Mod Post : Themes And Contributions

[sea_thoughts]

There's been a noticeable drop in contributions to the community this year. :( seniumboy and I have been discussing on how to improve this and I thought a poll might prove helpful.

Poll What would inspire you to write more/contribute more?

If you have any other ideas, please feel free to put them in the comments.

Oh, and please VOTE for January 2010. We need to catch up. :)

Comments

[verisimilitude9]

I'm fairly new to the comm, but... I'm one of those who agrees with the "this monthly theme is not my cuppa". Now, I know it's hard to find new themes that haven't been used already-- this community's been around for a bit. Maybe that's why, aside from Rei, Minako, Usagi and Mamoru, the latest several themes have seemed (to me at least) rather obscure. Also, I'm the sort who has a bazillion WIPs at a time and also spends a good chunk of her week working and doing RL stuff, so I already don't anticipate writing a fic a day. To even try to dip into something I'm not familiar with seems kind of like a waste of time that I just don't have :( and I'd rather be working on fics I've already started that I am familiar with when I do have the spare time to fic. So, perhaps, some more mainstream monthly themes are in order? I do like the daily themes.

As for the nominating/voting thing, I agree with what others say, and also here's a catch-22 for everyone to consider. For the more "popular" (I'm using the term loosely, bear with me) themes, more writers are going to contribute. Naturally, that means a bigger list of fics to read. Also, you can't nominate yourself for anything, so you have to find and read everyone else's fics, which is going to take a long time and not always yield fics that you like. This tends to stretch the nomination/voting for ages because... say you're a Minako/Rei shipper and all these silly other-writers are putting her with Kunzite. Or you see Minako as a stoic, seasoned warrior woman and everyone else seems totally focused on the blonde bubbly volleyball side of her. You're already reading stuff that, for whatever reason, you aren't too fond of. Now you still have to find something good and fill out that long list? Yeesh. (Again, this is just an example).

Conversely, we have these months where the theme is somewhat more obscure. You didn't participate yourself, because slash isn't your thing/you've never watched PGSM/whatever. So there isn't the trouble of "finding the fics not written by you to choose from". But... you still have to read through a bunch of fics, now on a topic you didn't even care enough about to write anything for, and fill out that long list.

So either way, it kind of feels like a homework assignment you'd rather not tackle, or maybe only tackle a bit at a time.

So, yes, perhaps do as Lytton says and eliminate the nomination process into a voting process right off. If there ARE some tie-breakers, the mods can step in and put up only those fics that are tied and have the ties broken (or break the ties themselves). For those who are better than I am and a more active participant, I daresay many will already have an idea of a fic they'd like to nominate/vote for as soon as it appears on their f-lists.

Sorry that was long-winded. Hopefully that helps?