Trolls *glares*

[badly_knitted]

So, I just had my first trollish review over on AO3 on Chapter 15 of Through Time and Space. No mention of the contents of the chapter, or whether or not they liked it, just a complaint that my end note hadn't changed since chapter one and that I should change or remove it

Comments

[too_beauty]

Well rude readers are becoming more frequent everywhere, what is worse is that they never comment on what they have just read ... only on your mistakes, lack of imagination or wishing you were dead, like in my case.
Don't worry, my dear, some people have a lot of free time between their hands and nothing inside their heads ...

[badly_knitted]

Well, to buck the trend, my 'troll' just apologised very nicely, which I think doesn't usually happen, so my opinion of her has gone up somewhat =)

There are a lot of rude people about on the internet though, and there's little that can be done about them other than to report them where possible.

[scripsi]

Urgh! And, actually, I think that may be a bug in AO3, so really Not Your Fault. And what an odd thing to hang up a comment on.

I got a similar recently on FF.net which just said that I got it wrong because X actually learned Y from W. Nothing more. And the thing is that I do touch upon it in the early chapters, I just don't made a big deal of it later, so the reviewer eitehr read sloppily or thought it wasn't enough. It is partly a mistake from my side as I had planned to include more of it, but it got mislaid in re-writing, but it is still there. And this is fanfic, if I want to downplay something, then I can do this becuase, you know, fanfic.

I don't get some plepole! If I felt really compelled to point out something I percieved as a mistake, then I would start with saying what I did like with the fic before getting to more negative things.

[badly_knitted]

Some people are just really weird. Fanfiction doesn't have to slavishly stick to canon anyway, it's up to each writer to choose what they want to write depending in the story they're trying to tell. The only times I'll offer that sort of constructive criticism is if they get something basic wrong, like having Torchwood Three be in London, or saying that Owen is Welsh when they are clearly trying to write a canon-based story. And then I put that at the very end of my review and do so politely

[scripsi]

I'm glad you got a nice follow up! I agree, often it can just be the wording that gets a bit wrong. It can be difficult to gauge the impact, especially if you are writing in a language which isn't your native one.

I hardly ever give negative feedback, but if I do, then it is for the reason you mention. If I don't like something then it is usually because my taste runs different and can hardly blame a a person for liking something else. Though, if one my consider my recent troll, that is just what some people feel entitled to do.

[badly_knitted]

If I don't like a story, I don't comment. everyone is entitled to write what they want to write, no one has to read it if it's not to their tastes and no one has a right to dictate to someone else how they should write their story.

I was lucky. In fact, I've seldom had anything that could be called negative feedback.

[asia27]

I appreciate the author's note because sometimes I may find a good story somewhere after the author has posted several chapters and then have to find the rest of the story. Most of the time, I won't post anything until the end and even then, only a comment that I've enjoyed the author's work. (I'm very surprised you were trolled because I've never read one of your that I haven't enjoyed, but that's just me. 😊)

[badly_knitted]

In this case, the end note referred to the first chapter and I hadn't realised it was appearing at the end of EVERY chapter, but I was annoyed not by having that pointed out to me but by the rather rude way they'd phrased it.

However, the person who left the note has since apologised, she didn't mean to be impolite, so she's been forgiven. Sometimes, things work out. *shrugs*

[asia27]

I've read that story, LOVED it and never noticed the note repeated... If I have to comment (and I usually won't for fear of offending a writer who dosen't know me), it would be only to compliment the story, not to criticize. (I do Document Production, not Editing..)

[badly_knitted]

=D

Sadly, there will always be some people who only comment to criticise or be nasty. I got another troll over on ff.net recently. I wrote a Star Trek drabble, and their only comment was 'Leonard Nimoy is dead', which I thought was a bit of a pointless comment. I replied that I knew because he passed away just after my mother, and they messaged back 'Your mother and Leonard Nimoy are dead' and then kept repeating that message, so I banned them.

Then the following day on AO3 I got a message from an anonymous reader saying I was probably their favourite writer on the site, so that cheered me right up again =D