In which I get mocked by a completely different fandom · 1:18pm Feb 16th, 2019
I know I've been blog-quiet for a while now -- again -- and part of that is because I feel very few people want to see me describe life as the thing during which medical appointments are scheduled. (Four days of them in a row next week. Four.) In that sense, it's hard to find both things to talk about and the time to ramble on them. But...
I found a new incoming referral on Triptych. Three hundred and thirty incomings, although there didn't seem to be any real correlation to increased page views: more of a glance-and-leave, presumably in disgust. It led back to Questionable Questing and because Knighty took out the exact links long ago, I had to track it down myself.
Turns out it goes to a recent segment of With This Ring. If you're not familiar with it, the story is a mega-fanfic for the DC universe -- more specifically, the animated Young Justice continuity and yes, I am stuck waiting on the home release for S3. It's rather popular. Based on its trope page views, it's much better known than anything I've done. (I was aware of the story before this happened: came across its main trope page on a Random Media hit and browsed for a while.) And this wasn't a referral because someone mentioned it in the story's comments. It was a link embedded into the story itself, because WTR recently went pony and the author decided to make a sideways mention of my work.
So I got noticed by a Bigger Gun. My incredibly dubious Internet """""""fame""""""" is spreading! Good times for all!
"But if we can get back to the point?" Sunset folds her arms across her chest and waits for a moment. "If we assume that my revised calculations for the application of magic 'work' are even remotely accurate, Earth Ponies should be able to do a lot more than they can."
"So… Some sort of giant Earth Pony conspiracy to keep food prices high?"
"What?" Sunset frowns. "No, that's absurd. Aside from the fact that only a minority of Earth Ponies work on commercial farms, that would require them to keep it secret from non-Earth Pony husbands, wives, parents and children. And Alicorns have the magic of all three tribes."
...so the good news is that the 'verse's own collection of trope pages has just added one more: Referenced By, because now there's a single-case need for it. Plus we finally have a semi-official Take That! entry, and that's arguably been long overdue because up until this point, they were all unofficial.
I'm sure there's some bad news to go with it, but I'll figure out what it is in a waiting room.
If you're curious: her monthly pain doctor, surgical clearance/EKG/blood test (more vertebrae work on the 28th), colon camera, and a dental evaluation at a college clinic.
And no, I'm not angry, demanding edits, or asking anyone to do such for me. I have no major issues with this and I'm not going to interfere with someone else's work.
"""""""Fame"""""" svcks.
I'd make a small bet that you won't HAVE TO "figure out the bad news" for the same reason that no one has to "figure out" that Godzilla is trashing Tokyo -it will become hideously self evident
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=lyrics+godzilla+blue+oyster+cult&&view=detail&mid=FE6E1A0692CCC02B832BFE6E1A0692CCC02B832B&&FORM=VRDGAR
Oh. That link is actually in the story itself. That's rude on multiple levels.
It took me a great deal of effort to suss out what was actually going on here. c.c
I'm... sorry your story is on TVTropes? <.<;
Ah, they just don't know a good thing when they see it. But hey, perhaps a few of them decided to stay and poke around to see what else is on offer hereabouts!
Please don't judge us based on the contents of the featured box...
You're very thorough in tracking attention your stories receive.
5014465
Not necessarily. It's possible that this was along the lines of an 'But I kid because I love,' (although my natural inclinations make it hard to look that way) or even a 'someone just mentioned this to me, so...' Or it could also be a direct 'And here is the idiot I am referencing.' Authorial intent isn't always easy to pick out, especially since I don't know how, when, and why he's linked other works in the past.
5014470
So is everyone who's ever hit the main page on a spin of the Random Media wheel. But I may need to explain a couple of things for the non-writers and new arrivals in the group, so...
Incoming Referrals
Every story has a Statistics page. To find it, look to the right edge of the Upvote/Downvote bar. You'll find a downwards-pointing arrow next to the page views counter. Hitting that opens a menu: Statistics is the second entry. This tracks page (and chapter) views over time, the story's position in the site's rankings, how many bookshelves the story is on -- and referrals.
For example, here's the Statistics page for Soul Survivor. And if you look to the right and scroll down a bit, you'll find Referrals.
Basically, every time someone arrives at the story from an offsite link (as opposed to onsite ones, which aren't counted), it's added to the Referrals column. In the past, this was displayed as a pie chart on the story's front page and showed the exact URL for the sending address. But Knighty stopped doing that -- it's still missed -- and now all you get is the column and the top URL. Anything beyond that, you're tracking on your own.
But the core idea is still there. When someone looks up your story through a search engine and then comes to the page -- if there's an offsite forum discussion which includes a link -- you'll know. As such, it's not a bad idea for the writers in the group to check their various Statistics pages once in a while, especially if you get a page view jump out of what only looked like nowhere.
For Soul Survivor, the referrals look like this:
Nothing spectacular. The CDA has a TVtropes page of its own, so sometimes people will view that and then come to the story afterwards. Each nation's Google is counted separately. Singularity Dream reviewed the story on their own site, so there's a few arrivals from there. Two people came in after reading the Patreon announcement. And that's about it. It may be a typical example for one of my works: I don't exactly get a lot of offsite discussion.
For comparison, here's the same list for Five Hundred Little Murders.
There's a lot more going on here. This was my Royal Canterlot Library feature, and that's why the EQD referrals are present. (I have the story linked on my Patreon front page for that reason: something for new arrivals to read before they consider pledging.) There's been some offsite discussion, and search engines have accumulated over time. The Polish translation explains the .pl address -- but joomag and jeuxvideo? No idea, and without having the exact links any more, I may never know. And of course, 4chan incomings. Run.
The Triptych referrals list is a majority of TVTropes links, very few of which led to actual chapter views. But it still adds an entry now and again. And when I see 330 incoming referrals... it stands out. So I backtracked.
The Triptych Continuum TVTropes page(s)
This link goes to the main page. There are multiple subpages, and reader edits are welcome. (Especially for the Crowner pages, where I'm not necessarily the best judge of what's Awesome or Nightmare Fuel.) As of this writing, the 'verse has trope references on over one hundred pages outside its own cluster and has seen -- this is the actual number -- 11,111 hits from offsite, non-search engine links.
Yes, I took a screenshot.
(Different devices used by the same person are likely counted separately. I probably got some false positives from the Quicksand album. Everyone who's just gone from the typical link in a story's long description and then immediately closed the browser gets added in anyway.)
5014485
See above: page view bumps can stand out, and I also just like to know where my latest bashing came from.
But thee art more popular than me -- and so here's the Referrals list for All The Mortal Remains.
For tracking, the TinyURL one is pretty much mission impossible. Some of the rest could be hunted down, especially that big EQD number.
Never seen Darkpony.space before, though. And tracking Facebook...
5014465
I mean, I’d personally be honored.
It's not necessarily a bad thing, at least it means you have some notoriety that someone would feel the need to put it in and mention it in their story. And who knows, maybe it does lead someone who otherwise would never have found your catalog to see some great stories.
So... there is a giant earth pony conspiracy to keep food prices high in Triptych?
5014486
AS someone who is (somewhat reluctantly) still following Zoat's wild ride, let me try to explain.
...Actually, no, I'm pretty sure he's never linked to other works before, and this was pretty derisive. That's just really rude, and I lost some of my lingering respect for this author when I saw that link. There are frequent links in WTR, but they mostly go to fandom wikis so people who don't have Zoat's ridiculously encyclopedic knowledge of DC lore can follow what's going on.
I actually like your medical updates.
The link within the body of the story is a little classless. Also I JUST STARTED GOING THROUGH THE MONUMENTAL UNDERTAKING OF READING THROUGH TRIPTYCH FUUUUU...
Ahem
I suppose with how long the story's been going spoilers are fair game.
And as always, good luck with the medical stuff.
5014595
It really didn't spoil much. The Giant Conspiracy first appears in Chapter Five.
...well, that one does.
5014599
I'm also not particularly against spoilers, I just like acting like it sometimes. Honestly, knowing the spoilers lets you play Spot the Foreshadowing and that's a much more fun reading experience for me.
Ah, sorry, Estee, about all the medical appointments and the """"""""Fame""""""".
5014485
I looked up darkpony.space. It looks like Russian translations of FIMFic stories. It also looks like you're very popular in Russia.
The story behind some of the reference links boggles the mind. It's also helpful, because I didn't realize somebody had done an automated reading of Monster until I saw the reference.
Oh wow.
I used to read WTR. I hang around on SV a lot and it was hard to avoid it for a while. From the perspective of someone who's fairly familiar with the politics/culture/drama of the board (well, boards - it's a thing) in question, I can say that you're probably right not to put too much importance in catching some flak from that position. I can give details if you're curious, but for now I'll just say that the author hasn't exactly covered themselves in glory lately.
5014556
I haven't read With This Ring, just heard of it. I've seen it mentioned a few times around Space Battles, but I thought it was only a DC/Young Justice story. I'm not sure how Sunset or any other franchise got involved. Is that part of the "wild ride?"
Eh. Between the two, I find Tryptich to be much more gripping, emotionally. With This Ring got... sidetracked? It's a bit overblown if you ask me, and the writing style is not nearly as interesting as yours.
It's not even a conspiracy to artificially inflate food prices.
It's a conspiracy to hide a secret weapon from other ponies on the off chance that they end up in a race war.
One of my stories has hits from kiwifarms and plagscan.
Well, it's publicity alright. :)
I look forward to any updates from you, regardless of what they're about. It lets us know you're still kicking and venting is a lot healthier than keeping things bottled up.
5014556
During the Fool's Canon episode, he linked to Worm, as an example of "all grimdark all the time." There might be others I've forgotten.
Also, I suggest not reading too much into Sunset's reaction here. Sure, she was dismissive, but she's shown elsewhere in WTR to be anti-social, short-tempered, and self-centered. She could be quite wrong. If you want to know how the author actually feels about the idea, you'd be better off looking at Grayven's reaction, since he's a divergent form of what was originally an author self-insert. And he didn't seem to treat an Earth Pony conspiracy as being ridiculous. So, I'd say that Mr Zoat takes that story idea seriously, even if Sunset Shimmer does not.
There may be an opportunity to find out more in a few months, when episode 94 is written. Looks like Grayven will take a trip to Equestria.
5014926
> I'm not sure how Sunset or any other franchise got involved. Is that part of the "wild ride?"
On the first of April in-story, the protagonist of With This Ring encountered a number of other fictional universes, from alternate DC Comics universes to Kung Fu Panda and Captain Planet. One of those contacts was Sunset Shimmer arriving through a portal that transformed her into a human - and then immediately closed behind her, which she didn't expect. She gets recruited to help study magic, though she spends most of her time on her own research to become an alicorn.
So, Mr Zoat has made another reference to Triptych, and sure enough, it sounds as though he does like it. Perhaps that's why the character in his story who dissed it was a not-really-reformed Sunset Shimmer? Ie not a reliable source.
https://forum.questionablequesting.com/threads/with-this-ring-young-justice-si-thread-fourteen.8938/page-453#post-3023161
5014486
For what it's worth, the episodes where Grayven visits Equestria have been published now. And sure enough, not only does he find that there is a native (albeit not well known) earth magic tradition, Sunset Shimmer even gets beaten up with it by Maud in a spar.
Sorry to hear that you felt the original reference was an attack on your story. I'm pretty sure it wasn't intended as one.