expository ramblings part the fifth
'Twas while I was writing Voices that I really had to accept just how much of a minority ship Sam/Cam was. Thousands and thousands of words of SG-1 shipping being added to FF.Net each day, and I'd somehow managed to put up over 120k words of Sam/Cam with only cutehands's 3k words in two short stories right after TTTW to accompany it. I also wasn't getting that many reviews, though the ones I did get made me very happy. Still, not many folks seemed to be Sam/Cam shippers.
*drums a finger on the table for a few moments before continuing*
I have no idea how most folks find stories to read on FF.Net. Personally, I use a scalpel. It's the blunt, unwieldy scalpel of their filtering system - which I could rant against quite vociferously - but it meant I usually never see any particular show's full listing. I just keep links to my preferred set of filters and use the rss feeds for them. So anyone whose gateway is the show's main page would likely miss my stories since I would post them all over the course of nine days at a chapter a day. They'd get swept off the first page of the listing fairly quickly.
I tend towards the OTP type of shipping, there are very few instances where I am willing to multi-ship any particular character and it never seems to apply to het ships. So I use the genre and character filters to zero in on those stories in the admittedly scant hope of finding the stories I'll enjoy most. Essentially, I'm not interested in Cam/Carolyn, Cam/any other lady, Sam/Jack, Sam/Dan, or Sam/any other guy stories, and I don't go looking for those stories and have... issues... with reading them. I've previously described encountering those ships in the background of a Sparky story I was reading as being hit with a wet sponge. It takes me out of the story completely, to the point I almost can't overlook it.
I can't begrudge other people their preferred ships, I'm not interested in shipping wars or anything like that. I would never try to convince anyone to become a Sam/Cam shipper if they're an avowed fan of another pairing. These things are subjective and no one is wrong - except of course, they totally are wrong if they're not shipping Sam/Cam... seriously =P - in picking a particular pairing to enjoy. However, I'm always happy to tell someone that if they have an open mind, or like multiple ships, that Sam/Cam is something that will make them squee. I'm usually right.
I suppose the minority status of Sam/Cam is a repercussion of the show getting canceled prematurely - oh so prematurely - and only having the two seasons and two films to draw from. And also having to stand opposite the elephant in the room that Sam/Jack became in canon. In my opinion a rather one-sided and otherwise indifferent elephant. I was already convinced by the time of the eighth season that Jack and Sam shouldn't be together, I thought Pete was a mistake and was glad when he was written back out of the way, but was irked it was done only to seemingly push Sam back into the path of Jack, which just felt like a bigger mistake to me. So season nine felt like a completely new start for me, something so fresh and absolutely necessary.
Do I wish more people felt as I do? Yeah sure you betcha.
Sorry, Jack.
It would mean more people might read the 400k words I've posted up on FF.Net. And maybe... just maybe... someone else might add some new stories for me to read too.
*drums a finger on the table for a few moments before continuing*
I have no idea how most folks find stories to read on FF.Net. Personally, I use a scalpel. It's the blunt, unwieldy scalpel of their filtering system - which I could rant against quite vociferously - but it meant I usually never see any particular show's full listing. I just keep links to my preferred set of filters and use the rss feeds for them. So anyone whose gateway is the show's main page would likely miss my stories since I would post them all over the course of nine days at a chapter a day. They'd get swept off the first page of the listing fairly quickly.
I tend towards the OTP type of shipping, there are very few instances where I am willing to multi-ship any particular character and it never seems to apply to het ships. So I use the genre and character filters to zero in on those stories in the admittedly scant hope of finding the stories I'll enjoy most. Essentially, I'm not interested in Cam/Carolyn, Cam/any other lady, Sam/Jack, Sam/Dan, or Sam/any other guy stories, and I don't go looking for those stories and have... issues... with reading them. I've previously described encountering those ships in the background of a Sparky story I was reading as being hit with a wet sponge. It takes me out of the story completely, to the point I almost can't overlook it.
I can't begrudge other people their preferred ships, I'm not interested in shipping wars or anything like that. I would never try to convince anyone to become a Sam/Cam shipper if they're an avowed fan of another pairing. These things are subjective and no one is wrong - except of course, they totally are wrong if they're not shipping Sam/Cam... seriously =P - in picking a particular pairing to enjoy. However, I'm always happy to tell someone that if they have an open mind, or like multiple ships, that Sam/Cam is something that will make them squee. I'm usually right.
I suppose the minority status of Sam/Cam is a repercussion of the show getting canceled prematurely - oh so prematurely - and only having the two seasons and two films to draw from. And also having to stand opposite the elephant in the room that Sam/Jack became in canon. In my opinion a rather one-sided and otherwise indifferent elephant. I was already convinced by the time of the eighth season that Jack and Sam shouldn't be together, I thought Pete was a mistake and was glad when he was written back out of the way, but was irked it was done only to seemingly push Sam back into the path of Jack, which just felt like a bigger mistake to me. So season nine felt like a completely new start for me, something so fresh and absolutely necessary.
Do I wish more people felt as I do? Yeah sure you betcha.
Sorry, Jack.
It would mean more people might read the 400k words I've posted up on FF.Net. And maybe... just maybe... someone else might add some new stories for me to read too.