New short story, and a question about FiMFic blogging · 2:45pm Jul 8th, 2015
First, writing news: after completely forgetting about it for several months working tirelessly on it since March, I've made some small edits and published Scootaloo, M.D. in my Bantam Tales collection. Go check it out!
Now, the question.
Presumably, if you're following me you're aware that I do reviews at One Man's Pony Ramblings--after all, I'm better known as a reviewer than as a writer, and have been for some time. Yesterday, an author e-mailed me to ask if I could crosspost or post update blogs here on FiMFic. This is not the first time I've been asked about that; in fact, as I look through the feedback I got from the questionnaire I put up at OMPR last week, a few people seem to want me to connect my OMPR reviews and FiMFic blog to some degree.
The reason I haven't done this before is pretty simple: I don't think FiMFic has good support for blogging. Even after updating the ability to search in the top bar, tracking down an old review is a chore--the only way I can find anything from PresentPerfect's reviews that I want to look at is to use the BIG MASTER REVIEW LIST, which is unwieldy for its own reasons (though still a ridiculously valuable resource--I love that there's someone in this fandom who's taken it upon himself to collect and collate almost 10,000 fanfic reviews!). Compare that to, say, Logan(berry)'s blog, where it's easy to both glance through old reviews and to search for his thoughts on specific stories (or to see if he has reviewed specific stories). Doing reader-oriented reviews through blogspot, wordpress, or even tumblr just seems to me to give you much better searching and tracking options than FiMFic.
But even so, why not post in both places, or at least post a blog here with a "New review, here's the link" when OMPR updates? Well, to avoid clutter, mostly. I know there are people I've unfollowed in the past because they were swamping my feed with things I didn't care about (and burying the stuff I did; I've missed PP's fic recs posts before because, say, he posted them right before a new episode and they got buried under twenty reactions posts in my feed), and while I also follow people because I want to read their blogs, I don't assume that everyone who follows me wants to see three newsfeed items from me every week. I don't want anyone to feel like they need to unfollow me (and miss my stories) because of my blogging--to me, my stories are what FiMFiction is for.
...Of course, I might be getting all worked up over nothing. SO QUESTION TIME: would you like it if I started posting blogs on FiMFic linking to my OMPR reviews? If so, would you want me to post every time I update, which would be three posts a week? Would you prefer I did a once-a-week roundup? Once-every-two-weeks? Once-a-month (the problem with the roundups is that conversations on reviews tend to die after a couple of days, but maybe that's not something you care about)? Or would you rather I stuck with my current "policy" of keeping reviews mostly off-site?
Whatever the case, please let me know if you've got an opinion!
I don't care about the frequency. Personally I'd like a full cross-post for every review. But at least just drop the links off here.
Stick with your current policy. That way I can post a notice on my fimfic blog whenever you post to One Man's Pony Ramblings, and steal followers from you.
Well, what a coincidence that you should bring this up today; you've given me an excellent opportunity to explain why there is a bad taste in my mouth regarding your blog.
Literally yesterday, I wrote a semi-lengthy detailed comment on your post about Amending Fences, but you haven't seen it and you never will because I can no longer think about those words without seething with rage. See, that comment widget on your blogger blog is in fact the most useless piece of shit in the entire universe and whoever wrote it should be forced to use it in hell for all eternity using a browser that randomly deletes cookies every ten to sixty seconds. When you press "publish", if you aren't properly logged into the site that you've chosen to supply identity information from, it will redirect the entire page to that site's login page, completely obliterating the contents of the comment box beyond all hope of recovery, since pressing the back button won't restore the contents due to the actual text entry field being added by a script after the page loads.
So in short, you should post your reviews somewhere where there's a comment system that wasn't spawned from the deepest pit of a sulfurous hell and isn't actively hostile to first-time commenters.
Yes, I realize that it works perfectly fine for people who diligently ensure that everything is in order and copy their text into an external editor for safekeeping and whatever, but part of a good interface is ensuring that the system doesn't irrevocably destroy work if a user isn't being cautious enough.
Yeah, no, three more notifcations a week on top of those I already have would be annoying, especially when I already visit OMPR on update days. And I do actually follow you on FimFic for your stories, believe it or not. Your current model is fine. Stick with it.
I'd definitely prefer to have everything cross-posted here too - having slightly more posts in one place is a lot easier than tracking multiple sites. Any frequency is fine as long as the posts are comprehensive, though more often would be preferable.
Given that I actually didn't know you did reviews (or, at least, forgot,) some degree of cross-posting would be personally appreciated.
I love your reviews, but I'm VERY fimfic centric; even my knowledge of current events in the fandom usually comes from blogs on this site.
For me, personally, even something as simple as weekly or biweekly links to and descriptions of your OMPR posts could be very convenient. It would both be a reminder and let me see at a glance what you've been working on, rather than having to check your site every few days myself (which I usually forget to do). I imagine it would also be easier than having to cross-post everything on two different sites, which feels a bit unnecessary to me. Anyone who cares can see your blog posts and easily click through to whatever interests them.
Still. Whatever you decide to do, I'm glad that you're being thoughtful and considerate of your readers' needs, as always. Keep up the good work! ~ Sable
I'm down for however many non-zero blogs you end up posting.
I'd like that. I don't see a problem with either linking to the review or cross-posting it. The tag system can help somewhat too, I'm told.
3219208
I feel your pain. That thing's eaten my comments on multiple occasions, on OMPR and other sites. I've gotten in the habit of copying my comments, but sometimes I still slip up, and it's always with the long ones
3219208
3220029
This is exactly why I resisted setting up a capcha on the blog for so long; I don't remember if either of you were around at the time, but it finally got to the point where the spam was doing more to impede conversation than the perils of lost comments would. I still hate it, but I just need to look at my spam filter to see that this is a "no good choices" situation.
The problem is that FiMFic only allows people with FiMFic accounts to comment, and at least one regular drop-in (I don't know how many casual or irregular visitors this applies to) doesn't have or want one... so bringing the conversation over here would shut out people, too. And splitting the audience by cross-posting would probably kill conversation on one, or even both, sites.
Ugh. I hate it when issues don't have a simple, obvious solution.
3219181
Sadly, I think I'm going to ignore your wise words this time...
3219161
3219231
3219277
3219331
3219463
3219752
Thanks for the feeback, guys. At this point, I'm leaning toward starting to do some sort of "here's what got reviewed on OMPR" thingamabob. But with that said, I'm very sensitive to 3219211 here; I really doubt he's the only person who feels that way, and I see this as a "first, do no harm" situation.
Here's what I'm thinking, and I'd like to get all y'all's (or at least, somma y'all's) feedback: what if I did a weekly or biweekly "state of the writer" post, similar to what I've seen a few other authors do? Offer updates on what I'm working on, link to that week's/weeks' OMPR posts, and generally try to make it site-relevant? The obvious downside is that a lot of those posts would be things like "this week I did nothing," "this week I wrote 1,200 words, but don't get too excited because if there's a just and loving God, they will never see the light of day," etc.
Is that too much feedboxing? Is that too little useful information? Is that more annoying than valuable? Or did I find the perfect recipe on my first try?
3220148 I skip anything that says "State of the writer", so please put the links at the top.
I can only speak for myself, but I like to see activity from a writer I'm following. I have never unfollowed someone because they blogged too much. The "inconvenience", if you can call it that, is a click on the feed button, five seconds of skimming, and another click to get back where I was. People posting regularly gives me a sense that the community is alive, which helps keep my interest up.
I think once a week would be about right. Biweekly posts would probably be too scarce for them to be something I could look forward to. I suggest linking to your main site to keep the discussions in one place, though of course people with accounts here could just read your reviews over there and leave comments here.
I haven't played around with searching via the tagging feature, but if you're trying to blog things here and then locate them again, that should prove useful.
3220148
Any notification here would be better than none. If you want to turn it into a roundup, more power to you.
Your best bet, honestly, might be to experiment with doing it a few different ways over the period of a few weeks, and check your traffic and comment statistics to see what results in the best overall engagement. As you've already seen here, no solution will please everyone, and "do nothing" is just another one of those solutions.
I'm lazy enough to not go seek out reviews elsewhere, but not-lazy enough to read them here if you post them here. Make of that what you will.
3220546 Ditto. In spite of meaning to for literal years, I seldom read your reviews since they simply aren't on the website I normally frequent for pony fiction stuff.
3220640
i.imgur.com/Wy59mTf.gif
But that's why I have my own thingyyyyyy
I already follow OMPR, so reblogging here would just be another journal every so often that I have to ignore. :B Unless you're gonna provide original content with it.
3220478
You can speak for me, too.
3220148
Weekly or biweekly updates would be tolerable, I suppose.
I roundup post of some kind would be nice, even if it's just a collection of links.
3220148 I'd be a fan of that. I confess I've no problem with seeing 3 updates a week from you and I often forget to check OMPR
3220148
I'd be ok with that, but I suggest you not feel obliged to make full "state of the writer" posts if you don't have anything to put in them. Even just linking to the new posts on OMPR once every now and then would be helpful. And as Horizon said, trying a few different things would be the best idea. It's obviously not a question that can be readily answered with our current knowledge (see: the fact that it hasn't been answered yet), and experimenting is the best way to fill the gaps.
I imagine I'd still probably check your blog from time to time if you didn't cross-post them, but I do think it'd be more convenient if you would post it here.
Just a weekly 'Here is what I reviewed this week' post might be the best thing. Points people to your blog, doesn't spam the feed too much.
and yes, I'm aware that the big master review list is pretty much only functional with the search function when you are looking for a specific story or author.
3220974
3220478
And me too. Nothing contributes to the feeling of desolation and emptiness like zero non site news posts in my feed for three months.