OK, I've put my foot in my mouth, time to pull it out.  I'd like to explain
what I meant to say, and then apologise to Sebastian.

A SI is no more, no less a story than anything else an author may write, and
must be treated the same way when it comes to the final product. It's a
story you're writing to entertain yourself and to entertain those you have
read it.  The former does not imply the latter, and _that_ is the real
danger of an SI.  When writing one, you have to ask yourself: "OK, I'm
having all kinds of fun here, but if this was some other guy's story, would
I still find it as fun?"  If the _honest_ answer is no, then you've most
likely fallen into one of the major SI pitfalls.  Look at _why_ you've said
it, and fix it, no matter what it takes.

Now, I'll happily admit that this is not an easy thing to do.  Hell, writing
SIs can be the hardest fiction to write, especially if you're doing it
honestly.  I don't really enjoy scraping whole 30k chapters I've put
together because the chapter has become an episode of (to misquote Pete
Abrams) "This here is my Avatar.  Is he not nifty?  Worship my Avatar."  But
this is one of the things you have to watch for when you're writing SI.

To summarize, I'd like to apologise to Sebastian for my flaming.  I'd give
the excuses of frustration with writer's block and an stress from finals,
but they'd be only excuses.  The truth is, I didn't consiously go out to
flame him, and it wasn't until several people I really respect pointed out
to me that I stepped over the line that I really noticed what I had done.

Once again, Sebastian, I truly apologise, and I hope there are no hard
feelings.

Thanks to Zen, Lurker, Mike, and Matt for giving me the smacks upside the
head I deserved.

*sigh*

I'm going to crawl back into my hole now, and only come out again once my
finals are _over_.

--
Christopher Angel
c_j_angel@hotmail.com ICQ#: 24411826
http://www.geocities.com/~ca_godboy
Engineer for Hire