man

listen i've been on the internet long enough to know the whims of the mob are unknowable. but MAN getting my first triple digit likes on a pithy joke fic that i slopped together in an hour... i don't think it's BAD it's just like, i have other stuff i put actual effort into! cmon!!

i think in general i'm not sure what The Audience on here is really interested in these days. plumbing through the archives as i do a lot of the All Timers are intricate slowburn romances or epic adventures but most of what i see on the front page is... well, porn of course. like i said, i've been on the internet long enough to not be surprised by that kind of thing. but behind that folks seem most interested in lighthearted stuff and concept fics? fimfiction is really interesting to me as like, the site of a fandom that was huge but has shrunken a lot and how that's influenced tastes. is this the postmodern era of ponies

thanks to everyone who read and liked T-R-I-X-I-E tho! genuinely, to have anything of mine read at all is a blessing, so i don't mean to look this particular gift pony in the mouth. i know i said i don't want an audience to influence my tastes but i do have a couple more lighthearted, funny concepts sitting in my stack, so maybe this'll motivate me to spin something out of those. but my heart will always belong to drama

(does anyone even use this feature?? do people read blogs on here???? hi. tell me what you think about this site's taste in the comments, if you want)

Comments

[evelili]

i have noticed things r pretty hit or miss, tho personally i have been p lucky overall i feel! as a writer, my magnum opus picked up a lot of traffic after it was completed, and i can defo understand avoiding fics w an “incomplete” tag (im guilty of that lol). and just in general, comedy is a lot easier for people to recommend i feel. its the same in visual art, funny haha memes i put 1% effort in will always do better than what i put my heart into, its just part of the internet i guess.

for me as a reader, ive found that the contests r what push a lot of the activity on the site (the 1000 words contest recently had soooo many entries), and the results of those help me find new fics! i also rely a lot on fic reviewers to try out fics i might normally have passed over on first glance, since sometimes summaries / tags might put me off a story id actually have enjoyed

[gloamish]

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i didnt mean this to come off as so "why aren't my FICS getting VIEWS!!!" (genuinely i'm satisfied with the attention i've been getting and how generous everyone is with their comments especially) but i appreciate ur insight a lot eve! i also noticed the similarity with "agh i spent ten minutes on this sketch why is it getting so much attention" lol (don't draw but have seen the struggle enough)

i HAVE been balancing the pros vs cons of posting longer fics a chapter at a time vs all at once... still not sure which side i've landed on - i think serial would make more sense if i had presence elsewhere to draw readers here from, but as-is the three spots on the featured box for updated fics feel less good than the attention for a new fic. but i've yet to finish my current not-short fic so maybe people are waiting to pounce on it when it's marked completed? will have to wait and see

yeah i need to keep a better eye out for contests... exciting to write something with constraints, and fun to work alongside others!

[Foxtrot-Mayflower]

Oh don’t worry, many people use blogs, it’s like the community page on a yt channel, creators use it, some people don’t care enough to check it out tho.

And it seems you just got lucky/unlucky, depends on how you value famousness, if you want this story to be beloved or if you want your other ones to have the same treatment. Hopefully this transfers to make you completely famous but who knows.

[Mockingbirb]

but behind that folks seem most interested in lighthearted stuff and concept fics?

Could you say more about concept fics and what seems to appeal to the fimfic audiences?

fimfiction is really interesting to me as like, the site of a fandom that was huge but has shrunken a lot and how that's influenced tastes. is this the postmodern era of ponies

[justheretoreadstories]

I'm not sure exactly why, but for some reason stories like this one seem to stick out for me for some reason.

[Sunshyne]

I love all of your fics Gloamish

Including that one with Starlight Glimmer that you posted and then deleted, which I only noticed after I had finished the chapter

[RBDash47]

listen i've been on the internet long enough to know the whims of the mob are unknowable. but MAN getting my first triple digit likes on a pithy joke fic that i slopped together in an hour... i don't think it's BAD it's just like, i have other stuff i put actual effort into! cmon!!

It's a tale as old as time -- here's a group created 11 years ago dedicated to the feeling.

(Basically you're in good company)

[Mockingbirb]

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Yeah, the difference is that some of the people in that group are wrong.