Half a year, thirty minutes at a time · 10:16pm Nov 12th, 2013
There's this thing. It's a pony thing, and it involves a lot of writing. I have been participating in this thing daily--okay, almost daily--since March. This thing is called Thirty Minute Ponies. Let me tell you about it.
Thirty Minute Ponies is a group on Tumblr that puts up a writing prompt every day and gives writers a few hours to think about how to make a story out of it, and then write that story in thirty minutes. They usually get three or four on the quietest days, and some of the busiest days have reached a couple dozen. The mod on duty for that day reads the stories, adds a short critique or comment, and then posts them up on the blog. It is excellent, low-risk writing practice, and I cannot recommend it enough.
Since March 25, 2013, I have written one hundred and eighty three stories for TMP. That is thirty stories for each of the Mane Six, plus one extra in Rarity's, Pinkie's, and Fluttershy's stacks. That translates to ninety one and a half hours--almost four straight days--of writing. These stories have a combined total of 133,896 words in them, which means my Thirty Minute series accounts for more than half of all the words I've ever published.
I figure that since I'm finishing Twilight's compilation today, some statistics would be appropriate. Who doesn't love stats, right?
First, we'll start with links:
Rarity - Rainbow Dash - Pinkie Pie - Fluttershy - Applejack - Twilight Sparkle
General
As stated above, the total word-count is 133,896. This makes the average word-count per story 732. My resulting average words per minute is 24.
The largest compilation is Fluttershy's with 23,178 words. The smallest compilation is Twilight's, with 21,681. However, if the extra chapters were taken away, Rarity's and Pinkie's compilations would both be smaller than Twilight's, and Fluttershy's would take second place to Applejack's.
The least liked compilation was Pinkie Pie's, with only 44 likes and 40 favs. The most liked compilation, by a fair margin, was Twilight's, with 78 likes and 88 favs. From what I have witnessed in the past, that's straying awfully near the threshold for the update slot in the Feature Box. You lot love your lavender librarians, don't you?
Tags
My understanding and use of the tags when uploading chapters has changed a little. If I were to go back through the earlier compilations again, I probably would have tagged some of the stories differently. But, as the tags currently stand, they are as follows.
[Comedy] 59 tags. 32.2% of stories.
[Romance] 48 tags. 26.2% of stories.
[Slice of Life] 46 tags. 25.1% of stories.
[Sad] 29 tags. 15.8% of stories.
[Dark] 23 tags. 12.6% of stories.
[Adventure] 21 tags. 11.4% of stories.
[Alternate Universe] 5 tags. 2.7% of stories.
[Random] 3 tags. 1.6% of stories.
[No Tag] 3 tags. 1.6% of stories.
[Tragedy] 2 tags. 1.1% of stories.
[Crossover] 1 tag. 0.5% of stories.
[Human] 1 tag. 0.5% of stories.
[Apples] All the tags. A gajillion% of stories.
The Funniest Pony, based on the number of [Comedy] tags in her compilation, is Applejack with 13. Apples are plenty funny.
The Most Romantic Pony, according to tags, is Pinkie Pie with 10. She had you at *GAAASSSP!!*
The Saddest Pony is a tie between Rarity and Fluttershy, with 6 [Sad] tags each. Not a coincidence that they're also the two ponies with multiple crying emotes.
The Princess of Darkness is also a tie. Rarity and Rainbow both have 6 [Dark] tags, and must share their shadowy crown.
The Most Adventurous Pony, with 7 [Adventure] tags--that's a full third of them--is Fluttershy. Who knew?
The Most Boring Pony Ever, with 11 [Slice of Life] tags, is Twilight Sparkle. This is what happens when you spend all your time indoors with a bunch of books.
Shipping
So who is sleeping with whom these days, anyway?
The most shipped pairing, the couple that has come to the fore again and again through these last hundred and eighty three stories, the pairing that, statistically speaking, must be my OTP is... not Apple Pie?!
As a matter of fact, the most frequently-occurring ship is RariPie, showing up in nine separate stories. Apple Pie is not far behind, in a three-way tie with Flarity and Twijack for second place with seven stories, but I guess I need to turn in my Apple Pie badge, because apparently I am a RariPie shipper now.
The Omniship--shipping all six of the main cast in a single polyamorous relationship--appeared 5 times. Every one of the fifteen possible combinations of the Mane Six appeared at least three times... except for TwiDash, which it turns out I never shipped except as part of an omniship. Sorry to disappoint all you TwiDash fans out there; you'll just have to make do with the dozens of the ship that get written by other people every week.
Pinkie Pie is my most shipped pony, narrowly edging out Rarity with 38 relationships to Rarity's 37. Rainbow Dash was the least shipped among the Mane Six, with only 19.
The most-shipped secondary character was Luna, who was shipped with Applejack, Fluttershy, Pinkie Pie, and Bon Bon over the course of the last few months. Lyra x Bon Bon was the only secondary character pairing that appeared more than once. It is now officially part of my headcanon that Golden Harvest has a crush on Applejack, mostly because Golden Apple is an awesome ship name.
Miscellaneous
The Pony Who Is Forever Alone is Rarity, who has suffered through 7 failed or unrequited relationships. Poor Rarity.
The Pony With the Longest Rap Sheet is Applejack, who was arrested three times. It should be noted that all of the Mane Six were arrested at one point or another, but Applejack went back two more times.
The Total Death Toll over the series is 33 ponies. That doesn't include the vague numbers of ponies who presumably died in the background during events like eternal night or the return of the Windigos. That's the number of ponies that have died, or were implied to have died, "on screen." The Deadest Pony is, as you may have guessed if you've been reading along, Applejack, with six death scenes and one instance of being undead. What surprised me, however, was Fluttershy taking second place in this with four deaths. I didn't remember killing her off so much.
The Pony Who Can't Keep Her Muzzle Out of Other Ponies' Business is Twilight Sparkle, who featured in 79 stories, including the thirty in her own compilation. By contrast, Rainbow Dash only featured in 57.
Out of the 183 stories, the Author's Favorite is How Equestria Was Made, in the Pinkie Pie compilation. Celestia, reincarnation, and pinkness. I am probably the proudest of that one.
The Fan Favorite is... well, you'll have to let me know in the comments below which you think it should be.
Commenters
I couldn't do this without you guys. I really couldn't. All of you folks that come here and read, favorite, like, and comment on the things I write make the whole process worthwhile. I appreciate it so much when you people take the time to share your thoughts and opinions on my stories. You lot are all great in my book, so I would like to take a bit of space to recognize the folks who have been giving me feedback on these six compilations.
Silver Commenters--folks who have left 5 or more comments. I'd love to recognize everyone who's left even one comment, but we'd be here all day if I did.
RandomNobody, SpaceCommie, Aataxe360, Donny's Boy, Kitsune Risu, Princess Glitzy, Flying Claw, sharpshadow, Diamond Sparkle, Tracking Target, Squee-chi, ProfCharles, Valhuir, Soldierpony, and Lion. Thanks, all you guys!
Gold Commenters. These people have left more than ten comments. Most of these commenters have followed the Thirty Minute series across multiple entries.
bahatumay, Fluttershy20, Olpert, SleepIsForTheWeak, Kage no Brony, paint_blossom, Pen Brush, nemryn, and Loeden. I really appreciate your contributions!
Platinum Commenters. These are the folks that have left upwards of thirty comments. These people have been a reliable source of feedback, and many of them have been with me since the first one. I am very grateful to have readers like you.
Honey Mead, Periphery, maskedferret, Midnight Herald, JetstreamGW, and Brakyo. Thank you so very much!
Brakyo had the greatest quantity of comments throughout the compilation, clocking in at 70 comments.
The highest-rated comment, with 5 thumbs, was left by JetstreamGW on Chapter 22 of the Applejack compilation. It reads:
Pfffftahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Yeah yeah, y'all're havin' five-ways 'n shit. Good fer ya. Me, I'm bangin' a princess. How d'ya like them apples?
Thank you all so much for reading. It's been one heck of a trip, and it wouldn't have been half so much fun without you guys and gals.
Now that it's over, I think I am going to try and put some effort into my longer stories. The next few months may see some of the stories I wrote for this collection getting upgraded into standalone and even multi-chaptered fics. In addition, I've got a half dozen other stories lying around that need to be finished some time. So, while I won't be doing any more TMP for a little bit, I'll have no shortage of writing to do. Hopefully it'll be to your tastes!
Please don't turn in your ApplePie badge ... You do it so well. Besides, isn't there enough Pinkie for at least two ponies?
Dang nab it, if I had started commenting from the get go, I probably could have made over 150 comments!
Still, I won a prize! Yee-haw!
I SEE MY NAME
Hm, now I have to decide whether to comment here or on Twilight's final chapter, since they both wrapped things up in a different way, but my comment in both places would be mostly the same.
Well anyway, I may have only started reading these during the Fluttershy compilation, the fourth of the series, but these were fun to follow, never knowing what sort of story to expect. Now I need to go back and read the other three, too. I have no idea when, but you'll probably get some more comments from me on those sooner or later.
And quite a few of them did seem like they'd make good full-length fics, so I'm curious to see which ones you'll pick for that. I might need to actually use that little Follow button, for once, so I can catch when that happens.
Almost on the mark about Rarity being most shipped. Anyway, as I said in the Twilight post, this was amazing.
I'm just gonna list my favourites now.
Fly or Fall(Dash)
Perfectly done coming of age story, and I always felt like the bond between Fluttershy and Dash from Flight camp should be explored more, which is done perfectly here.
My little Princess(Pinkie)
Just... so very cute.
Mixed Signals(Pinkie)
Had me on the floor with the ending.
Ode to a pony in orange(Pinkie)
The fact that you managed to make an actual rhyme with orange is quite simply too astounding to leave this story off here.
Chickensitting(Fluttershy)
The fact that I'm still wondering whether Fluttershy is a mountain ninja or not should be reason enough to mention this one.
Bitter Harvest(Applejack)
You said above that you wanted to continue some of the prompts? This one would be the first candidate for me.
Five Minutes(Rarity)
Funny, insightful, cute, encapsulated within only a thousand words. Also reminded me of Cloudy's Recipe for Perfection, over which I actually came across you(as you won the contest that Recipe was in)
Seeing Things(Rarity)
D'aww.
Right where I want her(Rarity)
Utterly perfect Rarity.
Comission(Rarity)
Perfect little twist, and really funny too.
The Go-Between(Twilight)
Probably my favourite comedy out of the bunch.
Unsewn(Twilight)
Only sad one here, but it's just too well done to not have it here.
Under the desk(Twilight)
Just gonna quote myself here: Well, that was brilliant.
Pinkie Ships it(Twilight)
Ah, visual comedy, plus Fluttershy cuteness. What could be better?
I'm probably missing a ton, because I pretty much just checked what I commented on, but yeah.
1503402 If I ever get Everypony Loves Pie off the ground, I'll make a darn good try at proving there's enough Pinkie for five ponies.
1503408 I considered naming this prize the 'blabbermouth award,' but that seemed a bit too mean-spirited. I really do appreciate all the commentary.
1503895 OMG WHERE??
1504710 I'll have to do my best to make it worth the Follow. Not sure yet what's first on the expansion block, and I probably should have the archaeology paper I have due in a few weeks be the next thing I write, but there's quite a hutch of plot-bunnies here waiting to be fed. Hopefully I'll get to them sooner or later.
1504724 Yeah, you were close, and the numbers could easily change depending on little judgement calls here or there over what counts as shipping and what doesn't.
A lot of the stories you listed are among my favorites as well.
One technicality I feel I should note, though... >>"Also reminded me of Cloudy's Recipe for Perfection, over which I actually came across you(as you won the contest that Recipe was in)"
Cloudy withdrew Recipe from that contest because he wanted to help TAW judge. If it's the reason you started reading my stories, I'm glad for that, but I have to point out that I have never come close to writing like Cloudy Skies does.
I am grateful for the compliment, though.
1504900
Everypony Loves Pie will be the most epic thing ever. Pinkie ships like a boss with the mane six. She is the new Rainbow Dash of shipping IMO.
I shall be waiting patiently for that story to come out.
1504900
RIGHT THERE!!!
I laughed because I was feeling kinda down and wondering when I didn't see my name anywhere as I read since I thought I had commented more and then
I was in platinum!? I didn't think I commented that much
And somehow I totally missed poor Twilight. Off to remedy that asap!
1505214 Oh yeah. For the whole first half of the series, you kinda dominated the comment count.
1505473 ^^; eheheheh...my bad?
This was a really fun series, been reading since about halfway through Party Every Day and of course went back and read all the other stuff too.
I'll be sad without a new story daily!
Anyway thanks for all the fun one shots. I wish you the best of luck with whatever you do next.
1505584 Nothing bad about it.
Rarity only has five [Dark] tags by my count. Guess she'll have to hand that crown over to Dash.
On a more friendly note, reading these made me really glad I left "30 Days of Fabulosity" in my Read Later list even after it was concluded, because otherwise I would never have found the other five compilations. And that's just not a happy thought.
1519908 One, two, three, four, f... ffffffffff...
How did I mis-count that? I don't...
No, wait, I know what's going on here. Her Ticket is labeled as [Dark] on my local copy, but it's just [Slice of Life] here on FimFic. That's why the count is off.