It might even help the author a) improve write more. The rating system would work a lot better if people not only took the time to vote but to also leave comments about why they voted the way they did. Last, I look at total views to see who is the most popular over time.
NIFTY GAY FANFICTION ARCHIVE
I usually sort the archive by ratings (I look things over to see who has 10's and to see if those 10's have more than 1 vote) and I look at views per day to see who is most popular at the moment. So, we came up with the wonderful average of "Views per Day" If I add a great story today, it is going to be some time before it ends up with a lot of views, no matter what.
The total view count is a great feature, but I realized fairly quickly that it had a major flaw. Now, having had a great big hand in the programming of the archive and selecting the features availible, let me just say that I use them all. Lot's of stories now!!!!! Edited Jby Sparhawk And I must say I am so gald that I did, it has really changed since the last time I was there. I went back to a site I had not been to in quite some time this evening because of a post on this board. You really need to read through all the sections, you will find links to some great stories in the strangest places.ĭan I think this is a wonderful topic you started, I am really interested myself in how others pick the stories that they read. The Cafe is not the only place, even here at gayauthors. The Cafe here at gayauthors is a good place to start looking.
It seems that I am always finding and site out there that I have missed or, even a story(and that does not happen too often). Also check out Gay author sites that host great stories.
When I find a author I enjoy, I do a search of nifty and then the web. I do pay attention to how many people have read and voted and reccomended a story though. If it grabed my attention then I would at least read the first chapter. I had a lot of time on my hands and was able to at least read the first paragraph of each story posted at nifty on a daily basis for quite some time. I have really slowed down this last year. Is that what some of you do?ĭan I have done so much reading over the last few years. I know that if I see a story I really liked I'll do a search on the author's name to see if there's more by that author. Now, my question for y'all.How important are the # of views a story has had in choosing what to read? What exactly do y'all look for that helps you pick the story you'll look at? What methods do you use to pick stories from the Archive to read? I've got a spin-off stories that I never published, several half-written that I think I'm going to have to go and finish some time. Mists was the first story I ever posted on the web, and it seems like ages ago since I wrote that. It's a long way down to my next-most popular story, Mists of Fate. I'll have to get those files cleaned up and sent to him. Myr's been bugging the hell out of me to get Phone Call up on the board here, so I guess he's been right. You want to imagine a feeling of y meeting someone who is a real-life person you are writing a fanfic about, and trying to hold a conversation with them while sipping on a drink.
Somewhere along the way I stretched things just a little, but kept things mostly in line with things from personal experiences.Īn interesting side-not on that story, Phone Call, is that while I was writing the story I got to meet one of the main characters in that story in real life. Let's just say some of the things I saw in there made me cringe, and one of them (I don't even remember which), made me say "no.this is more realistic". I've met, and gotten to know a few Hollywood types over the years, and had read a few stories in the Boy Bands sections of Nifty a few times. Phone Call was a story that I never had any real intention of writing, and in a way different than Vampire Jarred, was another 'guilty pleasure' I indulged in. There's a large amount of stories between Dawn and my next most popular story, and I was quite surprised when I saw what story that was. My first surprise was that Dawn of Tears is the sixth most popular story in the archives (Comicality, Bill W., Freethinker, and Gymnopedies all have the top 5, and since all their works I love, it's quite heady to think one of my stories might be up there with theirs. For some reason, probably typical author ego curiosity, I chose to sort stories in the archive by the number of 'views' and came across quite a few surprises for me.