Comment thread spin-off

kdpierre
A few points.
-Everyone doesn't post to improve or criticize
-Everyone's criticism isn't valuable
-An honest comment with your emotional response is absolutely fine, but doesn't necessarily fit the criteria of helpful criticism. By percentage, most people will confuse the two
-Positive comments encourage more writing. More writing, if the author is interested in improving, will result in more improvement
-authors should feel free to solicit other authors for critical feedback in a place specific for that, even if just DMs

kdpierre
I honestly don't know. Spankingtube provides a free board, I guess that's the term, for everyone where there stuff is stored. I thought it would be a good back up and a good way to get readers who aren't members here. So I posted some of my work. Next thing I knew I was being attacked "verbally" and threats were made. Not only did I pretty much stop posting there; I pretty much stopped writing. I've got several works at various stages of completion and I plan on doing so but then I tend to run into the time problem. It's a lot easier to write when one isn't working or exhausted from work.

And the threats didn't even hint at the nature or source of outrage? That's crazy! You're better off avoiding a place that populated with loonies.

Thanks for all the comments so far. Some are aligned with my own feelings, while others take a differing view and are well worthy of consideration. One thing for sure, the responses definitely prove that the commenting issue is not without complexity.

For example, in my own case, I posted a story this month, ( A month of near record comment levels ) and it has performed worse than anything I've ever submitted here. (1 official comment out of nearly 300 views) And yet, the piece is in no way controversial, and is probably one of my more straight up narratives, since it was written as a gift for a friend and not intended for anything too deep. Now, I'm not posting this to solicit sympathy comments, because in my mind the only thing worse than a lack of response, are comments made out of pity, but I did bring it up to illustrate how a lack of even NEGATIVE comments leave an author baffled as to 'what went wrong?'

It certainly stings to get negative criticism, but if the criticism is made honestly and the objections valid, if nothing else, it will tell an author why a piece isn't clicking.

Anyway, going back to some of the responses in this thread, one observation was made by a few folks saying that (paraphrasing the general sentiment) "not everyone wants to improve". This may be true, but if it is, I think it may be far sadder than the lack of comments. I for one would be devastated if I ever offered one of my kids advice on doing something better and have them dismiss the help by saying, "But Dad, I don't WANT to improve." I think I'd cry.

I welcome negative comments, and say so in my profile.

I've been lucky--very few negative comments and, as far as I can recall, no nasty ones.

I comment much less than I should--I read on a laptop, without a proper keyboard. I am a dinosaur and can only type properly on a proper keyboard. To type a comment I would need to go to another room and plug in a keyboard. That's a big disincentive.

That apart, making a positive comment is easy, except when lots of others have commented already so it is difficult to find something different to say.

Making a negative comment is much, much harder as I don't want to upset the writer. The "this was really good, but...." would be a favoured approach. I would never say that I didn't like the story (it didn't push my buttons) as that is to do with me and my taste rather than the writer's skill.

If I just thought the story was badly written, I wouldn't say a word.

I would, however, say that a story did push my buttons as a writer would want to know that at least one of their readers liked it. I suspect that most writers want their readers to like their work.

Geoffrey Stirling.

My laptop has a keyboard plugged into it - not to help me comment, it's just that half the keys on my laptop's keyboard don't work since I spilled something on it!

A couple of very active and well-known members once told me that the life blood of the success of this library are the comments on the stories. Sometimes it can be perplexing why a serial part has not gotten even one comment. For example, in the teacher serial, part five there is a sorority initiation. I was advised school paddles were sure to pique the interest of the library's readers.

Cherry Red the author.

kdpierre
what made it extra strange were that they were fellow devotees of CP.

Unless criticism of writing is point-blank mean-spirited ("Learn to write, asshole!"), I believe it's useful, whether supposedly constructive or even rather negative. Of course, while I'll generally acknowledge his/her commentary to the commentator in a pop-up, that doesn't necessarily mean that I will adjust my fiction in response to it. Obviously, I'm figuring that most writers (including myself) are more likely to react positively to constructive criticism, as opposed to what could be interpreted as merely complaints about not writing to someone else's specifications.

Some comments which may be intended as somewhat negative don't necessarily strike me that way:

"The strict disciplinary treatment of the male protagonist by his aunt is extremely inequitable, relative to how permissively she treats his cousin, her daughter." (Thank you, that's what I intended.)

"Miriam must have blistered Paul's behind hundreds of times over the decades, when will he turn the tables and get to spank her for a change?" (Ummmm, he won't, their CP relationship is totally one-sided, which is how they both prefer it.)

However, I do find much of the criticism I receive to be valuable, especially if/when it helps me realize that I'm not achieving the effect that I'm hoping for in portraying a particular character or situation.

As for what kind of comments an author will receive, as that old ungrammatical saying goes, "You pays your money and you takes your chances..." --C.K.

My dearly departed mum used to say, ‘if you can’t say something nice, say nothing at all”. People put a huge amount of personal time and effort writing stories and we should all be very grateful they do. I’ll only ever make positive comments and if I don’t like a story, I’ll just stay silent. My only exception would be if a writer specifically asked for constructive feedback on a story. That would be different but the feedback should be given through a private message and not a public post. These are my personal views and quite understand how others might take a different approach.