Fanfiction etiquette

We already had Red Flags and many other topics, but I'd rather discuss certain (unwritten) rules when engaging with the fan-community and writers-community.

What is a complete no-go? How does one ask for reviews in a manner which does not seem to be too pushy or needy? Is it even en vogue to ask for them anymore? Do I absolutely have to translate certain words (when they are foreign) or explain terms to my readership, when I can assume that they know how to use Google and/or a dictionary? Am I supposed to assume that my readers are goldfish? Is it okay to refer in a franchise to other cartoons or comics of the same franchise and to assume that my readers saw/know about them? Should one always reply to every comment or review one receives, no matter how small they are and/or regardless of content?

Reviews are welcome and appreciated (or words to that effect)

Will vary from fandom to fandom. And from individual from individual sadly. This is a case of "you can please some of the people all the time and all the people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time" I'm afraid.

Assume not. If you've got a long time between updates, they've got a chance to re-read to refresh themselves.

It depends on the context. But if its not an explicit crossover, try to avoid anything beyond general knowledge being plot important.

That's your choice. It depends on how many you get and how fast.

NEVER hold chapters hostage for more review. Don't put links to private/friendlocked material in public forums. If you don't know if you can keep to an update schedule, don't announce one.

Also as a general rule of thumb be judicious in your use of tags (or similar). Too many and you just look like your fishing for readers.

The one thing that I hate that I see from time to time in summaries:

NEVER threaten your audience. In your summary or your author notes in the story, if you are slogging F-bombs or threatening to ruin someone's online life if they give you a bad review, don't even bother. I came across a couple of The Legend Of Zelda stories like that years ago by a particular author, I actually read one of the stories, but did not review because I was AFRAID to. I saw where it needed some work, but was afraid that this guy and his reviewer-girlfriend would jump on my back and murder me. I also decided "If you threaten people, I will not reward you with a review."

There are milder versions that aren't bad, but still annoy me. I've come to hate the Don't Like Don't Read tag. I can see by the pairing you summarized or tagged with what pairing it is, you don't have to further warn anyone of impending yaoi or whatever if you've basically done that already.

How do you guys feel about not including ship tags/etc in a story that is mostly gen, but has a slow build pairing that isn't really a major part of the narrative at all? Like, it's more of a side thing/garnish at most, and ultimately won't have any super elaborate romantic scenes. I've actually seen people who specifically don't mention pairings because they want it to be a surprise, but that seems uncommon in a lot of fanfic circles.

I've never written a story about pairings primarily and so I'll never tag them.

I tend not to tag for pairings unless I think it's a major part of the story, on fanfiction.net at least. On Ao3 I tag almost everything, including stupid, obscure tags of my own devising because their system lets you. (I think I have a variant of The Alleged Car on one of my story tags because.. hey, I could)!

I consider my stories "Gen" unless a romantic plot or subplot is a major force in the story. If "these two characters happen to be a couple" at the start of the story or "these two characters start to like each other" is present, but NOT a driving or major force of the story, it gets the same treatment as "this character ate a sandwich," in other words, if it's not much there, it's not worth mentioning (unless I find myself posting to a crowd of very sensitive people, like a group of Het Is Ew types, then I might "warn").

Stick to only tagging characters and/or pairings that are the most relevant to the story. Don't tag everything because it's information overload, plus not everything you can tag will be important.

edited 24th Jun '15 4:20:59 PM by Karxrida

I'm no expert. But after reading fanfiction for well over a decade, I propose the following rules:

• Keep rants against shows/characters/etc in your author notes to a minimum
• Keep politics to a minimum in your fanfics. No one comes to your "Harry Potter" fanfiction to hear Hermione recite your detailed opinion about abortion.
• Don't review someone's romance fic just to rant against the pairing they chose to write about. (Especially if said pairing is canon.)
• Before declaring your story a "fixer-fic," make sure you actually know the franchise you're "fixing." Otherwise, best to just label your re-write it as an "AU" story.
• Unless you're writing a parody, do what you can to avoid Ron the Death Eater. It's an exercise in creativity to portray a character you dislike in a respectful manner.
• Use the reply button to respond to reviews. Don't install a Q&A section in your author's notes, unless multiple people are asking the same question. Otherwise it gives the impression that you are mistaking constructive criticism from website members of equal standing as yourself for fan-mail.
• Don't be like me, and start half a dozen chapter stories at once. It's probably extremely irritating to your readers, who would probably prefer to follow one story at a time. They have other fanfic writers they're following, and other things in their lives going on.
• Don't make your chapters longer than they need to be. If you truly have a lot to say then do by all means. But don't "beef up" your chapters just because you like to see a big word-count. For why, see the above bullet.