Well, I Was The Fastest To Lose.
I have a bad habit of getting tangled up in questions of whether something I'm working on is 'worth' writing or sharing. Is this long enough for me to post to AO3; is it good enough? What's the point of this fic?
These are silly questions to ask when we're all just in fandom to have fun and share our love for things. I'm not going to lose my job as a ficwriter because I happened to post a silly little ficlet, and it's not taking up space that might otherwise be occupied by more 'worthwhile' fanfiction. The wordcount is right there on display; anyone who's not looking for shorter things can just pass the ficlet by, or filter by wordcount. People who are open to something short can check it out, if they so desire. Maybe they'll even enjoy it!
I've broken it occasionally, but I've been keeping to a general 'don't post anything under a thousand words' rule on AO3. The thing that finally led me to reassess: I found myself tempted to pick up a pinch hit for the PokéPod Project, which requires that fics be under 1,000 words.
In the end, I missed the opportunity to grab the pinch hit! But, while I was waiting to hear whether I'd been successful, I went, 'Well, I suppose I'd better create a space on AO3 where I'll be comfortable posting shorter things.'
Anyway, that's why I ended up creating my rixareth pseud on my secondary AO3 account, rionaleonhart, which I originally created for archiving my older fics. (My main AO3 account is Riona.)
I'm still not quite bold enough to post every ficlet I'd ever written, but I gathered some I felt confident enough to post under the rixareth name. I decided I'd post them without backdating, as most were originally written in response to comment prompts and had never really seen the light of day outside this journal, but I'd stick to one ficlet per fandom per day to avoid flooding fandom tags. I posted the first batch of ficlets and waited nervously to see how they were received.
Within four hours, someone had translated one of the ficlets into Russian, which was certainly reassuring on the 'will anyone enjoy this?' front.
I've continued to post little batches of ficlets to the rixareth pseud over the last few days. Here are some things I've learnt from this experience, other than 'translators work terrifyingly fast':
- It's sort of nice to have these commentfics archived somewhere. I've written a lot of little ficlets over the years; it's a shame that they've just been languishing in the depths of my journal, where no one is ever going to see them. I had no recollection of writing some of the things I've managed to dig up!
- Things add up quickly! I've posted thirty-two ficlets to the rixareth pseud so far. They're all tiny individually, but collectively they're over 11,000 words.
- The Torchwood fandom is a lot more active than I was expecting! The show ended thirteen years ago; I sort of assumed it would have gone quiet. But no; apparently plenty of people are still into Torchwood. (Death Note is also surprisingly lively for a long-closed canon, but I was already aware of that on account of my headlong plunge back into Death Note last year.)
- I have some fics that have just languished unfinished for years. This ficlet-posting exercise has led me to reassess them and realise that, in some cases, the problem isn't that I can't think of where to go with the fic; the problem is that the fic is already finished, and I just failed to recognise or accept that because it was less than a thousand words long. I should really comb through my 'abandoned fanfiction' folder and see what can be salvaged.
- You can just post tiny things to AO3 and it's fine! Nobody complains! The fact that a fic can be read in the space of a minute or two doesn't necessarily mean people won't enjoy it. People like sitting down for a full meal, but that doesn't mean they don't enjoy a quick snack.
These are silly questions to ask when we're all just in fandom to have fun and share our love for things. I'm not going to lose my job as a ficwriter because I happened to post a silly little ficlet, and it's not taking up space that might otherwise be occupied by more 'worthwhile' fanfiction. The wordcount is right there on display; anyone who's not looking for shorter things can just pass the ficlet by, or filter by wordcount. People who are open to something short can check it out, if they so desire. Maybe they'll even enjoy it!
I've broken it occasionally, but I've been keeping to a general 'don't post anything under a thousand words' rule on AO3. The thing that finally led me to reassess: I found myself tempted to pick up a pinch hit for the PokéPod Project, which requires that fics be under 1,000 words.
In the end, I missed the opportunity to grab the pinch hit! But, while I was waiting to hear whether I'd been successful, I went, 'Well, I suppose I'd better create a space on AO3 where I'll be comfortable posting shorter things.'
Anyway, that's why I ended up creating my rixareth pseud on my secondary AO3 account, rionaleonhart, which I originally created for archiving my older fics. (My main AO3 account is Riona.)
I'm still not quite bold enough to post every ficlet I'd ever written, but I gathered some I felt confident enough to post under the rixareth name. I decided I'd post them without backdating, as most were originally written in response to comment prompts and had never really seen the light of day outside this journal, but I'd stick to one ficlet per fandom per day to avoid flooding fandom tags. I posted the first batch of ficlets and waited nervously to see how they were received.
Within four hours, someone had translated one of the ficlets into Russian, which was certainly reassuring on the 'will anyone enjoy this?' front.
I've continued to post little batches of ficlets to the rixareth pseud over the last few days. Here are some things I've learnt from this experience, other than 'translators work terrifyingly fast':
- It's sort of nice to have these commentfics archived somewhere. I've written a lot of little ficlets over the years; it's a shame that they've just been languishing in the depths of my journal, where no one is ever going to see them. I had no recollection of writing some of the things I've managed to dig up!
- Things add up quickly! I've posted thirty-two ficlets to the rixareth pseud so far. They're all tiny individually, but collectively they're over 11,000 words.
- The Torchwood fandom is a lot more active than I was expecting! The show ended thirteen years ago; I sort of assumed it would have gone quiet. But no; apparently plenty of people are still into Torchwood. (Death Note is also surprisingly lively for a long-closed canon, but I was already aware of that on account of my headlong plunge back into Death Note last year.)
- I have some fics that have just languished unfinished for years. This ficlet-posting exercise has led me to reassess them and realise that, in some cases, the problem isn't that I can't think of where to go with the fic; the problem is that the fic is already finished, and I just failed to recognise or accept that because it was less than a thousand words long. I should really comb through my 'abandoned fanfiction' folder and see what can be salvaged.
- You can just post tiny things to AO3 and it's fine! Nobody complains! The fact that a fic can be read in the space of a minute or two doesn't necessarily mean people won't enjoy it. People like sitting down for a full meal, but that doesn't mean they don't enjoy a quick snack.