frostweaver said:
Readership is completely unreliable, and should not be used as a method to determine what fanfic is worth praising
Allow me to explain why. Certainly excellent fanfics will immediately catch good reviewer's eyes, and so the readership will be high. That is true. However, what about the people who will say "this is very good I can't wait for the next update" to absolutely everything that is presented to them? Certainly anyone who cruises any board regarding any form of writing will come across this type of readers. Ask them why it's good, and they'll give you the most vague answer of "I like the plot." Certainly perhaps a plot that's identical to the anime may attract their eyes, but I really want to ask them how do they understand the plot when the work is not even spellchecked? Such readers will give a fanfic an unfair amount of readership. Dragonfree has once commented indirectly about this, which I heartily agree to. "How come some fanfics that aren't even readable has more replies and views than some outstanding fanfics here?" This is because of this type of readers. They either got a terribly low standard, or they will do anything to cheer a friend on. Feeling biased is unavoidable when reading the work of a friend, but to that extent is a bit unacceptable...
I think it's true that there might be a certain element of readers/responders who have low standards, but if that's all, then wouldn't they equally be a bit or 'good' fanfics as well as 'bad' fanfics? Or you also mean to say that some random responders will browse through fanfics and respond more often to ones that have generic/recongizeable plotlines? In the case of the latter--especially with the attention span of the twenty-first century netizen in mind--the # of response might draw from a potentially larger personpool (too lazy to think of a better way to say that :\), but the readership won't increase. People will pass through, check something, maybe enjoy it a bit, but unless you're stipulating that there's a significant percentage of people who maintain a constant readership of cliche/poor fanfic but significantly less so of good/original fanfic...
...Well, I don't believe that's so. But if you say it is, I'll certainly believe you, since I've only been active in two fanfic forums, this one and one that died six years ago :(... I will say this. In my experience, a fanfic can have cliche plot elements, or even start out with a (seemingly) cliche plot, but also have something more to it, something that draws it readers and holds them and keeps them, something that develops over time and is recognizeable and is known in the hearts of readers, even those readers who are not so introspective as to be capable of answering much more than "I like the plot"...
Such is
Hitmonchan's Diary, which starts off as what seems a great cliche, friends traveling and encountering the TR duo and Ash & gang, with certain bad guys doing bad guy stuff at times which the heroes foil/disrupt. But... well, actually, the first dozen chapters are pretty much cliche, but fun cliche, and the humor is brilliant as well in the initial few chapters, with the British Mewtwo, insane Clefairy and... well, other terrible stuff. Conversation really defines characters, people, situations however; I think the conversation is what really attracted people to the fanfic. Later on it gets somewhat dark, especially with the 'banned' chapter in which Stephen and Misty have to enter the temple with the ancient ghosts that feed on feelings, to fulfill the prophecy that requires emotional/spiritual cleansing through... uh, bad experiences. :\ And of course, the end is not proof that all's well that ends well. Because it doesn't end well, not very well at all in fact. The unfortunate thing is that quite frequently the fanfic should require spell-check/grammar check...But, people didn't/don't seem to mind, myself included, since it's very readable. Honestly, it does occur to me, when looking at it as you probably would, that the first 15 (out of 30) chapters are a good part cliche, and the rest aren't completely break-from-the-norm either I suppose. The sequel,
Onix's Garden, however, is very much a well-written sci-fi/dark fic, and doesn't fall under cliche except in the most abstract ways I'd say. Too bad only seven chapters were written...
OK, before I began to rant about my own favorite fanfic, I was talking about... yeah, that. Readership. Fanfics I'd like to put on my page aren't necessarily ones with superb literary quality. If there's a few spelling errors but the content is noticeably enjoyable, that's all that's really necessary for me to want to have the privelege of hosting it, although I'd likely attempt to contact the writer and offer to proofread or help tidy up their work. But, aesthetically, I must say that I do find good writing to be intellectual stimulating, interestingly enough in such a way that discludes the use of comparative allegories... Which is part of why my mind is so very said to be unable to find any of the other great PokeGym work, like Zorak's bizarre/futuristic story he began, and Tyais's one-shot battlefics. Actually, I could probably message Tyais about those...
Ethically I should mention by now that over the course of writing this response attempting to defend readerships as being 'good' fanfic, I've only succeeded in realizing that I have low standards for fanfic. :surprised In which case, I'll just ask y'all to ignore everything I said about readership and just shift everything over to discussion of fanfics with literary quality... What can I say, I'm an emo kid at heart.
And as for your intelligent/observant comments on Pokemon MASTERS, I can only admit that your analyses are better than mine. :classic: Now, I'm off to read the next chapter... or go to sleep... or watch Saturday late night X-Files... hmm...
