4th letter to ff.net

[edenfalling]

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:

Elizabeth Culmer,

A new review has been posted to your story.

Story: Waking Persephone
Chapter: 1. Chapter 1

From: Lifequasher (Guest)
-------------------

Lifequasher:If you're 30 years old I'm the president of Australia, you bitch.

Homestuck is not for the 30 crowd, you whiny whore. That shitty webcomic is
for emo teenagers under 16 who cry when they spill their milk.

Go keep sucking your racoon's dick, you bestiality addicted bitch.

You're a dirty little liar who likes it in the ass.

Reported.
Lifequasher
Founder and lord and master of Eliminator.
You can't report this review bitch, I didn't sign in so that you can't stalk
me like you do those CU assholes.

-------------------
Do not reply to this email.

FanFiction.Net Messaging Service

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.

Comments

[jjhunter]

Dear lord.

Please let us know if you'd like more ff.net authors to sign on to your letters - I for one would be happy to add my voice. (As 'Idhren' I've been a member since 02-14-04.) You might also have good luck with pose_as_a_comm (Dreamwidth-based Homestuck comm) and/or other Homestuck fan communities; if people are targeting Homestuck as a fandom on ff.net, seems like your natural allies would be the Homestuck fandom. (Worth too considering that other fans might not be as articulate or as experienced as you in how to deal with such trolls, and would likely appreciate knowing they're not the only ones being targeted.)

[edenfalling]

I think any letters protesting against Critics United (except from people who have also been accused of rule violations on the second person pretext) would be counterproductive -- the participation of outside parties would play into their attempt to cast me as a troll who is whipping up an attack, and themselves as innocent victims. But more letters attempting to get the content rules clarified should not go amiss.

The thing about Homestuck fandom and ff.net is that by definition, an awful lot of Homestuck fanworks cannot be posted there, either because they are interactive (in the sense of requesting reviewer input into future content, as the webcomic itself used to do), or because they are written in chatlog form. Both those things are explicitly forbidden by ff.net, which is why I haven't even tried to post most of my Homestuck fic there. I may think their content rules are silly, but it's a privately owned site and the owners have the right to set such rules.

The supposed blanket ban on second person is eminently arguable, though, which is why I've been arguing about it. *sigh*

I may post something on that comm over the weekend, once I work out a relatively neutral way to describe the issue. Thanks for the link!

[redwolf]

Interesting that these losers are still playing the "I'm not but you are" troll game.

They've stalked and abused you (en masse, because they're complete cowards who hide behind their silly little "I have no penis or life" handles and need a lot of hand-holding and ego-stroking from like-minded losers to act) and because they're low life scum, they cannot comprehend that you wouldn't sink to the same level of moronity that they would.

Considering the escalation of stupid, it looks like you scare the hell out of them. Not entirely unreasonably considering their targets are usually children and this is probably the first time an adult has ever stood up to them and called their behaviour out.

[edenfalling]

At this point, they are making me more sad than angry -- there is only so long I can hold onto anger, even if I wanted to. After a while the sheer ridiculousness of the situation and the verbal posturing tips over into, "My god, is THIS seriously the best way they can think of to spend their time? Wow, I am so glad I have a life." :-/

[othercat.livejournal.com]

...The rules and the wording thereof are largely why I deleted my stories from ff.net. (Well that, and I hate the way the posting interface is set up, and the way the formatting changes every few months...)

[edenfalling]

Fanfiction.net's formatting restrictions are annoying -- I dislike the way the posting interface kills punctuation marks and things like strikethrough -- but I post there both out of habit (nine years' worth, dammit) and because it is still the largest multifandom site on the internet and so is a good way to reach readers... some of whom may not even be aware that other fanfiction archives exist. I will not delete my own stories, until and unless the administration changes the wording of their content guideline, because I stand by my interpretation of their rule as it is written.

But I think this weekend I will start crossposting all my old stories in all my old fandoms all the way back to 2002, on AO3. Which is not a perfect archive either, by any means, but at least is run in less of a black box fashion and has much more sensible content rules. (And is also not infested by trolls. Yet.)

[othercat.livejournal.com]

Heh. The only thing I don't like about AO3 is that the Chrono Crusade section only has a handful of fics. :D

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry. This is really ugly and I cannot believe that you would be targeted in this way.

[edenfalling]

Thank you. *hugs*

I can, alas, believe it all too readily. It is a symptom of a disease known as "refusing to meekly bow to other people's opinions online," (which you have, alas, experienced yourself in a somewhat different flavor), with a subset of "being openly female online" -- the combination of the two seems to drive a certain type of personality absolutely wild. *sigh*

[willowgreen.livejournal.com]

That's unbelievably disgusting. I'm so sorry you're having to deal with this. And, yes, the combination of "refusing to bow to others' opinions" plus "being openly female" can have scary results. :-(

[edenfalling]

Thank you. *hugs* It is very sad that in 2012 there are still so many people who think any misogyny, let alone this casually aggressive kind, is somehow acceptable. The moral arc of history may bend toward justice, but I wish it would bend a little faster. *sigh*

[hungrytiger11.livejournal.com]

I find this so bizarre and generally unbelievable that this happens at all, let alone to you.

[edenfalling]

Trolls are weird like that. I mean, I know they exist -- I spend time online, after all, and they are quite empirically evident -- and yet the behavior is so baffling that it is hard to believe that is how so many people choose to spend their time.

[marici.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry they are giving you grief. I'm more sorry that they've followed you to this site; I admit, I have never thought ff.net deserved any author of quality. I wish this wasn't happening, I see no reason for anyone to delight themselves with petty meanness like this.

[edenfalling]

Thank you. I figure ff.net is so huge, there is no way to make any accurate generalization about the people who read and write there -- and I have found some really awesome stories and authors there over the years, as well as casually stumbled into a lot of fandoms I might not otherwise have encountered -- but... there are reasons it's known as the Pit of Voles. *sigh* And we are witnessing one of those reasons in action. *deeper sigh*

[deralte.livejournal.com]

If it's any consolation, I've sent them many a complaint whenever they delete my fics without giving me a reason (they used to not even tell you what rule you violated, and now you just have to guess which of the rules you violated (and you probably didn't - they don't do more than a cursory check if at all, so if someone hates you, they can report all your fics)). I've sent them many complaints about this, and also about the strangeness of their rules in general (I know they're trying to get rid of those annoying chat fics, but writing a story in script format is a valid form of writing, and short author's notes should be perfectly acceptable. *goes and reads TOS* When did RPF get banned?) They have only ever responded to me once and it was very short and cursory, so you have gotten a better response from them than I did several years ago.

I simply had to give up and find other places to post. My fics are still up on ff.net, but the only place that has all my fics in one place is AO3.

[edenfalling]

I can see that it must be nearly impossible to do a thorough check of every story reported for breaking the rules -- ff.net is simply too big for detailed hands-on moderation -- but in that case, I personally would err on the side of leaving things up rather than taking things down, if only to mitigate the problem of vengeful spurious reports.

There's an awful lot of fic I never bothered crossposting to ff.net in the first place -- short things, self-indulgent stuff, etcetera -- and for obvious reasons (chatlogs and ACTUAL interactivity) I haven't even tried to post most of my Homestuck fic there at all. (Even if I think their rules are silly, it's a private site and the owners have the right to decide what kinds of content they want to allow.) I am just annoyed about this particular issue because the rule in question is so poorly worded, and it would be SO EASY to fix that and remove any source of confusion. And you know, if ff.net decided to unequivocally ban all use of second person whatsoever, I'd removed my second person stories from the site. I just refuse to do that while the rule people are interpreting to mean that does not, so far as I can tell, actually ban what these people think it bans. *sigh*

I already have a bunch of stories up on AO3, and I put up a couple of my really old HP fics last night. I think I will continue that archiving effort Saturday and Sunday. A handful of stories per day won't be too much bother to upload.

[deralte.livejournal.com]

What also annoys me is that they don't warn you. I don't usually care when they take a fic down these days, but I do care sometimes about losing the reviews for that fic. I took to archiving the reviews I liked on my computer so now I don't worry if someone's going to report one of my fics. I'd be happy to take down fics that violate their rules, but I can almost never tell what about my fics did violate their rules.

You can transfer fics wholesale from ff.net into AO3 in case you didn't know. That made transferring my fics over a lot easier though it did lead to a hilarious exchange with a reviewer over whether or not I owed it to them to remove the author's notes that were at the start of each chapter (as it was set up in ff.net nearly ten years ago) (the answer being that if they have the free time to edit 50+ fics to perfection, I am very envious of their free time).

[(Anonymous)]

deralte - the author got several reviews alerting her to the point that she may be breaking a rule on the site before the story was removed.

Just a question to the author: If the story was removed in the end by the admins then wouldn't that make this little tirade/crusade/ whatever a moot point? Would them saying it was removed because it wasn't allowed answer your question if "you" based stories are allowed or not?

I have a very hard time seeing why you're so confused over it when it says "second person/you" stories in the rules. Can you not tell that it's a blanket rule that is generalized and not a specific one as you are believing it is?

[edenfalling]

You are allowed to call me Elizabeth Culmer or edenfalling, you know, not "the author." I only object to being addressed by diminutives that I don't use (such as "Eden"). You are also allowed to sign a pseudonym to your annonymous comments, particularly if you wish to carry on a conversation -- it does help to show that you are a single person, not a series of unconnected anons. :-)

And no, the removal of "Me, Myself, and Die" does not resolve the issue, for two reasons. First, as I have pointed out, ff.net's own admins apparently disagree on the interpretation of the rule -- one admin removed two CU reviews (thus agreeing with me), while another removed my story (thus agreeing with CU). Obviously a rule that the administrators themselves cannot interpret consistently is a poorly written rule and should be rewritten to clarify the muddy wording. Second, the reason given by the admin who removed my story -- which you can see above in the text of this post, btw -- is "Not allowed: interactive, chat/script, real person, mst, and etc." Please note that this is a conflation of FOUR separate content rules without a single direct reference to the use of second person narrative, which is the specific issue under contention.

Until I get a clear answer from ff.net about their position on second person (and no, a statement about interactivity in general does not count, unless an admin says outright something to the effect of, "Fanfiction.net's official position is that all use of second person narrative is inherently interactive," which I think would be a blatantly silly and misguided interpretation of both second person and interactivity, but the site owners can define words however they wish so long as the definitions are clearly stated) I continue to stand by my interpretation of rule 5: namely, that it forbids INTERACTIVE content, but the use of second person narrative is only forbidden when used as part of an interactive story. Which "Me, Myself, and Die" was not.

I hope that explains my position.

[cat-i-th-adage.livejournal.com]

Sweet jesus.

May you be victorious in your endeavours.

[edenfalling]

Thank you.

At this point all I really want is to get that rule clarified, because it is SUCH a badly written rule. I can survive trolls -- not happily, obviously, but hopefully with some grace -- and I can live with ff.net deciding to forbid all use of second person across the board (should they decide to come down on that side of the argument, no matter how silly I think such a choice would be), but the way that rule breeds uncertainty is driving me nuts.