what i think ao3 comment discourse should be: there is no right or wrong way to tell someone you liked something they made! if a fic moved you in any way, it would almost def be meaningful for both you and the writer if you told them! you don’t have to stress about making a “good” comment; anything will be appreciated! the joy of this medium is that you can directly talk to the person who wrote your fav fic! there’s literally no need to be intimidated or feel like fic writers are on a different level to readers bc we’re all just chunks floating in fandom soup! supporting your fellow soup chunks is fun and nice! 🥰
what ao3 comment discourse actually is: commenting is how you pay us writers for the work we did for you. if you don’t comment, us writers will stop writing, because otherwise what would be the point? if you spend any amount of time with a fic, you owe the writer a positive comment (we writers don’t owe you a reply though obv). it’s ok if you don’t make fic or fanart but then your job is to comment. we writers are checking our inboxes 4 times a day for comments. if we don’t get enough comments on our fic we feel worthless; is that what you want? you have to comment otherwise you’re the reason fandom is worse now. comment. i need comemnt. give comemte now pleeeeeees