MOD Fanfic Press Conference (January 2017 State Of The Fanfic Address)

Yes, I understood what you meant. Yes, people should preface their stories if it deals with more mature subject matter still within the TOS (for example - drug use). But we can't make something like that obligatory unless it is for a clear cut thing (for example, inter-species relationships). Different people have different tolerances for things like violence and sexual encounters. And while we do make sure there is a clear "this is too much for these boards" point, different people have different levels with what they are okay with. If you don't like where a story is headed, but it is still within TOS limits, just don't read that story.

 

I have 100% tolerance for consensual sexual encounters of any kind, but violence can give me actual nightmares and panic attacks every now and then. About 1/4 of population is anxious, or so I think.

 

About the era tags *puts indexer hat on*

The fact is that the tags tend to be all over the place, especially in Saga. Lots of authors ignore the Saga-Legends tag altogether and go with the PT/OT/ST tag that suits them in an intuitive fashion -- basically as jcgoble said, they select the movie trilogy that's most connected to their fic, so a pre-TFA story that involves only or mostly TFA characters is usually tagged Saga-ST even though, strictly speaking, it should be tagged Saga-OT. Another issue is that there is an increasing number of stories that are a New Canon/Legends mash-up, and different authors have different reasons to tag them as Legends or New Canon. For some, having a New Canon protagonist is a reason to tag the story as New Canon even if the story takes place in the Beyond-Legends continuity; for others, a story should be tagged New Canon despite it having a Legends protagonist for whatever reason they deem appropriate.

I tried to seek clarification from the authors last time I was working on the fic index but I gave up; there are just too many fics that don't fit the official definitions or that are in some sort of grey area.

Personally I feel that the breakdown of Saga into three sub-eras has created more classification issues than it has resolved -- and that's not to mention the confusion about when "Beyond" starts in New Canon vs Legends, or the fact that Disney is re-canonising stuff all the time -- but I don't have a good solution to suggest or any solution at all for that matter. The best I can come up with is to re-merge the three trilogy tags into a single Saga tag and encourage authors to give as much info as possible in the title bar in order to help readers make their choice.

(I might add more to this post once I'm done indexing the 2017 fics and have numbers for each tag.)

About the other issues discussed above:

I find that expecting a fic to get more votes because it was a gift/prize is a stretch. Votes in challenges are secret anyway, so it's not like readers are particularly under pressure or anything. I do think however that, if someone wants to submit a fic-gift as a challenge entry, they should ask the person for whom the fic is written first; that's just common courtesy.

With regard to trigger warnings, that's something I'm a bit confused about, so I'd like others to share their experience about when they deem that a trigger warning is necessary for items that are not spelled out in the FAQ. I've read some pretty intense stuff on the boards, but I never felt that it crossed the line of the sort of violence that we see in the films (for instance when Vader chops off Luke's hand, or equivalent) -- however I realise that we all have different levels of tolerance to this stuff and I'm curious to know what everyone thinks.

 

Update on the era tags: here's a quick overview now that I made a tentative count of the 2016 fics (the final numbers will be slightly different to account for short stories in archive threads and such):

10 fics tagged "Before the Saga" -- of which 2 are Before - Legends fics (TOR/KotOR) and one is a Saga - PT fic (Rebels).
15 fics tagged "Before - Legends" -- no mis-taggings that I've spotted
12 fics tagged "Beyond the Saga" -- of which 1 is a Beyond - Legends fic, one a Saga - ST fic (episode 8+ speculation) and 6 Saga - OT fics (post-RotJ new canon)
110 fics tagged "Beyond - Legends" -- no mis-taggings that I've spotted but I had only a very quick look.

For Saga I didn't check yet for mis-taggings, but a few jumped at me straight from the alphabetical list (e.g. Rebels fics tagged "Saga" instead of "Saga - PT", etc) and I'm pretty sure that there are more than 41 fics that take place in the Legends continuity in the first place
70 fics tagged "Saga"
71 fics tagged "Saga - OT"
66 fics tagged "Saga - PT"
56 fics tagged "Saga - ST"
41 fics tagged "Saga - Legends"

 

Thanks for the breakdown Chyn.

We, obviously, have a few issues in terms of the current prefix system. We knew we would. Things are simply not as "cut and dry" as they were a few years ago (blame Disney). Plus, these are forums - not exactly the most "ideal" set up for a fanfic community. We are also currently constrained by the board functions - we currently can only delete, create, and re-name prefixes - once we get the upgrade, we will be able to do things like merge prefixes (we can't right now). It clearly doesn't make a whole lot of sense to overhaul or change the prefix system at this point, when it will be much simpler (not to mention needed) when we get the upgrade. And we are told (so don't shoot the messenger) that the upgrade is coming. But we at totally open to suggestions and input on how we should categorize fics moving forward.


As for the other stuff, I totally agree that Star Wars does deal with some pretty violent and mature things (planets being blown up, aunts and uncles being burnt to a crisp, mentors cut in half - and those are just in the first movie). Since all the movies are PG rated (or at least they are in Canada - I think they might be considered a "high PG" since some are given PG-13 elsewhere), we try to use those as a bench-mark, but you can get away with much more in text as you can in movie media. So - to a point - the "don't like it, don't read it" guideline I feel works, since people do run the gambit of what they prefer. I don't think authors should BE REQUIRED consider everyone when they write more mature but TOS-allowed content.


Edit: I also agree on the fic-gift stuff. Yeah, people should ask the recipient if it is okay to write/submit the fic for a challenge (since challenges sometimes have other elements added). But I don't think it affects votes. Likewise if someone writes a brilliant fic gift and it gets nominated for the awards, I think that is fine. I don't think the fact that it is a fic-gift affects votes.

 

*bump*

Re: the last thing
Can I still not allow this to be the case in the OTP challenge or ask them, like I once did, to reveal that it's a gift after the voting has been completed?

Also, some ideas I had, since I dunno where else to post them:

1. A grammar thread, where we can help one another. Of course, no bashing, no baiting, no flaming.

2. A Fanficcers' Couch - a place where we can talk about our writing insecurities and anxieties. Like a psychotherapist office, but cooler. Similar to http://boards.theforce.net/threads/authors-rant-therapy-thread-feeling-down-join-in.13567022/

3. All resourcey, surveyish and similar threads could be run by socks, for practical reasons. That said, does Xenforo allow something like thread ownership change? Invision doesn't, so I apologise if I'm asking nonsense.

4. When do we get a TLJ thread to post in? Ten days before the premiere, kind of fitting.

5. Can this title be fixed? It's annoying, there's a random character and a grave instead of an apostrophe. And the thread host is MIA.
http://boards.theforce.net/threads/...h-l-fanfic-index-v3-0-we´ll-be-back.29538471/

6. Can we have this http://boards.theforce.net/threads/list-three-authors.29588876/ and this http://boards.theforce.net/threads/fanfic-quotes.8036053/ again? Of course, with some strict rules? How about this awesomeness? http://boards.theforce.net/threads/the-mods-costume-party-challenge-and-the-winners-are.31931217/

7. Can we have a reading/watching/gaming club, that's not as posh as the Lit forum? Read comics, books, play games, watch shows and update each other on our progress, given that SW is a HUGE universe?

Hope that this was the right place. I would forget this by January. Sorry if this was an unwanted bump.

 

Yeah, you are free to do as you please (within reason) for your challenges, but I don't think people often (if ever) combine gifts with challenges.

Sounds like a good idea - write up a proposal and send it to the mods.

That's basically one of the functions of the Scribble Pad.

Xenforo doesn't allow for ownership changes. And I don't think all resource threads need to be run by socks, for practical reasons. Longer-running challenges and character/indexes are incase the thread-host needs to hand it off/to keep PMs separate, but it would just get too confusing and unnecessary to ask all resource threads to be run by socks.

10 days is a bit early, but we will have one up when it becomes more appropriate. If you want to talk TFA, there are other areas of the boards.

Frankly, if Mav and I fixed all the special characters that were corrupted during the move, we would have no time for anything else (plus the thread is truncated and people don't use it anyways). If you want to make a new H/L thread, let us know.

Again, PM mods with proposals.

Again, PM us, but this IS fanfic. We already have a social thread.

 

Short response: understood, will do, and I can't see myself running a H/L thread, I don't have the credentials for that position. Thank you.

And I guess I'll do that other thing, the PM for which I bumped for, first.