Fanfiction.net ARG

[Nebula1701]

Why do you have to make me so disappointed in you?

[LifeOfGesture]

Anyone read anything good lately? Not a whole lot of stuff is updating like I thought it would when summer hit. Alas. Well at least the movie line up for this summer looks to be really excellent. MIB 3 here I come~.

[Nebula1701]

Have you not read the front page and seen the mass fic deletions?

[jgkitarel]

Looks like they got targeted for a "moral crusade" and the trolls and those who hate creativity will have a field day.

[serbii]

I remember the same thing happening 10 years ago when they got rid of the NC-17 section and fics. This is hardly the first time they've done a mass deletion.

[Phht]

I can see them doing mass deletions for removing stories that fall under NC-17. But part of their rating set-up on the front page says "Detailed descriptions of physical interaction of sexual or violent nature" are above M. But if M is supposed to equate out to R, I don't see how detailed descriptions of physical interaction of violent nature would ever be classed above R/M. Unless something that would be left "unrated" would fall above M.

Though, whatcha bet all the yaoi/slash fics in HP and other fandoms remain after the mass deletions, but stuff that you'd think weren't close to crossing the mark get taken out?

[gman391]

No bet

[EdStargazer]

EroSlackerMicha already got slammed by them. At least a half dozen of his stories have been deleted. The only one I could see as being too far was 'NILF' but the rest I cannot understand. While suggestive at times, in my opinion they did not cross the line. But 'He Said, She Said' was gone, 'Blondes Have More Fun' 'Double the Please, Double the Blonde' and a few others. I looked at his author page but I am not certain if he removed any himself but the original 'HSSS' had been deleted on him.

[serbii]

There were NC-17 rated fics on that site, they were just submitted under M.
I'm not saying they should have gotten rid of them (or anything), but there certainly were explicitly sexual stories up.
How you judge excessive violence I have no idea.

[jgkitarel]

Unfortunately, their definition and ours are almost certainly not the same. We, as a group, are a bit jaded to violent content, though we draw the line at violence that serves no purpose. Keep in mind, this is giving the trolls free reign to abuse it, as well as those who only live to slam creativity. I may have read some horrific fics, but in most cases, I give the author credit for at least writing it.

[Phht]

According to his author page, NILF and two other stories were removed by him. Admins killed HSSS. And some dumbass is threatening to report Blonds Have More Fun for a suggestive scene in chp29.

Of course, the hilarious thing about HSSS is that it was plagiarized by another author. Now, what do you bet that author's fic is still up even though HSSS was killed? Or actually, if I'm remembering its name correctly, it appears it died as well. Can't help but wonder why ff.n can't require a log-in to read fics above a certain rating. Or do like Twisting the Hellmouth does for fic chapters having a rating above a person's rating filter point. The TOS already has a section requiring that account users are at least age of majority for user's jurisdiction, is an emancipated minor, or has parental/guardian consent. Oh, and the site is not intended for users under the age of 13.

Though, reading through the TOS, I came across this paragraph (I'm gonna bold the most interesting section)

FanFiction.Net reserves the right to decide whether Content or a User Submission is appropriate and complies with these Terms of Service for violations other than copyright infringement or privacy law, such as, but not limited to, hate crimes, pornography, obscene or defamatory material, or excessive length.

Seriously? They can remove content based on "excessive length"? What the crap is considered excessive length? Is it on a per chapter basis, or per fic basis?

[Minion]

What about fics that take place in a series where rape/brutal murder happen in canon? Will they remove those series?

Also, I will say that I'm pleased they changed the login letters. Half the time I couldn't read them.

[FoxWood]

I'm actually wondering if there are any others collecting fanfics. You know, downloading stories, mostly the ones they like ore the ones from authors they're fond of, or even just things that have been recommended to them.

I found the fanfictiondownloader a few months back and have been nabbing them left and right, simply because I'm always paranoid about authors taking down a story I like, especially if I don't know about another site they might have it on. I mostly just read them myself, or occasionally let a friend read them, but I don't distribute them so no angry authors to deal with. I'm just glad I don't have to go through stories page by page anymore just to save them. It's not really an easy thing to do once you get past 30 chapters.

But there are so many good stories, often ones that you don't even bother to save because everyone knows that story, or you didn't like it the first time you saw it, or you thought you already had. And after reading so many fanfics, it starts to blur in your head which ones you have bookmarked, which ones you have saved, and which ones you need to. And it is sorta pointless to bookmark every single story and author writes when you can just bookmark the author. It becomes a little troublesome keeping everything sorted. Also if you've been reading fics since you were about 10 and now you're in your 20s.

Who else here has their own folder(s) of fanfiction for rainy days?

(Actually, that used to be why I downloaded them. Hard to interrupt my reading if I don't need to be online to read it. Also good for a long car ride.)

[Zankaru Zelladonii]

When I first discovered fanfic's I was very anti-technology when it came to reading, could not stand reading anything not on paper, so I ended up printing out all fics and carrying them for four years. Have a couple tote boxes full of rolled stories. I save them on my kindle now though, the screen on those things are fantastic.

[doc.exe]

Well, I do the same thing (downloading stories that I like in text files for my personal use). I'm relatively organized when it comes to my PC, but even then I have to admit that, after 12+ years of reading fanfics, it can become difficult to sort the files, or even remember in what folder was what story.

And well, regarding the issue with ff.net: Why they didn't restrict access to M(R) and MA(NC-17) stories unless you are logged to your account and your birth date match a certain criteria since the very beginning? Sure, it's not a perfect solution to prevent minors from reading material they are not supposed to read, but there is not a perfect solution for that when it comes to the internet, and it's better than not doing anything or start mass deletions.

[jgkitarel]

It's an overreaction to probable threats of a "moral crusade", or some method that can damage them, like a threat to get their IP revoked. This is not the first time it's happened to them, which caused a lot of its' best authors to jump ship to Media Miner, which is far less restrictive. It'll die down eventually, and while pulling a fic because it was reported for shallow reasons is rather stupid, it takes a lot of reports from different users (and having dozens of logins tied to dozens of email addresses doesn't really help much, they nipped that issue due to abuse in the past).

I've been reading from that site for over a decade and something like this happens every two or three years.

[Vael]

It's an overreaction to probable threats of a "moral crusade", or some method that can damage them, like a threat to get their IP revoked. This is not the first time it's happened to them, which caused a lot of its' best authors to jump ship to Media Miner, which is far less restrictive. It'll die down eventually, and while pulling a fic because it was reported for shallow reasons is rather stupid, it takes a lot of reports from different users (and having dozens of logins tied to dozens of email addresses doesn't really help much, they nipped that issue due to abuse in the past).

I've been reading from that site for over a decade and something like this happens every two or three years.

It just gets tiring ya know?

[doc.exe]

Yeah! I'm aware it's not the first time this has happened, I just wonder if there can't be a better solution than engaging in mass deletions.

[Minion]

I don't get how the site could be pressured. It's on the internet. Who get's to decide to threaten or pull the site down based on its content? Again, it's the internet. They want to clean things up and they start at ff.net?

[gman391]

Ad revenues. A lot of companies that want a family image won't advertise on sites that allow smut and the like because it's not family friendly. As that makes a lot of the money to keep the Pit going..it's in their best interests to cater to those companies.

[Tempest Kitsune]

It happened to TV Tropes after all.

[jgkitarel]

EDIT: Deleted. Thanks for the reminder man.

[Tempest Kitsune]

Oh, look at this, it's a shift within the topic. No political commentary guys, that stuff is just asking for trouble and flame wars.

[TeflonBilly]

This whole thing is unfortunate all the way around.

Particularly because the TOS for FF.net is so ambiguous anything that has violence and up can be removed without warning.

One of the other major classes of fics being removed which hasn't been mentioned here are the "Reading the Stories" fics, which I will freely admit is straight up copyright violation. But I will admit to some of them being a guilty pleasure of mine, some of them have been actually pretty well written (others are just garbage with the characters yucking it up every couple of paragraphs with nothing much being added character development wise or anything.)

One of the other major reasons this pisses me off is because ff.net really has almost no viable alternative. None of the other fanfic sites that I've looked at (and I have looked at a lot) have a usable user interface or credible search function. They are all very poorly layed out and are impossible to filter properly.

FF.net's is actually pretty bad, IMO, but it's the best out there. I wish they had one more feature, though with their newest TOS crackdown this would never be added, but I wish sites would have a slash filter so I don't have to wade through reams of slash fics. And you are right, I highly doubt the slash will get purged, even though the overwhelming majority of it does not meet the TOS.

I honestly am worried that NoFP could run afoul of this new draconian interpretation of the TOS, due to the violence in the story. And that just makes it lowsy for a whole host of other reasons, the authors of the fics that I like are getting scattered to the four winds and are going to be impossible to actively keep track of and fics that I've enjoyed are going to just go missing for me.

TB

[jgkitarel]

These things crop up every few years. Sometimes its the Ad Services, other times its enough complaints from [sarcasm] "concerned citizens" [/sarcasm].

The purges tend to be brief, fortunately. There are other alternatives, but FF.net has the most user friendly interface there.