If you can’t find it, why don’t you write it?

16 Dec 2010 7 Comments

by Nikkiin writing Tags: , ,

The title seems like a fairly innocuous and even an encouraging question, eh?  And, hell, maybe some people mean it like that – I mean, you’ve clearly found a void in fandom so you may as will fill it, right?

Yeah, no.  Fuck you anon.  Or non-anon.  Basically, fuck you to anyone who says that.

Why?

Because wanting to read a certain type of fic does not mean in the slightest that you want to write it.  The other day I was bitching about the lack of sick but not pregnant fics on the internet but it’s not like I actually wanted to write it.  I have no inspiration to (though Beckett with food poisoning and the guys thinking that her biker boyfriend knocked her up would be kind of funny).  But I was rather happy when @wabbit89 wrote a fic in which T’Pol was rather under the weather.  Cuz, yeah, I wanted to read, not write.

And there is a huge difference between the two.  Especially the motivation behind why one writes rather than reads.

When I write, it’s because I have (or at least very strongly want) to.  The story won’t leave my head so, dammit, I just force it out onto paper/MS Word/my iPod.  I need an entire idea and the sense that the story is going to go somewhere, not just a trope to fill/subvert.  Not to mention the sense of satisfaction I get from writing a fic is a completely different emotion from the enjoyment I get from just reading one.  I enjoy both activities, but only one of them requires me to use my brain.

When I read, it’s because… well, I always read.  My default state of being is reading.  Hell, even while watching tv (NCIS, currently), I’m reading.  That’s part of the reason why I absolutely detest streaming video – too much of it is flash based and you can’t really fullscreen a flash video on one monitor and read on your second – it just bumps out.

In short, writing is time consuming.  Reading is not.  I can read a 1500 word fic in two minutes for chrissake.  You know how long it’d take me to write that?  Two, maybe three, hours – that’s seventy-five times as long.  Sure, it might take me an hour during NaNoWriMo, but I don’t do any research, editing or, hell, even thinking during a word war!  There is a complete and utter difference in time commitment between reading and writing.

So yeah, the next time you go to say that, just do us all a favour and stfu.  If you’re trollin’, you’re not being particularly ground breaking – get some new material.

(Oh look, I wrote an entry without Sanctuary as one of the tags!  Damn, broke my three post streak.)

Castle Fic and Why I Cannot Read It

14 Nov 2010 7 Comments

by Nikkiin tv, writing Tags: , , , , , ,

As weird as this may sound, and despite my love for both fanfic and tv, there are some fandoms  that I just cannot readfic for.  And, well, you’d have to be living under a rock for you not to know that I really love fanfic.  I read it constantly.  For chrissake, I have downloaded fic and put it on my iPod.  And I’ve been doing that since I got a first gen iPod nanoback in, what, 2006?  Admittedly, that experiment didn’t last very long – the nano only would display x number of characters in a text file and, ultimately, it was waaaay more work that it was worth.

But, dammit, I had tried.

Nowadays I just save the page in html (or view source and c+v the appropriate code), boot out all of the page formatting and convert to ePub.  Or c+v into Word and convert to ePub.  Or take the supplied pdf/doc and convert to ePub.

I think you get the point – I really like ePub.

Not that point is the point of this blog – the point is that I can’t read fic for certain fandoms.  Only two fandoms, mind you – Castle and Lost Girl.

Wait, what?

Yes, those are my two of three of my most favourite of favourite shows currently on the air (the other, of course, is Sanctuary, which I also don’t read fic for, but that’s just because nobody writes anything I’m interested in).  I’m actually in both of those fandoms (well, ish - I’m not really in any fandom, I just lurk on the edges) and, hell, I’ve ever written Castle fic.  So why can’t I read fic for either of those fandoms, especially Castle?

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omgironman

17 Dec 2009 6 Comments

by Nikkiin comics, movies, tv Tags: , , , , , , , ,

As pretty much the entire internets is aware, the IM2 trailer was just released today.  Seriously, if you didn’t know this by now, you musta been living under a rock or something.  I mean, hullo, trending on twitter!  At least 50% of the people I’m following on twitter have made omgironman<3 tweets already.

Unsurprisingly, I was among them, as well as being crazy enough to demand a time machine (@Navarr helpfully provided a time loop machine, thus adding even more fandom to my already fandom full twitter feed).

So.

Yeah.

Trailer good Nikki happyyyy.  I mean, whoa, ‘splosions and War Machine and Pepper makin’ out with the helmet omg!  The last one on the list was surprisingly hot – I predict that the Tony/Pepper LJ comm is gunna explode with ficlets about that kiss and their exchange – “Go get ‘em boss” “You complete me!” – so deliciously shippy.  I’d hope that that would make the T/P die hards stop freaking out over potential Tony/Natasha but, well, that’d be a pipe dream and I’m not all that naive when it comes to fandom and shipping.

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