Questions about the new Fiction Archive. No Complaints, please.

[JesusA (imported)]

Just a question... Does suspended mean the same thing as banned? I do not understand why Andro-Phil could be banned..

If you reread the last part of Andro-Phil's post #23, you can see why he needed a brief time out before he did something that would get him banned. A little reflection; a bit of time to calm down. He could grow into a valued member here.

[Cainanite (imported)]

When the whole EA went down, and I couldn't log in, my first thought was that I must have been banned for some reason. For the life of me I couldn't think of what I had said or done, and I was beside myself. I had only just become an active member, and was really feeling at home here, then suddenly "poof".

Let me tell you, my stomach was in knots.

Fortunately, I was able, through the help of some private emails to find the alternate way into the site, and boy was I happy again. I'm not ashamed to say, I did the happy dance in my kitchen. My cats thought I was insane... Well, more insane than usual.

If I ever got legitimately banned from the EA, I think I'd be in a puddle on the floor. There would be flowers and candy, with personal heartfelt apology letters in the mailboxes of any of the moderators I could track down. (please don't take that as a suggestion to get free candy ) I'd become that sappy ex who just can't let things go in a relationship. Driving slowly past your house in the night screaming, "I'm sorry. Please take me back!" out the window.

I have no idea where I was going with this.

Oh, yes. I remember.

I'm just happy to be here, and happy to have something constructive to do.

If your story has recently returned from the dead, and I've messed up in editing, please let me know about it. If the way I'm formatting is destroying your intent, I'd like to know that too. I would really like to know if I'm doing okay.

There are other proofreaders working hard behind the scenes, of course. It's not just me, but I'm editing every day, and if I can catch something for you, I'd like to make sure you're happy with your submission.

Got a cool idea for the story site? This is the place to share it, and I'd love to hear it. I can't do anything about it of course. I can barely program my coffee maker, but it would be neat to discuss.

Lets get this thread back on track.

[noxmagnus (imported)]

Hmm, well to get this thread back on track, here's some ideas. Please note I didn't promise good ideas.

A. Not only separate stories into sections to track what they are about, color code them in the alphabetical sections. Just going stereotypical maybe blue can be straight castrations, violet or purple for gay castration, and pink for female themed.

B. The ability to view stories arranged by length.

C. Hit this one in my previous post but it bears stating again just for completeness. A search feature.

D. I've seen this hit as well, but eh. An author sort would be awesome.

E. When the editing is all done and new stories are allowed to be submitted, bring back the section that has all the new stories listed out.

F. Any chance of the bug in the remember me box getting fixed so it does remember you?

G. There could probably be more themes, or sub-themes.

H. What if at the end of each story it came up with links to either other stories by the same author, or random stories that meet up with the same theme and such?

That's all I have for now. Hope you like em.

[OneBallBoi (imported)]

If you reread the last part of Andro-Phil's post #23, you can see why he needed a brief time out before he did something that would get him banned. A little reflection; a bit of time to calm down. He could grow into a valued member here.

Thank you for replying Jesus.. Like I said I was banned for 6 months once too. We all have to learn to read and keep our mouth shut most of the time. I am a softy and feel sorry for someone who is dislexic.. My nephew is that way.. It does make for misunderstanding..

[morpheustheman (imported)]

I really used to love some old stories, like "the hive part II", "one million males" between lots more. Can we wait for all the stories of the past come back? I d love to have them again!!! hugs!!!

[Cainanite (imported)]

talula is probably going to have some not nice words to say about this (seems as he's the one who has to transfer them over to the new Archive) but there are currently about 850 stories we've finished editing waiting to go over.

There are a lot of amazing stories there, and I'm excited at how much we've accomplished. There are some of my new favories in this upcoming batch, like "Platonic Love" by Ganymede ( a bit touchy on the subject matter, but SOOO beautifully written.) A lot of the lengthier entries will be restored soon. There's going to be a lot to read. Some of these stories were a real mess, and have turned out, after a little spit an polish to be real works of art.

... some not so much, but they're coming back anyway.

I've also been trying my hand at editing and restoring some foreign language entries that looked promising, so we'll be less of an English only club.

We are quickly approaching the 50% mark... not yet, but very soon.

Frankly, I'm pretty excited about this next big update. Even if talula yells at me.

[Riverwind (imported)]

Your now a member of the staff, he can only yell softly and can no longer use a big stick.

You guys are doing an amazing job, and one that I have absolutely no interest in what so ever but having said that you guys doing all this hard work get all the praise in my book.

To the poster above with all the suggestions, good as they are remember that each and every one must be programmed into the system for it to take place. Sense we only have one person who does this, don't look for any of it soon, he is off on other projects as this is not the only thing he does, he also works two jobs plus other home projects. There is already several months of work getting it this far, so enjoy what has been done, it very well may be all for a while.

River

[bearded1 (imported)]

Sorry for the delay in responding. According to what I've found on the Wayback Machine, Byzwriter has stories titled "Byzantium" 11-19, and there was a number 20 that does not show. Also found "The Tale of the First Eunuch" and "SS Research Unit." Does that help?

[Il Musico (imported)]

Cainanite,

I will reply to your questions here.

1. I generally like the look of the new archive, and I specially appreciate the functionality to search for stories with specific tags. This allows easily getting the stories of the types one likes, while avoiding those that leave one cold, or that one finds disgusting.

2. I first checked shortly after the beginning of the recovery effort, and I was happy to see that several of my stories were rescued pretty soon. I know that cleaning and reformatting text in strange formats can be quite tedius, so I won't try to exert any pressure to anyone to speed up the process. I don't have any hurry to see the remainder of my stories processed. If somebody wants them, he should ask! I downloaded and checked only one of my own stories, and I didn't notice any difference to what I wrote originally, so I have no complaints in that regard. But when I re-read any of my stories, I find spelling and grammatical mistakes (which I made myself), and sometimes I think I should go over all my stories, correct these mistakes, also improve wording in a very few places, and re-upload them. Will there be any way to replace a buggy story with a corrected one?

3. My contributions to the archive have been sporadic, but extending over many years. When there was talk about possibly closing down the archive, I felt really sorry about that, and started looking for other places. It seems to me that at this time there is no other place that would be a full replacement for the EA, but I hope that if the EA ever goes under forever, some such place will show up.

I was working on a story when the big crash happened, and I must admit that I stopped working on it, having no really good place to post it. But then, anyway I often stop working on a story for a long time, and then take it up again. Some of my stories took more than a year to complete. I need to find some time and patience to finish my present story. It's complete in my head, but writing it down takes lots of time. Looks like I need a secretary...

Interestingly, SHARING my stories does not seem to have much therapeutic value to me, while WRITING them does have that value! I share them mainly to contribute to the big cause, so to speak, and to re-pay other people for their good stories which I have enjoyed. If eventually the EA goes under, and no other place fills the void, I might end up writing stories just for myself... Or maybe I adapt and write stories that suit the specific interest of some other story site.

4. I have re-read some stories, but not many. They are about like I remembered them. I found one which I did not remember, and which I liked (Omaha Boy's Choir), but I frankly don't know if I missed it when it was first published, or if I simply forgot it since then.

5. What I would like to see in the future? Well, lots of good stories, of course! A search engine and the best possible tagging system, to improve the odds for every reader to get the kind of stories he likes. The stories on the archive are very diverse, and probably most readers like some kinds and dislike others, often very strongly.

6. My general concerns are mostly about the disheartening trend of society in many countries to limit freedom of speech, of thought, of expression, to such a point that it has even reached the EA. When those who believe they are the mainstream in the society think they have a right to suppress every idea and expression that's not aligned with theirs, we have a problem. In the middle ages it was the Catholic Church, burning "witches" atop bonfires, or forcing a certain well-known scientist to declare, against his certain knowledge, that the earth doesn't move and is the center of the universe. Nowadays we have a mainstream society that thinks it's fine to show murder on TV for pure leisure, and to start a war in order to protect some faraway people from themselves, but that it's necessary to silence anyone who thinks that castration is not always evil. This trend might force moving the EA to places that are more tolerant of non-mainstream opinions, but it's better if we keep up our heads and try to help convince our fellow humans that all opinions and thoughts have a right to exist and to be made public. I think the stories should be openly accessible to everyone. What we think, and write about, is part of the cultural richness of humanity, and every person who desires so should have easy access to it, of course with full freedom for each person to reject what he doesn't like, but with no permission at all for one person to prevent someone else from finding the stories.

[Cainanite (imported)]

Hi Il Musico.

Thanks for your input. I agree with your fears that the EA might reflect what seems to be going on in the world. There seems to be a kind of moralized war on all things different. Where the preemptive strike is preferred over dialog, and understanding.

Unfortunately, I don't think we here at the EA are equipped to engage in that fight. All we can continue to do is try to stay out of the cross-hairs. That is why having the stories behind a password is so important to us. We hope it doesn't prevent people from finding us, but prevent people who might trigger an unwanted response from stumbling on it unnecessarily.

Maybe something we can do in the future, is to rotate out the sample stories at the sign-in screen. Give people more free access to the stories within the site, to encourage more people to sign-up and enjoy the stories.

I agree the stories speak to the cultural richness of humanity. Until I found the EA I thought there was no-one in the world like me. I was a freak, and was trying to bury it all down deep. Finding the EA let me know I was not alone. With my love of writing and stories, the fiction archive drew me in. Reading those stories kept me sane, and kept me from doing harm to myself. I truly believe the stories need to exist, and need to be told.

Though you may not have found any therapeutic value in sharing your stories, I found therapeutic value in reading them. The Choirboy remains one story that sticks with me. Peter and Bertrand showed me something valuable and beautiful without castration being simply sexual and forbidden.

Not every story is like that though. Many are sexual in nature. That diminishes their importance not one bit. But can raise the ire of people who simply do not understand, and make no effort to understand. Those same people, in today's world seem to prefer a preemptive strike against something they perceive as an evil, rather than seek to understand. They choose not to learn that castration in and of itself is not an evil for those who seek it. That stories of castration are inexorably tied to childhood and sexuality. That we do better to share a story here, than let it fester in our minds and tear us apart.

They fear that stories of this nature are going to encourage people to commit terrible acts against innocent people in the real world. That fear alone overrides the truth that violent and disturbed people will commit terrible acts regardless of their trigger. Taking away the stories won't stop people from doing terrible things to others. Those disturbed individuals will just find some other trigger to justify their actions.

I can only attest to the stories having an affect on one disturbed individual... me. The stories actually prevented me from killing someone I thought of as evil... myself.

I do hope that the people who need the stories can still find them. I hope the log-in screen isn't a major impediment. I don't however see the log-in screen going away anytime soon. We need it for a level of protection for ourselves and the stories. I think what we do here is too important.

Keep writing Il Musico. We need your contributions. Your stories have incredible value here, as do all contributors' stories. For me personally, your stories have been incredibly valuable.

Thank-you.

P.S.

If you'd like to submit a corrected version of your story to me, I'll see what I can do to fix your originally submitted story. Send me a PM and we'll exchange emails.

When we decided to edit the stories, we agreed we wouldn't touch grammar errors in the text, or spelling errors in characters' speech. We didn't want to destroy the authors intent. Therefore we let a lot of errors through, because we don't want to change your art beyond what you originally wrote.

We do often add punctuation, and paragraph breaks to stories that were missing them, as well as running the spell-check. Sometimes I'm sure we replace a misspelled word with the wrong one.

I don't offer this to everyone, but if you want me to make changes, let me know, and I'll see what I can do for you.