It's better to be honest and say you don't like a certain song rather than ride their high tail(is that the phrase??) And say you love everything they make cause let's be honest, it's damn near impossible to have a long career and not have 1 song that's just not that great
Yeah, and the thing is that BTS knows this. They donât make every single song with the thought:Â âWeâre certain that every ARMY is bound to love this.â Yes, theyâre creating music to share it with us. But theyâre also making it for themselves, and if they love what theyâve produced, thatâs what matters most.
But when those fans come out and start screeching about how BTS worked hard on the song and so we must appreciate it, itâs just⌠when did not enjoying a song because itâs not our style suddenly equate to disregarding their hard work? I admire and commend the immense effort that BTS put into every single one of their albums, but that does not mean itâs an automatic given that Iâm going to love each song.
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I donât get all this drama about âpotentially copying someoneâs storyâ. If the idea is widely spread (soulmate) and you come up with an idea (specifically when you plan it out like you do) thereâs literally no way that the idea is identical to another.
I donât really know why youâre calling it drama, since I havenât seen this broadly debated at all. Itâs pretty general: the more widely a trope is written, the higher the likeliness of one story of that trope being similar to another.
Using the soulmate trope as an example, it has a very straight-forward formula. I have read numerous soulmate fics that have been constructed on this formula and have been identical in many aspects, despite that the authors definitely wouldnât have copied each other. Itâs simply because thereâs only so many ways you can write a trope and most writers tend to go for the first that pops into their head: soulmate meets soulmate > conflict occurs between the soulmates due to them previously being enemies or one of them having a sensitive past or one of them already having a soulmate > conflict resolves and soulmates end up together because love always pulls through and they were designed by the universe to be united.
With soulmate fics especially, the likelihood strengthens, as there are many categories that narrow it down. The matching tattoo. The connection of senses. The monochrome vision until you see your soulmate for the first time. The changing hair colours. Unless you come up with a âbondâ that is very unique or throw in a very original twist, matching one of those categories with the general formula is bound to cause similarities to appear.
And Iâm not saying that fics like that are bad at all. Iâm a slut for soulmate fics. My old soulmate series, Sillage, was constructed on that exact formula. Theyâre just more susceptible to similarities with other soulmate fics of that nature, which is what occurred with Sillage and is part of the reason I lost inspiration for it. When readers start to notice this, they call you out on it for plagiarising, even if youâve never read or heard of that other fic before.
Also, Iâm not saying that you cannot write an original soulmate fic, because you definitely can if you put a lot of thought into it. For me, not writing one is personal preference in order to avoid the possible backlash.
Another example that Iâm going to leave you with is A Ticket to the Sun. I thought it was a highly original idea when I came up with it, despite that the ballot element of it was vaguely inspired by The Hunger Games. At the beginning of this uni semester, one of my readings was The Lottery by Shirley Jackson; a short story published in 1948 in which a village has an annual ballot, and whoever draws the paper with a dot marked on it is sentenced to death by stoning. Even though Iâd never heard of The Lottery when I started writing A Ticket to the Sun, the plots are very reminiscent of each other, and I was both horrified and amazed whilst reading it because of the shocking similarities.Â
So ideas may not be identical detail-for-detail, but no thought is necessarily original. And in fics, where there are commonly written AUs and tropes, the chances of similarities appearing between fics of those AUs and tropes only grows as more are written and posted.
uhm, not trying to sound rude here but if youâre not writing for us (which is understandable) or not for an audience (this isnât), why do you even post it on Tumblr? Like, i donât get it, sorry. but youâve had previous blogs and you already know how huge the audience is for your writings, and almost everyone in this fanfiction community is kind of âresponsibleâ to make it enjoyable for the reader, if you get what i mean. if youâre doing this as a hobby and merely for you, i donât get the 1/2
concept of publishing your stories onto a social media website. when every single constructive criticism is only answered with âThis is a hobby. I am doing this for me.â It is hard as a reader to get on your level and kind of find a connection. Especially the use of tags somehow shows that people want to gain an audience, itâs most likely not to categories the stories. as iâve mentioned, iâm not trying to attack you. maybe iâm too dumb to get it. 2/2
All of my previous messages have been responded to rather sporadically and while I was busy, so they are somewhat all over the place. Now that I am sitting down and able to properly focus, I will try to clear up my perspective on this as eloquently as possible. Please read this in a calm tone, because I am not angry.
Long before I was even writing fan fiction, I was posting short stories and small pieces of writing to a personal Tumblr blog (completely unrelated to any fandom). Despite that a handful of my real-life friends were capable of seeing and reading those posts, since they were following that blog, I was writing/posting them for myself. I was never crafting them to suit somebody else. To me, that was generally the primary use of a blog; to document parts of your life, your thoughts, your creativity and hobbies. So the reason I started posting my fan fiction to Tumblr was because that was what felt natural to me, after having been posting my other stories to that personal blog for about three years. During those three years, I was not writing my stories down in a journal. I was writing them in a Tumblr text post and archiving them in an online journal; that blog. I hope that addresses why I began posting my stories here.
As for your: âAlmost everyone in this fan fiction community is kind of âresponsibleâ to make it enjoyable for the reader,â comment, I guess I must be the percentage that is not completely the case. I genuinely think that is kind of... silly and borderline entitled. I have never read any fics on here with the thought:Â âI hope this is enjoyable for me, because it is fan fiction and so the writer has written this specifically for me,â in mind. I think I do somewhat get your intentions, if you are meaning it is because the majority of fics posted by the community are in second person perspective and/or reader-insert. Which is still, you know, not a good enough reason to say it is therefore the writerâs ultimate responsibility to make it enjoyable for the reader. I feel like most fic writers would not react nicely if you said that to them.Â
Bottom line is that we do not owe such responsibility or enjoyment to anyone. We are just real people with real lives who are writing fics because we love writing, and we wish to share that fun with the rest of you.
Continuing on, this is a hobby, and I am doing this for me. When I say that I am writing for myself, I mean that I am writing fics for my own fun, and to work on my writing style. If I was writing for others, I would have requests open and be tailoring everything I write to the precise desires of those who are so insistent on me better suiting it to them. When I say that I am writing as a hobby, I mean that I am writing fics in the precise same way that I wrote those short stories for my personal blog all those years ago. When I answered an ask with: âI am not here to accumulate readers or notes,â I meant that having readers is a freaking wonderful bonus, but I could delete my blog right now, start on a clean slate, and be just as happy. When I also answered that ask with: âI am not here to cater to any particular audience outside of myself,â I meant that I am not here to alter my writing style so that it better suits a particular age group, reading level, etc.Â
So yes, I am answering constructive criticism with such responses because 1. I am doing a double-major at my university for creative/professional writing, where I already receive a ton of constructive criticism from my tutors and peers, and 2. I consider this space as a free one where I write how I want, what I want, and as nothing more than a hobby. But the main issue with the âconstructiveâ criticism I have received lately (save for the one about run-on sentences) is that none of it is necessarily constructive. The thing with constructive criticism is that it is not only meant to help you improve, but it is supposed to inspire you to do so. It provides you with new ideas and methods to orchestrate into your work, whilst simultaneously giving you the creative drive to pursue them. And I can tell you for sure, being told that I am trying to âpull off an âI am an authorâ conceptâ is certainly not inspiring.
In regards to audience, what I am trying to say is that it was never my intention to have one. I am very clearly presenting my stories to an audience now. But I did not start posting my fics on my first fic blog, sugasmut, with the thought:Â âI hope somebody reads this,â because I never had that kind of thought when I was posting short stories on my personal blog. Though once I slowly started to gain a reader-base, I realised that hey, people actually enjoy my writing. From there, I never expected fic writing to become such a big part of my life, nor for this many people to join me in that. So yes, while my initial intentions of posting my writing on here remain to be true (a fun hobby that focuses on developing my style), I am now happily sharing that with the incredible readers who have become interested in my writings along the way.
Anyway, here is the core of this massive rant in a neat summary:
I started posting my fics on here due to force of habit from when I posted non-fandom short stories on a personal blog, back when I was a teenager; I never thought I would gain an audience, nor did I aim for that
I am writing for myself and as a hobby; by that, I mean I am writing for my own improvement and for my own personal enjoyment/fun (not the literal: âI am only writing for me and only I am allowed to read it!!â)
Although I am posting such stories online as a hobby, it is not a call for constructive criticism; I receive enough professional constructive criticism in my course that I am actively applying to my style
âAlmost everyone in this fan fiction community is kind of âresponsibleâ to make it enjoyable for the reader,â is highly incorrect, please do not think like that
I love and adore my readers beyond comprehension, and I am truly honoured that they enjoy my writings, I respect them with my whole heart
âDo you know this fic? [Insert description of fic]â which I have already addressed here and in my FAQ. I have received another 3 overnight, sigh.Â
I tend to get about 8-10 of those questions about different fics every day, and it has really started to clog up my inbox. I am not a big reader nowadays, anyway, so I usually do not know 6/8 of the fics that are being searched for. Hence why I have given my answer to those sorts of questions in my FAQ.Â
Yet it seems that some people just cannot comprehend the purpose of a FAQ. Instead, they prefer to completely avoid my only request of checking it for their question before sending me said question. And this gets... exceptionally frustrating.
So let me say it again: I am no longer answering questions that revolve around searching for a specific fic that you once read, or heard of. I spent a handful of hours the other day reorganising my desktop and mobile themes for my fic recs blog @thelibraryofbts. It now has filters that make for easier navigating, and they can narrow down your search to the specifics of the fic you are looking for. If no results show up that are similar to the fic, that means I have never read it, and so I do not know the author/title either.
What you did with the penetration station was awful. In trying to expose a bunch of bullies, you guys went to the extremes and back even calling them the 'penetration station'. You guys have such a large following and to exploit that and make such a big matter over something that should have been solved personally? Honestly, what makes you better then them? I'm sorry but I've lost a lot of respect for the writers I once highly looked up to.
Iâm genuinely disappointed. Sure these people were problematic and bullies and Iâm not trying to downplay their mistakes but I sincerely hope you see mistakes in the way you guys carried this out too. Your asking many people not to send hate- but thatâs exactly whatâs going to happen considering the lengths at which you went to outst them. Sure you can go tell your followers not to hate on them but you set them up to be victims of bullying too. Are you pleased?
Considering this is the only message I have received on the matter, I am going to answer you because I believe I need to make a few points of my own and clear up some of what you have said. Prepare for this to be a lengthy response.
1. They named themselves the Penetration Station. That was what they personally labelled their friend gang, and what they tagged their posts involving the friends involved in the incident as. There is no reason in the absolute slightest that we would call them such a name outside of the fact that this is what they called themselves, and this is what their readers knew them collectively as.
2. Do you really believe that we did this without any thought? The personal/private route was the first one we deliberated, and making that post was our last resort. Do you really think that we wanted to do this, that we thought we would be heroes by exposing those screenshots? We thoroughly considered all options, and unfortunately, the post went from our last resort to our only resort. What we have also discovered since putting up the post is that sure, if we had handled the matter privately, it would have been away from the public eye and the issue with Ave might have been solved. But there would have been a fair amount of other worse bullying incidents that they were doing, which we had no clue about until yesterday, that would have continued on without our knowledge.Â
3. We are in no way happy that this is the route we had to take. Do you see any of us on our blogs celebrating and boasting the fact that they have removed themselves from the community? No. We are not saying that they deserved what they got. We are not trying to pit anyone against them. I keep seeing it be brought up that us strongly advocating to not send them hate is not going to stop the hate, but would you rather we never said anything about sending hate at all and let anyone have at them? Us saying that was to make people stop in their tracks and consider their actions before they go forth and do something that stoops down to their level. We knew that negativity would be a consequence of spreading the awareness about these bullies in our community, so all we could do in this case was do our best to firmly put out that we do not condone, nor support the sending of hate mail.
4. Large followings or not, that was not our focus in the slightest. We never thought:Â âWe have bigger followings, so the support will be on our side,â in this case. We did not band together based on the fact that each of us have decent sized followings either, and rather because we are all good friends with Ave who she trusts. All we were doing was taking the measures we had to in order to protect Ave, and also numerous other members of the writing community who were having worse occur to them without our knowledge.
5. Although you have not addressed it here, I would also like to say that yes, the post could have gone without that final line about the tea. But if any of you are going to allow that one line to completely offset the entire attitude the post, then so be it. That is your decision to make.
6. They never apologised to Ave, which is the one thing that we wanted to come out of this situation because then, we would have been able to slowly forgive their actions and let bygones be bygones. Yes, they made apology posts, but their expressions of regret were directed at their friends and the network. They never directly apologised to her. The only one of their group who has been the bigger person and come forward to apologise to Ave is Jaz, which is commendable of her and we appreciate that more than we can express.
Am I pleased? No, I am not pleased in any way about this having to occur. None of us are. I am beyond against call outs, so personally, for me to be involved in this is a big display of the matter that we had no other options. I have said to myself many times: âThis couldâve been avoided if we never did the post.â But what I have come to believe more strongly is: âThis couldâve been avoided if those girls never bullied Ave and Candee, and did worse to other members of this community.âÂ
If you have lost respect for me and the other writers involved in the post because of this situation, then that is your call. We are not forcing anyone who is not comfortable with our last resort decision to support us as writers. Just know that this never could have been a private matter that would have been completely resolved, as much as we would have preferred it to have been done that way.
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as a writer, i think the feedback/reviews is a two way thing. as in, if someome gave you (not you, but writers in general) feeback and didnt get any reaction/reply from the writer (on websites like FFN/AO3 where you dont directly interact w writers bc you comment on their story and thats ir) then, whats the point of giving feedback? It looks v unappreciative on the writers side. [1]
on the other hand, on tumblr ppl can interact w writers directly via âasksâ which is better but imagine taking time out of your life to send this super long feedback only to get a âomg thank you!!â And somewhere along the lines which sounds as generic as the next feedback that goes âhey i like what you wroteâ itâs disheartening in itself to know that the feedback you pour your heart into is equivalent to a mindless, barely feedback-like, well, feedback [2]
what im saying is, both readers and writers will have to play a part in this. readers take the time out of their life to give feedback and writers should at least show a little bit more enthusiasm through their replies. these replies reflect how much you appreciate feedback and if it doesnt show, then chances are readers are gonna go âtheyâve prolly heard this a thousand times alr and will reply w the same old reply bc theyre bored of hearing the same thingâ and theyll end up not giving [3]
so writers shouldnt be whining like a baby if they didnt get feedback. its prolly bc they read and dont respond to it (most likely on ffn, ao3 etc) which makes the readers believe their feedback is unheard. and even if they did, their reply prolly doesnt sound like theyre happy about the feedback which can deflect potential feedbackers. now i get feedback every once in awhile, not many, but i do get them [4]
and i make sure to reply to them in a similar length to their feedback because readers are just as human and own lives and they take the time to send us feedback so its only fair for writers to take the time out of our life to reply to them in a similar fashion and not just go âthank you omg etcâ but actually lengthen our reply (referring to those who give long feedback) [5]
i think i forgot to turn on anon on that last ask. sorry im kinda out of it atm bc im losing sleep these past few days but i hope i got my point across and that you read it in a calm manner. i only mention that im a writer so that others would understand im not coming onto fellow writers like i havent been in their shoes. I have and still am as i only get 1 or 2 feedback w every fic i post. [6]
i guess thats it. tldr dear writers, pls remember we write for ourselves first. kf we get feedback, thats nice and if not, thats cool too. we dont need to be demanding every single person for feedback. and readers, giving feedback is a nice thing to do but dont do it if you dont want to or if the writer comes off ingenuine with their reply or if you read the whole fic but dont rly enjoy it. its a two way thing. i hope others get it despite my limited vocab and word building đ [7/7]
oh i just reread the feedback/review reblog. its true that feedback motivates writers, and its very disheartening when only the first chapter gets hyped but the rest doesnt. still, i stand with what i say, and thats for writers to be more vocal about how they aprpeciate the readersâ feedback and also for the readers to give feedback but because they really love what they read and want to tell the writer that. you dont have to give it if you feel something off. either move on or point it out đŞ
(Sorry to mobile users; Iâve put it under a read more, but this got super long.)
Iâm going to try address each of the things youâve said here in order.
Firstly, thereâs only so many ways that a writer can say âthank youâ in a response. Thatâs great that you put effort into your responses to feedback. So do I. But trust me when I say that I try very, very hard to make each of my responses to feedback different to the previous one, though itâs almost impossible. The only way I can make it different is if the reader has pointed out a specific element of the story that I can further discuss and fan-girl with them over, etc. Otherwise, all I can do is say âthank youâ and mean it with all my heartâand I do mean it every single time, no matter if I provide one sentence or a whole paragraph in response. At the end of the day, I mainly express my gratitude by doing my best to produce more content for my readers to read.
(Side note on this: itâs unfair to use a writerâs enthusiasm to feedback as an indicator of whether you go out of your way to provide them with it. Considering this is all text-based, tone is difficult to decipher. One writer might display their enthusiasm by adding emojis and hearts throughout their responses, while another may perceive nothing more than: âThank you so much!â as being enthusiastic. Thatâs just something to keep in mind!!)
Secondly, and personally, when I provide feedback to a writer, no matter how long or short my feedback is, I donât do it for a response. Iâm not writing an in-depth review of their story for them to send me a âthank youâ messageâIâm writing it because I want them to know how much I appreciated their story and their hard work. I want them to know how much I enjoyed being inside of that world they created throughout the duration of reading it. Thatâs the point of feedback. Iâm not saying that writers shouldnât feel obligated to respond to feedbackâitâs always nice to be thanked. But if I donât receive an answer from a writer Iâve given feedback to, Iâm content knowing that they most likely read it, and that it probably made them smile.
Because no matter if you write for yourself, receiving feedback doesnât make a writer angry or sad. For example, if youâre in a writing rut, it can be super hard to pull yourself out of itâbut a message expressing that your fics are appreciated can light that spark of inspiration in an instant. That has happened for me more times than I can count. And at that, feedback doesnât have to be a five-part message for it to be motivating. It can literally be 10 messages from 10 different readers that say the sentence: âYour fic was great!â in slightly different variations, and itâs still going to make any writerâs day over no messages.
Thirdly, I donât know of a single writer in the Tumblr BTS fandom who purposefully doesnât respond to feedback. To suggest that they âwhine like a babyâ about lack of feedback only to not answer it when they receive it is just⌠wrong. There are more eligible reasons, such as 1. Theyâve received an overwhelming number of messages (and that number can vary depending on the person; 10 messages can hold the pressure of receiving 100, for some), 2. Theyâre busy with real-life responsibilities, 3. The message didnât come through because Tumblr is shit like that, 4. Some writers like to keep their messages in their inbox to read on a day theyâre feeling uninspired, 5. Anything other than them not caring about the feedback theyâve received. As I said, I canât think of a single writer who doesnât feel their spirits lift when reading feedback, no matter if they only write for themselves, so they wouldnât purposefully be ignoring it. I understand readers might think that way if their feedback has gone without a response from the writer, but really, thatâs a highly unlikely reason.
Overall, nobody is forcing readers to provide feedback. If a reader doesnât like something theyâve read, weâre not telling them to provide feedback on it. All weâre saying is that receiving feedback is wonderful and encouraging, just as receiving content to read is exciting and enjoyable. Weâre saying that if you enjoyed our fics, donât hesitate to let us know about it, because knowing that weâre writing good stuff is going to motivate us to write more good stuff. Itâs letting writers who write for themselves know that them posting their stories is not just an echo into the void. And, to be honest, if a reader can demand a second part to a fic or harass a writer for the next chapter of a series, which happens exceptionally more often, then a writer can say: âHey, some feedback to give me a bit of motivation would be cool,â every once in a while.
(Final note: Iâm saying all of this based on the BTS Tumblr writers that I follow and/or know of. Iâve never seen any of them respond unenthusiastically to a feedback message. So hey, you mightâve seen a writer or two that I donât know of respond unenthusiastically or disregard feedback messages, but I can assure you that theyâre a minorityâand even then, they might have their very valid reasons for not being able to answer it.)
okay there's nothing wrong with not liking the music of group if it's not your taste!! see it's cool that people like you understand that bts is growing as a group and like to try things out and respect them and their art form ya know, but that doesn't mean everyone's gotta like every single sound they create. we all have our tastes, let people live jfc
Exactly, thank you. As Iâve said before, I donât like half the songs on their entire discography, but I still love the other half. Likewise, my readers arenât going to like every single story I post, and itâs impractical to think that they will.
Even though this is not what that anon was doing/saying, it feels relevant to point this out. Everyone is so quick to jump on fans who have an opinion about BTS and/or their music that isnât rooted in positivity and praise. BTS are not perfect human beings. BTS are not perfect artists. Theyâre pretty darn close, but theyâre not. As long as the fansâ opinions arenât blatantly spiteful, itâs completely natural to have an âunpopularâ opinion about someone/something.
Thinking that they are the purest goody-two-shoes who canât make a song thatâs any less than amazing is highly idealistic. And thatâs no hate to any fan whose mindset is like that, because theyâre free to their own opinions. But when those fans start attacking other fans who even hint at a slightly opposing opinion to their own, thatâs when it becomes a problem.