#(PLEASE INTERACT WITH ME---)

[artemisdesari-blog]

A writer friend told me something that broke my heart a little bit today; they're going to quit publishing their fanfic.

My instant thought was that they had been trolled or attacked or that something terrible had happened in their life because this person is so passionate about their writing. It wasn't any of that. Engagement with their works has been going down, as it has for many of us. Comments are like gold dust a lot of the time, and just looking through the historical comment counts on old fics on ao3 demonstrates this trend very clearly. It was not simply the comments dropping off which caused them to decide to stop posting, however.

My friend came across a discord server for their fandom (I should point out here that their fandom interest and mine diverged a couple of years ago, we stay in touch but don't currently read each other's posts because I'm not into their fandom and they would rather gouge their eyes out with a wooden spoon than read anything Star Wars) and specifically to share fic in that fandom. They joined, because we all love a good fic rec, only to discover that their latest multichapter fic, which has almost no comments and very few kudos, is being hotly discussed in this server as one of the best stories ever. Not one of these people has bothered to say this to them on the fic. When they asked, none of participants could see the point in telling the author of the fic they apparently loved so much that they love it.

This discovery has absolutely destroyed my friend's love of sharing fic. They share because they love seeing other people's enjoyment, and fic writers do that through comments and kudos/reblogs/likes because we don't get paid. There is no literary critic writing a blog post/article about how amazing the story is for us to copy and keep/frame. There is no money from royalties. All we have are the words of the people reading our works.

Those people on that server could have taken five minutes of the time they spent gushing about how amazing my friend's story was to other people and used it to tell the one person guaranteed to want to hear that praise how much they loved it. They could have taken a moment to express their opinion to the person who spent hours upon hours plotting, writing, editing, and posting those chapters. Instead, they deprived my friend of thing that keeps them sharing their writing, and in the process have killed their love of it. My friend now feels used and unmotivated.

I won't be sharing a link to their fic, they said I could share their experience but not their identity. I know they plan to post one final chapter. I know they intend to express their hurt at being excluded from the praise for the thing they created, and I know they intend to announce that as a consequence they will not be posting for a long while, if at all.

So please, I beg you, don't hide your love of a story from the writer. It's just about the only thing we have.

[theoldkyokodied]

Really quick doodles of a few scenes from the stream yesterday. Including combat flirting taunting, gale’s magnificently distracting shoes and.. whatever you wanna call gale agreeing to give 15 gold to astarion 😐😑😐😑😐 (that’s me blinking)

[pissed-whizard]

my blog is a gateway drug to cooler and better blogs (my mutuals)

[zekuto]

i was obsessed the first time i saw someone post leon on that stupid panda rocker but i was never able to find raw footage of it lol, so i decided to compile leon with all the playground interactions because i love him <3

[bloodysparklez]

i'm obsessed with nikki's completely disproportionate response to this situation lmao

giovanni: mansplain manipulate manslaughter

nikki "gentle parenting is always the solution" lastname: how about MANNERS

[musubiki]

balor 🥰

[pearsandrust]

mydei having a library is absolutely heartbreaking symbolism. it's a running gag that the kremnoan language doesn't have many words; there's no word for flee, no word for fear, even no word for love. i know the library was his family's, but still -- it is such a distinct symbol of how mydei wants to break kremnoan tradition. how he openly rejects the idea that violence is the only valid form of communication. how he always dismisses the baseless rumours surrounding his abilities, proving that he values truth over glory. we see mydei try to talk his people into reason. we see him apologize to tribbie for being rude. we even see him (begrudgingly) admit to phainon that he knows how to interpret poetry. time and time again, mydei chooses language -- and truth -- over violence. so when he invites phainon to visit his library in the next life, he's not just expressing hope -- he's asking phainon to remember him by what he really believes in. even if i become the avatar of strife, he's saying, even if you have to kill me one day -- in the next life, please see me as the person i've tried to become.

mydei knows the power of a name, perhaps because his language has so few of them. and that makes it doubly ironic that he personally has so many titles: son of gorgo. the patricidal crown prince. kingslayer. godslayer. the undying. but as krateros points out, the name he prefers is the one he uses with the chrysos heirs. and although mydei doesn't talk much, all his actions seem to say the same thing.

remember me as mydei, not mydeimos.

[azherwind-art]

"Tell your favorite creators that you like their work, people usually enjoy things silently, but hate tends to be loud"

This is a phrase I just heard from Dnd shorts that captures perfectly why I often try to make the effort of commenting on posts and telling people that I enjoy their work and why Even to small creators, I advice everyone to make the extra effort to tell them, I can guarantee it makes all the difference in the world, it's not cringy or obnoxious, it'll just brighten someone's day

[erabu-san]

I enjoyed every second of this quest

[This art has platonic intention. Thank you for not tag ship!]

[ballistic-goat]

I'm just trying to imagine what OSHA compliant sex work would be like

[8pxl]

PSA 🗣️ another scammer using genAI without disclosing it

pixlgirl has been posting generated AI (targeting fandoms) without disclosing it, passing it off as their genuine art and has apparently scammed at least one person into ‘commissioning’ them. this is a public PSA so yall can block them, and not interact. please do not harass them!

it’s incredibly shitty to be disingenuous while posting AI but even shittier to scam people with it 🤢 stay diligent yall

[problekaktic]

chronically online antis when nobody irl gives a fuck about what kind of fiction someone likes because it's not real

[proxythe]

sorry im really obsessed with this pair … 🧚 u guys must understand… i have a rare pair addiction …

[univemma]

it better be,,,,the SUNNIEST FUCKING DAY

[corruptivedove]

"are you a proshitter?" yeah i think shitting is good. you probably should go to the bathroom atleast once

[thepsironyofchokingonalifesaver]

ATTENTION TIKTOK REFUGEES: if you are a secret proshipper, PLEASE JUST BE OPEN ABOUT BEING PROSHIP.

You’ve spent enough of your life hiding the fact that you’re not okay with bullying over goddamn fiction, and everyone’s spent enough of their lives putting up with antis either way. Leaving one godforsaken app for another is, in a way, a fresh start. Nobody benefits from you pretending to be a crueler person than you are, and antis should not be allowed to keep acting like they’re the moral majority or whatever the fuck, especially not on a site whose culture was built by people who are or would be Proshippers. What kinda culture do antis even make anyway? Purity culture? Culture of fear? That shit sucks moldy fish penis.

Just because TikTok isn’t a safe place to be okay with fiction doesn’t mean tumblr gets to be made worse and more unsafe by TikTok refugees. So please for the love of fuck, don’t add, even ostensibly, to the perception of a rising wave of antis running roughshod over fandom culture