Things that might not be helping

Subject: Things that might not be helping
Author: Tomash
Posted on: 2019-10-08 20:40:00 UTC

A big one is that we're hard to find. My main example here is that most of our stuff for the last few years has been on Google Docs. This is the opposite of discoverable for people on the internet.

I'd actively encourage people to, for example, go and post their back catalogs on AO3 (especially given that they don't have FFnet's anti-sporking policy and won't have one as a matter of meta-policy). Maybe not all at once, so it's easier to maintain attention, but still.

Another thing is that, due to the above, we've lost the steady stream of younger folks who have more time to write stuff, and that's creating a cycle of lack of engagement (as Ix alluded to). I don't think this will lead to the downfall of the PPC or anything, but I do think that, for example, we should be actively making our existence known in places where writers and fan-folks are. We used to have (from what I can tell) things like a noticably actively LiveJournal community, but that site died a bit under a decade ago and we don't have a replacement PPC space elsewhere on the internet.

Anyway, these are my preliminary thoughts on the situation.

- Tomash

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PPC Assassin! by Snowblaze on 2019-10-08 13:14:00 UTC Reply

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" asked Edward.

Kat grinned, turning around from where she was pinning a piece of paper to the noticeboard in the Cafeteria. "What could possibly go wrong?"

Edward shot her a death glare until she admitted, "Okay, I did that on purpose to annoy you."

"When the Ironic Overpower ruins all this, it's your fault."

"It was my idea in the first place," said Kat, "I'll take responsibility for it." She jammed the final pin into the board. "There we are!" she said, stepping back to admire the notice. It read:

PPC Assassin!

Ever wanted a PPC game of Assassin? No? Well, I made one anyway. The rules are as follows:

Sign up below by writing your name, RC number and an object commonly found in HQ or on missions. Sign-ups close two weeks from now (22/10/19), and you will receive your target and object shortly after.

To kill your target, all you have to do is give them the object that you were given before you are killed yourself. However, they must willingly take it: no forcing it on them, giving it to them when they are unconscious, or mind-controlling them into taking the object.

If you are killed, you must tell your killer who your target and object were and they will then take on that role. If at any stage you find yourself having to kill yourself, let me know and I will reshuffle the surviving players.

Good luck, have fun, and let me know if you have any questions.

Sincerely,
Katarina Eagle, DMS
RC 841.720

(OOC)
The rules as stated IC apply for this. There is no time limit; it can go on as long as it takes. For one of your agents to kill someone, you have to write a canonical PPC story (mission, interlude or RP) featuring one of your agents giving their target the object.

As that previous statement implies, sign-ups are only open to people with Permission and at least one story featuring their agents. Enter in this thread with between one and four agents and the same number of objects commonly found in the PPC, and please make your email clickable so I can send you your targets once sign-ups close.

If the target one of your agents is given means you have to co-write something with someone you wouldn't normally co-write with, you may post something along the lines of "one of my agents needs to kill one of your agents, can we do a co-write?" but don't reveal which agent.

This next rule should go without saying, but no meta-gaming. Just because you know someone is trying to kill one of your agents doesn't mean the agent is allowed to know that. Try to respond in-character as your agent, even if you know that means they'll get killed.

Good luck, have fun, and may the best agent win!

Snowblaze.

Signups closing soon! by Snowblaze on 2019-10-18 11:46:14 UTC Reply

The plan is to close sign-ups on Sunday, but I'd rather get to around twenty agents to make this a bit more viable (currently, if I remember rightly, there are nine). If I don't get at least a few more by Sunday I'll extend the sign-up period.

Oooh, what's that? by Hardric on 2019-10-21 14:01:17 UTC Reply

A perfect occasion to go back to writing PPC fics, and in cowrite to get back on the saddle more easily? And I've got vacations starting that week? I'm signing up on this very much, please.

Agents are Richard Legard and Marina Nicodelli. FOr the items, I'll go with glasses and DORKS.

Euh, PS. by Hardric on 2019-10-22 12:41:09 UTC Reply

So,I just remembered that DORKS were already on the list, and would like to ask if it is possible to switch Purple Stuff for a Remote Activator?

Will do! (nm) by Snowblaze on 2019-10-24 11:44:32 UTC Reply

Regarding 'getting the word out'... by Aurora Morningstar on 2019-10-19 23:53:09 UTC Reply

...would you like something said on the Discord? Or maybe you could repost this further up, if necessary? It seems like no one is scrolling this far down and your thread's gotten buried by the Board Feedback thread, and extending the signup period isn't going to help if no one notices. (I, personally, would sign up, except I do not have Permission, and will not anytime soon.)

That makes sense. by Snowblaze on 2019-10-20 11:23:36 UTC Reply

I was thinking of reposting once the original period closes (actually on Tuesday, as I'd have noticed if I'd read my own starter post properly). It would be great if you, or someone else, could mention it in the Discord. Thank you!

Tracking sign-ups by Snowblaze on 2019-10-09 15:45:00 UTC Reply

In a Google Doc spreadsheet (https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FFRywWbatsQvIYWE8EaaJBwccMx7Hg2wPVWkk3CO4/edit?usp=sharing).

Note: objects are assigned on order of sign-ups so people can see which objects have been used, and this order will have no bearing on the game once it begins.
Signing up! by Huinesoron on 2019-10-09 09:31:00 UTC Reply

"Guys! Guys guys guys!"

Nita looked at Nancy-the-Spirit-of-Imagination, then back at the rapidly bouncing Kaitlyn. "Everyone here is female," she pointed out.

Kaitlyn rolled her eyes emphatically. "Dudes? No, same problem. Folks? Now I sound like a Ren Faire. Um... peeps? Peeps! Peeps peep- no, now I'm a duckling."

Hypatia (aka I-Can't-Believe-She's-Not-Arwen) looked puzzled. "Was it a D.O.R.K.S. malfunction?" she asked. "Only you still look human to me."

Kaitlyn stared at her for a second, then turned deliberately back to Nita. "You'll never guess what! There's a game of Assassin starting!"

Now it was Nita's turn to look puzzled. "You're not an Assassin," she pointed out. "None of us are."

"Ugggh, do none of you keep up with obscure party games?" Kaitlyn waved a sheet of paper in the air (far too fast for anyone to read). "We get to pretend to be Assassins by giving people... notepads or something."

"Uh-huh. No thanks." Nita snatched the flyer from her hand and set about pinning it back to the noticeboard. "I've had my- I mean, I don't like the idea of killing people, even in pretend."

"Um." Hypatia raised a hand. "I do? I mean, I think? I don't really have a job, so, y'know... I'll sign up?"

"Er... great!" Kaitlyn kept one wary eye on the taller woman and edged over to the board. "So that's Hypatia... and Kaitlyn... and..." She glanced quickly around the Cafeteria. "Great, she's not here; Selene can join in as well. Fun!" She shot a quick look at Hypatia. "Well... hopefully fun."

Because I'm not going to regret including Hypatia at all. [Eyeroll]

Agents Kaitlyn Jackson and Selene Windflower, and HQ resident Hypatia.

Objects can be any of: notepad, book from the Canon Library, mission pin, Canon Analysis Device.

hS
I'm intrigued! by Neshomeh on 2019-10-09 02:55:00 UTC Reply

(So as not to ignore the original post.)

My ability to keep up with something like this might be... limited... because I'm easily distracted and have poor time management skills... but I am intrigued!

Henry Robinson (age ten) is certainly game, if kids are allowed. Seems like the sort of thing PPC kids would love. ^_^ For a totally common object... how about an old shoe? Possibly just a shoelace?

~Neshomeh
Looks good. by Novastorme on 2019-10-08 17:54:00 UTC Reply

I wouldn't mind answers to hS's questions before I fully commit with Agents etc. But I'm in for this.

Proper Sign Up Post by Novastorme on 2019-10-14 18:48:00 UTC Edited Reply

"Hey, look at this." Cinnabar announced as she sat down with her lunch.

"What's got you excited?" Theo asked, looking up from the staring contest he had been having with what the cafeteria staff had claimed was mashed potato. "Because there's no way it's this 'lunch'."

Instead of talking Cinn handed the piece of paper she'd taken from the notice board. "Here, game of assassins but without the killing and the blood and the screaming that assassins normally have to go through."

"Huh, sounds good enough." Theo replied before reading further down. "It says about suggesting items to be used for these assassinations, you got any ideas?"

Cinn smirked, before looking at Theo's left, cybernetic arm, "I've got an interesting one...

So my agents Cinnabar and Theo (both DOGA) are up for the challenge. Items for the challenge could be: a toothbrush, a flask of Bleepka, Stuff (specifically, Purple Stuff, but other varities could work too), a roll of Duct tape and mashed potato. (Despite the above interaction hinting at the use of Theo's arm I'm not going to put it in as it's not really feasible or practical especially considering he doesn't have a spare).

Nova

Hmm, interesting. by Huinesoron on 2019-10-08 13:48:00 UTC Reply

I'll probably sign up, but I have a couple of questions:

-Are signups just for agents in the same RC? I have a few agents who act as solo consultants and could conceivably be pulled into any mission, but equally you might be thinking just of natural teams.

-Are the agents all individual players? So it would be (say) Kaitlyn has to target Edward, but Mira is targetting Selene?

-If one of your agents has to kill another of your agents, do you get to write that? Or would that be an 'ask for a reshuffle' scenario?

-Is there an active (PPC canonical) RP community on the Discord? I ask because there's not a whole lot of stories being published these days, and I don't want to be a pain and be The One You Have To Write With rather than just a quick RP (particularly since I'm notoriously bad at keeping up with cowrites).

(Actually, just generally: how active is the Discord? The Board is practically dead, but is that because everyone's moved over to Happy Fun Chat Land, or because everyone's just left?)

hS, talking himself out of it more and more

Answers by Snowblaze on 2019-10-09 07:17:00 UTC Reply

You can sign up with any agents (or other characters resident in HQ) that you like. The agents are indeed individual players, and you should write one of your agents killing another if that’s the case.

I’m not actually on the Discord myself, so I can’t really answer those questions.

Thanks. :) by Huinesoron on 2019-10-09 09:33:00 UTC Reply

One more question, just so that I know what I'm doing: is the object a feature of the assassin, or the target? When you kill someone and acquire their target, do you still have to give them the same object, or do you get told a new object to give them?

hS

Same object. (nm) by Snowblaze on 2019-10-09 14:27:00 UTC Reply

Obviously I can't answer the rules questions... by Novastorme on 2019-10-08 17:53:00 UTC Reply

But as to the PPC Discord... it's not dead persay, but it certainly feels like a lot less PPC-based discussion goes on there than it used to. Rudi's is still an active place, however you usually have the same rota of people in there, and oftentimes it can be continuations of previous days RPs which feel (at least to me) rather hard for someone different to enter. And Rudi's is the only channel out of the 11 total that regularly deals with PPC stuff (besides Badfic, but that feels more like it's just quoting badfic than anything else). Oh and Rudi's doesn't always seem to be canonical anymore, but that may just be me.

It's acutally something that I've been thinking about talking/posting about for a while now. The PPC-ness of the PPC community feels like it's been draining away slowly. I was thinking about all the Discord servers I was in the other day and realised that the main reason I'm still in the PPC one is because of the D&D campaign that Badger is running in there. The European friendly write up while great has been a singular occurence, and I feel like it's become more of a chatting place for several groups of friends that interlink, rather than a chatting place for a writing community. The main reason I joined the PPC was to help hone my writing skills because I felt like it was a friendly community where doing that was not just easy but also actively supported, and yet I feel like that has been left by the wayside more and more since the launch of the Discord.

I mean, this is just my opinion obviously, and it's a fairly bleak look at things. But part of me suspects that my experiences aren't necessarily too far from the truth.

Nova.

General response to this part of the thread by Snowblaze on 2019-10-09 07:35:00 UTC Reply

So I definitely didn’t intend to start this kind of discussion, but it’s not a bad thing, if it needs to happen.

I still feel like a newbie, even though I’ve been here over a year, although that’s probably more just me. I’m not on the Discord, and probably won’t join because time zones and my weird availability mean I’ll basically never be on at the same time as anyone else.

I have been trying to write missions, but it’s not easy. I’m allowed less than an hour of writing-at-computer time, and I’m trying to write two regularly-updating fanfics, an original work and an endless collection of drabbles and one-shots as well as missions. I do post on AO3, but it can be painful and take up a lot of time to transfer a mission from my Word doc to AO3. Plus my PPC works appear in one obscure fandom which very few people will see and one that’s so big works are wiped off the front page before anyone sees them.

Not to mention, I actually find writing missions fairly tricky. My first one came fairly easily, but after that it was much more of a struggle. It feels kind of repetitive since all missions have more or less the same plot, and when there’s so many other things I need to write which have deadlines it’s very often the PPC that slips.

I’m not giving up, though, and I’ll try to get this next mission up by the end of the year, although I doubt it will help the PPC much overall.
Tangential comment on Rudi's (and a bunch of proposals) by Tomash on 2019-10-09 01:33:00 UTC Reply

(This is a post that started from me misreading your complaint, Nova, so it's not quite a response to you, but I still figure it needs to be made)

I went through and counted how many folks have been involved an RP in #rudis in the past week, and, though there's definitely something of a core group, I counted 16 folks (I can post the list if it's wanted).

Now, a statistic worth noting is that a bit under half the folks on that list have posts on the front page, and of the folks who have posted on the Board, not all of them have been really participating.

And, now that I've been thinking about the situations I have a few unconnected proposals:
- I'm willing to (and probably will, since I just volunteered for it) throw together a survey thing to gather folks' thoughts on why they're not also here as well as the chat.
- We have control over a bot in the Discord and over the new Board. One interesting thing to consider is some form of Board->chat bridge, so the Discord gets poked about new posts. This will also enable catching up on unread posts via the unread indicators in #board (or whatever), which might reduce the friction involved in needing to scroll down and check all the threads.
- Given the core RP group issue, and since I've noticed this myself sometimes, is #rudis getting crowded? I think it sometimes dose reach that point, and since people are rather unwilling to use #other_rp for overflow, we could maybe use a second RP channel for when the first is busy? Thoughts from the chat-folk?

- Tomash

Some Slight Rambling (or: Why GMA's a Terrible PPCer XD ) by The Good Mod Addict on 2019-10-09 03:00:00 UTC Reply

I'm definitely in the category of "people who aren't as active on the Board as they should be." I do make an effort to check the Board at least once every couple of days, but I usually don't post anything. I think I know why, too; I just don't have that much to say on a lot of topics, and it feels like kind of a waste to write a forum post just to say "I agree with so-and-so" or "nice job on this thing you wrote." Then, past a certain point in time, it feels almost awkward to comment on older posts even if I do have some thoughts later; after all, who's going to slog through chains of messages to refresh their memory on the context of a discussion several days old just to read one more comment? All of this is a problem with me, of course, not the community structure; I could definitely start making more of an effort to read and comment on as many things as possible, it just feels to me like that's not how a forum like this is designed to be used.

In terms of the Rudi's RP, it's one of the main draws of the Discord to me. I know for a fact that having a space for roleplay that isn't canonical (and therefore doesn't require Permission) has improved my writing dramatically. Sometimes it can get crowded, sure, but I think that could be solved by simply having multiple channels for it. I'd feel way more cautious about a more "canonical" RP chat, if only because I think it could cause even more of a disconnect between people who primarily use the Discord and people who mainly use the Board; with a collective setting like the PPC, it certainly helps if everyone is equally aware of developments in the canon. That said, I'm all for the idea if it would attract more people to contribute to the setting in a format different (and less effort-intensive) than writing missions.

One more belated thought on Discord and mission writing. by The Good Mod Addict on 2019-10-09 03:15:00 UTC Reply

I just thought of something else: The #badfic channel of the Discord. I don't know about how people with Permission who use the Discord see it, but I could definitely see how it could be detrimental to writing missions in the long run. I know that if I had Permission, I would try to actively avoid missioning things I had previously thrown into the Discord; after all, a good chunk of people would have already seen what makes the fic bad, so it would be a bunch of extra work writing things just to get some character interactions down onto a page (not that there's anything wrong with that, it just puts the "sporking badfic" aspect of PPC writing far in the background).

I don't really have any suggestions for dealing with this potential problem, if it even is a problem. I just thought it was worth mentioning.

Well, yes, but actually... by Neo Skater on 2019-10-12 15:31:00 UTC Reply

There's a good reason Ix's missioning My Immortal even though pretty much everyone knows exactly what makes it bad, and that's that having characters actually react to the events of the fic while inside of it and witnessing the reality distortions caused by Suvians is entertaining on a different level than just criticism. It's also fun to see exactly what way the agents are going to kill the fic and how they're going to deal with the dangers.

You have a point. Maybe the #badfic channel should be shoumetsu'ed. As a matter of fact, perhapseth the whole Discord should be shoumetsu'ed or highly reorganized, because I know that I'm getting caught up in all the discussion rather than reading or writing PPC. (Not to mention how fast I get around to hating what I've written...)

But missions are a heckuva lot more than just sporking badfic. They're also for character development and interactions.

And hey, maybe if we try to encourage more PPC writing by posting to AO3 and such and such like that, we can create a renaissance in our community! If we all try to be more active on the Board, we can fix this! And now someone's playing emotional, dramatic anime music in real life!

The point I'm trying to make is: Don't Give Up!

I support demi-canon RPing. by Neshomeh on 2019-10-09 03:07:00 UTC Reply

Even if I can't personally keep up with realtime chat in a large group, I agree that it's of great benefit to have a space where you're free to try out ideas without needing to commit to them for life.

If you like it, of course, it can always become canon. {= )

~Neshomeh

That sounds pretty familiar. by Huinesoron on 2019-10-08 20:04:00 UTC Reply

I remember some comments back during the previous chat (what was that, the IRC?) that people weren't coming to it for the PPC - they were coming because that was where their friends were.

Which would drive me batty if I were on there, but... I'm not. ;) Noncanonical RP is an old tradition of fandom communities - heck, we do it all the time on the Board, and the one thing I remember from the first chat was a silly LotR RP.

The trouble with 'how do you make it a writing community' is that the answer is 'get a lot of people engaged', and we don't have that. I'm usually not engaged enough to get involved with writing stuff, as you might remember from the prompts. So what we get is one person, or two people, trying to organise something, pushing it for a few weeks, and then giving up because barely anyone replies.

Which would be less of an issue if there were more people around, because if one in 10 reply, then it matters whether you have 20 or 100. But... the only ways we've historically gained large influxes of new members are 1) being posted on a big archive (TVTropes), or 2) someone writing a whole lot of missions on one of the archives.

Which means you need someone with the time to write missions like there's no tomorrow. Unfortunately, all the people who've done that in the past got old and busy, and we don't have any super enthusiastic writers in the current crop of young (usually school or uni-aged) PPCers. I can tell, because if we did... they'd be posting missions like there's no tomorrow. ^_~

One idea I floated a while back (like... five years) was a Welcome to the PPC series: old missions posted to FFn & AO3 for the first time, under a single title, to try and draw in readers. I have five missions that were proffered at the time filed away; I could probably chuck in one of mine to go with them. If we (I) posted one per week, that would give us, uh, a month and a half of the PPC being a visible part of the fan community.

Which ain't much. But we could work on it.

hS

Great Idea! by Thoth on 2019-10-09 00:44:00 UTC Reply

The AO3 thing, I mean. Definitely something worth trying.

Maybe wait a month or so, because we're about to jump to the new board, so starting now might mean pushing a bunch of potential newbies towards soon-to-be-dead links and then they'll all show up at the 404 or domain not found messages and be very confused.

Speaking of which, the board move might help. Maybe. I'm not sure, but being optimistic about it, it would move us away from an early-2000s interface with a broken login button, which is something I definitely see possibly pushing away newcomers.
Further commentary by Aurora Morningstar on 2019-10-09 00:26:00 UTC Reply

It seems to me like the Board runs in cycles - influx of newbies, lots of missions are written, something happens and people disengage, repeat. Currently, I think we're near the end of that disengagement bit; hopefully, we'll be able to get back to the start soon and that will revitalize things. Looking at the Discord, I think we actually do have some enthusiastic newbies (I count myself, I suppose), but none of them have Permission yet; maybe in two or four or six months, we'll get some new missions.

Regarding the posting of a compilation, wouldn't it be a good idea to post everything (that is, the collected missions from one time period) rather than just selected missions? There's quite a bit of cross-reference and I feel like it would make more sense to readers that way, plus it would last far longer; I reckon we've probably got years worth of missions if you only post up to 2008 or so at one per week. And Ix's planned My Immortal sporking would probably be a useful tie-in given the sheer infamy of that particular fic; maybe you could try to arrange it so that you start around when that's published?

"Everything" is an awful lot. by Neshomeh on 2019-10-09 02:21:00 UTC Reply

And it's not all what I'd choose to present to the wider public. We've changed rather a lot since 2002, and worked hard for that change, and I wouldn't want to put stuff out there that doesn't reflect the culture we have today.

See, IMO, part of our recruitment problem is that it's hard to find people with the right balance of snark and respect in their hearts. Back in the day, the balance was skewed more toward snark. Since then, in response to accusations of bullying and misogyny and such, we've made strides in being critical without being mean. It's a tough balance to strike for anyone, perhaps particularly for the younger, more active set. We ask for a lot of critical thinking as well as a sense of humor.

And there ARE people out there who can walk that line, and enjoy it. If we want to attract them, though, the stuff we choose to put out there has to reflect our current values as much as possible. It shouldn't be just anything, and it certainly can't be everything.

But, here's another issue: Is it okay to repost someone else's work like that? To my mind, preserving stuff in a privately maintained archive for our internal use is one thing, but putting it out on AO3 or whatever would be another.

(Anyway I'm way ahead of you all; I've been on AO3 since the last time we had this conversation, whenever that was.)

~Neshomeh

I mean, strictly speaking... by Aurora Morningstar on 2019-10-09 02:36:00 UTC Reply

...the PPC Wiki is public, ergo it already is all publicly accessible. But I do agree with your point; if we want to recruit people who are compatible with our attitude now, we need to show what that attitude is correctly to begin with, and given that most of the really old Board posters have left at some point we probably shouldn't do anything with their work. Yes, 'everything' might be a bit difficult.

So I suppose that means that we should try and prioritize recent missions from current Boarders, if we go through with this? That seems like it would deal with those problems, although it does mean that historically relevant things like Trojanhorse/Paddlebrains, who more-or-less seem to have written the book for Bad Slash, and some of the old Departments like DOGA, which doesn't seem to had a mission in a decade, might be left out.

Good news on DOGA: by Huinesoron on 2019-10-09 09:35:00 UTC Reply

There was a new DOGA mission last month. :)

hS

On a DOGA related tanget by Novastorme on 2019-10-10 19:29:00 UTC Reply

I just realised I'm about to start a tangent off my own tangent, but anyway...

hS, how do/did you go about working out which badfic's where DOGA missionable instead of DMS or Floaters missionable? Is there a certain threshold after which you went "this is too far" or what?

Asking because I have a pair of DOGA agents I want to write about but one of the reasons I stopped trying with them was a lack of badfic to do with them.

Nova

Interesting question. by Huinesoron on 2019-10-11 08:50:00 UTC Reply

My general assumption with PPCing is that a mission can go to any department that can identify at least one charge specific to them. So any mission with a Geographical Aberration can go to DOGA, even if it's only a minor part of the story. (This was taken to extremes with the requested Pain & Regrets etc, where the DOGA charge is... moving a hut.)

That said, for pure DOGA missions I preferred to find stories that had something seriously geographical going on, and there were three ways of doing that:

1/ Reading fanfic. Back in the day, I was an active reader of fanfiction.net, and looked at multiple fics per day. If I found one that was a) bad and b) had a DOGA charge, I made a note of it. More Than Ordinary was actually written by someone I internet-knew.

2/ Place-names and princesses in summaries; in Middle-earth the latter (especially Elven princesses) usually imply the former. Echoes of the Narbeleth has a Summary Princess, and sure enough, she comes from 'Lakewood'.

3/ Being prompted by the Board. Eledhwen was one of these, apparently, and creates at least three new countries.

~

For a more general approach, I'd say a DOGA-worthy mission should have one of:

-A badfic-created location (country, planet, building, whatever) that doesn't fit with the setting.

-Major geographical compression, ie, you can protest that they go from '[blank] to [blank] in a single day!'.

-A change to the nature of a location. Empire State of Mind places Middle-earth as a separate planet, which... no.

hS
*tangent (nm) by Novastorme on 2019-10-11 08:17:00 UTC Reply

Things that might not be helping by Tomash on 2019-10-08 20:40:00 UTC Reply

A big one is that we're hard to find. My main example here is that most of our stuff for the last few years has been on Google Docs. This is the opposite of discoverable for people on the internet.

I'd actively encourage people to, for example, go and post their back catalogs on AO3 (especially given that they don't have FFnet's anti-sporking policy and won't have one as a matter of meta-policy). Maybe not all at once, so it's easier to maintain attention, but still.

Another thing is that, due to the above, we've lost the steady stream of younger folks who have more time to write stuff, and that's creating a cycle of lack of engagement (as Ix alluded to). I don't think this will lead to the downfall of the PPC or anything, but I do think that, for example, we should be actively making our existence known in places where writers and fan-folks are. We used to have (from what I can tell) things like a noticably actively LiveJournal community, but that site died a bit under a decade ago and we don't have a replacement PPC space elsewhere on the internet.

Anyway, these are my preliminary thoughts on the situation.

- Tomash

The Other Problem by Thoth on 2019-10-09 00:35:00 UTC Reply

The Other Problem, the sort of meta-problem if you will, with that issue of not making our existence known is that the PPC fundamentally doesn't mesh well with the internet at large. The forces that created us are mostly dead or diverged from the mainstream and we're left with an internal culture that is likely gonna be very left-field to a lot of newbies.

Culturally, we're closest to Usenet and Forum discourse, as we have the same sort of threading, which promotes topic-focused discussion, rather than the short-form memes and focus on personality that social media interfaces encourage. And we have a lot of expectations that date back to those historical influences, as well as a bias towards long-form posting, that is likely at odds with what any newbie will be used to.

This isn't really a fixable problem. The only way to "fix" it is to change who we are for the worse.

But... well, who's left? Livejournal is dead. The blogosphere isn't what it used to be, Tumblr's terrible threading system ensured that serious conversation would never be that platform's strong suit (even trying to comment on someone's post is a nightmare, just imagine what a discussion would be like...), usenet was on its way out when we were new, and forums just aren't the majority communication form they used to be (they're still around, just not as popular, and they were always fragmented by their very nature anyways).

Social Media won. Reddit is the closest thing now that's still massively popular and the timbre of the place is fundamentally different -- I think all of us know we could never survive as a subreddit. Only the young and naive would even suggest it.

So yeah, we do need a replacement PPC space. Problem is, there's absolutely nowhere suitable to host it.

...that was depressing to write. I'm gonna go write about... I dunno... dragon romance or something to cheer myself up...

We don't need to lose hope yet? by Tomash on 2019-10-09 01:48:00 UTC Reply

There are probably a reasonable number folks who'd want a space like what we're (hopefully (I do seriously hope)) wanting to be (topic-focused long-form-biased discussion on fandom and writing and poking fun at badfic).

Big problems we're facing though are:
1) That aspect of the PPC has really slowed down, as has been pointed out in this thread. So we sort of need to re-bootstrap ourselves and that's going to be tricky.
2) Even if that were fixed some, we'd somehow have to make it known that's what's going on here, which is at least as hard.

That is, our internal culture (as you put it) is definitely out there from the perspective of the modern Internet, but it may not be doomed.

Or maybe it is, and we're looking to wither away as the community as a whole ages and has less time to be here (or twist into something rather mainstream-looking with a weird forum potentially attached for legacy reason). Or that, come, say 2022, varied effectively-former members will be looking at the PPC and going "well, we had a good two decades, but it's basically dead".

... yeah, I can see how contemplating this can be depressing.

Looking forward to reading the dragon romance, by the way! I like Ferrux!

- Tomash

Really, though, we don't. by Aurora Morningstar on 2019-10-09 02:05:00 UTC Reply

It's not like there's no-one in the high-school/university age bracket who would be interested (out of literally millions of people); and if there was any reason why social media or other internet trends would reduce that, you would think it would have already happened years ago; Facebook is... actually older than I am, apparently.

You're correct in that we've got two problems to deal with here, but I feel like good publicity (the second one) will help us with the first; newbies who expect the community to already be like that might help us push it in that direction, and it'll also help get existing members engaged again. There's nothing wrong with having a well-defined niche internal culture so long as you're able to reach lots of people who fit in that niche.

No idea how I feel about dragon romance, but I'll probably check it out.

The trouble with back catalogues is... by Huinesoron on 2019-10-08 21:17:00 UTC Reply

...#they always try to teach the wrong lesson (doot do doo)#

No, wait. But also, yes.

Because if you've been writing for a long time, you look at your older stuff and go: yaaarrrghuuerch that's awful! I haven't wanted to look at the beginning of The Reorganisation for over a decade, for instance, and Dafydd's missions... yeah, no.

So while I totally agree with the principle, I also think that for some of us, it's a bigger job than it looks like.

(Though I would love to clean up Dafydd's stuff and post the whole thing in order, splicing in some extra missions to flesh out his relationship with Connie... maybe someyear. But not yet.)

hS

That's a good point by Tomash on 2019-10-09 01:04:00 UTC Reply

~~though I did say post them, not read them~~

More seriously, I understand the "ow, my old work sucks" thing (which is why I'm not likely to re-read my computational epidemiology paper from 2014. I don't want to be shocked at how that got accepted to a conference, even though it's probably not actually that bad).

And this is definitely more of a problem in the case of people with lots of work that's been improving over time, like you and Ix.

All that being said ... I'm still thinking this might be worth it, even though it's going to involve a lot of looking back at old stuff.

- Tomash

For me, it's just... the enthusiasm's gone. by Iximaz on 2019-10-08 20:21:00 UTC Reply

I'm lucky to get maybe two people commenting on my missions any more these days. I know, I know—we should write for ourselves first and foremost, but when you post something you've worked ages on and get practically no response?

You just... stop caring.

Which feeds into a vicious cycle—nobody's commenting on my stuff, so why should I comment on their stuff? And I know, it's extremely selfish, but there you go. It's disheartening to put effort into things that people don't care about.

I've got a mission that's currently struggling along to be written. I swear I'll pass that 100-mission mark and get My Immortal published, but after that, I don't really know if I'll have the energy to keep going.

I get that feeling by Thoth on 2019-10-09 00:40:00 UTC Reply

For my part, I'm sorry I never end up commenting on your stuff. It's hard to keep up with everything and whenever someone posts a mission my life invariably goes to heck around the same time and then I never read it and... yeah. Not great for everyone else, I know.

Myself, I just have trouble actually writing longform. Always have. Somewhere around 15 pages in I start to get drained... and then I doubt myself... and then I sloowly start to hate everything I've ever written... and then I have to resist the urge to throw it all away. Again.

So yeah, that's why I still haven't published a second mission.

Mission length (etc) by Tomash on 2019-10-09 01:01:00 UTC Reply

I'm going to point out that a lot of missions used to hover in the 10-15 page mark.

I think there's been a trend upwards over the years, but I really don't expect there's anything wrong with missions being shorter than they usually are.

And, if that's just plain not happening, the first thing that comes to mind is that there's still room to revive the Department of Intelligence (yet again). I remember SeaTurtle's Intel reports clocking in at 4-5 pages. Maybe you could be the person to do that?

And on top of everything, from what I've seen of your writing, it's better than you seem to think it is. But I'm pretty sure everyone people here could say that to almost everyone else here (probably including themselves).

- Tomash

Short missions are fun! by Huinesoron on 2019-10-09 09:10:00 UTC Reply

I set myself a goal with Driftwood of staying under 6000 words, and it's worked out brilliantly from my perspective.

I think the reason missions kept getting longer (and I do this as much as anyone) is that we feel the need to highlight every single thing wrong with the badfic. Which can be fine! Some stories really need that treatment.

But with others, it can give a much better mission to pick one or two things and really focus in on them. Kelly the Roman Warrior was 'look how many minis there are/wolves yay'. Pain and Regrets, Power and Battle was 'STOP MESSING ABOUT WITH TIME/Dafydd and Vemi's relationship'.

Thinking about it, what I like to do is actually pick theme from the badfic, and one thing to do with the agents, and use the mission to tie the two of them together. It works quite well from a writing perspective, and feedback from early in Driftwood suggests it works well there too.

Which isn't to say big long missions are bad! My fourth Agent Huinesoron mission is huge, and deliberately so. But they don't all have to be that way.

hS

This is pretty interesting and helpful! by Tomash on 2019-10-09 22:59:00 UTC Reply

Thanks for taking the time to explain some of your process.

I might try something like this once I actually start working on mission #2 so as to prevent things from getting bogged down.

I feel like this is something it'd help to put on the wiki somewhere, just so it's easier to refer to, but I can't quite think where I'd put it.

- Tomash

On that note: by Huinesoron on 2019-10-10 08:27:00 UTC Reply

I have a mission coming through later this week (once I get through the ending); would it be potentially helpful for me to use it as a worked example and explain the thought processes behind it?

hS

I would like to see that. by Hieronymus Graubart on 2019-10-11 11:08:00 UTC Reply

But no pressure; I really shouldn’t request anything when I’m just still around, but not doing anything for I don’t actually know what reason :-(

HG
I'd be interested in reading that by Tomash on 2019-10-11 06:55:00 UTC Reply

but please don't feel obligated to put in a bunch of work unless you want to.
I dunno about helpful... by Thoth on 2019-10-10 11:28:00 UTC Reply

But it'd be super neat!

Review posting way down the line by Tomash on 2019-10-09 00:56:00 UTC Reply

So, one thing I've just realized we really don't have these days is a mechanism that's actually used for posting a review (or at least a "that was neat") of something that's not currently on the front page.

I know that, for my mission I put a spot on the wiki for folks to drop reviews, and Nesh has a similar page, but this sort of thing isn't standard practice, let alone discoverable.

I'm not sure how much work can be done to fix this retroactively, but if I had a magic wand, I'd add some way to leave comments (or even AO3-style kudos) on every bit of PPC mission that didn't already have one by way of where it was posted.

(This does not quite solve the problem of people actually using those features, but we can't have the culture of leaving reviews if we physically can't do that)

- Tomash

Mission-tagging for the T-Board? by Aurora Morningstar on 2019-10-09 01:12:00 UTC Reply

One way you could fix this (partly) going forward with the T-Board is to add a separate category/subforum tag for mission threads alongside the RP tag; this means any individual mission would take significantly longer to drop off the 'front page' for that section, and it would also be helpful for someone who wanted to look through all the back-missions, while not requiring an extensive reworking of anything.

On the other hand, I have absolutely no idea how this could be fixed retroactively without manually copypasting all the missions into this section, so I don't know how much this would actually help with that.

We will actually have a subforum view by Tomash on 2019-10-09 01:34:00 UTC Reply

So people wanting to page through the last while of missions will be able to do so.

(and the set of tags is something we can configure)

Not a complete solution, but worth noting.

Signing up myself! by Snowblaze on 2019-10-08 13:15:00 UTC Reply

Entering for Agents Edward, Kat and Mira.

Objects: pen, D.O.R.K.s, DVD