Poll -- Form a Prose Thread Similar To the Sketch Thread?

[synkr0nized]

Hello there, you artistic and creative folks, critics, and just plain viewers alike.

As you may know, this forum section is home to our art and creative efforts, including pictures, paintings, written prose, and so forth. Most of you that post here are aware of the stickied sketches thread wherein users post various works to share and perhaps get some comments.

Recently, it has been suggested that written works, such as small poems and the like, be given a similar thread for users to quickly post and offer feedback. Personally, I would consider having my own thread for personalized feedback and to avoid mixing in with others' work would be superior, however that is just the opinion of one user here at NPF. The sketch thread suggests that a general thread would be enjoyed, and perhaps you folks would be interested in also having a poetry/prose thread like that.

So, here's a small poll. Depending on responses, I may add another sticky to this section. Please keep discussion reasonable and civil. Also, I wouldn't mind hearing from those who browse this section without necessarilly contributing even if you are hesitant to respond -- you're users of the forum, too.

Thanks for reading.

[Green Spanner]

Ordinarily, I would agree that personal threads for submitting prose would be best for the reasons you've said.

However, after the onslaught of silence I got when I submitted some prose, and realising that most people seem to have the same problem, I think a stickied thread would help.

I mean, the people who post on the sketches thread seem to be doing pretty well in the feedback department. Better than the writers at least...

So yeah, I'm all for this, providing the option to post individual threads remains.


[EDIT]: Yeah, what those guys below me said. The stickied thread should only be for smaller works to prevent it becoming oversaturated.

[Krylo]

Originally Posted by Green Spanner

Ordinarily, I would agree that personal threads for submitting prose would be best for the reasons you've said.

However, after the onslaught of silence I got when I submitted some prose, and realising that most people seem to have the same problem, I think a stickied thread would help.

No, this would make it worse.

People don't give feedback on writing and prose because they go into a thread see ten pages of bullshit, and quickly back out without giving it a second thought.

If you had a whole THREAD of that, no one would even go into and look at that thread except to post prose. You'd get zero feedback.

The only reason artists get feedback is because it takes like three seconds to look at a picture and know whether it sucks, and then maybe another fifteen seconds to decide WHY it sucks or doesn't suck.

Sketches would still do better at getting feedback if there weren't a thread, and, indeed, long ago when there wasn't a thread, they DID get feedback pretty consistently.

In fact they tended to get a little more of it than they do now, as that non-artists avoid the sketch thread.

In short, you're mistaking tl;dr syndrome with 'oh I must not be getting feedback because there's no thread for it'.

Edit: If it were JUST for poems, it might be ok, but any kind of stories and what not are going to be better served with individual threads.

[synkr0nized]

Note of clarification: Any potential sticky for prose would only be for briefer works, such as non-epic poetry, blurbs or excerpts perhaps, and that kind of thing. I do not think it would be reasonable to have one thread for longer works, as you folks have also pointed out, and did not intend to imply that.

I also do not think the creation of a sticky necessarilly prohibits one's creation of their own thread -- though, to use the sketches as an example again, if you made a thread just to post one thing you likely should have just used that thread.

[Green Spanner]

That's a fair point, Krylo. I didn't really think of it that way (and I kinda feel stupid for not having done so).

I did clarify, through the magic of edit, how I feel the thread will only work with shorter pieces (and most of what people post here prose-wise tends to be short poetry anyway). I still think it's worth a try, even if just to see if it works

[Solid Snake]

The problem with a stickied thread dedicated specifically to any and all prose is, that thread's going to get ridiculously long. Not long in terms of the quantitative number of posts, but long in the sense that each individual post is going to cover a heck of a lot of text.

And chances are you're only going to want to read choice chapters of one person's work, and in order to read that one person's work you're going to have to slog through excessive amounts of other projects. If the works are posted chapter-by-chapter as they're finished, you're going to have works truncated halfway by...other chapters for other works. So if three users (say, Mirai Gen, DFM and NonCon) are each writing independent stories, and you want to read Mirai's, you might eventually find Mirai's Chapter One, then have to skip through several of NonCon and DFM's chapters posted in succession in order to reach the next update of Mirai's work.

It'd be immensely difficult to follow unless you were actually reading everything, but I doubt every potential critic has the time or the energy to critique everyone's work.

This concept works with poetry and really short stories, but assuming this would also encompass novellas and larger works by chapter, I can't say that I'd think it'd be a great idea.

[Amake]

Sounds good. Maybe with a limit on how long a story can be in this sticky? I know I'd probably make some annoyingly large posts. But anything that promotes writing and reading would surely be very useful.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

I'm all done for tearing apart peoples works and crushing their lifelong dreams with my criticisms but individual threads seem more appropriate for that. No way would I look at a long thread full of random prose.

[synkr0nized]

Oh, good, the poll is closed. I had forgotten if I set it for a month or a couple of weeks.



OK, few responses but that's fine; overall I see no reason to make a new sticky. Thanks for the comments. Carry on, creativity forum.