Overly critical feedback from non-authors

[gordo12]

It's a cougar story in the Mature category (so not GM).

https://www.literotica.com/s/amish-honeymoon-cruise

I read and enjoyed the story Keith. For some reason the Amish and Mennos are interesting subjects to me. The conflict with the modern world is fraught with plot possibilities. I currently have two stories written but not posted that I've been sitting on. I'm not sure if I ever will post them.

There was a writer over at SOL that was writing a Menno story and was sending me chapters for pre-reads before he published them. I did some research and discovered that one of the major settlement areas for the Mennonites was just twenty miles away from me. 60+ years in the area and I'd never twigged to why the strange dresses and hairdos were running around our malls. Duh!

And Rumspringa... ahhh the possibilities

 

[SimonDoom]

I just received this doozy to one of my stories:

Bad Very Bad
Regardless of what some these people say this was an extremely bad story im not going to tell you what i think you want to hear to try and be nice and not hurt your feelings my 5 Year old niece can write a better story then this it was so bad i hope this was your only story cause i tell you if not you should stop posting them before you ruin this site i wished i was blind and couldn't read that's how bad it is tell you what you want to learn to write an actual decent story take writing classes about 100 times a week no scratch that not even that will help you write a decent story do us all a favor and quit just completely forget how to write.


Well, he/she didn't hold back. There's that.

I'm going to take a deep, wild guess that this person is not an author, so this comment qualifies for this thread.

There's not one constructive word in this comment. Not one explanation why my story is so bad.

If the story had been posted in Loving Wives, I wouldn't be surprised. But it's an Incest story, and I've never received a comment like this for an Incest story.

I should note that this story currently has a 4.7 score with 1001 votes and over 98,000 views.

 

[gordo12]

I just received this doozy to one of my stories:

Bad Very Bad
Regardless of what some these people say this was an extremely bad story im not going to tell you what i think you want to hear to try and be nice and not hurt your feelings my 5 Year old niece can write a better story then this it was so bad i hope this was your only story cause i tell you if not you should stop posting them before you ruin this site i wished i was blind and couldn't read that's how bad it is tell you what you want to learn to write an actual decent story take writing classes about 100 times a week no scratch that not even that will help you write a decent story do us all a favor and quit just completely forget how to write.


Well, he/she didn't hold back. There's that.

Definitely one for:

"It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt."

138 word sentence...wow!

 

[JPGmvny]

I just received this doozy to one of my stories:

Bad Very Bad
Regardless of what some these people say this was an extremely bad story im not going to tell you what i think you want to hear to try and be nice and not hurt your feelings my 5 Year old niece can write a better story then this it was so bad i hope this was your only story cause i tell you if not you should stop posting them before you ruin this site i wished i was blind and couldn't read that's how bad it is tell you what you want to learn to write an actual decent story take writing classes about 100 times a week no scratch that not even that will help you write a decent story do us all a favor and quit just completely forget how to write.


Well, he/she didn't hold back. There's that.

I'm going to take a deep, wild guess that this person is not an author, so this comment qualifies for this thread.

There's not one constructive word in this comment. Not one explanation why my story is so bad.

If the story had been posted in Loving Wives, I wouldn't be surprised. But it's an Incest story, and I've never received a comment like this for an Incest story.

I should note that this story currently has a 4.7 score with 1001 votes and over 98,000 views.

Putting aside the lack of anything constructive, it sounds like it might make for a good, slightly unhinged character for a story. The guy everyone steps away from on the subway, moving to a different car when it stops at 14th Street/Union Square.

 

[ChuckWolf]

Writing has no bearing on anybody's ability or right to criticize. Siskel and Ebert were two highly regarded film critics, neither of whom, I believe, ever made a movie.

Ebert wrote the sequel to Valley Of The Dolls and it was pretty trashy; the kind of movie that Ebert would have torn apart in his role as movie reviewer.

 

[TeroWright]

I just received this doozy to one of my stories:

Bad Very Bad
Regardless of what some these people say this was an extremely bad story im not going to tell you what i think you want to hear to try and be nice and not hurt your feelings my 5 Year old niece can write a better story then this it was so bad i hope this was your only story cause i tell you if not you should stop posting them before you ruin this site i wished i was blind and couldn't read that's how bad it is tell you what you want to learn to write an actual decent story take writing classes about 100 times a week no scratch that not even that will help you write a decent story do us all a favor and quit just completely forget how to write.


Well, he/she didn't hold back. There's that.

I'm going to take a deep, wild guess that this person is not an author, so this comment qualifies for this thread.

There's not one constructive word in this comment. Not one explanation why my story is so bad.

If the story had been posted in Loving Wives, I wouldn't be surprised. But it's an Incest story, and I've never received a comment like this for an Incest story.

I should note that this story currently has a 4.7 score with 1001 votes and over 98,000 views.

I'm willing to bet this was written by an Anonymous user because in the short time I've been on this site, I've noticed that since there is no info about them unlike a registered user, they just say whatever hateful, useless thing comes to mind. Registered users can be held accountable in some fashion and therefore seem to be generally more respectful.

This is why I don't allow Anonymous Comments on my stories. Nothing useful comes out of them. Can't do anything about votes from anonymous users, but they seem to get flushed from time to time, so their opinions rarely matter.

 

[SimonDoom]

I'm willing to bet this was written by an Anonymous user because in the short time I've been on this site, I've noticed that since there is no info about them unlike a registered user, they just say whatever hateful, useless thing comes to mind. Registered users can be held accountable in some fashion and therefore seem to be generally more respectful.

This is why I don't allow Anonymous Comments on my stories. Nothing useful comes out of them. Can't do anything about votes from anonymous users, but they seem to get flushed from time to time, so their opinions rarely matter.

Yes, it was an anonymous comment.

I don't agree at all that nothing useful comes from anonymous comments. I receive more positive anonymous comments than negative ones. I've received some very intelligent and helpful anonymous comments. Were I to disallow anonymous comments, I would receive at most half the total number of comments I receive now. Rather than do that, it makes much more sense to me to allow anonymous comments and to let the stupid ones roll off like water on a duck's back.

 

[ElectricBlue]

This is why I don't allow Anonymous Comments on my stories. Nothing useful comes out of them. Can't do anything about votes from anonymous users, but they seem to get flushed from time to time, so their opinions rarely matter.

While Simon's anon commenter is a splendid example of truly stupid commentary (the irony of the guy's own illiteracy is wonderful), some of the best commentary you will ever receive comes from anon. I wouldn't turn anon off, ever. If I did, I wouldn't see comments like this:

Bravo!
Jung said, "Archetypes speak the language of high rhetoric, even of bombast" and you've made a fine job of that here! That's literary praise, lest you doubt me. I look forward to reading the rest of this tale, and many more of yours, I hope.

Also, a fair chunk of your voter input will also come from anons (although it's impossible to quantify).

 

[SimonDoom]

If I did, I wouldn't see comments like this:

That's such a neat comment to receive. The pleasure of receiving a comment like that outweighs the discomfort of twenty nasty comments. More than that.

I look at it this way: If you leave anonymous comments on, you still have the option of ignoring or deleting the bad ones. But if you disable anonymous comments, you do not retain the option of reading the wonderful and insightful comments you might have received if you'd left the option on.

It seems like an easy choice, to me.

 

[TeroWright]

I look at it this way: If you leave anonymous comments on, you still have the option of ignoring or deleting the bad ones. But if you disable anonymous comments, you do not retain the option of reading the wonderful and insightful comments you might have received if you'd left the option on.

It seems like an easy choice, to me.

Yeah, my choice stems from my obvious lack of experience with the site. At the same time, my experience is nothing positive or even remotely helpful from anonymous users.
I am aware that there are different audiences for different genres, and my stories are all in the Fetish category for now, but I'll admit that I'm not familiar with that particular communities comment and voting habits yet, so I'll consider the advice given here and see if anything changes in the future.

 

[SimonDoom]

Yeah, my choice stems from my obvious lack of experience with the site. At the same time, my experience is nothing positive or even remotely helpful from anonymous users.
I am aware that there are different audiences for different genres, and my stories are all in the Fetish category for now, but I'll admit that I'm not familiar with that particular communities comment and voting habits yet, so I'll consider the advice given here and see if anything changes in the future.

Take your time. Look around and absorb information. Don't form judgments too quickly about this place.

My third story, which I posted in Loving Wives, received absolutely savage criticism. I was shocked. But I never deleted anything (the moderator did delete some of them). I just kept going, letting anonymous readers post, and focused on the positive. That's my advice.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Yeah, my choice stems from my obvious lack of experience with the site. At the same time, my experience is nothing positive or even remotely helpful from anonymous users.

That's a real shame. I've been fortunate, I think, in that my writing garners far more positive comments than it does negative. And even then, the negatives tend to have a begrudging acceptance that I'm going to do what I do regardless what they say. As evidenced by this little gem - from a Fetish story:

Bizarre
by Anonymous user on 10/09/2019
It prompts me to ask you why you wrote it, and myself why I read it. I got nothing. Just 'bizarre'.

But then the same story got these comments:

Very Erotic!
by JJMemaw0623 on 10/10/2019
So erotic and as she put it, very naughty! I loved the story and hope you do well!

Well done!
by vanmyers86 on 10/29/2019
I found this compelling, skillfully written and paced, with just the right amount of erotic horror/occult to make it a nearly perfect Halloween story. This is not a genre I have read much, but I am glad I took the time to read this tonight. Best of luck with the contest!

Style and originality
by doobius on 11/05/2019
You set the standard. A truly original story. The plot had style and the writing style was good as ever

And, as Simon notes, you can always delete the truly moronic comments, which I've done maybe half a dozen times.

 

[TeroWright]

Electricblue66, I didn't save any of my anonymous comments because they were just straight up hate. The comment you have from your anonymous user is rather respectful compared to what I received. And what you posted from your positive comments, I noticed they all have user names associated with them, which backs up my point about registered users seeming to be more respectful overall.

A user who follows my work from another forum has shared with me that the trample fetish specifically is somewhat uncommon here, and stories like mine are even more rare in general. One that I'm currently uploading involves a homeless guy who was a part of a friendship trio a couple years prior to the story, and the others return home and are shocked at how much his life has changed. The three actually care about each other and have heartfelt moments while trampling is secondary (among other things) to the plot, and that is practically unheard of in a trample fetish story. Well this anonymous person absolutely HATED the fact that it had anything to do with a homeless guy crying over his deceased cat (in makes sense in the story), and what he said wasn't worth leaving up as a negative comment - and then he continued to shit over the other parts until I turned off allowing anonymous feedback.

I was just getting sick of reading hateful ramblings, and that's why I came to the decision I did. As I said before though, I don't know what the comment and voting habits are for the Fetish community here, but that's been my experience thus far.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I was just getting sick of reading hateful ramblings, and that's why I came to the decision I did. As I said before though, I don't know what the comment and voting habits are for the Fetish community here, but that's been my experience thus far.

Those were sample comments from a Fetish story, and yes, from folk using their account name - but to me, they're still as anonymous to me as the anons - I don't see a difference. But other stories - I reckon for every account name comment I get an intelligent anon comment.

I suspect the problem in Fetish, is that if it's not their fetish, regular readers might be hostile to someone else's kink. You're copping the category police, I reckon.

 

[ThisNameIsntTakenYet]

Interestingly enough my most negative comment so far was from a registered user. To be fair, it was constructive, well written and didn't contain any personal attacks or insults. I just didn't agree with it, as did some of my other readers.

I did get one anon comment that was just... Not hateful, but I couldn't even start to comprehend what they were trying to say. They either wanted the protagonist to not use a condom (which he didn't do in the story anyway), or they DID want him to use one but then talked about how great it would be for him to fill her up, which A, he did in the story, and B, would be impossible if he actually wore a condom, if that's what the commenter meant. I scratched my head, showed it to a few other writers and finally just deleted it as none of us had any idea of what to do with it.

 

[NotWise]

Anonymous commented on "Breaking with Tradition" to criticize every detail of the first two-three paragraphs. He/She then made an aside about US gun culture (which, like it or not, is what it is), and echoed someone else that the ending was rushed.

I had no reason at all to believe that they read past the first two-three paragraphs before they gave their hypercritical, and not well thought out, commentary. I deleted it.

 

[sbrooks103]

Does anyone else get irritated by overly critical feedback from non-authors? It compares to food critics who can't cook. I feel the voting/comments system should be altered. One should have the choice of allowing everyone vote/comment on their works. Or allow only fellow published authors to vote/comment.

Nope. You don't have to know how to cook to know if something tastes good. Siskel and Ebert were two of the most famous movie critics, I don't believe either ever made a movie

 

[naughtyboyincali]

Nope. You don't have to know how to cook to know if something tastes good. Siskel and Ebert were two of the most famous movie critics, I don't believe either ever made a movie

Roger Ebert wrote a screenplay and it was DOGSHIT. See "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls". Fat fuck Ebert couldn't even pull off satire.

Oddly enough, his future partner, Gene Siskell, gave it ZERO stars out of FOUR. Watching that film is probably what caused him to die before fat fuck.

 

[TRYTSTYN]

Who Cares

I write for myself. I read the feedback but I don't really care about it so if the person commenting is an author or not what does it matter?

In other words I don't write for acclaim or credit, or rank or points, nor do I care if I have 1 read, or 51K. Seeking validation for yourself based on what others say is a fool's errand.

There is too much deference to authority in the world as it is. A comment, or criticism, is valid or not on it's own, not based on what the commentator does or doesn't do. If the criticism is valid who cares if the commentator is an author? If the criticism is invalid does it matter that the commentator had fifty books published?

An idea stands or falls on its own merit not the pedigree of the person espousing it.

If you think the feedback helps you why would you care about the source? If you think the feedback is crap then flush it away with all the other crap you come across each day

 

[bunnieee99]

I honestly don't get why people get so pissy over criticism, even if it's overly critical. Maybe that's because I started off on Wattpad and people literally beg other people( or do payments like following, leaving comments on the editors book, etc) to critique their stories. Even if someone doesn't have something nice to say, it doesn't even affect me. Like, it literally doesn't matter, even if someone is extremely critical and may or may not know what they're talking about. Just get over it.

 

[lovecraft68]

I just received this doozy to one of my stories:

Bad Very Bad
Regardless of what some these people say this was an extremely bad story im not going to tell you what i think you want to hear to try and be nice and not hurt your feelings my 5 Year old niece can write a better story then this it was so bad i hope this was your only story cause i tell you if not you should stop posting them before you ruin this site i wished i was blind and couldn't read that's how bad it is tell you what you want to learn to write an actual decent story take writing classes about 100 times a week no scratch that not even that will help you write a decent story do us all a favor and quit just completely forget how to write.


Well, he/she didn't hold back. There's that.

I'm going to take a deep, wild guess that this person is not an author, so this comment qualifies for this thread.

There's not one constructive word in this comment. Not one explanation why my story is so bad.

If the story had been posted in Loving Wives, I wouldn't be surprised. But it's an Incest story, and I've never received a comment like this for an Incest story.

I should note that this story currently has a 4.7 score with 1001 votes and over 98,000 views.

I wonder if his 5 year old niece knows that i should be capital I because they obviously don't.

 

[SimonDoom]

I write for myself. I read the feedback but I don't really care about it so if the person commenting is an author or not what does it matter?

In other words I don't write for acclaim or credit, or rank or points, nor do I care if I have 1 read, or 51K. Seeking validation for yourself based on what others say is a fool's errand.

There is too much deference to authority in the world as it is. A comment, or criticism, is valid or not on it's own, not based on what the commentator does or doesn't do. If the criticism is valid who cares if the commentator is an author? If the criticism is invalid does it matter that the commentator had fifty books published?

An idea stands or falls on its own merit not the pedigree of the person espousing it.

If you think the feedback helps you why would you care about the source? If you think the feedback is crap then flush it away with all the other crap you come across each day

I can't go this far. I write for myself, for the most part, and my own standards are more important to me than are those of my readers, but I'm not indifferent to how readers react, and I don't want to be.

There's a reason I publish these stories rather than keeping them in a drawer or stored on my hard drive. I want to connect with people. I want to find readers who like my stories. Every time I hear from a reader that my story gave them pleasure, I'm happy about that. If they didn't like it, I don't take it too much to heart -- I've got a thicker skin than most about reader criticism, I think -- but I'm not indifferent, either.

Where I think authors go a little haywire is in caring too much about scores. You absolutely should not get overly concerned about scores, although it's OK to be SOMEWHAT concerned. A highly rated story is more likely to get desirable visibility and therefore more likely to connect you with readers. That's what I'm after.

 

[KristaMorane]

Helpful Forum - deleting messages

I've been an author for quite a while and not too many stories, yet, but reading this thread I learned i can delete obnoxious comments and I have other options as well.

Thanks, so much. I don't have any comments which need to be deleted but now I know it's an option.

As far as anonymous comments are concerned...

I prefer identified comments but since I will occasionally post one anonymously myself I think this is a good feature in general. And, like others said, comments from non-authors and anon should be taken with a grain of salt.

Krista

 

[CarlySands]

I couldn’t paint a portrait or a landscape but I can still tell whether or not it’s a good painting.

You THINK you can.

 

[KeithD]

You THINK you can.

Yep, and only against personal criteria.