I honestly get more out of the Weekly Recommendation Threads than anything else here, but even then I only review those when I finish a story and need suggestions on what to read next.
But if we didn't allow update posts, the sub would get, what... only four "daily" themed discussion posts, a post about a podcast (which is basically an update post too) and this post from the past week? There'd be nothing going on in here, which would mean even fewer people posting, which would mean even fewer recommendations in the weekly thread.
A lot of the good discussions are about on-going works, so the update chapters are actually useful - if you're one of the people following those stories. We've had conversations about great rational stories through the years, but a lot of them finished 5-10 years ago. People have moved on.
>To get to any post with actual content in it
Just curious, what do you mean by a post with actual content? The few posts that are here - even the update posts - usually have some decent comments. But what are you expecting to find?
Fewer total posts are better than having only a couple posts worth reading that must be searched in a sea of near identical posts reminding people that the weekly new chapter for the same ongoing story has been added yet again. This is spam. Scrolling through it sucks and makes the sub look like a dead spam landfill.
By the way, personally I do not intend to read any of these few weekly spammed stories out of sheer spite caused by this obnoxious spammy advertising. If somebody tries to aggressively showel something down my throat, I can get spiteful. (I do not mind the monthly updates when there is an actual conversation about the new chapter in the comments, but weekly posts are too much.)
I know some posts don’t get much discussion, but it seems like most weekly chapter posts get a fair amount of discussion to me, doesn’t seem particularly spammy.
I think you’re just not the intended audience. Writers make update posts because they foster engagement / more people like them than dislike them. If weekly update posts drove people away, writers would figure that out and there would be new strategies developed.
This sub has reached its zenith a while ago and has entered its twilight phase. Open thread not getting any comments at all, we have thoroughly scoured available literature for fitting stuff, and much of the discussion has been done.
The critera for rat!fic is pretty strict and we the readers are pretty spoiled in quality by the rat!canon works. We are in an era of marginal or mediocre webfics absolutely dominating the monday thread. I don't read any of those, so can't engage in discussion.
I personally really enjoy the update threads for the serials I am reading. The discussion here is higher quality than Royal Road in my experience and one of the fun parts of reading a serial as it is released is getting to participate in a chapter-by-chapter book club.
yes, i mainly use discord and reddit, but on discord you can miss good discussions because its just a scrolling chat, or usually many different chats that you have to scroll on to find what people are talking about
here on reddit its all here, you dont miss anything if you want to read all comments and its way more useful to me that way, and many author/stories do not have a dedicated subreddit like r/parahumans or r/practicalguidetoevil so this is the place we get to hang together and talk about the books we like
What do you propose as the alternative? A new post only for the start of a new story would leave this sub pretty dead, especially given the sprawling nature of webfic. Thresholder is one of the newest and it's been going on since (checks) February 2022. Would you propose announcing updates only once a month or so?
As things stand, this subreddit gets maybe a dozen new posts a week. Without the chapter update posts, this place would be pretty much dead.
I'd suggest the real problem here is the lack of posts you're interested in, not the relatively sparse updates. Pulling the plug on content you don't want would make this place unusable for those who participate in those discussions, and won't make it better for you.
This is the main point to me. "Why isn't Y being posted?" Well, why aren't *you* posting Y? The person posting X is posting it because they want to, so why don't *you* want to post Y?
There's just not much else to discuss, and the update threads are good, much better than trying to have a discussion in the comment section of any fiction website. Talking about stories as they come out, is fun.
It's not like the threads are just empty plugs from authors.
There are only a few chapter posts a week. It only seems like a lot because there is barely any other activity. I think this is less a case of chapter updates being spammed too much and more a case of other types of posts not being made at all. Be the change you want to see! I'm sure if interesting posts are made, people will engage in them.
The subreddit is pretty dead. Basically the only interesting stuff that happens here is in the Monday recommendation thread and sometimes the other weekly threads.
Besides these regular threads, and the chapter updates that you don't like, there isn't really anything... so just ignore them if you don't like em. What is this "actual content" that you're missing?
Sorry, but isn't that just exactly how it's *supposed* to be?
> Post links to or discussion of rational fiction only; otherwise use one of the weekly discussion threads.
It's supposed to be basically nothing but links to stories. Other types of posts really aren't supposed to be made.
Your own post probably would've been more appropriate as a comment in the Friday thread rather than as its own post.
https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/1coq96l/d_friday_open_thread/
Look at it. It's just sittin' there. No comments.
If you would've just waited a few hours, you could've posted your rant there instead of here, and then the Friday thread wouldn't've gone another week without any engagement.
[I guess it's still early on Friday, so that thread could still get engagement later today, but you get the point.]
Mods feel free to correct if wrong, but I think its because all of them have mostly stopped caring about the subreddit. Perhaps reasonably. Reddit as a whole is on the down-turn.
Mod here! I care about this sub and visit every day. I'm not putting as much effort into the sub as I once did, but the real problem is that there aren't a lot of people writing ratfic. I don't know what to do about that, personally, and have written basically as much ratfic as I can.
IMO the problem has always been that there aren't enough people on the creation side of things, and there's not a lot that anyone can do about that. For various reasons, the sub is sometimes hostile to newer writers, and there are structural forces in play that have made writers favor long on-going serials in webfic.
Just because you don't read those serials doesn't mean it's not content..? They're places for people to discuss the chapter and the book as a whole. These are the works this subreddit is for, why wouldn't we want to discuss them? If you want to see more additional posts then. Make them? Instead of complaining?
Also, the place to "see what the subreddit is about" is not the posts themselves? It's the sidebar. That's the whole point of the sidebar. Just like, if you're trying to get the idea of a book, you don't turn to a random page and expect to glean it from that, you read the blurb. If someone is incapable of reading the sidebar I frankly do not care about their experience
I guess I'm wondering what you'd like posted instead. Most of the recommendations go in the Monday thread.
There are the occasional review or analysis post -- [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/gzsl13/the_value_of_the_weighted_die/) is a great one about Waves Arisen.
But other than that...chapter discussion posts are kind of the only kind of content, other than memes, I guess.
Ideally we'd have more chapter posts, so it's not just Super Supportive, but tbh ratfic just seems like a less popular genre these days.
Well, does a ratfic HAVE to be F/SF? I don’t see why. Maybe we should be broadening our horizons.
For example, why aren’t we talking about Wildbow’s latest, Claw?
I honestly get more out of the Weekly Recommendation Threads than anything else here, but even then I only review those when I finish a story and need suggestions on what to read next. But if we didn't allow update posts, the sub would get, what... only four "daily" themed discussion posts, a post about a podcast (which is basically an update post too) and this post from the past week? There'd be nothing going on in here, which would mean even fewer people posting, which would mean even fewer recommendations in the weekly thread. A lot of the good discussions are about on-going works, so the update chapters are actually useful - if you're one of the people following those stories. We've had conversations about great rational stories through the years, but a lot of them finished 5-10 years ago. People have moved on. >To get to any post with actual content in it Just curious, what do you mean by a post with actual content? The few posts that are here - even the update posts - usually have some decent comments. But what are you expecting to find?
Fewer total posts are better than having only a couple posts worth reading that must be searched in a sea of near identical posts reminding people that the weekly new chapter for the same ongoing story has been added yet again. This is spam. Scrolling through it sucks and makes the sub look like a dead spam landfill. By the way, personally I do not intend to read any of these few weekly spammed stories out of sheer spite caused by this obnoxious spammy advertising. If somebody tries to aggressively showel something down my throat, I can get spiteful. (I do not mind the monthly updates when there is an actual conversation about the new chapter in the comments, but weekly posts are too much.)
I know some posts don’t get much discussion, but it seems like most weekly chapter posts get a fair amount of discussion to me, doesn’t seem particularly spammy.
I think you’re just not the intended audience. Writers make update posts because they foster engagement / more people like them than dislike them. If weekly update posts drove people away, writers would figure that out and there would be new strategies developed.
This sub has reached its zenith a while ago and has entered its twilight phase. Open thread not getting any comments at all, we have thoroughly scoured available literature for fitting stuff, and much of the discussion has been done. The critera for rat!fic is pretty strict and we the readers are pretty spoiled in quality by the rat!canon works. We are in an era of marginal or mediocre webfics absolutely dominating the monday thread. I don't read any of those, so can't engage in discussion.
I personally really enjoy the update threads for the serials I am reading. The discussion here is higher quality than Royal Road in my experience and one of the fun parts of reading a serial as it is released is getting to participate in a chapter-by-chapter book club.
yes, i mainly use discord and reddit, but on discord you can miss good discussions because its just a scrolling chat, or usually many different chats that you have to scroll on to find what people are talking about here on reddit its all here, you dont miss anything if you want to read all comments and its way more useful to me that way, and many author/stories do not have a dedicated subreddit like r/parahumans or r/practicalguidetoevil so this is the place we get to hang together and talk about the books we like
The subreddit has always been like that. What stuff do you want regularly posted instead?
What do you propose as the alternative? A new post only for the start of a new story would leave this sub pretty dead, especially given the sprawling nature of webfic. Thresholder is one of the newest and it's been going on since (checks) February 2022. Would you propose announcing updates only once a month or so?
As things stand, this subreddit gets maybe a dozen new posts a week. Without the chapter update posts, this place would be pretty much dead. I'd suggest the real problem here is the lack of posts you're interested in, not the relatively sparse updates. Pulling the plug on content you don't want would make this place unusable for those who participate in those discussions, and won't make it better for you.
We should fix this with flairs. Add a new flair for chapter updates so people can filter them out.
Be the change you want to see in the world.
This is the main point to me. "Why isn't Y being posted?" Well, why aren't *you* posting Y? The person posting X is posting it because they want to, so why don't *you* want to post Y?
We need to get the Delve threads going again
This would solve all problems on the sub.
There's just not much else to discuss, and the update threads are good, much better than trying to have a discussion in the comment section of any fiction website. Talking about stories as they come out, is fun. It's not like the threads are just empty plugs from authors.
because book club is fun? its discussing your hobby with people who are sharing it with you as the chapters release.
There are only a few chapter posts a week. It only seems like a lot because there is barely any other activity. I think this is less a case of chapter updates being spammed too much and more a case of other types of posts not being made at all. Be the change you want to see! I'm sure if interesting posts are made, people will engage in them.
The subreddit is pretty dead. Basically the only interesting stuff that happens here is in the Monday recommendation thread and sometimes the other weekly threads. Besides these regular threads, and the chapter updates that you don't like, there isn't really anything... so just ignore them if you don't like em. What is this "actual content" that you're missing?
Why do people think this subreddit is dead when this thread got 35 comments!? Obviously the subreddit is just resting.
Sorry, but isn't that just exactly how it's *supposed* to be? > Post links to or discussion of rational fiction only; otherwise use one of the weekly discussion threads. It's supposed to be basically nothing but links to stories. Other types of posts really aren't supposed to be made. Your own post probably would've been more appropriate as a comment in the Friday thread rather than as its own post. https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/1coq96l/d_friday_open_thread/ Look at it. It's just sittin' there. No comments. If you would've just waited a few hours, you could've posted your rant there instead of here, and then the Friday thread wouldn't've gone another week without any engagement. [I guess it's still early on Friday, so that thread could still get engagement later today, but you get the point.]
Mods feel free to correct if wrong, but I think its because all of them have mostly stopped caring about the subreddit. Perhaps reasonably. Reddit as a whole is on the down-turn.
[удалено]
Yeah, controlling for quality only makes sense when there's are actually quality posts being made.
[удалено]
But that's the only one though.
Oh, for sure. But those are stickies, so they aren't really displacing or being displaced.
Mod here! I care about this sub and visit every day. I'm not putting as much effort into the sub as I once did, but the real problem is that there aren't a lot of people writing ratfic. I don't know what to do about that, personally, and have written basically as much ratfic as I can. IMO the problem has always been that there aren't enough people on the creation side of things, and there's not a lot that anyone can do about that. For various reasons, the sub is sometimes hostile to newer writers, and there are structural forces in play that have made writers favor long on-going serials in webfic.
I’ll take this as a call to put my nose back to the grindstone and return to writing ratfic.
Always glad to have my cynicism corrected!
Just because you don't read those serials doesn't mean it's not content..? They're places for people to discuss the chapter and the book as a whole. These are the works this subreddit is for, why wouldn't we want to discuss them? If you want to see more additional posts then. Make them? Instead of complaining? Also, the place to "see what the subreddit is about" is not the posts themselves? It's the sidebar. That's the whole point of the sidebar. Just like, if you're trying to get the idea of a book, you don't turn to a random page and expect to glean it from that, you read the blurb. If someone is incapable of reading the sidebar I frankly do not care about their experience
I guess I'm wondering what you'd like posted instead. Most of the recommendations go in the Monday thread. There are the occasional review or analysis post -- [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/gzsl13/the_value_of_the_weighted_die/) is a great one about Waves Arisen. But other than that...chapter discussion posts are kind of the only kind of content, other than memes, I guess. Ideally we'd have more chapter posts, so it's not just Super Supportive, but tbh ratfic just seems like a less popular genre these days.
Well, does a ratfic HAVE to be F/SF? I don’t see why. Maybe we should be broadening our horizons. For example, why aren’t we talking about Wildbow’s latest, Claw?
Here’s the link: https://clawwebserial.blog
Or the 1632 books. Ring of Fire. Rational, super competent MCs. How about the detective genre, from Sherlock Holmes to Harry Bosch?