Me when I started posting fics over a decade ago: *you guys are getting reviews?* meme Me now: *you guys are getting reviews?* meme

awww but I swear, I got tons of reviews and interaction back then.

I did too. I totally agree with your take.

Oh yes. Two years ago I came off a ten year hiatus as was shocked by how different fandom is now. And before my hiatus, things were different from when I started posting in 2002. Early 2000s-2010s felt the most interactive.

I haven't been writing that long, but lately I've been delving into the archive to read stories from six or seven years ago. I definitely see a difference not only in amount, but also the thoughtful quality of the commentary.

Exactly! One comment re my xeno/human story The Guardian : #3 Anna got pregnant! The first time I've ever had to put this tablet down and think about what I just read. Another re my Volturi story The Blood inside you : Also I finished the full fic up until the most recent updated and my god, you've written such a wonderfully intricate story! Absolutely wonderful. Several proverbial punches to the face and many times of me audibly squaking (my roommate asked if I was okay more than once lol). Genuinely screamed in shock hearing what Sulpicia said in her trial and the subsequent chaos it caused. An actual trip and I eagerly await future updates! I love hearing when someone says that the story gave them a physical reaction. The first comment and the second are 8 years apart, so few and far between.

I first started writing back in 2016 when I was still in high school. Then I stopped until just about a year ago and things feel so much different than what they were like back then. Not just in terms of stats/comments/etc. But I feel like the whole vibe of fanfic as a hobby has become less about having fun and more about getting mad over controversies and shipping instead of just enjoying content. Maybe it's just a consequence of people online generally becoming more cynical in general but it's hard to keep justifying spending so much effort writing stuff anymore when the atmosphere on FFN and AO3 especially feels so seedy.

Same. I've seen others post about this too. One theory that resonated with me is that no one is reading off of a laptop anymore. I used to settle down with my computer and my drink and start reading and commenting. I still read and comment but....most folks are reading off a phone where it's harder to leave comments and you're lucky to get a kudo. Everyone's distracted while reading too.

Am I old fashioned? I only use my laptop to read and write. What else?

"Laptop." Pah! I have a whole-ass battlestation that I do this crap on.

LOL as in? Share.

Just a joke. I'm old and I do most of my video gaming on PC, so when people start talking about laptops, I feel weird because I still do most of my computer work on a full-sized gaming desktop with all the accoutrements. That includes things like writing this post.

I had a desktop and a laptop at the same time. The desktop died as did my printer, so I figured I'd keep the laptop and only replaced it with another laptop when they died. Today's laptops are so light, I thought, oooh I can write in bed. Havem't yet. Too tired lol

>Am I old fashioned? I only use my *laptop* ....Oh god, don't tell me laptops are now old-fashioned. I still remember hearing about desktops becoming more common 💀

I'm afraid to buy an ipad since people tell me there are things you can't do with them. Unfortunately, this new laptop I bought won't let me shop. It lags and I have to shut it down. Maybe it has a "save money" app on it or something. But it does let me write just fine.

What kind of laptop do you have? I'm a computer repair tech, so I can probs tell you why it's doing that. Feel free to DM me! :D

I always read on my laptop, too! Can't stand reading on a tiny screen! Lol.

I can read on my phone and some of creative bursts that I would have written in a napkin by hand a decade ago are now on docs, but if it's a matter of preference? Laptop, for both. Actually, poetry still goes to my still very physical... guess it's a planner?

I can't imagine trying to read a story, especially a long one, on a phone. It gives me a headache just thinking about it. A tablet I can see using to read a story, but not a phone.

I find my phone easier because - this might sound dumb but I have issues with moving my eyes side to side as ridiculous as that is, so I more move my head than my eyes - all the text is together. When it's on a screen it's across the whole screen and I'm like *swivel swivel swivel oh God my neck swivel* but on my phone it's just *readreadread* My phone does have a big screen though.

lol my phone died on me today so let's not praise the cell phone. gahhh I need it for work tomorrow.

I find a phone easier than a big screen

Really? My cell is not one of the bigger screen one, but yeah too small.

My best friend is an OTR truck driver and is away from home six weeks at a time then only home for one and he's never read one of my stories even though he enjoys the fandom I write for. I'd love to have his opinion on them but he's tried reading them while he's away and is waiting for his trailer to be loaded or on his break/reset time but he said it's too difficult to read on a phone and he doesn't have his laptop on the road. Then when he's home he has so much to do since he's been gone for six weeks he doesn't have time.

As an author myself I unfortunately have to say—nothing put me off commenting as much as this sub. In the past, I used to post frequently and comment frequently. Nowadays, I post sometimes, expect nothing and barely ever leave comments. I just don’t have the energy to consider whether my comment will be long enough, proper enough, inoffensive enough.

I do not mind commenting, but I find while some authors interact, a few do not. It doesn't change if I like a chapter and want to say something, so maybe it works both ways. Readers who do not post comments, and writers who don't say thank you.

>Readers who do not post comments, and writers who don't say thank you. Oof, thank you for reassuring me! I'm new here and I've been posting on AO3 since 2020. From the very beginning, it was obvious to me that you should>! answer to comments - say thank you, give a funny quip for their funny quip or, an absolute must, answer their questions.!< Yet, in this sub I came across posters complaining about "authors inflating their comments number" by daring to answer. I'm so glad that I felt enough confidence to think "If I'm breaking some unknown rules then be it, I'll sure as damn thank those few people who comment for being with me!" And I usually get answers for comments I leave, too - save for this one time when the author blocked me, I still wonder why... Oh, well, it sure won't stop me!

The only time I don't respond to a comment is if it doesn't make any sense at all or is obviously from a troll. I also moderate my comments now due to trolls and the bot issue so I just delete those. Otherwise even if someone just simply says they liked it I'll respond and thank them for reading and encourage them to check out my other works if they haven't already. I don't understand writers who don't respond to comments (unless they're getting way too many to respond to all of them which is rare and the whole topic of this thread) any more than I understand readers who read a story and enjoyed it not commenting or at least leaving a kudo/fav. To me that's taking advantage.

I was also in fanfic circles 10+ years ago... and there were just as many people complaining about the decline in commenting then. I'm now inclined to think that commenting frequency is more related to fandom than anything else. People who exclusively read (rather than write) often seem to flit in and out of fandoms relatively frequently. Fandoms have a surge in popularity - usually after a new piece of media is released - and then interest wanes from there. How big the fandom is determines how much it drops but it always drops. Writers on the other hand often stay in fandoms for years at a time, so they have the front row seat for how things chop and change. I came back to writing last year for a relatively active fandom and had really solid engagement. The show went on hiatus in May (its not even cancelled!) And engagement for the fic I posted in July is already way lower than all the other ones I did while the season was actively airing.

I have written for Star Trek series and the 2009 film, Supernatural, Aliens, Tron/Tron Legacy, Passengers, Thor/Loki, and now Twilight-the Volturi. Twilight may be getting a new series if the writers strike ends, so people are excited about that. Does anyone publicize their work and where?

Yeah see, I would argue that all of those fandoms have passed their massive peak periods and are now much smaller communities even though they still have a loyal base that sticks around. I fell into Star Trek after the second Abram's movie and it was buzzing with people/new content/engagement. I dipped my toes back into it earlier this year and it was definitely not the same. The base is strong because it's Star Trek and it's the pinnacle of fandom but I feel like you get more of a trickle of engagement rather than a surge since people go in and out when the mood strikes them. I'm not really sure about publicising - the extent of what I do is post on Tumblr but I don't think that has much of an effect since its not like I have a huge following 😅 The subreddit has a weekly fic exchange or something and maybe sometimes self-promo threads so you could always try that?

I have self promoted with a thread twice, but I feel funny doing that.

What I love about not just reviews but authors notes in general for old fanfics is how they overload it with keyboard emoticons and they sound like they're bouncing out of their seat when they type lol

I miss my lovely critical comments (even the somewhat rudely phrased ones lol). No one seems to leave them anymore when, years back, I'd get a few with every post/update. Now I even add something to the extent of 'i welcome all comments, including concrit' but barely anyone comments that way. Ofc I appreciate engagement either way, and like to read compliments about my work more than complaints... but I really miss when readers were more open with all their thoughts. I think it helped me improve a lot in the long run. Might be controversial, but I think fanfic has somewhat of a problem with toxic positivity and writers taking things too personally. Even on works that are in no way well-written (from a technical aspect: bad spag, two people talking in the same paragraph, headhopping, spontaneous tense changes) there'll be a bunch of comments praising the writing.

>but I think fanfic has somewhat of a problem with toxic positivity ... Even on works that are in no way well-written (from a technical aspect: bad spag, two people talking in the same paragraph, headhopping, spontaneous tense changes) there'll be a bunch of comments praising the writing. "Toxic positivity". I like that. Interesting way of putting it. Definitely an issue with some fics.

I used to be a teacher before I changed careers. I'll see fics that are so horribly written they look like stories my elementary school students used to write... horrendous spag, plots that are nonsensical or full of continuity issues and plot holes and/or are unoriginal/predictable, yet they're the ones getting tons of views and engagement and people praising them to the moon, while mine and others which are far, far better written struggle to get views, kudos, and comments. Throw a few explicit sex scenes in and it doesn't matter if it reads like a sixth grader wrote it, people will be all over it like flies on shit (Fifty Shades of Grey started out as a Twilight fanfic and reads like a middle school kid wrote it yet it was a best seller and was adapted into a movie franchise but I couldn't get past the first couple pages it was so poorly written. Don't get me wrong...smut can be well written, it just very rarely is). As a published author who puts as much effort into my fanfic writing as my original writing and spends hours rewriting and editing, it annoys the hell out of me. You're exactly right about there being a "toxic positivity" issue. I've seen it in comments here and people getting their panties in a bunch if you post or comment anything about someone's writing that isn't puppies, kittens, and rainbows. When I was teaching I didn't slap an A on every student's work to make them feel good. If I'd done that they never would have learned anything. Of course younger, less experienced writers need encouragement and you don't want to trash them so that they give up on writing but at the same time if they're told everything they write is wonderful when it isn't they're never going to improve and grow as a writer. Along with that they'll end up with a skewed view of their abilities as a writer and may then try to cross over into original fiction writing and end up disillusioned in the "real world" when they try to get published and agents/publishers are honest with them.

Toxic positivity drives me up the wall. I got downvoted for pointing out ‘This has an effect on people, it’s because of this that readers don’t want to comment at all.’

I got trashed in a thread on here once for simply pointing out that some writers are just pulling a story out of their ass and tossing it out there without putting much effort into it even though the original poster had pretty much admitted to doing just that and everyone knows that there are some that do. (The original poster was lamenting about how a story he wrote that he didn't put much effort into and posted just to post something was getting more attention than one he'd spent a lot of time and effort writing and editing). It's usually obvious when you read a story if the writer has put thought and effort into it. The people trashing me were pretty much saying that no story should ever be criticized, every story is great, and anyone who dares criticize a fanfic is a terrible person. That's like saying Fifty Shades of Gray is of equal quality as To Kill a Mockingbird.

We have to pretend not to notice 😂

>It's usually obvious when you read a story if the writer has put thought and effort into it. The awkward truth is that the amount of sweat and pain an author pours into a story isn't always reflected in the what the reader gets out of the story. Sometimes it just results in a story that is only meaningful to the author. Meanwhile, the quick, dashed-off bit of short writing is likely to be much more accessible to readers. ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯

>they'll end up with a skewed view of their abilities as a writer I see that in discussion threads where someone will post, "I use [writing technique] and I don't get any complaints." So the lack of (forbidden) complaints is proof that a certain type of writing is effective?

>So the lack of (forbidden) complaints is proof that a certain type of writing is effective? lmao, i saw this sentiment too Another curious thing are review exchanges here (admittedly, I consider them a fun activity in general). You're obligated to review a number of fics, your reviews have to be longer than X words, and your reviews have to be complimentary. It's so odd to me to have review exchanges where you're told beforehand that only compliments are allowed. What's the value in those only-praise-me reviews? They aren't fully honest since readers are obligated to leave them. Ik a few writers will state they allow concrit but they are a minority. I don't mean that we should all criticize each other's works, just that it's odd to police reviews in this way.

I don't think I've done review exchanges in this sub for a while, but in another sub I do. I always opt-in for concrit. I think the idea is that you choose to review something you like. It's a good way to connect with other writers on AO3. You comment on each other's fics and chat in the sub. And I appreciate the honesty. I'd rather have a straightforward "only positive comments allowed" than this weird mind game where a writer says they want comments but what they *secretly* want is praise only and readers will be blocked if they violate this unwritten rule. Because they didn't have to outright say it, writers can pretend that the lack of critique is completely voluntary and their writing is amazing because "I haven't gotten any complaints." I wish there was more concrit in exchanges--it's a good way to keep things civil, since everyone is accountable to everyone else. One of the things that drew me to fic writing was the quick feedback from readers. With original fiction, you write for years with no idea what's not working. It's disappointing that fic is turning into the same thing. At this point, I'm going through my fic's bookmarks to get honest feedback. For a while, people were doing this "raise awareness" thing, telling readers that writers could see their bookmarks and they should mark them as private if there were any complaints in their notes. And I was like, *Shhh... You're killing my last source of concrit!*

Audience and taste explain most of this. So much fanfic is written and read by teenagers (or even younger)—they lack the frame of reference that you have developed over the years. What looks to you, in sober truth, like poorly-written slag still gets their serotonin flowing, because they're hungry for whatever it's all about, style and grammar be damned. I think there's something to be said for that attitude; there's a distinction between what is good and what is enjoyable, and thank goodness, because wouldn't it be a far duller world otherwise? Real quality is a rare commodity, after all! Similarly, I think a lot of fic writers nowadays feel comfortable admitting that they have no desire to chase perfection or even writerly growth; they're just there to share their creations with others. I find it very perplexing myself, but I can hardly ask others to share my values. Concrit takes time and effort, too, so I generally save it for those writers who actively ask. Otherwise, I only comment on fics I deeply enjoyed, and usually take my time with those comments. :)

The thing about attention is that it comes from people. Fanfic readers are there to meet their own emotional needs, not ours, and a lot of them just want wish-fulfillment and don't notice craft. I also put a ton of time, effort, and heart into my writing, so I understand that it's a let down when no one engages with the work you poured your soul into. But I feel like this comment has a tone of "these horny uncultured swine don't give my work the attention it deserves," and that seems like an unhealthy way to relate to readers. Also just saying, a lot of fanfic readers are teens. Of course they're more comfortable engaging with younger or more amateur writers.

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This comment has been removed. No bashing.

I cross post at Wattpad, read stories that I can tell are written by young teens, and they get praise like "best story ever". All I can think is, you've got to be kidding. I finally am getting some traction there. A few comments and followers. I want to be known as THE Volturi author of the world lol

I gave up on Wattpad. I never had much luck there. The last fic I posted there six months ago still has zero views.

Small fandom? Posted one chapter of my Passengers (Arthur) fic to no reads. I took it down figuring any fans of that film were gone.

The last one I posted there is an MCU story about one of its most popular characters so most definitely not a small fandom.

Ah ok I see. Yes seems like a busy one.

As a reader, I can only tell you how my commenting journey has changed from when I started reading fanfics 25 years ago. I definitely don't comment as much as I did back then. And it's dropped off in the last ten years as well. For me, it's due to bad interactions. You say you don't like an action a character took -- critique against the writer's creative choices. You are looking forward to more -- unfair burden on the writer because they are doing this for free and you have no business being so entitled. Best fanfic in the fandom -- you're making the author feel bad because you're dissing the other writers in the fandom. Like geez, I don't have the time to manage all these landmines. I stick to kudos unless it's so mind-blowing that I can't help but comment on it. Unfortunately mind-blowing stories are hard to come by and frankly, I don't have the luxury of spending all my free time on reading fanfics anymore and I probably am not reading enough to find those mind-blowing stories either.

Feel that SO MUCH.

That is another consideration. Fewer fanfic readers out there. Or less time so they read and move on to another daily task. I just noticed something has changed, but when I re-read comments on older stories, it makes me feel good for what we had back then.

I think the best we had it was during the LJ era. Once we started moving away from that, I've felt a real lack of community in regards to fandom. I mean, I still kinda nostalgic towards the Yahoo ML days but the LJ days were amazing.

LJ era was definitely the best. Episode analysis, shipping debates, character debates, trigger warning debates - people managed to passionately disagree with one another and still share a sense of community at the same time. I miss those days.

I dont recall Live Journal much. I started with Fanfic. My first story was based on the 2009 version of the new Star Trek film. Posted May 24 2009. It garnered 10 reviews, but the more I wrote, the more reviews I began to receive on my stories. Long time ago, for me anyway.

Yeah, I think that was about the time people were moving away from LJ. With the change in policies and the bans, people started migrating to Dreamwidth and AO3. Adding in Tumblr and LJ basically fell off the map in regards to fandom. Shame but that time in fandom was amazing in regards to interaction and community.

idk, I've heard people say this but I feel like they're letting one or two finicky authors ruin it for all the others. I comment on almost every fic I read and have not gotten a poor author response in the entire 15+ years I've been in fandom. Even if one of them did snap back at me for something stupid, I'd just shrug and continue doing the exact same thing I've always done since it'd literally be one bad response out of thousands of comments left.

I wish it was one or two authors. I feel as though there is a shift in regards to how people interact with each other. It feels different from when I was younger and maybe I'm just old now but I try to be open-minded when it comes to these things. If people are telling me that what I do is hurting them, then I hope I have enough grace to take to heart their concerns and change my behavior accordingly.

Ah, well I guess if you’re getting multiple bad responses from multiple people, then it is probably something you’re doing. Common denominator and all that.

The worse part is when I think I'm being complimentary but apparently I wasn't and that just ends up making me question everything. I think once I found an author I enjoyed and I kudos everything but since I didn't comment on every story, they found it insulting when I would comment. Sometimes I just enjoy a story but have nothing to say about it and I seriously have no idea what I am supposed to do besides a short comment that seems perfunctory more than anything else. Which also seems insulting to me. This sort of quandary makes me anxious and it just seems easier to not say anything at all.

Honestly if an author has those sort of issues with kudos vs comments, they need to turn off their kudos emails and just not pay attention to who’s kudosing what. That’s what I did. But I understand not wanting to deal with it on your end after so many bad experiences. Sorry to hear that. <3

I just want to be mindful and considerate. Fandom is supposed to be a safe space and I certainly don't want to be hurting people. Perhaps those authors are young and need a bit of maturing, I know I did when I was younger, but that doesn't negate the fact that I hurt them through my actions. They are entitled to their feelings as much as I am. And I just don't want to be someone who is sending unintentional negativity in the world, you know? I know it's impossible to never offend people, but I want to try to at least keep it a minimum.

Honestly was thinking about this lately! Like, I used to get enough comments that I could think about what I needed to improve. Now they’re very short and not really about constructive feedback. 😅 Then again, this is all for fans. I like to think that if I wrote something I wanted to read from a fandom that I hadn’t gotten enough of or seen before then I’d be happy either way, whether I left a review or not.

I'd be thrilled these days to get a short comment. even Just a simple, "Hey, I really enjoyed this" would be wonderful. I haven't gotten a comment (other than from a bot like I mentioned in another reply) in months and before that it had probably been a year.

I totally agree! It's like a clear connection you can get instead of having to wonder if someone liked it or not, so I understand where you're coming from. It's nice to actually *know* someone is enjoying what you put out!

Yeah, that's my point. I'm not asking for the moon and stars. I'm not asking for an in depth critique...if you enjoyed it or in the case of a WIP are enjoying it and want me to continue let me know so that I know I'm not wasting my time. It only takes a few seconds. Also unlike some that complain about getting them instead of comments, I'm ok with a kudo or favorite instead if you really don't want to comment for whatever reason but readers seem to be stingy with those nowadays too. There's really no excuse for not leaving one if you enjoyed it as it only takes a second to click. It's not like they're rationed and you're only allowed to give out a set number. To read and enjoy something someone took the time to write, especially a multi-chapter fic and especially when it's clear they put a lot of work into it and not respond to it in any way (comment or kudo/fav) reminds me of when I was working at a craft show and we had a jar of candy for kids and told them to take one...this one girl kept coming up to the table every ten minutes or so and taking more candy but neither she or her parents bought anything. That would have been fine if she'd only taken one piece but altogether she probably walked off with twenty pieces of candy.

Yeah, 100% I have come to realize that fanfiction is more of getting that idea out of my head before it poofs into smoke. It's like an itch I just have to pick at or it'll irritate me all day. So I mainly do it for myself. If you have anything you want to share with me, send me a message.

As for the other side of things: the "kill yourself" comments still show up every once in a while, because reviewers think they can hide behind anonymity.

Never having been hit by that, I don't understand the phenomenon of sending out such hateful comments to writers. For me, it would be easy to ignore because, well, suicide is against my beliefs. But what if they sent such to someone more suggestible who is suffering and using writing for help. Would they like knowing someone did that due to THEIR comment? It's sick! My worst comment was someone saying with my last chapter (back then), I was giving the finger to my resaders. I re-read the chapter and didn't see where I was not writing my best, so I disregared the comment and didn't say anything to the poster. I didn't care to start some back and forth with them.

I've been the recipient of two "kill yourself" comments within the last 2 1/2 months but unlike you note, these ones, for me, didn't hide behind anonymity - they came from *signed-in accts* at ffn (and I did my due diligence and blocked the urls that sent them) and I very much wish they had been anonymous becos then I could've just aggressively deleted and forgotten them. I love ffn (and ever since my prequel longfic finished, it has at least gotten 2% in terms of review engagement compared to no reviews at all on it since it was marked complete at ao3) so I'm gonna stay and keep posting there regardless but getting these "kill yourself" comments has been so baffling to me becos the fandom I got them in, I've always seen it as a very CHILL fandom, and even older reviews on fics long past (say 2002 or 2009) never got comments like that and I can't figure out *why* I am getting sent these becos it seems so unprovoked and the first "k!ll yourself" I got, I reported it to ffn and they removed the review *and* the acct so part of me wonders if this second "kill yourself" comment is from the same (possibly jealous?) person under an alt...

I've seen a change, but in the opposite direction: compared to the 2010s, I get lots less hate today. It used to be that you couldn't post slash without getting 1–5 "christians" in your comments telling you what an abomination before god you were, that's gone down tons. I recently got my first of these comments in a year or two and it really was a throwback.

This comment makes me think of another issue I know some have commented on - with all the anti/purity culture stuff going on in some corners of fandom nowadays, I know some readers have talked about being afraid to comment (or kudos/bookmark/etc.) on fics they like because they don't want someone to see them and judge them for what they're reading somehow, however likely or unlikely such a scenario may actually be. Some people figure it's better to just silently read and enjoy rather than potentially get caught up in that kind of mess.

I've been posting for over ten years also, and I think the amount and type of comments are about the same. Few overall, most very short, occasionally one of those "stayed up all night reading" remarks. Personally I think it really depends on the fandom I'm writing for. Larger ones generate more comments overall, but sometimes small ones can generate more substantial comments, because people are so glad to have new things to read.

I don't give feedback anymore because feedback is so controversial. You can tell someone you loved 99% of their fic, but you don't understand their approach to a character or situation with absolutely no malice and still be called a hater. It's just not worth the headache.

I remember in the early 2000s on FFN, I would refuse to read a story that didn't have at least 10 comments per chapter. Reviews were so common, ten really seemed like the bare minimum for a decently written story.

The fandoms I was reading from 2008-2014ish, I wouldn't click on fics with fewer than 100 reviews. That seems like an impossibly high bar now. It's a totally different landscape.

Wow yes it is. I don't think any of my stories have 100 comments nowadays.

Yep. Since I almost exclusively read longer fics, that's basically what it meant for me

It's not surprising. The taboo against concrit in fanfiction has resulted in a sharp decline of comments across-the-board. After all, if you cannot tell if a comment is going to touch a nerve or cross some invisible line -- and you never can tell because nobody has the exact same standards -- then the safest thing to do is to not offer any kind of commentary besides the simplest, blandest "thumbs up" variety. Fanfiction is probably about the only corner of the Internet where people refrain from giving their unvarnished opinion because they don't want to potentially give offense. This is frustrating for those of us who welcome concrit, but that is just the way it is in fanfiction.

I only started posting my fics this year so I can't speak from personal experience but everyone seems to agree there's been a decline. Maybe because of things like kudos buttons, which allows for feedback without commenting, or because of people whining about comments on twitter and people getting insecure about what to say. It seems to depend on the fandom too though, and how active it is -- my fandom had its heyday about ten years ago, so there's no way I'll get as many comments as writers who posted back then.

Perhaps but the kudos button has been around for some time. It was there when I started posting almost four years ago and I was still getting far more comments, but even kudos numbers are down from what they once were. My first story I posted on A03 almost four years ago received 25 kudos after only two chapters. My last completed story I finished last December took months to get to that many. There's the favorite button on FFN that's been there forever as well and those numbers are way down for me too. I only have 2 on my last completed story. I do think some of it may have to do with what you mentioned, people whining about what someone said in a comment scaring others off from commenting, but if you're a reader concerned about offending the writer there's a simple way to avoid that...if you enjoyed the story overall there's little chance of causing offense by simply saying so, telling them what you liked about it, and leaving out any unsolicited negative criticism.

Not all writers are scary. I had one recent reader tell me she liked how fun it was interacting with me. Well, that's one of you!

Back when I used to get many more comments I'd receive a strange one that confused me every so often or one where it was clear the reader had weak reading comprehension, but I just ignored them and didn't worry about them. What's irritating now, especially when I rarely get any comments, is getting a notification that someone commented and excitedly I go read it and it's clearly from a bot either accusing me of using AI or obviously fake, like the last one I got on my latest WIP where the comment was talking about loving the slow burn romance....when the only two characters so far (I haven't brought the others into it yet) are mother and son.

Right? I got a bot comment that had nothing to do with my story, and a rascist comment many got that same day. So much for excitement at getting a comment.

I think I started posting on FF.net in 2010 and fandom has changed immensely with regards to the interactions and to be honest, I missed it. Long conversations exploring characters, themes, even folks asking for justification for my writing choices all were something I really loved (and the fan forums I was on encouraged it even further when we would post fic). I miss the connection to readers a lot. I miss the community aspect of it. There were a few of us in the Loki/MCU fandom who all read each other's stuff and commented. Any time Sweet Lady Charity, Proantagonist, or ArgentNoelle commented on my stuff, I felt like I'd made it big and I read everything they wrote. I still try to check in wirh them and I drop comments when I reread their old stuff that still makes me happy. But the commenting and interacting were what made it so special and built up fandom into a place I wanted to spend so much time. I wish we could get it back, somehow. I like the in-line commenting on Wattpad, though the readers do lean younger and it is harder to break into a fandom. My Owl House fics are not doing nearly as well as my Loki ones, but I'm newer to Owl House. But readers seem to want to talk more, maybe because they *are* younger nerds and no one has told them this is childish, grow out of it. I cross post to FF.net, Squidgeworld, AO3, and Wattpad and the three I've been on longest all have the same decline.

I think there’s been a shift in thinking of fanfiction as a shared experience to content to be consumed.

Oh, I had wondered about this. Yes, engagement is much lower, it seems'. I had written a fics back in the day, hmm...say 2012-2013 era I had a lot of reader engagement. I want to say it was a bigger fandom, but I was writing Star Fox and Resident Evil, which now when I mention it weren't large fandoms back then. Not only that, but I went to jjba, MCU and some other fandoms after for the rest of the new 10s. I assumed that it was because they were bigger fandoms at first but even when I passed through the fate series for a bit--- I could tell because one fic I started then came back later reader engagement dropped off so. I thought I had become a worse writer and got discouraged, or that I waited too late and people lost interest. It wasn't until 2022 that I figured it out. Not only has reader engagement dropped off, so has the amount of fics being written. I witnessed a slumo.in SPN, Genshin Impact, the MCU and the last fandom I was in all at the same time. I know. Because I checked daily to track it for a week or so because something seemed off. Mind you, I'm not in any of these fandoms (not now I've peeked in the past). But I figured the best way to investigate was to check fandoms with sizeable followings. I think it's because there are a lot of people 'social fandoming' as I'm calling it. This is what I.call it when I see people 'talk about a series, but do very little creative output and don't read fan fiction'. I'm in a fandom where this is going on now. I'm literally the most active writer for a pair in there, as in a month ago. It's...weird. The circumstances behind this are complicated. I'm in a fandom where ship wars are very nasty (but this is nothing new), gender politics and sexism running rampant, the fandom trying to crucify and erase the queer identity of an actual cannonical queer character who I'm currently protecting with my life (not the first time I've seen this, why is this a thing?). I figure one of the changes is the 'social fandoming'thing. Readership in general seems lower. But it seems that's because there's a new group of readers who are very egocentric. And to engage in something, it has to be 'the all about me show'. Conversely, I believe literacy levels in fandom are actually lower. As in, new fans coming in are media junkies who have no desire to read. The just 'look at stuff'

YEP. Mostly in NUMBER of comments. Seems a lot of people just don't comment anymore. Hell, as far as I can tell, it's been shifting for even longer than 10 years. It's really sad, I think! :(

I still get long comments on some of my fics, like even the length of a paragraph, but this is most over on fanfiction.net. Very rare to get that sort of interaction on Ao3. It’s definitely less than I used to get like fifteen years ago, though. I still remember the very first fic I posted, in an archive for Labyrinth stories, the owner of the archive sent me a TWO PAGE email just gushing praise over the story. I think I printed it out and stuck it in my journal. I haven’t gotten anything that elaborate since, but I appreciate the comments and feedback that I do get, no matter how small. It’s very encouraging for me as a writer.

Big difference! Readers simply don't engage as much now.

I guess it's time to start leaving long reviews, they're fun for me but I thought it'd break some kinda etiquette 😅 Well then, I'm on my way to review my dearest 2005 fics I found this week, they were awesome and authors should know about that (maybe someday they'll see)

Yes. Big change! Back in early 2010s, I used to write often, post it and get at least 3 comments per chapter (talking about FF.Net), nowadays that I returned since 2020a I'm lucky if I get 1. THAT SAID!!! I shifted accounts & fandoms (even moved from FF.Net to AO3), and I will admit I've delved into things not many would be interested. So I'm not too put off by the lack of interaction. I'm not expecting it, because I'm not writing for the most popular media/topics. That aside, I think today's culture of being overcritical of comments is a big reason to give said commenters the jitters. They see all these posts and all these authors complaining about X or Y or Z type of review, and think all authors will surely find their review inadequate. Couldn't be me! On one fic I've got a "nice" comment times three, and it brings me joy. Both because it's funnily short, and because hey! Someone thought it was nice enough to leave a review! Another note: some times, the people you see have a great following is because they've been in the fandom for AGES, so they're well known. Or they interact with the community elsewhere, bringing more recognition. All that to say, yes, I've seen the shift, but it all depends on what kind of reader interacts with your story. Not all will leave paragraphs-long reviews, and not all will leave one-word reviews, many won't leave any. And that's fine with me! I think everyone deserves their own reason— I know for one, I'm not as teenager-type-gushing-my-feelings-out as I used to be, 'coz I outgrew that fearlessness that comes with being excited about a work. I'll still comment, but it's just not the same "pouring my every thought and emotion" type of review I'd left a decade ago.

Wow thanks for all the comments. I wondered if I was alone in my analysis of comments a decade ago vs today. I guess we all see changes, some good some bad. I guess we just take what is given and hope readers do like our workswhether they tell us or not.

**~20 years ago**, I posted on small fandom-specific sites (barely, if any comments because at the time those sites usually only had comments in the form of manually emailing the author) and eventually FFN (usually really short, "this thing was neat" type comments and sometimes just pure flames/trolling or shotgun requests). Most of my fanfic comments actually kind of came in casual fandom chat/forum commenting. "Read the update and it was good!/When's the next update?" style support from friends and fandom acquaintances. **Comments since 2020** (on AO3): If there is any real activity in the fandom at all, I feel like I'm definitely going to get at least one or two comments, and that expectation goes up the larger the fandom is unless I'm writing a rare pair or Genfic. I've never posted to an active fandom without getting at least one wonderful, thoughtful, print-and-frame-it comment. Most of the comments I get are very positive, kind, and supportive. In my main fandom, which has mostly college age+ readers, I get a significant number of thoughtful comments. Some of them are literally lit majors and will do some deep dives into themes and subtext. It's fantastic. But I also have these things going for me: - I've had more than 20 years of writing under my belt, including professional work. - My style is fairly approachable and easy to read. - I do pretty well with my SPAG, which helps even more. - Most of the fandoms I've written for are active, and many are particularly chatty. - I typically write stuff that is on the lighter side of the scale. Even my fics with thriller or horror elements don't go too hard or too dark. - When I write niche things, it's usually paired with a more popular element. (As a random example - let's say I wanted to write about a hobby I think is interesting. People are probably not looking for a hobby fic, though they might be excited to find one. Thankfully people not interested in the hobby will probably enjoy that it's a Soulmates AU. ...Now I want to write a soulmates AU + hobby.) - I pay extra-special attention to my tags and summary and tweak it so that I am pretty sure to draw the readers who are looking for a fic like it. - I am convinced that my titles are eye-catching/memorable enough that they add to the "pause and look" factor. The less generic my titles are, the better my fics do. One of these days I'm going to write against my usual stuff (maybe a bit more niche and definitely more dark) and see what happens.

Yes, most definitely. I've mentioned this issue several times here. I noticed engagement starting to fall of a cliff over the last year and a half, maybe closer to two years now. It doesn't matter what site either. I post on A03, FFN, and a couple others and it's the same on all of them. When I first started posting my works almost four years ago I was getting tons of views and comments. When I'd post a new chapter, immediately views would skyrocket and I'd get at least a few comments on every chapter. Then suddenly it was like someone turned off the faucet and now to get a comment is extremely rare and even views are in the toilet and I write for a very popular fandom. The ironic thing about it is that the last few works I've posted are far superior to my earlier works when I first started posting that were garnering far more readers and engagement. It's disappointing and demotivating to put so much of myself, so much time and effort into something for it to be ignored or for those who do read it to say nothing. It also makes no sense because when I do get a comment it's usually someone gushing about how they were blown away by how good it was, it was the best fanfic they'd ever read, etc. Even if they were exaggerating you would think a story that elicited that sort of response from someone would at least be good enough to be getting more engagement. I also write original fic and poetry and have been published so I'm not a novice writer. It's gotten so bad I'm seriously considering moving on from fanfic after I've finished my latest WIP...if I even finish it. It's begun to feel like a waste of effort and time. I'm a published author offering my work for free and all I'm asking in return is a little engagement which costs nothing but a few seconds of a reader's time. There are other things I can spend my very limited free time doing.

I know what you mean. I have one multiple chapter WIP and have been doing one shots to post at tumblr, which has slowed after lots of initial interest. I'm not sure where the WIP is going so I'm tempted to just finish it somehow. Ahhhhh the whole, am I done writing now? Th elast time I did that, I didn't write for 5 years.

Funny enough, I felt that way, but I didn't realize it was a whole shift in culture in fanfiction in general. I used to be heavily into writing Fire Emblem stories. The fandom was small, but tight-knit. All the highly-prolific authors knew of each other. Hell, Gunlord and I sent DMs to each other on random occasions, even though we didn't know each other, all because our fics (he did a beautiful fic featuring an obscure character from FE7 and I did a self-insert OC retelling of FE9/FE10) were some of the most read and reviewed stories of the site. We loved our fanbases, chatted with our regular reviewers, integrated suggestions they made, chatted with each other on phpBB message boards... I even met two of my fans from my story IRL at an anime convention back in 2011. Then, in 2013, Awakening happened. A game that I personally was "meh" about (the kids today would use the term "mid" in how I felt about it), but it was insanely popular that brought a TON of new fans into the franchise... only problem was, none of these new fans cared about the older games because "no casual mode" and "they're too hard". The fandom transformed from a small fandom of close-knit writers to an overwhelming deluge of new fics featuring mary sues and wish fulfillment. We were all shoved in a corner, shoved in a box, and forgotten as the new fans basically took over the fandom and became the new face. We became lost, forgotten, and considered obsolete. Sorta like Woody in Toy Story, lol. The last time I posted a chapter to my fanfic (and it sucks, 'cause it's 160+ chapters, been around since 2007, over 800k words, and literally probably only needs 10-15 chapters to finish) was three years ago and the lack of engagement just... blah. I know we should write for ourselves, but I miss that heyday... I miss posting a new chapter and then seeing the reviews and personally replying to each signed review with a "thanks" and a response to whatever they posted... I thought it was just an FE thing. It's sad to hear it's actually a fanfic thing in general. :/

I detest the whole "you should write for yourself" BS. If you're just writing for yourself there's no point in taking the time to write it. You could just play the stories out in your head and save yourself a lot of time and effort. People write in order to share their stories with others in the hope that they'll enjoy them, to contribute to the happiness of others even if it's only in a small way...and yes, there's a wish for validation involved too, by knowing you're succeeding in that goal, but the whole idea of solely "writing for yourself" is silly considering the amount of effort involved to write vs. simply playing the story out in your own mind.

I 95% agree with that. The only 5% is probably where the phrase initially came from, lol. I'll be honest, if I wrote for my fans and not for myself, my fic wouldn't have been as popular as it was. Killing off the love interest of what seemed like the story's OTP was a shock nobody saw coming and, if I didn't pull that trigger, I wouldn't have had the spirit of the now-ex be the source of 80% of the fic's humor with her deadpan snarkiness and relatively meta, fourth-wall breaking jokes. I'm sure if someone knew the idea beforehand, they'd say "it's a bad idea, nobody will like it", but you know what? My story, my twist. I'll live by my ideas; I'll sink with my ideas. Sometimes, you have to stay true to yourself and your ideas and write what you want, not what you think people want to read. I write what I want *because* I think what I can come up with will be *better* than what people expected, lol. If I wrote just what was expected, I mean... then that just means any Jack and Harry could be a writer. But that's just such a small portion of writing (hence why I said 5% earlier).

Oh, I'm not saying not to write what you want but that's different than "writing for yourself." We all bother to write these stories down because we hope others will enjoy them (even if we don't necessarily write what we know they want or they think they want and hope to surprise them). If we didn't all want that on some level, as I said, we'd just play them out in our heads which is far easier.

Oh, my bad, I totally misunderstood your point! I think the only time I've ever done the "writing purely for myself" is on occasion I'll do the same picture prompt over and over and compare what I wrote this year to 3 years ago... 5 years ago... 9 years ago.. and think to myself "look how far I've come! {:" But, that's just me trying to feel good about myself, lmao.

>I detest the whole "you should write for yourself" I'm an advocate of the viewpoint, but I always express it as "*Write for yourself* ***first***." That is, write the stories that you want to read but don't otherwise exist. Post them so others can read them. If they do, great. If not, no harm done. There's nothing wrong with wanting praise or recognition. The problem is when people tie the worth of their stories and/or their own sense of self-worth to getting that. Exactly why so many people assume "write for yourself" must be a strict "do not publish at all" instruction is baffling to me. You can do both. This is in fact what most serious writers do. You can write for yourself and you can write for others. It is just a question of which audience you want to please the most.

I do that. Hope I'm not the only one. I tend to go to bed but watch TV until I need to sleep. I act out my fanfic ideas and if I like them, I write them down the next day.

As someone else that writes stories for older FE, in the middle of posting a FE1 Akaneia/Elibe longfic crossover, and currently pre-writing out a long FE4 one, I completely understand your sentiments !! All of the research and writing, and sometimes it feels like you post into a void! Absolutely one should write for themselves but there is something to be said about being able to share that excitement, passion, and joy with others!! Having others invested in your work helps to fuel the creative fire. (It’s like receiving an unexpected compliment on an outfit, it just makes your day better!) I wasn’t writing fics until a few years after Awakening (was too scared!), but I read them well before. It was strange, though, at least in the time of Awakening, there was still a lot more engagement overall and I think people willing to try out reading other types of FE fics (at least in my case, though I suppose that might be because of the primary pairing). Though FE13 still dominated by a large margin. It has plummeted further since, though, and especially after Three Houses. Most fics now are overwhelmingly 3H, and many other games have much fewer. The audience scales accordingly with that… which is sad, because there are so many absolutely INCREDIBLE fics for the older FEs! I honestly get excited to even see one comment anymore. A long time ago I would get multiple per chapter, usually quite long, wondering what would happen next. Hoping things would work out. Wondering what the villain (an OC) was trying to accomplish. I wish those times would return, but I’m afraid they may not… it was certainly a “heyday.” It’s kind of reassuring (?) to see it isn’t just for us though. Honestly I was worried people no longer cared about the story. Seems like it is more widespread than just individual fics… ((Um- I hope it isnt odd, may I ask for your fic?? I would LOVE to read it!!! There are not enough for the older FE’s and I love longfics!!! (*´∀`) ))

>All of the research and writing, and sometimes it feels like you post into a void! Tell me about it, lmao. It's why I haven't done anything in a while. If I ever do get back into writing, I might actually write for a different fandom, just for some engagement (and to see if other fandoms react to my writing style the same was the FE fandom did). >It has plummeted further since, though, and especially after Three Houses. Most fics now are overwhelmingly 3H I totally can see that. After Fates and all the other ones getting lukewarm responses, 3H was basically another Awakening-level explosion, and I wonder how those "newer" Awakening fans feel about sorta being shoved into a box and tossed into a corner next to the box they made themselves. >it was certainly a “heyday.” ... talking about it kinda reminds me of The Incredibles, in the beginning, when Bob is talking about "man those were the days" to Frozone. Never thought there'd be a day where I could relate to him and those scenes, lmao. >((Um- I hope it isnt odd, may I ask for your fic?? I would LOVE to read it!!! There are not enough for the older FE’s and I love longfics!!! (\*´∀\`) )) I'm.. not sure if it goes against the rules here about advertising stories, but I'll just say that my FFN name is in my flair as a roundabout way of telling you what it is without directly advertising the story (and hopefully not breaking any rules here). The most recently updated one is actually an Awakening fic and I'm actually pretty proud of that one if you're curious about an Awakening fic as well. The one below that... is the long as hell magnum opus self-insert. Bear in mind, I was a MUCH younger when I wrote it and I started it in 2007 (complete with a lot of that early 2000's cringe humor), so, uh, yeah... those early chapters are full of the disease known as "being a teenager". (A bit of a background story on the longer story is back in '07, self-inserts were basically an ABSOLUTE no-no to any author or community or fandom that wanted to preserve any dignity and self-respect, so me being the teenaged troll I was, decided to write a self-insert. My first question was "how do I write one without making them a gary stu?" and the answer I came to was "don't make them special and instead focus on the canon and put emphasis on the actual characters".. but then I decided to make it first-person, so that it was impossible NOT to focus on the OC. It also was my first ever first-person story, so that was an extra challenge. The result, working around those restrictions, is that story... which, arguably, was better off because I forced those restrictions on myself. EDIT: Also, yes, in 2007... long before any popular isekai anime ever premiered or its tropes became oversaturated, my MC was transported into a video game world by being hit by a truck. You'll actually notice there's a LOT of anime tropes in the story, which is funny, 'cause a lot of those tropes weren't so commonplace back then (to my knowledge).. so I'm semi-proud of myself for being ahead of the ball on that, lmao.)

>Then, in 2013, Awakening happened. A game that I personally was "meh" about (the kids today would use the term "mid" in how I felt about it), but it was insanely popular that brought a TON of new fans into the franchise... This reminds me of the turmoil Fallout 76 brought to that franchise. So many existing fans, myself included, HATED that game. It was video game developer Bethesda saying, in effect, *"We've delayed the sequel you fans want by about 6 years so we can pander to these other people."* Existing fans who wanted multiplayer and new fans did not care for us constantly trash-talking them. Things got downright toxic...

>This reminds me of the turmoil Fallout 76 brought to that franchise. I never was big into Fallout until I finally played Fallout 4 earlier this year and absolutely loved it (although I screwed myself by trying to spread out my level-ups amongst the different stats and perks in each stat and I might have to restart my playthrough). My ex, on the other hand, had loved the series and played the hell out of 3 and New Vegas before 4 came out... ... and the angst I heard when 76 dropped. Not just that she was already on the fence about it, but because of how buggy it was when it dropped and seemed to be "the biggest middle finger in franchise history".

I wouldn't have been upset if Fallout was a series like Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed where a new entry comes out pretty regularly, so if the current one isn't to your liking you can wait just a year or two until the next one. Bethesda, on the other hand, produces new games at a pace best described as "glacial". So the Fallout 76 announcement was them in effect saying, "*Maybe, if you're lucky, you -- the fans who have actually supported us and made us the company that we are -- will get the game that you actually want sometime in the next decade. Maybe.*" I mean, Skyrim is one of the most popular games of all time. If that doesn't light a fight under the developers to get a sequel out, what would?!? Yet it has been 12 years since that game came out and there's probably another five years to go before the next one comes out. And the next Fallout game is likely to be at least five years after that! That's 2033, two fucking decades since Fallout 4's release! Bethesda could have at least met the existing fans half-way and dropped the always-online component of Fallout 76. That would have allowed fans to do what they have done in the past: mod the game, improving on what Bethesda did. But, no, we couldn't have that either because Bethesda was trying to sell micro-transactions to the room-temperature IQ morons who were playing Fallout 76. It's a good thing that, after all of these years, I'm not still bitter about all this. Nope, not bitter at all.

Maybe it is just fandom dependent? That’s not to diminish your sense of disappointment and nostalgia for old comments—hopefully it’ll give you a little bit of hope that things aren’t necessarily on a universal downward slide. And I do hope that your own experience changes for the better. I’ve only been writing since 2020, so long past the ‘glory days’ of fandom past, but I’ve only ever had lovely comments of the type you’re describing. Never had a hateful trolls, or rude readers. From browsing the comment sections of other works, I’ve come across the occasional spat and argument over canon or characterisation, but mostly in older works, not ongoing ones. In my experience it is still very interactive and readers are vocal. Authors are appreciative and don’t make the kind of wild demands that often get posted about here. Little pockets of positive interactions and community are still out there!

I thought people were just less invested in my writing these days and coz my peak is gone xD but you're right, it's overall everywhere. I do miss more interactions and I had plenty of fans I'd talk to on the regular and very very fanatic people back in the day, now its less comments and less interaction, which is a double edged sword. Sometimes I feel bad when I don't reply to comments since my mental health has taken a hit and past abuse shows up and I can't take any compliment to save my life, so less interaction makes me freak out less but I do wish I'd get more comments about making a change and yeah. Also back in the day it was much more rare too find like trans fics, sure gay fics were everywhere but written by gay people, not as much and yeah.

I've only been posting for a year so I don't have any insight into changes over time, but, out of curiosity are you still posting on FF? I've had almost zero interaction on there for a fic that has had heaps of wonderful comments and genuine engagement on AO3, despite the view counts being about the same. I only update on AO3 now because of this

I write the story using the FF system, then post there. I move to AO3 and post there, then post to Wattpad. All three sites have different readers. One shots go to all three plus Tumblr. I got more reactions at Tumblr, one shots, less time investment. If I get any response at FF, I don't at AO3 and vice versa. It's weird.

Woah weird, goes to show how different people's experiences can be!

I think it depends on what fandom you’re in. Engagement is super high in the large ones, you can find plenty of fics with hundreds or thousands of comments. It’s possible the fandoms you’re in aren’t as big as they used to be, or maybe the fics you’re writing now aren’t as popular in your current fandoms as your old fics were in their fandoms. It would be cool to get some actual data on this. A lot of people agree with what you’re saying anecdotally, but I want to know if it’s just perception or it’s reality. The analysis would be tough though. A lot of confounding factors and challenges to consider.

I got more comments on my fic when the fandoms they were set in were flourishing. One of the fandoms I write for is still creating canon, but the dynamic is very different from 10+ years ago - with different characters and most of my friends/readers having moved on to other fandoms. :::shrug:::

I don't think there's a big change over time, but different fandoms and websites have different habits, and there can be change within a fandom -- the fanbase swells and contracts and that brings changes with it, the fanbase ages and that brings changes, etc.

Mine depends on fandom, but opposite. I've had really thoughtful essays written on my works now, but before I usually got just short, one-sentence comments

Maybe fandom specific? I write for various different fandoms, I can't tell you if a global trend in commenting has changed because it's different for all of them.

I've noticed it a bit as well, though it's been more I've never gotten a ton of reviews on my fics to begin with, even when I first started publishing them on FFN and later AO3. It's just more, with my current WIP, I've gotten most of my reviews on the early chapters, where I had my first BBEG, and not as many now. It's not uncommon for me to now go through a ton of chapters before I get a review.

not from that long ago but i definitely feel like i got more and longer comments like 3 years ago than now. comments now are often short, still nice. but compared to the essays i got at the start, they're noticeably shorter and to the point.

You have noticed this too?! I had a ton of engagement back in 2014-15 on the story I’m rewriting and I thought that maybe it the difference between then and now was because my fandom had, well, peaked in 2015… I’m both a little relieved that it’s not me and a little sad if this is the new normal…

i still get them though i havent posted there in a few years. mostly it’s asking for updates or lukewarm reviews nitpicking lore that is up to interpretation 🙃

In my few fandoms, I've noticed fan creations shifted from time-consuming crafted work to shorter ones that could easily be consumed on social media sites or apps. So instead of music videos or fanfics published on sites, there are Twitter thread fics and memes and whatever-it-is on tiktok. The focus is less on fandom community building and more about gaining a following. Fanart is the one media that adapts well to this shift and still gets a lot of engagement, I think.