Morbane's coal

[coalcube]

In quantum wankchanics, Morbane's coal is a thought experiment, sometimes described as a paradox, of quantum wankerposition. In the thought experiment, a hypothetical gift may be considered simultaneously both the fic of your dreams (TFOYD) and coal, while it is unread state, as a result of its fate being linked to a random subatomic event that may or may not occur.

The Coaltide interpretation implies that, after a while, the gift is simultaneously TFOYD and coal. Yet, when a coalie clicks on their gift, the coalie sees the gift either TFOYD or coal, not both TFOYD and coal. This poses the question of when exactly quantum wankerposition ends and reality resolves into one possibility or the other.

Madness Opens: Tuesday 26 December
Author Reveals: Monday 1 January


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Comments

Re: Losing Yuletide

[(Anonymous)]

cyrt

Yeah and I’m weird because I rarely do more than glance at tags, if that. When I’m reading on AO3 it’s usually sorted by pairing if it’s a big enough fandom, and then I go by whether summaries sound competent (the premise doesn’t even have to particularly grab me, it just needs to sound like something by a good writer). Obviously if the summary makes me go “wait is this a modern coffee shop AU” I’ll check the tags but otherwise I’m just looking for the stories that look like they’re by an author who knows what they’re doing.

Re: Losing Yuletide

[(Anonymous)]

CYRT

Yeah, I'm much the same, especially since I'm mostly in smaller fandoms with slim pickings and generally just after fic with good characterisation of my fave rather than particularly caring about the pairing or wanting a specific trope. I tend to find summaries a much more helpful indicator of whether I'm going to get on with a fic than the tags, so I pretty much just trawl through everything and try anything I don't outright bounce off of. (And no doubt I frustrate other people with my minimalist tagging, since I only tend to include freeform tags I would personally find useful for filtering, which is mostly just setting information like "pre-series" and occasionally a single central trope like "time travel".)

Re: Losing Yuletide

[(Anonymous)]

cyrt

Samesies! I always struggle to tag beyond a really basic genre one, but I've tried to train myself into adding a few conversational/informal ones because in my experience it does help you stand out in bigger fandoms. Hate having to self promo, sigh.

And you know what I mean about competent summaries! It can be an excerpt or an actual summary, but you can just tell when they're by a writer who can write.

Re: Losing Yuletide

[(Anonymous)]

I'm the opposite, I barely even look at the summary, I just check whether at the tags list tropes, kinks and elements I like.