Site Post » PATIENCE · 3:26pm Jul 3rd, 2012
We haven't made a site post in a while, so I thought this would be a good enough excuse. I've been getting a relatively high amount of messages lately asking "Why hasn't my story been approved?" or some other similar question. Well, the answer is simple: We haven't gotten around to approving it yet.
A few months ago I wrote this post about how our story approval process works. I suggest you give it a good peeping if you're curious. We don't have all the time in the world to sit down and just click on stories to approve them. It's a very tedious and time consuming job for almost no reward. Every time we bring someone on to help with it they inevitably get fed up and stop doing it eventually (we are NOT looking for help approving stories! any requests will be ignored). Me and Wanderer D usually do the bulk of approval these days, and if one of us doesn't feel like doing it, stories don't get approved, unfortunately.
Basically, we're sorry if your story hasn't been approved yet. I do try my best to keep the stories flowing, but some days I just don't feel like doing it or don't have time to do it. The other moderators do the best they can as well. PMing or emailing us to ask whether your story has been approved yet unfortunately won't speed up the process!
Chin up, lad. Keep calm, and post ponies at a pace that is convenient for you. We (I, anyway) know you have a life outside this site.
208205
Well, what I laughingly call a life, anyway
Patience is key, right?
Patience is necessary to survival. So naturally, most people lack it.
.... I can accept this, though prepare for the butthurt from dum-dums
thought this would be about the error 502, 504 annoyance. maybe you already made a post on that? i'll go check.
People and ponies shouldn't be bothering you guys like that, that's rude and impatient. We should just wait patiently, as my granddad said, "good things come to those who wait".
And besides, I'd thought that Bronycon would've kept people busy, but there seems to be more stories being published than ever. Weird.
I'm just glad that you guys are managing through this, I don't think I could manage if I had a hundred messages an hour saying "hey, my story hasn't been approved! Get approving it!"
208237
We're getting a new server to try and solve the issues we've been having. Our hosting company kept giving us bum hard drives so we are scouting some alternatives
208248 oh that's good to hear. pony on then
I can see how y'all get fed up. Being that the bulk of stories now-a-days are lazily thought out self-insert/HiE-walls of text. I am serious, what the hell are new author's doing now? It's like they take all their writing skills from the goddam forums, and while I've received positive feedback when reviewing them, it's actually kind of mind boggling how PEOPLE SOMEHOW COPY-PASTE STORIES FROM ONE ANOTHER. There are so many samey-samey HiEs every day that it's just baffling how so many could fall into the same pattern as their peers.
Anyway, for aspiring new authors, please take a look at this before submitting anything. Trust me, it'll save you all a lot of grievances.
dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/sillyfilly_Derpy_Hooves.png
dl.dropbox.com/u/31471793/FiMFiction/emoticons/sillyfilly_Applebloom.png
What is this 'Patience' and how can i achieve it?
"We are NOT looking for help on this matter!"
MYBE I CAN HLP U WITH THT
...Anyways, what was that thing that happened recently where everyone just kept getting 502 or 504 or somesuch?
EDIT: I need to read comments. I'm rather dumb.
Or you could automatically deny the stories from people who post such impatience.
Nah, that's too harsh. Maybe just slap an additional 7 day delay to the story's approval cues, and give the poster a reply with only that Meow Wow picture in it. Hopefully they'll be too busy trying to decipher the message to notice when their week-long delay is up.
Lol... Gravity Falls.
I JOURNEYED INTO THE DARKEST PITS OF THE REBULICAN PARTY AND RETURNED WITH THE PATIENTS OF A THOUSAND MEN!!!
NOTHING CAN SHAKE MY PATIENCE!!!!!!!!!! I AM THE MOST PATIENT MAN IN THE UNIVERSE!!!!!!!!!
Sees buffering on Youtube: FFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks guys for having patients for everyone and their stories.
I know it may not mean much coming from me, but honestly thank you for your hard work and dedication.
And now, you will get more PM's about it because people are just jerks.
208233 Dum-dums better bring gum-gum!
On a serious note: Even though it's disheartening to know those other volunteers give up, it's nice to know the some people are still doing their best! And I don't blame you for not feeling up to it. Some days you just want/need to do something else.
Here's a question, and I don't know if it's been answered before, but it could be kinda important,
so whatever.
Question: When a story is submitted for approval, how much actually gets read before it's approved?
The first chapter?
All submitted chapters?
Just a quick glance to see if it fits criteria?
The answer could alter submission timing strategy decisions.
I'm just grateful to have a place where all these talented and/or passionate folks can congregate, and I can post pony stories without getting strange looks. Thankless jobs are the hardest to keep up. People may say "thank you" and what not, but there's no paycheck or anything, I mean.
Keep calm and pony on, I suppose.
Are you sure that running a large site with only 5-6 mods is wise...? Just saying you should set up some sort of interview thing monthly/weekly were users can apply for moderatorship. Of course the test wouldn't be easy, but still.
208337
I'd rather not answer a question like that so people don't abuse the system to and get shit past moderation. I will openly admit that we generally only skim stories, though.
So set it up so more people are in charge of story moderation. That's how volunteering works.
Well, at least you (probably) won't be getting any more PM's about stories being approved.
Check that off the list.
I will keep this in mind next time I post a new fic. (though writing a new fic depends on my current fic not getting critically panned, which I'm afraid will happen)
Patience is a virtue.
unfortunately it's also a boring virtue.
The moderators are not robots. they can't work 24/7 people!
I love Gravity Falls
208364
well if you have "volunteers" do the moderating you might get people who will let stories go by that poultron or wanderer would otherwise not let through
New approval method close eyes and start randomly clicking around the screen!
What do you mean that was the old method?
I usually just take a nap and by the time I wake up their posted personally. No need to sweat the time restraints folks. I know it's exciting and all to release a new fic, but take a breath and relax.
208263 Oh, oh, oh, and the ones where they basically just take a successful story written by someone else and add their own ideas into the story and then do (original story name): (their take). Lack of originality is go
208408 And then how they start crying and defending their story when the shit hits the fan.
208411 It's so bad, and yet so amusingly funny at the same time.
208438 Like this one?
Once the author comes back, shit is definitely gonna hit the fan.
This has been noted and filed away in "Important S#!+ To Remember." And I shall be patient when I submit my next story.
Remember kiddies: FIMFICTION DOT NET A SUBSIDIARY OF POULTRONIC INDUSTRIES INC.
208446 Check out this one. Not a spin off, but still so much fail, and the author just thinks hes the greatest shit ever. All these people try to help him, and he just tells um hes a genius and they can all go to hell. I can support a author who tries to improve through comments, especially with an original idea, but some of these guys just make me laugh at their fail.
208540 Bahaha! Poultron, you should put this as your page quote
208551 I looked at the story, and walked away.
As for myself. I hate my own stories. Well, except one...
<.<
>.>
Disavowed...
208552
He should.
You have my pathos and respect fine sir(madam?) Having to deal with walls upon walls of text for so long is not enviable. I just hope that dealing with a disproportionate number of crappy fanfics to good ones doesn't turn you into a jaded husk of human toxic waste. I raise my glass to you.
Not approved yet? Mine all seem to be approved in mere hours, andI'm hardly a big-leaguer around here, so why do people complain? It all seems to be rather quick.
208551 Oh my god that is hilarious.
I drop all pretenses of even trying to help, that actually made me laugh. It was like look at a Half Life, Full Consequences script.
208559 Shameless advertising... I like it!
208570 So bad, so horribly, laughably bad.
208573
It's Monday...couldn't help it...
No problem. I'd been more irritated by the site updating errors than how long it takes for my stories to pop up lol.
The way I see it, the fewer stories that are approved, the more time mine has on the front page!
I think the issue people have, is that it's basically, luck of the dice, or "whether the mods feel like doing it", that determines whether your new story spends five hours at the very top of the front page, or thirty minutes on the front page at all before falling off the bottom. I'm not sure if you really appreciate how valuable that front page real-estate is, especially now that stories only get it once in their entire life-cycle because updated stories don't get on the front page anymore, but that front page time can really make or break a story. Basically, when a new story gets published on here, it gets that first jolt of promotion on the front page, and then that's about it (unless it ends up on EqD), given how hard you have made it for ongoing / updating stories to get in the featured box, or get listed in the Top Stories list anymore.
If there was a way to make sure those kind of drastic disparities in the amount of time a story gets to spend on that precious front page real-estate didn't happen, I think people would have far less of a problem with the approval process as it currently works.
I hope you take this for what it is. Not complaining, but rather pointing out why I think is a real disparity in the way the site currently works that hopefully, some way can be found to fix.
Well, I'm glad that other authors just might understand that the mods have lives outside of the site. Thanks for working so hard, Poultron, and good work.
208581 Speaking of I'm supposed to write a blog about what I want to, but probably won't, write this week.
208627
actually from what we observe not only does the posted time (like early morning or afternoon or whatever) actually seem to affect the average number of views, the amount of time a story is up on the front page also doesnt seem to matter very much. it all comes down to how interesting your story is on the front. people judge books by their covers whether authors like it or not. one way to really boost your views is to have a cover image. ANY cover image will do. having a concise title and description help too.
also, it used to be even worse as stories did not go into a post queue before they were posted. we would just post stories in batches of 4 at a time, then get bored and wander off, leaving those stories to linger on the front page for hours and hours.
we understand very well how the site works.