<snip warning... Beware the Idea's of July!>

	I decided to give this Rant a go and answer in my own annoying fashion,
stick to it please. I'm POSITIVE I made a few good points :D

	Early Morning Editorial!

	Keener contendidly read his Early Morning Edition from his lazy boy
recliner, somewhere deep in the mountians of Tibet. A small ball of
fluff brought over a tray of snack cakes as his master turned to the
Revenge's End section. "Good lord! A technobabble battle of epic
proportions! I'm glad I like my sceience fiction operatic, give me a
decient lightsaber or blaster anyday." Smiling, the hack become king...
of funk, choose a yellow roofed Zinger and turned the page to the FFML
section. His kawaii servent scuttled off to rehearse a blues number with
his companions.  

	Let's see, thought Keener, someone asking for Recommendations, THAT'S a
loaded request. Oh and look, she's nice enough to say "thank you"...
publicly... to each and every contributer. Sighing, he flipped a few
pages. More "curses" questions, he thought with another sigh, well, I'm
sure the newbei's are getting an education. Now, what's this? Looks like
a RANT of some sort. Maybe someone's calling for common sense to prevail
and just have everyone read "Keener tm" fics, isn't that sweet of him.

	Munching thoughtfully on sponge cake, cream and icing, Keener ignored
the obscure Gainax political cartoon and read the "editoral" 

PRIMARY RANT: 
A couple of days ago I sent chapter 4 of my Iczer fic "Guardian Angel" to
the FFML. Since that time, however, I have recieved ABSOLUTELY NO FEEDBACK
WHATSOEVER! 

	Keener winced, wondering how a newspaper could yell at him. Still, he
had to ask himself, if this was chapter 4, had the author gotten
feedback up to this point?  

Now I realize that there are not a great amount of people (even
amongst the anime community) who like the Iczer series as much as I do, but
at least somebody out there must have read it. PLEASE, SOMEBODY TELL ME WHAT
YOU THOUGHT OF IT!  SEND A FLAME IF YOU WANT TO, BUT TELL ME YOUR OPINION!

	Keener took his hands away from his ears and shoke his head to get the
bussing noise out. Okay, he thought when his head stopped ringing "You
are NOT dealing with AT&AT, please stope trying to trip us with the
phone cord!" I can see your point. First off it's generally better not
to demand C&C, the meek shall inherit the Travis Butler, and all that.
Secondly, you have to understand that dozens of fics are being shot at
us ever few days. Readers HAVE to be selective to survive the onslaught.
Your fic had a few things going against it in this little war for
attention.

	It was of a series that not many on this list had much familarity. The
first couple of chapters were bunched together with little room to
breath (no spaces between what looked to be blocky and imposing
paragraphs) and there wasn't much fanfare to the start of the series to
warn people to be on the look out. Finally there were the obligatory
typo's plus the character you chose to highlight was a tad on the
obscure side. Any single one MIGHT get a fic deleted, all of them
together and your story didn't have much of a chance. 

SECONDARY RANT: 
Okay, this is something I've been meaning to bring up for some time, but
never gotten around to: The excessive amount of Ranma stuff on the FFML.
When I first joined I read it, then I started thinking "Oh, another Ranma
fic. Delete."  Now I have started to think "Oh, no, here we go again."
People, I know that Ranma is incredibly popular with you, but surely there
are some other shows that you like. I mean, the Two thirds of the total
stories in the synopsis list this week were Ranma stories for god's sake! Do
something else before I start actually hating Ranma fanfics, and then hating
the real thing as well!  Please, I don't wanna hate Ranma but you guys and
girls are forcing me to!  

	A sigh escaped the fic writers armored exterior. THAT question again.
Well, remember the whole fight for attention? Doing a Ranma fic helps
you in that battle. One, because Ranma is a well known series that
almost EVERYONE has some familarity with. Two, the Ranma characters
inspire either hate or love in most people, rarely apathy. Even people
who DON'T like the person your writing about, will give your fic a
chance if it gives them something to rage against. Thirdly, Ranma's
ending was MADE for fanfiction, we saw characters we had grown to love
simply get tossed to the four winds with little or no closure. As far as
I know, this was intentional as Rumiko actually enjoyed her creations
living new lives in her fans imaginations. 

	Keener pauses to take a breath after visualizing that last paragraph.
Okay, he sets up, this next bit is gonna seem sort of strange, keep up
with it and I PROMISE it'll realate to what I've been saying. That
thought completed, he rushed once more into the breach.

	Ever notice how many alternative Batman comics there are? Why even in
the series normal comic run, there are numerous interpretations of the
man sharing the same continuity. From the grit of Detective comics, to
the gothic pathos of Shadow of the Bat... yet they are ALL Batman.

	Keener pauses as the Mokonators renact a scene from the movie. Six
different balls of cuteness in six different costumes. One wearing a
huge muscle frame while drool slips from his mouth, another wearing a
cheesy polyester outift with small ears and annoying "POW!" sound
effects following him. The seventh Mokonator, dressed as a city punk in
Go-Go boots, begs the question... "Pu pu pu?" <What are you?> The six
bat-mokona's answer, "Pu pupu!" <I'm Batman!> before beating the seventh
to a pulp... fiction (couldn't resist) 

	Anyway, Frank Miller explained the phenomenom thusly. "Here you have a
character you can describe in a few sentences, his parents were
murdered, he spends the rest of his life waring on crime. It's so broad
in it's simplicity that it's opened to an infinite number of
interpretations" (I'm paraphrasing but you get the idea) Basically, the
character and those around him were painted with such broad strokes that
they can be placed into thousands of different worlds, and stories,
while never losing sight of the original characters that made the story
such a good read in the first place.

	Ranma's characters are the same way. Any one of them could be described
with in moments, yet the interpretations of any of them is boundless.
Put all this together and you have a REAL good basis for a fic. A fic
that has the recognition to get noticed by prospective readers. Now the
question is, are you a good enough writer to KEEP that attention once
you have it?

Even worse than the Ranma fics are the questions
about the Ranma series.  If you don't know what would happen in a given
circumstance, do what I do and make up the answer yourself, or
*ASK IN R.A.A.C OR ON A RANMA MAILING LIST INSTEAD OF ADDING MORE #%&/ SPAM
TO THE FFML!!!!!

	The sheer sonic force of the text blows the costumes off the
Mokonators. They em-bare-ass-edly cover naughty bits they DON'T actually
have and ease their way to the trailor. Keener watches them leave and
then pops another snack cake in his mouth as he muses this over. 

	This Mailing list is to help authors in the creation of Fan Fics. From
the very first Idea post or idea generating question, to the fic and
finally to the C&C that leads to more ideas, more questions and then
more fics, which get C&Ced which leads to more ideas and questions...
you get the "Idea". Basically, removing question OR Idea posts cuts down
on the author to author disscussion, a forum that actually helps to
generate better fics. I'm afraid that's worth the occasional Spam if it
means that better stories are produced.
 

Just letting off steam...

	"NOOOOOO!" screams Keener, awash with emotion and angst. "Don't let off
the steam, the world will be SAVED by steam! Keep IT safe from those who
would exploit it!"

Andrew Dynon, champion of all things Iczer and Mekton Z

	Hmmmmmmm, thinks the fic writer, finally coming to the end of the
article. I wonder how many Mekton Zeta players there are? I run a pretty
mean game of Mecha and Men myself... Considering, Keener returns to the
recesses of his trailor, ignoring the Mokonators as they vegetate with
buttered popcorn and "Escaflowne" After retriving a Jolt from the
refrigerator, he suddenly realizes he hasn't seen this episode. Now
THIS, would make a cool Mekton campaign he muses.

The End

(And the Moon was as blood, the Storms crashed and the Seas BOILED!)
(Typical, thought the Lobsters)  
      /  
 Oo
(~, )
 V