3 things: writing, wrath, and water

1. I put in some more work on that Jade/Dave/Terezi crossdressing fic I have been stalled on -- it's now at 6,600 words and we are about to see Dave in his slinky red dress for the first time, after having seen Jade put on her own dress and help Terezi tie the tie of her three-piece suit.

I am not sure how a fic that was intended to be basically PWP porn turned into a thing with so much buildup and also clothing descriptions -- not to mention the whole "Jade shaves Dave's legs while Terezi kibitzes" scene and thoughts on Dave's insecurities and the role of humor in his relationships with girls -- but oh well, at least I'm getting somewhere again. Even if it is mostly descriptions of clothes. (So weird.)

-----

2. In other news, ff.net proves as inscrutable and capricious as ever. One admin shared my interpretation of the content rules and deleted two reviews from Critics United members. Now another admin (a different one? the same one in a different mood? there is no way to know!) has apparently taken the exact opposite stand and deleted my story.

I intend to write another letter to ff.net support, both in protest and to reiterate my request for a clarification of the wording of the rule. But that will have to wait until tomorrow evening, when I am less screamingly annoyed at the inconsistency and the lack of any operational transparency whatsoever.

Grrr.

-----

3. On Tuesday, it rained in Ithaca. It rained all day long, from before 8am to after 7pm, steadily and without any surcease. Which would normally be fine... except that there is something wrong with the drain on the roof of the building in which the smoke shop is located. It clogged once before and the resulting leak literally disintegrated one of our ceiling tiles, but we were told the leak had been fixed.

Maybe that particular leak was fixed. But the underlying problem -- the drain clog -- remained. And so Tuesday afternoon BW discovered that the ceiling was leaking again. We put out buckets and also an empty magazine tote (which was the only thing large enough to cover the necessary floor space to catch all the drips), called maintenance, and moved a neighboring ceiling tile so it wouldn't disintegrate like the previous one.

Maintenance duly arrived, investigated, and told us there was an entire foot of standing water on the roof. They promptly began pumping it off, but they were unable to unclog the drain. The obstruction turned the drain snake into a corkscrewed pretzel, and even the big industrial snake didn't do much. The maintenance guys couldn't try attacking the clog from beneath either, because that would've required opening the drain pipe in the basement, at which point removing the clog would have sent something like 300 gallons of water exploding into their faces in under five seconds. (Gravity and water pressure are not forces you want to mess with!)

Anyway, they were able to pump the roof mostly clear by the time the rain finally let up, and they promised to return on Wednesday to remove the clog. I was not at work so I don't know the outcome, but I certainly hope they were successful!

Such are the trials of working in an old building. *sigh*

4th letter to ff.net

To whom it may concern,

I have recently been party to an argument with the group Critics United (http://www.fanfiction.net/forum/Critics-United/78623/) over the interpretation of a second of fanfiction.net's rules on forbidden content. The rule in question is #5, which says:

5. Any form of interactive entry: choose your adventure, second person/you based, Q&As, and etc.

This is a poorly worded rule, which is the source of the dispute. As I interpret it, the rule forbids INTERACTIVE content, and second person is only forbidden when it is used to create interactivity, as when the reader is addressed as if she or he were an insert into the story. When second person is used as a simple point of view technique, akin to first and third person, to convey the viewpoint of a named canon character, that is not interactive and therefore not forbidden. The members of Critics United argue, on the other hand, that ALL uses of second person are forbidden -- either because the rule can be read to say so, or because they think second person is somehow inherently interactive.

The rule is so poorly worded that your own admins disagree on its interpretation. For example, in response to the first round of complaints, an admin agreed with my interpretation and deleted two reviews from members of Critics United. In response to a third review from Critics United and a second complaint from me, no action was taken. And in response to a fourth review from Critics United and a third complaint from me, my story was deleted. So as you can see, one of your admins thinks I am correct in my understanding of your rule, while another thinks Critics United are correct.

This inconsistency helps create a poisonous and fearful atmosphere on the site, as can be seen by the way some anonymous users followed me from my fanfiction.net page to my livejournal (http://edenfalling.livejournal.com/) and began posting misogynistic slurs in my journal, and by the way a group that may or may not go by the name Eliminator (though I would take that with a grain of salt, since it was reported to me on my livejournal by an anonymous troll; Eliminator may well be a single person with far too much time on his hands) has now begun targeting me on your site with abusive and misogynistic anonymous reviews and claims that they have reported me for violations -- even of stories that do not use second person!

Here is an example of one such review:

( cut for BLATANT MISOGYNY and SEXUALLY ABUSIVE LANGUAGE )

Please note the misogyny, the sexually abusive language, and the irrational hatred directed toward the entire Homestuck fandom. Please also note that the story in question -- "Waking Persephone" (http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8637148/1/) -- is not in second person and does not violate any other content rules either. This is the sort of behavior that results from unclear site rules and inconsistent enforcement.

I respectfully suggest that the wording of the content rule in question be changed to eliminate this uncertainty. If you intend to forbid all use of second person narrative, with no exceptions, it would be simple to add a 7th content guideline to that effect, like this:

7. All use of second person narrative (you-based POV).

If you only intend to forbid second person narrative when used in an interactive fashion, it would be equally simple to reword the existing rule along the following lines:

5. Any form of interactive entry: choose your adventure, Q&As, and etc. (Second person/you-based narrative may be a warning sign of interactivity but is not necessarily interactive on its own.)

In either case, the rules would then be clear and all parties would know where they stand, instead of being dependent on the inconsistent ways each individual admin reads and interprets the current poorly worded rule.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth Culmer (http://www.fanfiction.net/u/461224/Elizabeth_Culmer)
Member since 2003

---------------

ETA: I would like to state, for the record, that the reason given for the removal of my story was this: Main reason for removal: "Not allowed: interactive, chat/script, real person, mst, and etc." Note that there is no mention of second person whatsoever! Me, Myself, and Die did not use chat/script format, was not about a real person, was not an MST fic, and was NOT INTERACTIVE, under any standard definition of interactivity.

So why was it removed?

Because the forbidden content rule is badly written. Therefore the rule should be clarified.