Apr
10th
2024
Anon and why I hate it. · 7:36pm April 10th
Let me just go on a little rant here.
I hate Anon. Seriously, just make up a name. ANY name.
Literally any name.
Please.
I'm sure there are perfectly good stories out there, but Anon instantly ruins them, takes the reader instantly out of the story. It shows a complete laziness and unwillingness to put any effort in whatsoever and completely ruins the illusion. And it's infesting this site like a cancer.
Just... anything. Please. Bob. Dave.
John. John is a perfectly good name.
Anything. But. Fucking. Anon!!
Agreed. Anon actually takes me completely out of the story. An "Anon" story has to be especially good for me to put up with the silliness of using "anonymous" as a name. You might as well put "Hello, [ INSERT NAME HERE ]" brackets in the dialogue, because it's just as subtle.
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Yeah anon is only good for silly stories. Now anon filly isn’t as bad since she has become a character type and it’s the name given by FPS for unknown foals.
yep it a type of story that I never read.
Definitely agree with you there. Unfortunately, terminally online weirdoes have turned it into either a replacement for "you" to disguise a story they weren't brave enough to write in the second person, or just being lazy, like you said.
On the plus side, since it has its own tag here, you can just add an exclusion for it.
bob.
Worse is that "Anon" is often the same character architype: unlikeable asshole who is just there to troll Twilight. And somehow we're supposed to identify with the character...
i think anon is ok if its a skit story like
- MLP: FiM
- Comedy
- Random
- Anthology
Anon takes over Spike’s job of transcribing Twilight’s friendship reports. He does exactly what you’d expect.but not serious stories that have actual story line to them.
Anon is just supposed to be "Quirky human X" and can be used as a functional character that you don't really need to introduce for them to join the story seamlessly.
like the canon character, Twilight, Pinky, Rainbow, they can just be put into the stories here without introduction.
Anon fits this niche, "need a human? just add Anon, everyone knows Anon."
each Anon is a bit different but he's similar enough that it doesn't really matter.
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Not when it take up half the stories on the front page.
There are many named great characters, but there are reads that like to imagen themself to be Anon, because the lack of character development they fill in the blanks with themself.
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i find reading stories that are in second person to be annoying.
mostly because when the "You" does or says something i absolutely wouldn't do, there would be a little nudge at the back of my head that goes "grrr, no i wouldn't
stop telling lies about me."
Its irrational but involuntary.
at least with Anon, that's a guy that i can disagree with him doing something but i could understand someone else doing that thing that i would not do.
and when he does something i believe i would do i can sympathies with him.
Totally agree but to play devil's advocate here for a second on why I think that Anon became so popular.
Anon is by design supposed to be a blank canvas, an audience surrogate. Actual characters like Bob, Bill or Rick have actual pasts and backgrounds and character traits and personalities that need to be expanded upon in order to make a good story. This is doubly so for HiE characters because they aren't just normal, run-of-the-mill people whose lives we can just jump into. They are by definition humans who have been ripped out of time and space, inserted into a world of ponies that isn't their own and have to deal with that emotional turmoil. That's a HELL of a lot baggage right out of the gate.
It's a lot of ground that an author has to cover, a lot of world-building to do and a lot of character development that has to happen. This isn't ideal for short, 1k-2k comedic shorts. It's not always possible to do compelling characterisation in that short amount of time.
Alternatively, you know what you are getting with Anon. You what their personality is and you know that their backstory isn't important. Or if you do care about Anon's backstory, then multiple highly talented authors have written great stories about their past and you can transplant whatever head-canon you prefer. It's simply easier for authors to use Anon as an easy audience surrogate. It's a template that already exists and most people are already familiar with it. You can jump into the action straight away without having to arduously lay the story's foundation.
With Anon, authors don't need to explain who "Billy" is, what his personality is, what his life story is, how he arrived in Equestria and how he feels about it if they just want to make a funny little short about a human who tricks unicorns into wearing condoms on their head by lying that they are "horn-warmers".
The Anon trope is definitely an overused literary device and it's arguable that it's even a lazy one but it's not hard to see why a lot of authors use it.
(I agree that Anon is a dumb name. Although, its a lightyear improvement upon "You" or [Y/N] from places like FF.net or AO3.)
I complettly agree with you there Hiver. It shows a lack of effort and creativity. True writting a story as second person instead of using Anon is way harder, but is also more rewarding. Some may consider it a horrible viewpoint, like a certain unicorn complains in your stories (Normal life or Duties, i think) but it's still better than calling him anon.
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I'd like to say that I hate second person too, but that's just a personal preference. Anon on the other hand is objectivity bad.
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That's more of what I mean to say. In my opinion, second person stories are the hardest to do well. But when people want to tell a story like that, they'll use 'Anon' as a largely inoffensive blank slate instead of 'You' in the same way a lot of isekai does with milquetoast leads with generic (for Japan) names.
Anon takes it a step further by being *almost* its own person in trollfics, but not enough to justify its own existance. Or maybe it never was its own character, and those same strange folks who created Anon manage to identify with it, and expect the rest of us to as well. Downside of being a fandom that grew partly thanks to 4chan, I suppose.
I agree. The only Anon stories I've enjoyed were ones where the character has a reason they are "Anonymous". IE
- "The Long and Short of it", a mature story on this site where Anonymous is a reporter, and thus the name and cutie mark fits in with their job.
- "Jumping in at the Deep end", where the main character is sorta like a planeswalker, and not having a name is due to a bad encounter in the character's past that "removed" their "true name"
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True enough, though some things work best in 2nd person.
To me its the reading version of getting teeth pulled without anesthesia. How are you supposed to take someone with a greenhead and a question mark face seriously. The character should be buried in a lead coffin and thrown into a active volcano.
Agreed and I only know of one or two stories that I've read that had an anon character that I was willing to read. At this point in time, it's gotten more annoying than anything.
A lot of the comments here show that they really don't understand what Anon even is.
Anon is a 4chan meme (he's literally the personification of the site's zeitgeist), and, well, considering 4chan is intimately foundational to this fandom, I can't help but feel that you're tilting at windmills.
Feel free to hate it, but you aren't really the target audience (nor am I really).
I'm going to have to disagree. Given that it's usually something that was either written as an /mlp/ greentext or inspired by one, it's a flag saying "this story is about having fun first, and if your literary conventions get in the way of that, they can go to hell."
There's a very good reason for this. Back when the fandom was new, we had a bunch of "fun first" stories that didn't use "Anon" or other /mlp/-isms. Then the early authors got all worried about getting featured on EqD, and fell into the same trap of "writing for the critics/editors" as commercial publishing suffers from. /mlp/ don't care. /mlp/ don't give a shit. So now greentext authors can walk in here with a folder full of material, do a basic reformat into prose, and own the front page, because greentext authors and their fans are having fun.
I'd rather see Anon than some obvious self-insert that isn't labeled as such.
The name doesn't bother me.
It's the character archetype and the way the stories are written around them that piss me off.
There is only one I actually recommend and it's because it has no problems punishing Anon for his behaviors.
I like some Anon stories but I do wish they would be more creative with names other than Anon. I do understand the 4chan joke, but it’s everywhere and at this point I’m tired of seeing it. Although I am curious as to why you are bringing this up now when this has been a thing for most of the fandom’s lifetime. If anything they have gotten less common.
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A bunch of the greentext authors have started converting them to prose (or have editors doing it for them) and are posting them here. I've noticed a significant uptick in converted greentext stories being added to groups, which has let me find a bunch of new-to-me authors. The top four stories in the featured box right now are Anon-fics.
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Huh. I feel dumb now. Guess I just ignore them subconsciously.
Somehow it seems that on 75% of cases when authors try to write a prettier name for the character, they end with Alex.
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I agree with Hiver. Alex is a massive improvement over Anon.
There’s two types of Anon’s
1) Anon the green masked, black suit with red tie, that walked straight out of 4chan that has a nickname for every character…that usually boils down to [Color + relevant character trait]
2) Literally any character that could have been named anything….
I’ve seen a few stories that faff with a play on Anon like Arron Emous or something, but yeah I feel ya.
I can't agree to this. Are you willingly discarding stories from RunicTreetops, CrimsonWolf360, Soaring or even Some Leech just because the name Anonymous is used? That's sad because they are great.
I think people forgot why this name is used. Anon is a shell, someone we can relate to. Of course, we don't always agree with how the author portray him or make him do some things but its writer try to make us understand why he behave in a certain way. Certainly, some person don't want to put much thought in their story, they are lazy, nobody can ignore that but from time to time, a rarity drop in the featured with Anon as the MC and we can't ignore this. We can't put all the fics with Anon in it in the same bag.
I'll drop my mic here
I'm rather fond of Sue.
Preach! hey I have come across multiple stories where the author just used their screen name. Literally. It wasn't mlpfan265 or anything but it definitely wasn't a really person or even pony name.
I get that they are trying to do the tween romance or isekai thing where they make the main character so bland, it's easier for the reader to self insert but at that point. You might as well write in the 2nd person.
5776211
We could download and use Microsoft word to sub basically any name in. Your point about not discarding stories purely for an obnoxious name is absolutely valid. Sometimes it is done with artistic intent. Of the stories you listed, how many would you say used the name Anon as you described?
wow this is a sad comment section
I have read a few comedy stories where the Anonymous name is creatively used, but mostly I agree with your sentiments. If you're writing a serious story, use a serious name!
Personally, as I listen to fics using a TTS app, I've changed the pronunciation of Anonymous and Anon to Steve. This occasionally causes hiccups in other contexts when a sentence starts with the word Anonymous, but it gets the job done. I occasionally do the same thing for other character names if they're grating on my ears.
5776211
While I would agree not all fics using Anon deserve to be dropped in the same bucket, I will argue against the assertion that Anon is a shell we can relate to. They're a nebulous character with a hundred interpretations invented out of whole cloth by the internet, not an audience surrogate. Your average self-insert or OC that's a thinly veiled self-insert is far more relatable than your typical Anon because while both share the human perspective, Anon has a predilection towards tossing shitty insults at powerful horse wizards and in general being an abrasive prick.
There are very few exceptions to my general agreement with your statement. Last stop on the mail route makes me muss interesting without actually being a stereotypical anon. Most are awful though
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Same. Feels like a war just started just because Hiver's upset that people who write Anon are actually writing (and get featured, which is the particular gripe I'm getting here).
5776211
Yooooo I got mentioned. Actually recognized. Thank you!
5776217
Only putting in my two cents here with your comment since I feel you're being extremely respectful about this and I really appreciate it.
For me, particularly, I write it because of the situation. I could care less about giving the human a backstory because it has no relevance to the situation I'm writing. Anon fits perfectly with that, and it allows me to focus more on the bits people want to read: the scene. I won't deny that I'm also somewhat lazy when it boils down to coming up with a name, but I also do it because writing Anon makes sense to me. I don't write it in 2nd person because I hate 2nd person overall, and I don't write it as a self-insert because I don't want to make out or fuck a horse. Just being brutally honest, is all. Would rather have fun with less constraints than bear witness to random former accountant human named John Doe the Third™ because a user online would get agitated that I named him Anon, like Hiver here.
To OP: I understand your frustration. I also write HiE as well, and I get why this sort of subject matter irritates you since you put so much work into your human character and how you developed him/her/them over a course of time across all your fics. I understand. I just think you have this notion in your head that, when you see an Anon fic, you automatically dislike it because you feel that the author(s) don't put time, effort, and creative ingenuity into their characters.
Turns out, it's false in every way, shape, and form, but going into that diatribe would be moot with how you've worded this blog. Just know that while I respect your work and what you do, I think it's sad that you wanted to rant and disparage authors who write Anon as simply being a cancer to the site. If that's the case, I have terminal seven, and I will ensure you that I'm proud of it.
Think of it like Minecraft's graphics. They put the bare minimum amount of effort into that part of the story/game so that they could save it for something their audience actually cared about.
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It's worth mentioning that 4chan literally does not support usernames as a function. Anon is definitely meant to be the average 4chan user, written by and for the average 4chan user. And now you know why you don't go to 4chan.
Imo its just you. Maybe a old head can give me some info on how anon was used back in the day for fimfics but in the last 4 years ish I've been here, anon as a Mc name is extremely extremely predominantly a nsfw/comedy thing. If you want any adventure/longfic then you'll see plenty of ocs/self inserts (same thing really).
In fact I though the whole green human anon was just a 4chan meme towards mlp/alsl that one famous mlp comic edit. I didn't even know people used anon as a Mc name until I perused the nsfw/comedy section. But as others have pointed out its a method of shedding the hie personality and name/history generally to focus much more on other aspects of stories.
Would (You) be better?
5776160
Not to butt in but identify with ? Anon is a old relic from when 4chan and mlp were closely intertwined thus it makes perfect cents that he's usually portrayed as a asshole kinda who cracks jokes and never takes anything seriously with a healthy heaping spoonful of Gary stew,becausehe is commonly recognized as a "character" with specific traits and mannerisms.
Not identifying with a Mc regardless if it's anon doesn't make a story good or bad as the author isn't writing the story to "pander" to you and make it something you can relate to. Just my 2 sense.
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Thank you for being up RunicTreetops. They are the one that really got me invested into Anon stories.
I used to ignore Annon stories all the time. Runic fostered a love for Anon in me.
Because of Runic’s stories I’ve found a dozen great stories. I’d say those stories are def in the top 50+% on this site. And some of them I’d say are among the best new stories on this site.
But I also understand why people dislike anon. I was one of them not even two years ago.
Ultimately I think it just boils down to the fact that some stories just are not for everyone.
Like me I dislike any anon-a-miss stories. Or G5 stories.
But I know others enjoy them.
To be quite honest, and just speaking from someone here who previously *solely* wrote Anon, and with some time off from the site is planning to branch out... and still write Anon, while writing some more diverse stories...
I think it's a very similar situation to Harems and Isekai in Anime right now- where yes, the tropes can be atrocious and done so wrong, and it can have a bit of a detrimental effect to how other writers write their stories. IE feeling like they need to edit and poke their stories to align more with 'what works' to get views... But the concept itself isn't broken. It can actually be done really well. But it's down to execution at the end of the day. I put Anon down as more of a trope now than anything else, since I think 'genre' is pushing it but it still has a big effect on the story. It's a tool. If you rely on the trope too much it can make your eyes roll and it's really easy to get sick of it, but at the end of the day, it is a tool, and it just depends how you use it.
A lot of Anon stories can have people with detailed pasts, some that matter to their stories, which is very much off from the norm. They can act completely differently, being an emotional person, or the usual jackass, completely traumatized, or literally anything else. Some are literally just normal people, beige-to-brown skin and all, but the author couldn't come up with a name/wanted to distance themselves from the usual HiE self-insert, since that is a trope that has FAR more 'ugh' history than Anons do lmao. And some yeah, wear the mask because they saw some porn artist draw them with one and was like 'hahah that's neat/funny, I'll do that' and stuck with it because it was like an injoke.
At the end of the day, I think it's more of a statement than anything. 'I'm gonna either make a silly jackass story that may or may not have shitloads of porn, or I'm gonna do something weird and different, but either way, you know that I know that you know what an Anon is.' And that can matter, because it's a pretty big statement to a community- like a nod or a handshake, 'you get it', that is hard to understand unless you know the history behind it. Even if it's dumb and silly. And doubly so hard to understate how important that can be to a reader and a writer when you do get it.
Like, it is genuinely hard to describe how peaceful it is, being able to click on an Anon story- and how you understand that handshake, and it makes it easier to tolerate complete slop or the most beautiful writing you've seen in the fandom. As a certain continuous-reseller of games may call it- a mystery box!
And quite frankly- having read a few Anon stories where the Anon isn't even the primary perspective or the side-characters dominate quite a bit, there's a shitload you can do with a blank-slate human that doesn't rely on the 'who' beyond after they got to Equestria, and the general human knowledge you might expect 'a dude' to have. It gives you a breadcrumb trail to follow, and makes you question why the story is using them this way. And again, it generally helps sidestep a lot of the 'HiE problem' the early fandom had lmao.
And yes, you absolutely could just call them 'David' and rock the same thing... But again, it's sort of that handshake. While yes, it would be extremely easy to just give them a name- that isn't the point. And if it's really so horrific or distracting, idk, get a program that automatically replaces the text in your browser or something, I've heard a lot of those float around over the years after people get upset at Anons for this or that...
Or you can be me, and can't name a character for shit, so it's easier to rock an Anon and have that baseline to work with instead of running yourself down a rabbit-hole of trying to find a meaningful name, avoid a cringey one, trying not to make their identity matter WAAAY too much or make it feel too self-inserty or wish-fulfillmenty, so on, so forth... Don't fix what ain't broke, and if it works... it ain't stupid, imo.
But at the same time, I've done the ultimate cardinal sin of doing second-person as well as it, so, y'know... Disregard my opinion!
I just enjoy reading good stories. While some tropes can make it harder to get into some than others, it's often worth it. Exchange got me into the writing side of this fandom, and stories like that will forever shape who I am as a writer. Quality isn't dictated by the name- it's dictated by the writer.
Edit: Holy shit I wrote a ton
TLDR: Yes
5776249
The most reasonable take
Just to toss my two cents out, when I started reading here 1-2 years ago, the initial high review anon fics I saw were things like "Dear Princess Sunbutt" and figured it would be be similar to other places where anon is just a comedy figure of varying quality. Then I encountered getmeouttahere's "Exchange" and "I Dream of Luna". Anon was still kind of a comedy figure, but he actually evolved in those stories. Differently in each story, but still kinda cleared my biases a bit of what Anon could be. The surge over the last few months of RunicTreetop and ScrungusBungus fics has reinforced in my mind that if you can keep from tripping over the name, you can find some good reads.
Links just in case someone reading has missed out on the two fics I mentioned by name. Might want to read Luna first. It's easier to put down. Once Exchange hit its stride, it grabbed me and I didn't sleep that night while reading it. Hopefully it grabs/grabbed others the same way.
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On the rare occasion I stumble across such a fic that reels me in before I take note of this crime against literature, I like to use a find and replace tool. I go with Cletus MacGucket. If the author can't respect their work, the insane hick inventor from Gravity Falls ifs officially the main character.
eeeh. i'm perfectly fine with anon. to me, "anonymous" isn't just some lazy old name - he's a genuine character. what kind of character he actually is does depends on story to story, but i usually see him as the anon hailing from 4chan we all know and 'love' with a sense of humor that i personally find funny.
i do get why you hate anon though, a lot of authors (cough) feature box (cough) just slap the name on a blank slate and send him on his way. i still think you're missing out on a lot of great stories, but i won't demand you to read anything
how do you feel about names that are a play on anonymous, though?
eg: mous, muss, moose, etc
I’m not alone!!!!
I don't want to sound like a dick but aren't you throwing stones from a glass house. I mean your fic also uses a few tropes people say are bad. Like the Mc just appearing in equestria for no particular reason (at least no stated yet), then getting in a relationship with one of the princesses, then turning into a alicorn, and even getting into a harem. All tropes many are critical of and some, like your take, state that these tropes ruin the fic.
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A well thought-out response which basically covers any point I might raise, or at least any which my sleepy head can think of right now. It comes down to if the story is good or not. Using Anon might be a reputation-induced handicap based on my personal tastes as someone who detests R34 and dirty humour, but it doesn't preclude quality by any means. I would praise any good Anon fic just as vehemently as I would slam a degenerate piece of slop.
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Case in point. Alicorn OCs are a topic I'm neutral on, and Blank Page passes muster as far as I'm concerned due to when and how it occurred, but normally the romantic content of later instalments would be an instant turn-off for me (bearing in mind that I'm somewhat behind at present, still early into reading Eclipse). I was nonetheless convinced to try it and was pleasantly surprised by that 'bad trope done tactfully' factor. Page got me through the last summer of my MChem when I was suffering through lockdown in a 33C room, resorting to literal medieval methods of cooling (chunks of ice in the room) because I had no fan. The most disappointment I've felt was from the military details, which is hardly a surprise given that I've made military history a lifelong hobby and write extensively both in Middle-earth and the EaW setting, and certainly did not prevent my enjoyment of the vast majority of the story.
To good or ill end, Anon deserves the same chance Page had.