Comment Meta

[amaresu]

Femslash Mini Meta fest was an utter fail this year. And I'm still not in a place where I could do it, so I purpose Comment Meta. And let's have it cover all things female and fannish. However you define those.

How it works

1. Post a meta topic in a top level comment. Use the subject line for the meta subject and expand as you want in the body of the comment. Or don't.

2. Repeat Step 1 for as many meta ideas as you have.

3. Comment on other meta topics.


It's kinda like a kink meme, only with meta. Feel free to browse the mini meta tag for ideas.

This is meant to be about as low pressure as it comes. Feel free to write on your own journal/Tumblr/blog and link back here. Respond with as little or as much as you want. This post will remain open indefinitely, so please track it if that makes things easier for you.

Comments

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[havocthecat]

Commas. Good God, commas. The bane of my betareading existence. (Yes, I know that's a sentence fragment, but it's for emphasis.) No, seriously, commas are one of the things that drive me the most nuts about fic, but which people seem to screw up terribly, terribly badly. I also hate passive voice, too many adverbs, subject-verb agreement, consistent tenses, redundant description, and overused ellipses. (In fact, if the ellipsis were banned from fanfic, I think I might throw a party.)

Commas and passive voice also seem to be the things that people just don't learn how to fix. I've given up on fixing them for people, because who has that kind of time? I can't tell you, though, how many times I've betaread for someone, sent them a general description of comma use, fixed the first two or three (or half dozen) errors, and then linked them to a university's writing guides on grammar, only to get their next story with just as many errors as their last. (If you're reading this and I've done this to you, which is entirely possible, I'm sure you've already accepted that I'm a very particular person and have moved on to other betareaders. I'm fine with that.)

Just Be Nice kerfuffles can kiss my ass. I wish I were kidding, because I really do love being nice to people, but I also interpret "just be nice" a little differently. It is nice to tell me when I have made a mistake, thereby giving me the opportunity to fix it. It is nice to let me know what I have done wrong, so I don't find a typo five years later and become convinced that all of fandom has spent the last five years sniggering at my inability to type "the" instead of "teh" five percent of the time. Also, it is nice to want to help someone to become a better writer, and, frankly, it's about time we started divorcing the idea of constructive criticism from bitchy posts railing against bad fic. They are two different things, and bitchy posts don't suddenly make concrit not okay.

I don't have the time to beta and concrit as much as I would like, but I miss it. I come from a time and place in fandom where betareading involved long hours of line-by-line work. It wasn't just copyediting, but it was also a back and forth dialogue with the person you were betareading for about the meaning of the story, the motivations of the characters, the details of who is reading what, or listening to what, or the implications of your plot on the characters' lives three years past the end of your story. I miss that kind of in-depth work. It was more like editing than anything.

The problem with that kind of in-depth beta is that it's hard, lately, to find people even willing to take the time to read a fic and chat a little about it. I have friends I've given up on, because every time I ask them to read a story and give me general plot feedback, they "accidentally" get kicked from gchat. (The first few times I believe it, but after that, I don't happen to be that gullible.) I want back and forth, and friends who will give me that kind of critique in exchange for my in depth critique.

I'd come up with kind of a summation, but I have to run off and pick up the kidlet from day care. I'm sure I've soapboxed enough, though.

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[jelazakazone]

I have a really hard time finding people who are willing to give me the whipping/flogging kind of feedback I crave. I find beta'ing to a type of collaboration and have really enjoyed it when people have cared enough to do it for me, but I know that none of us have as much time as we'd like and there seems to be a trend for people not to want that deep criticism.

Er, long way of saying, yes! I totally agree!

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[havocthecat]

Long way is obviously fine with me, as you can tell by my comment! :)

Anyway, I wish I had the time to beta like that; I really enjoy doing so when I find people who also like to beta/be betaread the same way.

We should make a point of keeping in touch for when we might have time to beta, only with no pressure. (Also, we're both Liaden universe fans, I can tell. Though I haven't read anything past "I Dare" yet. My lack of time is epic.)

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[jelazakazone]

LOL. I can be quite chatty:D

I honestly cannot tell what people think of my beta comments and I have a very hard time beta'ing long fics (where long means anything over about 7-8K), although there are certain people where I don't notice the length AT ALL, go figure.

Yes! Good idea. Wonder when I will ever have free time to do creative stuff again. It better be soon because I have various commitments. Ack!

LOL. I have not read the latest book, but I recommend the books after I Dare. My interest in the Liaden books seems to have waned a little, but since I started writing fanfic, I've hardly read anything, so it may not be the best indicator of anything:D

I think I'm going to follow you on Twitter, if that's ok. I mainly talk to podficcers there, so don't feel obligated to follow me back. I have Twitter locked because I got tired of the spam followers:D

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[havocthecat]

I don't mind it at all! I will say that most of my Twitter posts are reposts of anything I put on Pinterest. There are only so many social media sites I can handle.

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[jelazakazone]

That's fine. It's just a good way to keep track of you without me feeling compelled to reply to anything you post, no matter how interesting it should prove to be:D

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[cleo]

I have...a lot of time on my hands right now if you want something betaed that way this summer!

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[havocthecat]

She's a really amazing beta! Take her up on it if you get a chance!

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[jelazakazone]

Ooh, I will!

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[jelazakazone]

Excellent! Do you know the new Star Trek series? That's the only thing I've got planned for the summer. Elsewise, I've got a femmeslash modern au thing that I really would like to finish up at some point that is Merlin (Morgana and Mithian).

Do you have limits? Not sure how explicit the Star Trek fic will get (not very, if I follow my usual tendencies). The Merlin one I had intended to write as NC17 because I feel we get so little NC17 femmeslash.

Thanks!

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[cleo]

*flail* Sorry for such a long wait! I promise I'm a faster beta than I am a commenter!

I don't have limits as far as how explicit things get or kinks or anything. It's all fine with me! I'm working on a Star Trek Voyager fic right now set in the reboot series, so I'm definitely embedded in that universe! Hooray! And while I've only seen the first season of Merlin, I have betaed Merlin femslash before. So, while I can do a really in depth job with the Star Trek piece, I can't help much as far as canon and in depth characterization goes for the Merlin piece. But I'll definitely look at both if you'd like!

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[tellitslant]

Ugh, yes, all of this. I've been in fandom for more than fifteen years, and I think this is the most annoying change I've seen. I WANT to know what I've done wrong - but I feel like that kind of crit is no longer publicly welcomed by almost anyone else. It holds me up on stuff like writing recs - do I mntion that this is rec'd reservedly because the commas got on my nerves but it was still good enough to pass on? Or is that Rude? *tears out hair*

I think the fact that fandom is expanding so fast, and on so many different platforms, means that we have a lot more people who don't care about writing as a craft and just want to get their fabulous idea out there. I just don't understand that,t hough. Don't these hypothetical impatient writers want to actually connect? Argh!

Commas are definitely the big one for me. Others that I tend to backbutton from of late are epithets (the blonde, the brunette, the officer, the agent, the taller woman, the shorter woman - dear god how many women are there!), said-bookisms (she spat, she hissed, she muttered, she growled, she whispered, she huffed), and rapid POV change. I can excuse some of those, but the POV change really got me.

I am lucky to have a good friend who makes my fics much, much better, but I miss the days when reviews included "Hey, here's a typo, and btw I love what you think about character X's motivation because..."!

Re: Grammar, Critique, Betas

[havocthecat]

I'm a bitter old fandom queen, and these epithet-using kids can get off my damn fannish lawn. I have also been in fandom for more than fifteen years, somewhere between fifteen and twenty, honestly, and people have been using epithets for almost that long. I think they first started getting on my nerves in BtVS? "The red-haired hacker." "The blonde Slayer." ARGH. I won't even read fics with more than one epithet in them. Writers get one chance, and then I'm gone.

As to said-bookisms, well, I admit to being guilty of throwing those in every now and again myself, so I don't hate them so much. Well, unless they're used every other sentence, in which case I back-button hard. Also if someone uses a said-bookism for something that's an expression, not a way of saying things. "That's because I'm smarter than you," smirked Elizabeth. She didn't smirk that! She said it!

Um. You may have noticed that I'm cranky. At least I own it?

I think that a lot of people see writing as a way to win friends and influence people, not to mention become a BNF. Which I get! But the problem with having a fabulous idea that you desperately need to get out there is that good writing takes time, and work, and practice. If you're not willing to put your best foot forward, that's on you, but I think that you'll be forever lost in a morass of mediocrity if you don't want to perfect your craft.

I owe fandom and fans so much for helping me to hone my writing, but it makes me a little sad to post a fic and not get into a huge comment thread about character motivation, or ramifications, or just generally all the fun things that come with writing.

By the way, I have no idea how I haven't added you before now, but I plan to tonight. I think we've been in tangential fandom circles for quite a while.