Walking out on GA?

Patrickgay17 · March 7, 2005

From what I am hearing from SEVERAL of my contacts including myself here at GA they are walking away. I spoken to almost ten people and we're calling it a walk out. (how origonal).

Apparantly we're just not satisfied with what goes on.

I would like to give this oppertunity for those of us who are leaving to voice their oppinions about what they aren't satisfied about. I don't like the fact that so many are so distastefull and want to leave and it troubles me.

If you feel like it would be better to sneak out of the room and not speak up about your trouble feel free. But for those of us who are leaving please let's get some reasons out on the table and maybe you can be helped with your problem.

I know that most of us won't talk about it and that is ok and that I might receive some troubling emails about where I am getting my information but please speak up.

DomLuka · March 7, 2005

Walking out? I guess I have a few questions here. First of all, why? Is it lack of feedback? Are the people wanting to walk out ONLY posting on Gay Authors? Are they posting the library, or on a site?

I

miguelsanchez55 · March 7, 2005

Dom,

You hit the nail right on the head dude. Guys don't leave, lets work to mek this an even better place.

Mike Sanchez :sword:

Myr · March 8, 2005

I find this all very frustrating. Let me cover a few points:

1) The vast majority of people that read stories never reply or write to the author.

2) It is not the job of this site to give you feedback. This site is about providing a community to those that want to discuss gay writing. As Dom I think aptly put it, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink.

3) Except for the complaints of one author about feedback, I haven't been made aware of any problems. How can I fix something if I don't know it's broken?

You wanna know about lack of feedback? How about what you "several" are doing to this site, hmmm? I have, in good faith, provided this site to the gay community at large. Most of the cost is coming out of my pocket directly. Most of the admin activity is handled by myself. I have asked for volunteers... nada. I have asked for feedback on how to improve the site. Two things, which I did what I could with and have been working very hard to take care of on the next version of the Story Archive.

This topic makes it sound like it is my personal responsiblity to support the ego of every writer of words to cross my path. Honestly, I do the best I can.

If you want me to correct any perceived problems, then let me know what you think they are.

As for this walkout, I'm not holding a gun to your head. Stay and help make this place better, or leave. The choice is yours. Throwing a temper tantrum isn't helping anyone.

Patrickgay17 · March 8, 2005

I have to leave for much more personal and family reason's for the most part I love this site.

Yea the feedback suck

Anyways, if you have a problem then DO something to improve it. Give suggestions, come up with solutions, communicate with the people who are actually the ones reading your stories, but please don

reapersharvest · March 8, 2005

I AM CURSED. Every forum I join somehow runs into problems and ends up dying on me. When I joined the Bill Maher forums (I'm very political) not five posts after I joined people began walking out to go to Political Nutshell, and it was just me in this barren void of a forum. Now here is falling apart too! This isn't good. I just joined disinfo.com, next thing you know their servers will mysteriously be destroyed in a fire that scorched my R into he floor. Where else would you go? Even if you don't get feedback, it's an author's community, I have Nifty for feedback!

Myr · March 8, 2005

Reaperharvest,

Gay Authors isn't going anywhere. Not while I'm running it. We will be moving servers, but I'm waiting on that now. It'll take 3 days and I can't close the board when this BS is going on.

Don't worry guy.

Myr

boy on a string · March 8, 2005

I don't think it is falling apart. That does not mean that I am not worried.

This is a free place to post your stories. There isn't anyway to force people to provide feedback. I don't care where you post your stories, more people will read them than will ever reply. That is the nature of the beast.

I have seen several people make comments about wanting/needing feedback.

My question to the authors here ... do you provide an e-mail address at the end of your chapters so people can e-mail you? That way you don't have to be a member in order to give feed back.

I also wonder if it is acceptable to post at two different places. I know of several authors that do that.

I do think that leaving is not the solution. If it is feedback that you want, and you want to post your stories at another site, then do so. That doesn't mean that you can't post your stories here as well.

Boy on a String.

movieguy47 · March 8, 2005

it been awhile since i had any feedback , but my counter tell me they keep coming back. i see it in other authors story at the site i got

but i also go to every forum that i know is out there, guess what. the author say they too don't get mail or feedback

now i realize some are scared to post, or e-mail for sure they get found out, after all not all the news on gay or bi is always good. so they are caution

many think writers get so many letter they won't read the one they write and respond to them

many had their feeling hurt because and i'd admit they have not respond to them because maybe they didn't get the mail? maybe the author waited so long to respond, or they got a new e-mail address since they wrote the mail and think the author didn't care to hear from them

some i heard from even said that some author have wrote back a smart aleck reply, now i know some of them may have said something about a story and made a suggestion. and some authors are picky about suggestion. so they may have gave a polite but not too polite reply. and that upset some

those some might be reading everyone story now, but feel hurt from one or authors

that may be one of the reason we don't get much feedback. hate to say it. but some writer have made it hard for the rest of us, and i want to make it clear that those authors are not here. so don't go thinking they are. or at Dewey. Eggman, Crvboy and the Fort, or Dabeagle. some of these writer and i won't name them are at nifty and no where else that i can see. i been almost to all the forum and site and have not seen them there or their story or even a yahoo groups

i hate to see some upset because of lack or no feedback, but wait please, it will get better as many see that we care to hear from them, it take time and if you don't wait and quit then you will later see them asking by the hundreds, where did this one go? or that one?. i've seen many ask about author that have not wrote anything for a while, and it sadden them that they quit

and those quit about 4 or 5 years ago, yet the chapter that are still online make reader want to see more because they never finish the chapter, and the reader are the unlucky one

Sparhawk · March 8, 2005

Patrick, I can understand that you do not want to post names, but I am curious how many people you are talking about?

Now guys, if you have a gripe let someone know about it. It can not be fixed or helped without someone being informed that there is a problem.

As far as feedback goes, that is totally out of our hands. That is up to the indivual readers. Lack of feedback cannot be blamed on a site.

Patrickgay17 · March 8, 2005

I looked back at my emails earliier in case this question came up.

Counting me (even though I am starting to reconsider and post at both nifty and here) 13.

Myr · March 8, 2005

Post in more than one place. Nifty, by it's nature (it has 10 bloody mirror servers) is a hell of a lot busier than here. This is just a place for authors to gather. I can't force people to provide feedback. Lord knows most of us writers would like some.

BTW, I've got my stuff posted elsewhere as well. Fanfiction.net and fictionpress.com. This does not include the different places that people have mirrored. Oh, PoD has also been translated into French and Russian. Post around. It's probably the only way to get a steady trickle of feedback.

As for the others, as I said above, if I'm not aware of a problem, I can't address it.

Patrickgay17 · March 8, 2005

Hey is it possible to check how many hits you have at Nifty?

Sparhawk · March 8, 2005

One thing to keep in mind folks, Nifty has 100,000's people reading the stories, we have 440 members. I think that if you could track how many read each story and then how many actually responded to the authors, it would be very depressing.

Myr · March 8, 2005

Hey is it possible to check how many hits you have at Nifty?

No. But it is possible to track how many hits you get at nifty through a link in the story archive here. (it is the number of views listed on the story archive)

Once you have a post on Nifty, we can add you to the archive, if you'd like.

Patrickgay17 · March 8, 2005

I would like greatly to be added to the archive. The story is in progress (editing but I would love to be added).

Umbathri · March 8, 2005

Does Nifty even have a forum for their authors to discuss things? cause I never saw one. To be able to talk with the authors about stories and the way their written is valuable to any aspiring author. I came from nifty TO HERE and havent been back yet... odd I guess.

As others have said, why not just post your stories in more then one place. Ya post it to the mega giant Nitfy for coverage, then also post it at GA (or some other small community of like minded writers, if your insisting on burning your bridges here).

Id hate to think of the very first community like this that I ever had the courage to join, breaking up so soon after.

As far as the feedback vrs number of Hits argument.. I dont think Im the only freak out here, theres a LOT of us that are very quite and withdrawn, who may never write in a proper feedback. But just by the number of hits it should be obvious that your stories are being read and appreciated. Is that not enough?

~Umbathri

Patrickgay17 · March 8, 2005

Like I said feed back isn't a problem for me don't get me wrong I love feed back but in the first two days my first chapter had 240 hits and I loved that.

Maybe I will stay some very important points have been brought up.

Novelty · March 8, 2005

Myr, one thing I find missing from each of the story pages is that there isn't a direct link to the forums here. That would be cool and might encourage people to leave their feedback on the forums... that is if you do want them to place their feedback here.

Well, just so that people are aware, I'm only on this site because it's the first place that Dan posts his Do Overs and I've been a fan of that since... chapter 1 of the first story. I don't particularly have the time to read anything else here though (not even Dan's Harry Potter stuff), so my apologies if I don't provide any feedback for anyone else here.

My advice for people who want their stories to be read... and better still get some feedback? Make sure the first line, if not the first paragraph of the first chapter of the story entices and encourages the reader to continue. Bait them early, and they'll follow your story, hook, line and sinker.

Myr · March 8, 2005

There is a link to the forums on many of the authors pages. Dan does his own pages, so he puts whatever links he likes.

I'll see to being more effective about getting the links everywhere.

Thanks for the suggestion.

GunRunner · March 8, 2005

OK,

While my opinion might not be valid or even wanted, I feel compelled to throw it out there anyway.

1.) Myr --- you are doing an excellent job here. Do any of you even fathom the amount of work (and money) he is putting in to this to make it work?

2.) Feedback --- This isn't always going to happen, and it will NEVER be much as you want, but let me give you a couple of points that might open your eyes. I check my stats every single month to see how my stories are performing, since I have had Myr post them in the archives, I have more than quadroupled in traffic to them. Each and every month I am getting hits from more and more different countries and I am seeing my hit counter go up by leaps and bounds. The e-mails that I get are very few and far between as well as posts on either this board or the one that I run. But honestly here folks, think of how much smaller the number would be if I didn't post here or in the archives? I can tell you from true numbers and stats that it would be significantly lower.

3.) This is a community for authors. We bounce ideas off of each other and gain in support of friends. This is not a feedback generator, although both Myr and I have been trying to come up with solutions to this and work together for the benefit of each and every one of us (all at the same time of trying to run our communities, write stories, fix code, go to work, and have a semblance of life.)

4.) Burning bridges and throwing temper tantrums is just plain childish. I have a teenage and an adult son, and I wouldn't hesitate to send them to the corner for such behavior. There are much better ways of dealing with issues than this, and you never know, but a diplomatic approach might just yeild a better solution. We are all trying to build this community and provide a service, but we are not perfect, and the only way that we can grow is to voice our concerns and ideas (appropriately) and support the team that tries to implement them. At times the process might seems slow, but remember that this kind of community is a full time job, and I know that Myr already has one of those as well.

5.) There are people here who would do anything to help a fellow author (Myr and myself are two that come to mind quickly) and while I might not be an admin or a moderator on this site, I OWN another one and understand exactly what Myr is going through and what he is trying to do. If you have an issue and you don't feel that you can approach him, talk to me. I will be more than happy to try and help you come to a better solution. And trust me there is always a better solution than throwing your hands up in the air with some cursory explatives and walking away as you throw a flame down on the bridge that brought you here. I mean seriously folks, come on here, we are adults. Give this a chance.

If there are issues that you need to address, PM an admin or a moderator, or even me for that fact. Together as a community we can make this grow and make it better. Stand apart and give up and we only weaken it. But rest assured --- WE AREN'T GOING ANYWHERE! We will survive and we will grow. How much and how fast and to what degree of success is up to you. How can we know what you want if you wont say something?

You can PM me here

You can PM me on my board Jeffs Fort Board

Or you can email me gunrunner@cornercafe.us

Just don't be a part of the silent majority. If you want change, you need only open your mouth!

-Gun

dkstories · March 8, 2005

I'm largely going to keep my mouth shut because I'd respond to this like I would a flame e-mail, and the sight would not be pretty.

Considering the relative youth involved here, I'd recommend learning a very real lesson: Talk quietly before raising a big stink. Talk to the people in charge, talk to other Authors, because posting stuff like this is guaranteed to piss people off and get yourself a load of words you might not like.

Myr and the others who contribute to this site have always been the most helpful, most considerate, and good people I've known. I've never had a problem in getting them to work with me or to give me a hand when it was needed. They don't do it for money, but out of a labor of love.

Trash it, trash them, and you'll find plenty of people ready to defend them.

Oh, by the way, I've received maybe forty or fifty e-mails for stories that have had over 3,900 hits. Feedback has to be cultivated by the author, and it takes a lot of effort on the AUTHOR'S part. No one can do that for you, so take up the burden and do the work.

Bill W · March 9, 2005

What I see happening here is what appears to be a childish temper tantrum, blaming the most convenient target for what bothers them. If people walk out of things every time something doesn't go exactly as they wish, then they'll be very lonely for most of their life.

Not only does Nifty have more readers, but it is easier to stand out against much of what is posted there. Maybe that is why readers are more apt to reply to those individuals who put out a better product.

My reaction is, if people want to leave, let them. If that's the way they are, then we're probably better off without them. I'd prefer to have people who are willing to work and make things better, not bail when things go other than what they'd like. I've had fair-weather friends like that, and I'm happier without them too.

Patrickgay17 · March 9, 2005

Well said.

Aleric · March 9, 2005

From what I am hearing from SEVERAL of my contacts including myself here at GA they are walking away. I spoken to almost ten people and we're calling it a walk out. (how origonal).

Apparantly we're just not satisfied with what goes on.

Goodbye Patrick.

I am not going anywhere, thats for sure. And apart from your post,

I've seen NOBODY else say anything like this.

Blah,

Aleric

Walking out on GA?

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