Nick Leifker <nightelf@thekeep.org> wrote:

If you had a brilliant idea for a story, one that would knock the socks
off people, but one that you knew would get bad press from a few
overzealous, overauthoritative people, would you write it?  Would you
release it, knowing that it would cause you a lot of unnecessary grief?
Would you even think of it, when narrow-minded people are blasting
other characterization ideas right and left?  

Are you capable of discussing this without throwing around insults?

Anyway, my answer to your question is HELL YES, I would.

When I started writing fanfiction, the most (maybe ONLY) influential
critic around was Taleswapper. Taleswapper only ONCE ever liked anything
I wrote. Did I quit? Did I junk all of my ideas and try to emulate
Palmer or Lawson? No. Because I know that the stuff I write is
worthwhile -- and there are people out there who enjoy it. If
Taleswapper likes it, that's cool; but if Cindy Toler or Thomas Schmidt
likes it, that's just as cool. And if I can find out *why* Taleswapper
doesn't like it, I'll try to see whether there's anything I can learn
from that.

Now, you seem to think that what I say has some sort of enormous
influence over the reading public. Well, maybe you know something I
don't. I talked to several people on IRC about your story during the big
argument thread on it. Many of them said they liked it. Some of them
said that they disliked it more than I did. Not one of them said, "I
agree with everything YOU said, of course! Thank you for telling me what
to think!"

I'm sorry you got upset by my reaction to your fic, Nick. But negative
criticism is a fact of life in any creative profession. If you're going
to write, and make your writing public, then you had damn well better
learn to deal with it without flaming your critics.


Gary Kleppe
http://www.execpc.com/~kleppe/comics