I can feel the effort.
And now that jdsampson has established that all criticism = flaming, note how quickly she switches us back to talking about *stories*, not *people*.
I can feel her joy in the story and that, to me, is worth way more than twenty pages of properly formatted text with no soul.
This is a logical fallacy known as the "false dilemma," and it's another *classic* anti-criticism argument. jdsampson is describing two types of fanfic here-- one type that may be full of errors, but can still be appreciated because the author wrote it with a soul full of joy, and one that is properly formatted and yet soulless.
Now, it's true that these two types of fanfic probably do exist. However, jdsampson's implication is that these are the ONLY two types of fanfiction that exist. There is only: (1) "joyous, soulful" stories that do not emphasise technical correctness, and (2) stories that are dead and soulless and boring, that *do* emphasise technical correctness.
The "false dilemma" is often also called the "law of the excluded middle," because it ignores that there can be a middle ground in between two stated options. jdsampson is purposely ignoring a huge middle ground here. The type of fanfiction she's ignoring is probably the most common type of fanfiction that exists; a story that has soul, and yet has ALSO been spell-checked, because the writer cares deeply both about the "soul" of her story AND its technical presentation.
Now, we *also* have an example of a fallacy called "false cause" here. jdsampson is implying that boring yet technically correct stories are boring BECAUSE the authors care about technical excellence-- and that soulful yet sloppy stories are wonderful BECAUSE the author does not waste her time worrying about technical excellence.
In jdsampson's worldview, the act of running a spell-check would actually strip a story of all its joy and soul. It does not seem to occur to her that one could be a joyous, soulful writer who writes down her deep, personal fantasies-- and then checks her story over for obvious, glaring errors before posting. She's got a completely backwards view of writing, where the author who cares about being an effective communicator is the author who doesn't understand the "soul" of writing at all.
What if you were to find a poorly written story on the "featured" section of Fanlib. Would you think, geez, look at the junk they're promoting. Or wow, someone's slipped a screw.
Or would you think - hey, that's terrific. That newbie writer really deserves the encouragement and the additional eyes that the "featured" section brings. That's cool.
Well, personally? I'd think that maybe FanLib didn't quite understand the meaning of a "featured" section, or the purpose of having one. Everyplace else on the web that I've ever been, the "featured" or the "editor's choice" or the "x of the week" spot is reserved for *great* examples of whatever the site is about; it's not meant to spotlight newbies who don't understand the basic rules and guidelines of whatever craft it is they're practicing. Encouraging people, even if they're not incredible super-geniuses, is a valid and worthy goal! However, it's not what a "featured" section is for.
Now, if FanLib changed the title of its featured section to something like "New Writers To Encourage" instead of "Featured," then I doubt anybody would have a problem with it presenting stories that weren't absolutely excellent. I mean, I'd *still* like to think that in order to be worthy of being featured, a story could at least show that the author wasn't completely careless in how she wrote and presented it. Not having spelling errors in the summary would be one hint of that. But I do think most people would cut the stories in a "New Writers to Encourage" section a fair amount of slack.
However, if FanLib's featured stories are going to continue to be called "Featured" stories, then FanLib's site readers are probably going to continue to expect that section to feature stories that are *outstanding, excellent* examples of the content FanLib hosts. And if the "Featured" section instead features carelessly written, unedited stories, then that's going to have two effects.
First of all, it will have exactly the *reverse* effect that jdsampson thinks it will. If you "feature" stories that are full of errors, authors will *not* be encouraged to improve their work. Why should any author actually bother to spell-check or edit her work, if it turns out that any old thing dashed off in five minutes is good enough to be a "featured" story on the front page of the site? Why bother working hard if you can write something totally random, not even edit it, and get it "featured?"
The second effect of putting carelessly written stories in the "Featured" section will be this: FanLib readers and new visitors to the site will see those listed stories and assume that the mediocre, slipshod stories being "featured" are, in fact, the best that FanLib has to offer. They'll be unlikely to read further if they think that FanLib's *best stories*-- the stories that the site itself chooses to feature as examples of the fare it offers-- are carelessly written and basically half-assed.
The only potential positive effect of featuring crappy stories is as follows-- bad authors will be encouraged to post more slipshod, messy stories to FanLib in hopes of getting them featured. How is this a positive effect? Well, it's not positive for the readers, who are going to have to sort through even more junk in order to find the few gems that may exist on FanLib. But it *is* positive for FanLib's bottom line, which depends on the *number* of stories being posted-- as shown by their "post lots of stories, get an iPod" campaign. Once again, it seems clear that quality isn't an issue for FanLib. *Quantity* is. And that's why you'll probably continue to see crappy, careless stories featured in the "Featured" section.
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no subject
Date: 2007-06-25 09:38 am (UTC)Dang! Yes! FanLib needs loads of new authors that will post a "chappie" every day so FanLib will look "busy" to its investors. Fanfiction authors, not casual web site visitors, are FanLib's most important commodity. The authors come back over and over, are exposed to the most advertising, and are most likely to buy crap.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-25 09:43 am (UTC)FanLib: Like fandom, but without standards.
The sad part is, that's probably what makes it appealing to a certain percent of its users.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-25 10:17 am (UTC)Now she has deleted the original post?
What the hell?
no subject
Date: 2007-06-25 10:30 am (UTC)Seriously. At this point, don't they REALIZE we're watching them and what they say? Going around and trying to delete something after you've already said it and been *extensively quoted* is so clown shoes.
no subject
Date: 2007-06-26 12:33 am (UTC)If so, it is odd, because the people that know her report she seemed to be enjoying herself, and received decent feedback on her stories.
Was decent feedback not enough for her? Did she want more lovin'? Did a bad experience happen to one of her online friends?
Whatever caused it, her views have affected FanLib's approach, I believe, and that is unfortunate.
It entertains me she is FanLib's first [and paid] BNF. I miss her sig line "This is why I get the extra cookie." It was so very BNF. :D