As an author, what is your take on 'reviews'?

Ral

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Some people are really, really, really bad at receiving reviews. You can even see it here on the forums when people get negative reviews or ratings. I've seen too many authors to count who act like receiving a negative review is literally a death sentence for their story, or it enrages them to the point of wanting to track the person down to harass them, causes them to get depressed and consider dropping the story, and so on. As for positive reviews - well, I never really see people bring those up since they tend to focus on the negativity. I'll see authors who receive a single negative review and act like it's the end of the world, but then when I go to look at their review section, the vast majority of the other reviews are glowingly positive. There are definitely authors who 100% care far more about reviews, and both positive and negative reviews (but mainly negative ones) can have a massive impact on them. I try to tell these authors not to take reviews so personally, but it rarely works.
This.

I am so not going to review any story anywhere anymore. Sometimes I slipped but I try to stop myself. This is easy to do in SH since it is kinda a hassle to write reviews here.
Everybody else I've talked to regarding SH, both other authors and readers, are pretty much all in agreement that SH is for "weeb" stories.
And those kind of stories won't find success in other platforms.
The only way that SH is really gathering "leftovers" is in regard to sexual and LGBT content that is either banned or heavily discriminated against elsewhere, in which case I am happy to let SH be for those "leftovers."
It is not bad that SH would provide a platform for the "leftovers;" for stories that don't find success elsewhere or not wanted elsewhere.

The problem though with that is, it results to SH being kinda incoherent. There is little to no unity in its users both the writers and readers. In other platforms you can feel some energy there, the passion. Authors would be inspired by each other. Heck, even Patreon and Discord would provide more energy even though they aren't platforms dedicated to stories.

Members in SH just clashes with each other. I don't mean they fight each other. What I mean is that it doesn't feel comfortable to talk. This is kinda changing though. Maybe one day SH will be full to the max with energy.
Also, hey, Ral. I still have fond memories of that way-too-lengthy discussion we had that one time in RR's suggestions about Trending = P
Did they change their trending algorithm?
100% agreed that reviews should be for other readers. But it shouldn't be too harsh on the content either. Of course unless its a very detailed and nuanced review, which are hard to come-by.
Eh. Still a waste of effort. These kind of detailed and nuanced review might be hard to come by, but they are also rarely appreciated by the authors. If you wanted something that they would appreciate? Write a review that applaud them. Less effort but more successful in getting the appreciation you wanted.
Majority of the authors here are amateurs in their starting steps or passion-writers. For them reviews could mean a measure of affirmation.
The very authors who would not appreciate any criticism. The very sort of authors that you should not give reviews to.
Link please?:blob_cookie:
I think it was all gone now. I deleted, at least my part of the discussion. Though we do talk about the maths and the algorithms.
 
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LostinMovement

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Like in RoyalRoad. Heck even in Webnovel. There are many stories that are posted both here and Webnovel and they often are floundering in Webnovel but very popular here. I don't think most stories here would do well in FictionPress. There are also Wattpad but . . . considering the community there, no.

It is like SH is where the leftovers go. Not to mean there aren't good stories here, but the situation seems to be like that.

There is truth to your point but I respectfully disagree with some parts of what you mentioned. While many glorify RoyalRoad as being the genuine fantasy-writing platform, I personally find every story there to be pretty much a carbon copy of another. Isekai? check. LitRPG? check? Reincarnation? Check. System and harems? Check. One-dimensional protagonists and dungeons ? Check. It is not that different from SH at all. Readers there are just more active and 'somewhat' critical that is all.

If you want an example, here is one. The once top story called Golden Fox smthg has much better rating in RR than on SH (4 stars to 3). I don't mean to bash the author but that story has so many issues and flaws. RR's readers are neither smarter nor better than SH's readers in my personal opinion.

In SH and even Webnovel, you can write anything you want and you can still get a readership. In RR, you have to conform to the mold and follow the same formula or else your work would fall into obscurity. Many great works don't see the light of the day on RR. I guess that was happens when you have a platform with a one-track minded readership.

FictionPress is different. I posted my works there before and people are much harsher than RR and all other writing platforms combined. Mediocrity doesn't fly there from my experience. On the brighter side, you can get genuine and detailed reviews which I have always appreciated.

Over all, I guess it depends on your experience with every platform and how you look at things.
 

Assurbanipal_II

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There is truth to your point but I respectfully disagree with some parts of what you mentioned. While many glorify RoyalRoad as being the genuine fantasy-writing platform, I personally find every story there to be pretty much a carbon copy of another. Isekai? check. LitRPG? check? Reincarnation? Check. System and harems? Check. One-dimensional protagonists and dungeons ? Check. It is not that different from SH at all. Readers there are just more active and 'somewhat' critical that is all.

If you want an example, here is one. The once top story called Golden Fox smthg has much better rating in RR than on SH (4 stars to 3). I don't mean to bash the author but that story has so many issues and flaws. RR's readers are neither smarter nor better than SH's readers in my personal opinion.

In SH and even Webnovel, you can write anything you want and you can still get a readership. In RR, you have to conform to the mold and follow the same formula or else your work would fall into obscurity. Many great works don't see the light of the day on RR. I guess that was happens when you have a platform with a one-track minded readership.

FictionPress is different. I posted my works there before and people are much harsher than RR and all other writing platforms combined. Mediocrity doesn't fly there from my experience. On the brighter side, you can get genuine and detailed reviews which I have always appreciated.

Over all, I guess it depends on your experience with every platform and how you look at things.

Indeed, I have seen quite some more successful stories on RR that made here an appearance on scribble as well. :blob_reach:
 

Ral

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There is truth to your point but I respectfully disagree with some parts of what you mentioned. While many glorify RoyalRoad as being the genuine fantasy-writing platform, I personally find every story there to be pretty much a carbon copy of another. Isekai? check. LitRPG? check? Reincarnation? Check. System and harems? Check. One-dimensional protagonists and dungeons ? Check. It is not that different from SH at all. Readers there are just more active and 'somewhat' critical that is all.
And what is the problem with that?

Do you know the Sturgeon's Law? It states that 90% of everything is crap. So what if there is a lot of crap in RR? It is true everywhere even the traditional publishing platform.
If you want an example, here is one. The once top story called Golden Fox smthg has much better rating in RR than on SH (4 stars to 3). I don't mean to bash the author but that story has so many issues and flaws. RR's readers are neither smarter nor better than SH's readers in my personal opinion.
You mean Golden Fox with a System?

I think you got it backwards. It is rated 3.72 in RR and 4 in SH. It also has more readers and views in SH than in RR.

And I didn't say that readers in any platform is smarter or better than others. What I said was stories that failed in other platforms will find more success here. I also didn't say that there are no great stories here in SH.

Though, I did say that mediocre stories thrive here. That is mainly becuase SH isn't really harsh against authors. They tend to get harsh feedback in other platforms.
In SH and even Webnovel, you can write anything you want and you can still get a readership. In RR, you have to conform to the mold and follow the same formula or else your work would fall into obscurity. Many great works don't see the light of the day on RR. I guess that was happens when you have a platform with a one-track minded readership.
This isn't exactly bad. I mean, there are publishers who only publish Romance novels and reject everything else. Sure not great for those who write in other genre but it has benefits (like it is great for Romance writers and readers of Romance novels).

In fact, being this unfocused, like with SH, have its disadvantages. There was already a note of readers here not translating to patreon numbers. It is this lack of focus is one reason why. Though, this isn't always a bad thing you know. Just different.

And what constitute as "great works" really depends on the reader. Not to mention, not everything could succeed even if they are great. Just being great doesn't guarantee success.
Over all, I guess it depends on your experience with every platform and how you look at things.
Each platform have their faults. Each platform have their own quirks.
 

TRNRLogan

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While I occasionally post reviews here, I tend not to since authors on this site are more... sensitive about their stories. Hell I was banned from commenting on a story i LIKED because i made one negative comment that was purely my opinion.

As a reader though i tend to prefer reading stories that have reviews. Especially if they have a couple 3 or 2 star reviews since those tend to actually give an idea of what the story is like. I usually ignore 5 star and 4 star reviews since they usually just praise the story without explaining why they think it's fantastic.
 

LostinMovement

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And what is the problem with that?

Do you know the Sturgeon's Law? It states that 90% of everything is crap. So what if there is a lot of crap in RR? It is true everywhere even the traditional publishing platform.

You mean Golden Fox with a System?

I think you got it backwards. It is rated 3.72 in RR and 4 in SH. It also has more readers and views in SH than in RR.

Yes that one. I swear I just stumbled upon it few days ago and it had a 3.3 rating on SH o_O I guess, my point still stands somewhat as there isn't much difference between the two ratings.

Though, I did say that mediocre stories thrive here. That is mainly becuase SH isn't really harsh against authors. They tend to get harsh feedback in other platforms.

And what constitute as "great works" really depends on the reader. Not to mention, not everything could succeed even if they are great. Just being great doesn't guarantee success.

Each platform have their faults. Each platform have their own quirks.

What do you think about this idea? Let's say we fix the genre system (narrow it down more) and have a Trending list for each main genre. Wouldn't that be 'fairer' so to speak? That way writers don't get punished for writing different genres from the mainstream ones.
 
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Ral

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Yes that one. I swear I just stumbled upon it few days ago and it had a 3.3 rating on SH o_O I guess, my point still stands somewhat as there isn't much difference between the two ratings.
There are stories that both succeed or fail in multiple platforms. That is why it is advised that you put your stories in multiple platform. To increase your chance of success.
What do you think about this idea? Let's say we fix the genre system (narrow it down more) and have a Trending list for each main genre. Wouldn't that be 'fairer' so to speak? That way writers don't get punished for writing different genres from the mainstream ones.
It sounds that it could work. Sounds great even.

I think we could take it a step further, gave each genre their own environment. Like, this part of SH would be devoted to Romance, another devoted to Adventure, etc.. I don't think this has ever been done in big scale before. This would provide presentation for each genre instead of being presented all together and fighting for attention in one page/environment.
 
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Ral

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But what if a story has both?
It appears in both.

SH just provides an environment devoted to a genre but internally the stories are not separated at all, nor though authors have to create different accounts or something for each genre. Then there would be a main page like what we have now where everything is presented.
 

Ace_Arriande

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And those kind of stories won't find success in other platforms.

Hey now, I had 8k total followers over on RR before trying to bring as many of them as I could over here = P. Weeb stories definitely can find success on other platforms. It's just that SH is dedicated to the weebery while it's sort of a side thing elsewhere. The only platform I can think of that wouldn't really be any good for weebs is Wattpad, but it can still be good if you write romantic fanfics of select anime. Heck, even Amazon does pretty good with self-published weeb stuff. My point is just that, while there may be (successful) weeb stories on other platforms, weeb is the focus here rather than a side community.

The problem though with that is, it results to SH being kinda incoherent. There is little to no unity in its users both the writers and readers. In other platforms you can feel some energy there, the passion. Authors would be inspired by each other. Heck, even Patreon and Discord would provide more energy even though they aren't platforms dedicated to stories.

Members in SH just clashes with each other. I don't mean they fight each other. What I mean is that it doesn't feel comfortable to talk. This is kinda changing though. Maybe one day SH will be full to the max with energy.

I'm not really sure I get what you mean here. The only time I ever see any clashing regarding what authors vs readers like is here on the forum, and forums are never really indicative of majority opinion. Most of the top stories and authors are weebs. Pretty much everybody on the Discord server agrees that there's a huge weeb focus, too. As far as inspiring goes, I'll agree to thinking that not many people here seem inspired by each other so much as they seem inspired by other web/light novels (of JP origin, mainly) that they've read. I feel like, since SH is basically NU's little sister for now, most authors were probably off reading translated novels there before coming here. On RR, you can definitely tell that the authors there get inspired by each other sometimes.

Did they change their trending algorithm?

Nope. I doubt that they ever will.
 

Ral

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Hey now, I had 8k total followers over on RR before trying to bring as many of them as I could over here = P. Weeb stories definitely can find success on other platforms. It's just that SH is dedicated to the weebery while it's sort of a side thing elsewhere. The only platform I can think of that wouldn't really be any good for weebs is Wattpad, but it can still be good if you write romantic fanfics of select anime. Heck, even Amazon does pretty good with self-published weeb stuff. My point is just that, while there may be (successful) weeb stories on other platforms, weeb is the focus here rather than a side community.
Yeah. True. Though, I don't think your story was weeb or I think it did not go that far. Still, they are better appreciated here.
I'm not really sure I get what you mean here. The only time I ever see any clashing regarding what authors vs readers like is here on the forum, and forums are never really indicative of majority opinion. Most of the top stories and authors are weebs. Pretty much everybody on the Discord server agrees that there's a huge weeb focus, too. As far as inspiring goes, I'll agree to thinking that not many people here seem inspired by each other so much as they seem inspired by other web/light novels (of JP origin, mainly) that they've read. I feel like, since SH is basically NU's little sister for now, most authors were probably off reading translated novels there before coming here. On RR, you can definitely tell that the authors there get inspired by each other sometimes.
I don't think I even explain myself well.

There is a community here, like the weebs, but taken as a whole, SH doesn't have cohesive whole or an identity. SH is very much lacking in other areas/genre or the other genres aren't flourishing. The Trending area for example is always filled with scantily clad women and "those" kind of stories.

This is maybe why you are doing the Adventum Contest.
 
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Ace_Arriande

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There is a community here, like the weebs, but taken as a whole, SH doesn't have cohesive whole or an identity. SH is very much lacking in other areas/genre or the other genres aren't flourishing. The Trending area for example is always filled with scantily clad women and "those" kind of stories.

In my opinion, the identity is the weeb stuff. Even the scantily clad women are anime girls 99% of the time. Also, to be fair, while many stories might look like "those" kind of stories every time they pop up on trending, those covers are usually being used as clickbait and the stories are just your typical weeb things instead of smut or anything = P. Anyways, doesn't lacking in other areas/genres kind of make it even more obvious that the identity is weeb? I would think that, if there were a bunch of genres of equal success, then the identity would be even less certain. Or rather, its identity would just be that of any other catch-all novel platform for general use that doesn't really specialize in any one thing. Right now, I see SH's identity as weeb-focused, and that's why I prefer it over all the other platforms. The identity being that of a place for weebs is what makes me want to see it grow more successful than its competitors. If it became less focused on weeb/anime/Japanese tropes and themes, I wouldn't be as interested in it. I personally believe that it's got a pretty strong identity right now. The community is overall friendly, accepting and tolerant, and full of weebs. If you don't think that it has that identity, then we might just have different standards for what constitutes an identity in the first place.
 

Ral

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In my opinion, the identity is the weeb stuff. Even the scantily clad women are anime girls 99% of the time. Also, to be fair, while many stories might look like "those" kind of stories every time they pop up on trending, those covers are usually being used as clickbait and the stories are just your typical weeb things instead of smut or anything = P. Anyways, doesn't lacking in other areas/genres kind of make it even more obvious that the identity is weeb? I would think that, if there were a bunch of genres of equal success, then the identity would be even less certain. Or rather, its identity would just be that of any other catch-all novel platform for general use that doesn't really specialize in any one thing. Right now, I see SH's identity as weeb-focused, and that's why I prefer it over all the other platforms. The identity being that of a place for weebs is what makes me want to see it grow more successful than its competitors. If it became less focused on weeb/anime/Japanese tropes and themes, I wouldn't be as interested in it. I personally believe that it's got a pretty strong identity right now. The community is overall friendly, accepting and tolerant, and full of weebs. If you don't think that it has that identity, then we might just have different standards for what constitutes an identity in the first place.
Well, there are lots of weeb here.

I don't really think SH focuses on weeb, like Webnovels with cultivation stories when it started or NU with translated novels. It just becomes a place for the rest (which are mostly weebs and erotic).

I think I'm not explaining myself well. Of course if you use something, you identify with that. Heck, I identify with SH. However, the identity of the stuff itself is not about what you think or what the users think. It is what is it identified as a whole, including others that aren't users.

Maybe I should be calling it brand. That might be the more correct term. Think of iphone and Android. There is a strong identity with each. Even if you don't use them, you know what they are. The other phones however don't register much to the collective. Sure if you use those other phones you can identify yourself with that phone, you know what it is, you might even love it; but for the rest, they don't make an impression. Maybe they know of those but there is no clear identification of what that thing is, except for just "another phone".

That is what somewhat happens here, I think. Sure if you belong to SH, you can identify it. I identify with it too. I am here. I don't particularly identify with weeb, though I love Japanese culture and even learning the language, but if someone think weeb stories do they really think of SH? I mean, I think these stories are kinda everywhere. And if I want Japanese stuff, there are actual stuff/stories from Japan I could have. In contrast, if you think cultivation stories, then Webnovel; LitRPG, RoyalRoad; fanfiction, FanFiction.net; translated Asian novels, NovelUpdates. There are actually jokes from before about changing the sites names and no one gives a name for SH.

Maybe it is just my perspective. Maybe SH has a strong identity as a weeb story platform instead of being another weeb story platform. Heck, it might be that SH is actually becoming a weeb story platform. I don't think that is bad at all.
 
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i think i'm more of a degenerate than a weeb, i can't enjoy het stuff as much anymore.

i want more moe girls getting really gay with each other, especially if they're lolis and cute onee-chan <3

that's one reason i put my most shameless things on Ao3, i think in here, loli yuri can be pretty controversial.

ao3 even allow underage smut although i tend to keep mine over 18 (even though they might look 12) :D /
 

TRNRLogan

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i think i'm more of a degenerate than a weeb, i can't enjoy het stuff as much anymore.

i want more moe girls getting really gay with each other, especially if they're lolis and cute onee-chan <3

that's one reason i put my most shameless things on Ao3, i think in here, loli yuri can be pretty controversial.

ao3 even allow underage smut although i tend to keep mine over 18 (even though they might look 12) :D /

Same but without lolis.
 
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