Re: Things that annoy me about BetterBuffyFics -- Better Buffy Fics

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Date Posted: 18:04:19 11/20/02 Wed
Author: Barb
Subject: Re: Things that annoy me about BetterBuffyFics
In reply to: bbf member 's message, "Things that annoy me about BetterBuffyFics" on 01:16:32 11/12/02 Tue

The "I can't believe.." and the " is the only one!" stuff can be a little bit annoying, but it's very, very, very minor. I suffer worse annoyances driving to work every morning. I think most people are tongue-in-cheek about #2 anyway.

As for #3, the existence of this board is no skin off my nose. If discussion here picks up, great. If not, well, it's not like I'm being charged for its upkeep or anything.

>4) Discussion of fics. Except for the recs discussion
>is so scarce that one might say it's non-
>existent. Presumably, this is due to the fact that the
>authors of the fics are subscribed to the
>group and their tender hearts may be shattered into
>million pieces by hearing something
>negative about their work. At best what one can say is
>"I don't like it, it's not for me". And
>heaven forbid you do say something harsher, then
>you'll become just like the meanies on TWoP.

As lakrids said, I'd phrase criticism which I knew the author was going to read differently. But knowing the author's going to be reading doesn't change what I say, only how I say it. The main thing that inhibits me from posting is a deep terror of accidentally saying something spoilery and forgetting to put spoiler tags on the post and getting hunted down and skinned by the mods.

The times (all one or two of them) I've gotten involved in a critical discussion on the list I try to give concrete reasons why I don't like a fic or why it's not for me. Otherwise it's not very helpful to other prospective readres or to the author, for that matter. Criticism can hurt, but if it's thoughtful we need to hear it. And if it's not thoughtful, we should be able to get over it. Go on, crush my tender heart. You know you want to!

Barb

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[> Re: Things that annoy me about BetterBuffyFics -- Riolist, 20:07:16 11/20/02 Wed

Just a couple of comments...

>1) The line "I can't believe this hasn't been recced
>before" No! Really? For those in the
>audience who live in a cave here is an interesting bit
>of information. So if you want something
>recced do it yourself but spare us your rightful
>horror.

I usually take this sentence in one of two ways, depending on who's doing the reccing and what their pushing. :)
For example, in the case of Gyrus' rec of THE TRICK CHRONICLES, I really can't believe that someone hadn't recced that yet given the size of the series and the quality of the writing. Thus, in my mind, the perfect use of the phrase.

However, for the majority of people who pull the "I can't believe" stuff, I see it as their way of saying "Please don't hate me if I'm recommending something that EVERYONE knows about just because I'm not clever/industrious/technologically savvy enough to find it in the bookmarks or archive" and just go on with my life.

>3) This board.

I have to agree with this one. Half the time I forget that the "other" board is out here; the other half, I just don't have time to check it.

>4) Discussion of fics. Except for the recs discussion
>is so scarce that one might say it's non-
>existent.

I would love to see more discussion of fics also, but given the size of the Buffy fandom and sheer number of fics, I see one of the difficulties in getting a good discussion going is that everyone is reading different things at different times.

I'm not sure if this has been suggested before (I'll admit it, I'm too lazy to check past messages), but maybe we could do more of a formal book club thing and choose a fic to read and discuss on a weekly basis.

Also... I'd like to add one more annoying thing and a couple of things that don't annoy me.

Keeping with the numbering thing:
5) The bookmarks/links arranged by size. While I appreciate the difficulty in coming up with a method of organization, I often feel frustrated after searching for something within those folders when I have no clue as to the size of what I'm looking for. When I'm looking for something to read, I'm more likely to want to look for a certain genre, character, time frame, etc. than a short, medium or long fic.

And a couple of things that are not so annoying...
A) The time and effort put into the list and the archive but the BBF Powers That Be. This is one of the better, if not the best, lists I've been a member of and I appreciate that you all have spent so much of your time to make it so.
B) The "community events" such as "Pimp yourself" day (or whatever it was called) and the New Author search. Although, come to think of it, I'm not sure if the second one ever got off the ground. In any case, they were both clever ideas to get more people to participate.

Hmmmm...for a person who never uses the board, I certainly seem to have said a lot. :)

-Riolist

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