dragonimp

In more upbeat news, I so far have three sketches and two fics for RoyEd Week, working on a third. Sometimes you just need to escape.

I just noticed a message in my inbox that Prices didn't crosspost to LJ due to size. I don't know why it's only telling me this now (message is dated a week ago) when I posted the fic back in May, but I'm amused that after 10 years in fandom I finally have a fic that exceeds LJ's posting limit.

In short: I can't make fandom an obligation. This is supposed to be my escape, and instead it was becoming one more thing to stress over. This wasn't because of any person or any thing that happened, it was just - I guess - the headspace I was in. But the end result was that I haven't been writing at all, and it has taken a while for me to get past that aversion. I still want to finish these stories, and still want to write in the FMA world, I have no plans to leave any time soon. But you might have to bear with me.

Amazon announces Kindle Worlds: new stories inspired by books, shows, movies, comics, music, and games people love.

This has been floating around tumblr so some of you have probably seen it already, but for those who haven't: Kindle Worlds is "a place for you to publish fan fiction inspired by popular books, shows, movies, comics, music, and games. With Kindle Worlds, you can write new stories based on featured Worlds, engage an audience of readers, and earn royalties. Amazon Publishing has secured licenses from Warner Bros. for Gossip Girl, Pretty Little Liars, and The Vampire Diaries, with licenses for more Worlds on the way."

This is kinda sitting funny with me for a number of reasons. For one, it seems less like fanfic finally being acknowledged and more like Amazon trying to cash in. For another, the idea of earning royalties off fanworks - even with the property owners' permission - doesn't seem right. On that same thread, we're all used to getting our fanfic for free; are people actually going to be willing to pay for it?

And then there's the guidelines page:

• Pornography: We don't accept pornography or offensive depictions of graphic sexual acts.

Yeah, okay, I might've predicted that. Can't have midwest soccermoms stumbling across something that'll scar their poor innocent children. (Honestly, I understand this one, even if it does make me roll my eyes.) But then:

• Amazon Publishing will acquire all rights to your new stories, including global publication rights, for the term of copyright.


• Kindle Worlds is a creative community where Worlds grow with each new story. You will own the copyright to the original, copyrightable elements (such as characters, scenes, and events) that you create and include in your work, and the World Licensor will retain the copyright to all the original elements of the World. When you submit your story in a World, you are granting Amazon Publishing an exclusive license to the story and all the original elements you include in that story. This means that your story and all the new elements must stay within the applicable World. We will allow Kindle Worlds authors to build on each other's ideas and elements. We will also give the World Licensor a license to use your new elements and incorporate them into other works without further compensation to you.

That sounds like you turn over all rights, and can't put the fic up anywhere else.
And then this bit:

• Illegal and Infringing Content: We take violations of laws and proprietary rights very seriously. It is the authors' responsibility to ensure that their content doesn't violate laws or copyright, trademark, privacy, publicity, or other rights.

Um.... can someone please tell me where the line is between writing a story in a copyrighted universe with trademarked characters and violating copyright, trademark, privacy, publicity, or other(!??) rights? I mean, it's fanfic. It's using copyrighted material. But somehow we're supposed to know the difference between using copyrighted material and violating copyright?

But really, I think the biggest strike against this is that we're used to getting all this for free, being able to put it up wherever we want, and being able to include whatever elements we want. This seems like Big Money trying to tie down and cash in on anarchy.

Must ... finish ... rewrites ...... chapter ... refuses ... to end ....

My urge to write manga-fic seems to have been smothered. I'm assuming it won't last, but .. interesting.

Yeah, so, back to the first anime.

I really hate the way I obsess over things. Although I did hold off on posting until I was in a much better mood. I was going to not post at all but I think I need to get this out so it'll hopefully stop interfering with my life and getting in the way of my writing.

Like I already said, I worry that the third chapter of Now and Then comes off as a cop-out. I was worried about it when I was planning the story, I worried over it while writing, I worried about it all the way up to posting. I thought I'd be done with the worry when I posted, but I should have known better.

Critical comments are a rare thing online and in a way, that's a pity. If I'm at all uncertain about something, I tend to think people are being polite or are too scared to say anything negative. In other words, it means I can't completely trust that people are being honest. Because I know my own habits, and I know I shy away from being critical, because I've seen authors react negatively.

But as an author I hate it, I'd rather be secure in the knowledge that readers would tell me if something I posted sucked. Or even if it was just disappointing in some way. It's not only so that I can trust the positive comments; if something is off in my writing, I want to to know about it. How else would I be able to improve? I don't normally get any feedback beforehand so comments after the fact are the only thing I have.

The last thing I want right now is reassurances, because in the state of mind I'm in, I wouldn't believe them. That's why I disallowed comments on the previous post. But that seems cowardly, so they're back on. So if the last chapter was a disappointment, I'm sorry. I gave it the best ending I could while staying true to the story and what I was trying to do with it. And now I need to let this go and move on with things.

Rough draft finally DONE, after a 1000-word sprint where things finally hit and came together. Kinda wish that had happened earlier, but eh, can't really control those things. Still not sure it's hitting all the right notes, but I'll let it sit for a while before going over it.

Going by the number of scenes, I thought this chapter was shorter than the other two, but I just checked the word count - it's actually the longest chapter o_O. Not by much, but still.

I pictured this scene going A, B, C⇒D, E. But once the boys got the reins they decided to go A-B-F-G⇒D, and we're still negotiating E. I think Ed might have pulled a fast one on me ^^;. I'm going to let this season a bit and then see if it still works as well as I think it does.

In the meantime, maybe I'll go peek in on the kink!meme XD