One Wank After Another

[coalcube]

A blank assignment is a funny thing, isn't it? When you have it, you don't appreciate it, and when you miss it, it's gone.

Wednesday 10 December: Default deadline (9pm UTC)
Wednesday 17 December: Assignment deadline (9pm UTC)
Wednesday 24 December: Main collection works reveals (9pm UTC)
Thursday 25 December: Madness collection works reveals (9pm UTC)
Thursday 1 January: Author reveals, end of event (9pm UTC)

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Comments

Re: Unpopular Opinion Time

[(Anonymous)]

DC

Some will eventually pick of the PH, consume my canon and write me gift fic (I've never received one that seemed like kittyfic).

But you can't know that that's exactly what happened. You cannot judge from the sign-up summary how many people actually know and are passionate about the fandom you're requesting, and unless a PHer says "I consumed your canon for this and it was fun!", you can't know someone's level of prior familiarity when they fill your PH.

Most if not all PHs I've picked up in Yuletide (or other exchanges for that matter) were fandoms I already knew and was passionate about but did not offer! There could be many reasons I did not offer them, ranging from not noticing they had requests, to not feeling confident or flexible enough to offer them without knowing the details of the sign-up, to forgetting they even existed (or that I had strong feelings for them) until I saw a particular request or prompt for them. Maybe I need to do some canon review but the enthusiasm is already there.

Yuletide IS different and I'd wager that PHs get snapped up so quickly not because PHers for it are so eager to get into new canons, but because the collective level of canon familiarity AND passion extends way, way beyond what actually ends up showing as Offers! This is triply true in an exchange where requests aren't visible in advance, which leads many people to offer much more conservatively than they would otherwise!

Re: Unpopular Opinion Time

[(Anonymous)]

SC I should be more specific, I think it is possible to know someone picked up your canon without being told outright, but not in Yuletide. In smaller exchanges and with regular exchange participants, you get a sense of what fandoms someone is familiar with both from what they request and comment on but also chatter over Discord and the like. Like, if someone goes eyes emoji at you posting a fandom promo in a Discord thread and writes you a PH in that fandom a few months later, it's not rocket science to figure it out.

I think most Yuletide PHs (except for very late PHs, potentially) are written by people who already know the thing (even if they need to do canon review), while PHs in small exchanges are dramatically more likely to be picked up by someone intending to consume or who recently consumed the canon.

Re: Unpopular Opinion Time

[(Anonymous)]

cyrt

Some will eventually pick of the PH, consume my canon and write me gift fic (I've never received one that seemed like kittyfic).

But you can't know that that's exactly what happened

Yes, I can, because writers talk about this in author's notes and when we talk in the comments afterwards?

Obviously, if you already knew and loved the canon, you wouldn't, but in the opposite case, "I saw your prompts and was intrigued about the canon" is a incredibly common thing to say. (It's a bit awkward when they tell you they were into your ship but thought the canon was sooo bad and it's about a canon you're earnestly fond of, but them's the breaks.)

Re: Unpopular Opinion Time

[(Anonymous)]

sc

Though I request the same fandoms all year round, so "I picked it up because of your PH" doesn't usually mean "I picked it up because your Yuletide PH was lingering" but rather "I picked it up because I frequently saw you go to PH with this fandom in the past".

Re: Unpopular Opinion Time

[(Anonymous)]

NC A single data point, but most of my authors have actually said in an author's note (or in a reply to my comments) that they picked up my canon just to write for me. Yes, even in Yuletide. One author did say they had consumed the canon previously, but it had been decades, so they had to fully re-consume it to pick up my PH. Several have said they'd never heard of any of my fandoms before. (Phrased in a positive way, I should add, like 'it was so fun consuming this canon for you, I had never heard of it before!')

Re: Unpopular Opinion Time

[(Anonymous)]

NC I can personally vouch for the fact that I've picked up multiple canons for assignments, including cases where I matched on a more popular canon (or picked up a pinch hit for a more popular canon!) and had enough difficulty getting started that I decided to just try it from a different angle via starting a new canon.