C.R.E.A.M

[coalcube]

Coal ruins exchanges around me - spitey spitey fic y'all. 

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Comments

[(Anonymous)]

People would get sick of constant "There's a pinch hit! Oh wait no there isn't." / "There's a pinch hit! Come on PLEASE claim the pinch hit!" emails. At least this way it stops some of the time. And if there's two in a batch you can do, you have a better chance of getting one.

[(Anonymous)]

yeah, or even smaller batches if they don't want to send them out as they come! especially in early days when there aren't as many, as opposed to close to the deadline!

i'd also like it if they posted them to the comm (like other exchanges do) and do away with google groups, but i guess it's too big an exchange to do that!

[(Anonymous)]

+1 i believe in u coalies!

[(Anonymous)]

well the current wank seems to be just how creepy untherius is

[(Anonymous)]

Ok. Hot take: yuletide is in decline

[(Anonymous)]

Dang, can't please everyone I guess

[(Anonymous)]

Hotter take: so is Untherius.

[(Anonymous)]

idk why anyone still cares about him. some women in fandom still have the ‘must focus on the rare cis males’ in fandom gene i guess

[(Anonymous)]

well the bar certainly is on the floor then

[(Anonymous)]

let's talk about kittyfic instead then

[(Anonymous)]

kittyfic at least tries to guess what your canon is about and use a like or two.

i propose that ‘i refuse to default’!odao fic written because the author hopes that their author is writing them the fic their letter asked for is worse.

there’s an inherent bastard quality where you’re denying someone else a better match because you hope you’re gonna get the fic of your dreams. at least write your 1k of what they asked for and then orphan it.

also theres a special place in exchange hell for people who refuse to default but also wish their author would default rather than giving them ODAO/kittyfic/etc

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

Yes.

Someone doesn't know how to do anonymous exchanges: https://archiveofourown.org/collections/trickortreatex2021/works/34853848

The author's note pats themselves on the back for having written a late pinch hit, oh, so hard, so much labor! So much research! And then they de-anon at the end by saying, "This was a pinch hit. I love receiving treats, so if you'd like to write me something in return..." and linking to their letters for other exchanges, de-anoning themselves.

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

Possibly unpopular opinion but the post-exchange write ups people do about their process each year for Yuletide is just as cringy as this.

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

Genuinely, why?

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

major cringe

[(Anonymous)]

Probably just because it's annoying he gets to participate after giving people crappy gifts.

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

Oh dear. Maybe they're teachable. The specific details they've included in the work are pretty cool! And they also read like they HAD to fit all these cool details in, who cares if each detail actually furthers the story.

I genuinely envy this person the energy they put into doing the research. I'm so self-defeating at research - I let myself get stuck and hung up on tiny details and I tell myself it's too hard.

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

It’s just as self congratulatory and a lot of them have some varying dig at the recip to some degree. They’re usually done by authors who wrote fics that weren’t a one to one match with that the recip wanted too.

As for the PH thing, there has been a lot of whining on here and FFA about getting PHers more recognition and having their prompt posts up earlier. The idea that saying it upfront like that is gauche but adding your prompts to the post is kosher is disingenuous to me. Either PHers are a inherently doing a valuable service full-stop and deserve to mention they are open to fics too or PHing is something being done voluntarily, can be done shittily, and you shouldn’t inherently be entitled to a reward or pat on the back regardless of wuality.

tl;dr this is unfun for the specific recip in this case but it’s not new and to me it has always been cringe and this person probably thought what they’re doing is fine because in namespace people do all these things too.

[(Anonymous)]

people who write odao rather than defaulting but throw a fit if they get odao are fucking hypocrites.

people who write odao because they're doing their best to fill their assignment while assuming their assigned writer is doing the same thing are doing what they're supposed to be doing, all the rules say odao is fine! and expected! yuletide is an odao fest!

like I get people being disappointed but like. fulfilling the requirements of a fic exchange, which are what you signed up for, is not a cardinal sin.

[(Anonymous)]

apparently people volunteer for bigot oppa to be assigned to him these days so i wouldn’t worry about it. morbane & co do overtime to ensure he has a safe space just like all the other bad-faith authors rather than banning them, because fuck the rest of us i guess.

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

Yiiikes. Tacky there, author.

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

CYRT

Hm, I know what you mean about some of them. Some people phrase 'I completed a writing achievement that challenged me' (pleasant, neutral) more like 'My recipient's prompts were a challenge' and the rest of their attitude suggests that kind of awkward opposition between author and recipient as well.

I've read a lot of writing dissections that I enjoyed, though. I like reading up about people's research notes that didn't make it into a story, or when they wrote themselves into a corner and then rescued themselves.


this person probably thought what they’re doing is fine because in namespace people do all these things too.

I'm not sure I buy that. It seems unlikely to me that this person would have got the idea of author's notes in the fic from current AO3 exchanges or from the same tradition in Yuletide - it's been dying out in Yuletide for years, no other exchanges seem to have this kind of wrap-up tradition, and if they got it from Yuletide, what an incredibly specific thing to pick up when they missed some other more obvious points of etiquette.

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

They've already edited out the letters, at least.

[(Anonymous)]

how many of the ‘im fulfilling the bare minimum and hope my author is too’ recips do you think really exist tho? and how many do you think run here to complain when they get average to subpar fic?

if they really are happy with “anything their author gives them” like odao implies then surely they can do their best to write whatever their assignment asked for. that falls within the “anything” the author might write them that they’re willing to read!

Re: Trick or Treat

[(Anonymous)]

SC

Oh, and about the pinch hit thing, I don't see the issue with the ToT 1st century BCE person mentioning it was a pinch hit. "I've done six pinch hits in the last month" only seems a bit weird to me because why does someone reading that specific fic need to know that? (And is there another fic in the collection that says "this is the fifth pinch hit I've written in the last month? Because if so, lol.)

I don't really care because I rarely put my prompts on pinch hitters' prompts lists but I feel like I haven't seen any whining about recognition for them. So I guess personally I don't think either an earlier post for them OR saying "I wrote this as a pinch hit" is gauche.