The absolute state of Scribble Hub

[Sylthix]

You know, it's hard to counter an argument like this.




Because they were always of lower quality.

You are saying things like: this is factual, this is objective, and there is no counterargument. Welp, you know, I haven't seen a single FACT from you. I haven't seen a single OBJECTIVE statistic from you. All I've seen is your opinion masked under the pretense that its objective facts. You posted a single freaking picture as proof. Then you say things like quality is dropping OBJECTIVELY!!! Yet you didn't even read those two stories you posted, right? You simply screened two stories and made your opinion based on their titles. Then, you come here and tell us it's an objective PROOF that the quality is dropping. AND THEN, you tell us to counter arguments you are saying. I don't know what to say here.


How solid are your factual, objective arguments? I assume you've read all of those stories to make this statement? You won't say that you are eligible to make an opinion by simply seeing the title, description, tags, and the first chapter, right? Can you show me the stats you've made after reading at least ten chapters of every story, the percentage of bad to good stories? You know, one more argument to counter, I'm not that good at doing it, but I do like trying to counter the arguments.

Yeah clown move from me claiming to have objective facts but not entirely unbased claims. I guess we're in a stalemate then considering this has devolved into "you don't have any facts" and "neither do ". On any other day, I would create a data set based on the criteria I've set out on to determine if a book is decent or not, and then compile and graph the whole thing. However, I genuinely don't have the time for it now to so I guess I can leave this sinking gut feeling unresolved.

 

[SailusGebel]

Yeah clown move from me claiming to have objective facts but not entirely unbased claims. I guess we're in a stalemate then considering this has devolved into "you don't have any facts" and "neither do ". On any other day, I would create a data set based on the criteria I've set out on to determine if a book is decent or not, and then compile and graph the whole thing. However, I genuinely don't have the time for it now to so I guess I can leave this sinking gut feeling unresolved.

Clown move from you saying something about quality when it's completely subjective while at the same time claiming that your 'observation' is objective.

 

[ModernGold7ne]

No I don't consider non-fantasy as quality. I just happened to word what I wanted to say really badly. I am in-fact, an avid fiction lover and I enjoy all things fantasy going from classics such as Harry Potter when I was starting to like reading, progressing towards present day with Japanese fiction. My views on genres and quality are actually completely separate. My issue with genres is that people on SH just don't want to read nor write anything that's non-fantasy. Though I see it as a loss of creativity on the whole, if SH wants to be a site with a fantasy-oriented viewer base, then it's going to be this way to my disappointment. Most of it just has to do with my misplaced and unfair expectations. But maybe I'm not so crazy if at the time I'm writing this, Twin x Twin has released a chapter a mere minute after the story Magic x Magic. (No hate to both authors).View attachment 13358

Now quality is a different issue altogether. As it has been mentioned before SH is a site for rookie writers. I know that too but knowing doesn't change the fact that most stories on this site are objectively bad. Anyone has the freedom to innovate and write but whatever they write isn't guaranteed to be good (shocking). However, exceptions can be made as sometimes great stories can appear out of nowhere but I did notice it being much more difficult to find stories that clear the bar for decency. What I consider a story to be decent is to have a decent title, a blurb hooking me to the world, standard characterisation and a plot that works. I don't think these things are too much to ask for yet most of the time I find a low quality story that ignores one, two or maybe all these check boxes. I'll give a crazy caffeine-driven example.

Let's say Jesus Christ from 0 AD somehow fell from grace and is being forced to work at his local Japanese post office with his big-breasted co-workers that happen to all a big surprise underneath their skirts. A couple things happen. Because he is Jesus, all women naturally gravitate towards him due to his ultra charisma and serve as nothing but fan service and flavor text providers. They don't have any other thoughts but to follow Jesus-kun and affirm his beliefs and decisions. Because he is Jesus, All issues can be solved by brute force or talk-no-jutsu leading to no conflict between supporting characters and Jesus-kun or Jesus-kun and whatever hooligan that vandalised his shop window leading to no character development. Jesus-kun and together with a hidden organisation of magical people disguised as civilians also have to fight and deal with an evil cult who time-traveled (unexplained) from 0 AD in order to take over Japan which has a high concentration of mana diffused into the air.

Now, not all stories here are as off-kilter and bat-shit insane as the one I'm imagining, but the foundations are there. A weird but interesting plot, magnetic side characters attracted to the MC, ZERO DEPTH AND GROWTH IN CHARACTERS and a weak plot with many unexplained elements. I guess in the end what I'm trying to say, the standard of stories has fallen imo and this worries me to a degree because maybe someday someone will post a thoughtless story with their version of Jesus-kun and it being very popular due to the large portion of readers being conditioned into thinking it's "decent" (literally 1984). All of this are just some of my concerns for the future of the site and ignores the "writing for shits and giggles element"

Try release scheduling.

 

[Kitsura]

No I don't consider non-fantasy as quality. I just happened to word what I wanted to say really badly. I am in-fact, an avid fiction lover and I enjoy all things fantasy going from classics such as Harry Potter when I was starting to like reading, progressing towards present day with Japanese fiction. My views on genres and quality are actually completely separate. My issue with genres is that people on SH just don't want to read nor write anything that's non-fantasy. Though I see it as a loss of creativity on the whole, if SH wants to be a site with a fantasy-oriented viewer base, then it's going to be this way to my disappointment. Most of it just has to do with my misplaced and unfair expectations. But maybe I'm not so crazy if at the time I'm writing this, Twin x Twin has released a chapter a mere minute after the story Magic x Magic. (No hate to both authors).View attachment 13358

Now quality is a different issue altogether. As it has been mentioned before SH is a site for rookie writers. I know that too but knowing doesn't change the fact that most stories on this site are objectively bad. Anyone has the freedom to innovate and write but whatever they write isn't guaranteed to be good (shocking). However, exceptions can be made as sometimes great stories can appear out of nowhere but I did notice it being much more difficult to find stories that clear the bar for decency. What I consider a story to be decent is to have a decent title, a blurb hooking me to the world, standard characterisation and a plot that works. I don't think these things are too much to ask for yet most of the time I find a low quality story that ignores one, two or maybe all these check boxes. I'll give a crazy caffeine-driven example.

Let's say Jesus Christ from 0 AD somehow fell from grace and is being forced to work at his local Japanese post office with his big-breasted co-workers that happen to all a big surprise underneath their skirts. A couple things happen. Because he is Jesus, all women naturally gravitate towards him due to his ultra charisma and serve as nothing but fan service and flavor text providers. They don't have any other thoughts but to follow Jesus-kun and affirm his beliefs and decisions. Because he is Jesus, All issues can be solved by brute force or talk-no-jutsu leading to no conflict between supporting characters and Jesus-kun or Jesus-kun and whatever hooligan that vandalised his shop window leading to no character development. Jesus-kun and together with a hidden organisation of magical people disguised as civilians also have to fight and deal with an evil cult who time-traveled (unexplained) from 0 AD in order to take over Japan which has a high concentration of mana diffused into the air.

Now, not all stories here are as off-kilter and bat-shit insane as the one I'm imagining, but the foundations are there. A weird but interesting plot, magnetic side characters attracted to the MC, ZERO DEPTH AND GROWTH IN CHARACTERS and a weak plot with many unexplained elements. I guess in the end what I'm trying to say, the standard of stories has fallen imo and this worries me to a degree because maybe someday someone will post a thoughtless story with their version of Jesus-kun and it being very popular due to the large portion of readers being conditioned into thinking it's "decent" (literally 1984). All of this are just some of my concerns for the future of the site and ignores the "writing for shits and giggles element"

I don't know what to say my friend, you're literally complaining about an amateur webnovel site having... Bad amateur webnovels?

It's not like people are here to win awards for their writing, you are expending way too much mental energy into griping about the meh quality of webnovels here. if you are really annoyed and want to read something good then there are plenty of trad publishing novel by well established authors to read, or you can read the vast majority of foreign translated webnovels novels on novelupdates.

I recommend Memorize, Coiling dragon, or the ascendence of a bookworm, all of these are excellent novels regardless of the fantasy genre. Faraway Paladin is one of the best fantasy books I've read period (even if it gratuitously steals a plot point from the hobbit). I would recommend apothecary diaries as another historical/fiction book that is amazing too.

Whether the quality of the novels going down on the site is not the point, is it? It's that you don't enjoy reading them that much and that's fine, but complaining about it is pointless quibbling.

 

[greyblob]

I whole-heartily agree with this. There is so much satisfaction of finding something well written here but what worries me is that I feel it has become more difficult finding the good stuff leading me to hypothesize if good novels will ever become impossible to find here and hence the thread.

I would actually argue the opposite. the definition of quality is very subjective. what you define as good might not be the same to someone else and vice versa.
besides that though, and as I said before, I think there are more novels overall right now. there are more "lesser" ones but also more quality ones. and for every "bad" novel that make it big, fifty or so ones don't and just die out.
I'd advise on not worrying about that which you cannot control - that's what I do at least.
I don't even check trending anymore since I've probably read or did not like what's on there. I pick a genre I like, exclude what I don't like, pick a word count and recent update date, and sort by the least popular. very rarely do I find objectively well-written and engaging novels.
what's decent, easy to digest, and actively updated rises to the top regardless of the "trash" surrounding it.