I've been thinking

[starrylizard]

Scary I know. :P

There's all these people talking about proper commenting/feedbacking etiquette, talk of friending/defriending and that worry about being rude to defriend, people who think it's only fair to ask before friending, others saying you should ask if you want to be friended back, people actually not friending people on the basis of that person asking permission to friend and taking that as begging to be friended back, people writing meta on proper feedback protocol... O_o

Sometimes I just gack at everyone, step back and say "Is this for real? Chill out people!"

I'm guilty of friending, de-friending and even of later re-friending the same people...usually based on whether their interests seem to match mine at the time, or if their journal appears to be unused at the time or on whether I have more or less time to read LJ posts one week, or if they have super long posts that I find frustrating because I have PMS that week. I didn't realise this could upset people at all. In fact I didn't think people noticed, but I realise now there is a email notifier thingy for it. Luckily most of the time, I just friend and forget about it. You're all such interesting people.

I also regularly leave feedback of the sort:

"Nice :)" or "Thank you! :D" or "Aww, cuteness, thanks :)"

Are there really people that think I'm mocking them and don't like their fic (art) when I do this? Believe me, I don't comment when that's the case. I'm generally of the 'say something nice (or at least constructive) or say nothing at all' way of thinking.

There isn't any dire need for you to comment back to my feedback if you don't want to. It's nice though, because it makes it easier for me to find your art/fic again because of the email notice I get. I won't however hunt you donwn for not replying or never comment on your stories/art again. :)

I friend randomly, friend back even more randomly. And lately I have to say some of the people I look up to and admire their fiction (or artwork) have popped up on my friends list without me even friending them first and how cool is that?! :)

I'm a multi-shipper/gen/friendship-loving kinda girl, who marvels at other people's skills. I love comments, as I'm sure other people do. I love how varied my f-list is, with gen/het/slash/artists/vidder/random non-fandom people all chatting to me willy-nilly. Don't cha'all change now. I hope I've not offended anyone at any point with my randomness.

This has been a completely random post by Starrylizard who has been reading too many references in other LJ's to meta and is utterly confused. O_o

Comments

[arlessiar.livejournal.com]

Don't worry, starrylizard, you never offended me in any way by not commenting or by writing short comments.

This whole "how and when to comment" discussion on LJ right now is weird in my opinion. I know that there are unspoken rules on LJ, one of them being that you should try to answer to comments/feedback other people leave in your LJ. I think that's a polite thing to do and hence a good unspoken rule. But:
In my opinion the key word is "should"! It cannot be the case that commenting becomes a duty or a 'must do'. LJ is supposed to be fun, it's something you do in your free time. When you have something like a standard f-list it's already hard enough to read all the interesting entries every day, if I also tried to comment on every single entry I'd spend the whole day on LJ. And that's simply not possible! I have a real life, and although I love being on LJ and am here quite often, I still have to give real life first priority. That means that I cannot answer to every entry/feedback post.

I try to comment first and foremost when my friends post stuff where I feel I have or want to say something, or when they need help/encouragement/comfort, because this is most important. I try to comment on art and fanfic too, but often I lack the time for that. I hardly have time to read all the fanfic/view all the fanart at all! Of course the author/artist doesn't know that and doesn't give a damn if it's important to me that I try to catch up with everything on my daily list. Everyone wants and probably deserves individual feedback. But still, it's not doable. So I only comment on the stuff that really impressed me. I'd love to discuss everything I see on LJ, I'd also want to give constructive criticism or helpful comments when there's something I didn't like so much. But I don't have the time, so I have to set priorities. And my friends real lives, the things that really impressed me, and stuff other people provide me with (like various downloads) are my priorities when it comes to commenting. That said, there are also things that really impress me but it's hard to say more than "Well done" or "thanks". Same when people leave a three word comment for one of my entries - I'm thankful for the acknowledgement of my entry then, but what am I supposed to write in a reply?

I plan on publishing SG fanfic myself one day. When I do, I'll be glad when people find the time to leave feedback, because it's great to hear what others think about my stuff. But I won't be disappointed if they don't comment, because fanfic should be for oneself in the first place. In the second place it's for a (random) reader's enjoyment. And when one reader finds the time to leave feedback then, then this comes in third place and is an added bonus.

So, I'm not angry or disappointed when I get no feedback or answers to my comments. I know what it means not to have the time to comment on everything! Vice versa I also expect my friends to understand that I cannot comment on everything. I appreciate feedback, I appreciate fanart and fanfic, I appreciate what some fans have to offer and share with other fans. And I can assure everyone that I read all comments and that I'm thankful for them. But sometimes I don't have time to answer, and I seriously hope that I won't lose friends just because of that. It's not ignorance or disinterest that keeps me from commenting sometimes - it's just life and its pressures.

[starrylizard.livejournal.com]

Yup. Exactly!

One of my favourite ever dialogues on a fic I wrote went:
1. SL posted fic (I think it was fic)
2. Commenter left: :)
3. I left: :D
4. They left: :P ^_^

It says so much. I made them smile and it made me happy. Not that I want everyone to just leave me smiley faces, but I would never be offended by it.

I'm terrible at replying to rl posts. I'm like a fly on the wall of all your lives who occasionally slips in and leaves *hugs* or *smiles*, but I never feel someone is insulted by my tardiness there. It's those strangely vocal artists that can confuse me. *grins*

*hugs you, hon.*

[arlessiar.livejournal.com]

1. SL posted fic (I think it was fic)
2. Commenter left: :)
3. I left: :D
4. They left: :P ^_^

*g*

*hugs you back* :)

Talking about strange comments... :D