I just wanted to say how cruel what you are doing in discord is. I got reviews on my spec rec fic today and thought people were reviewing it because they liked it. But no. It was because my fic was on a list of 'fics that need more love' and I was getting pity reviews. Just great. Way to ruin my self esteem. Why not just post a list on the blog called 'losers' and make us feel worse? :(
Hi anon!First and foremost: We are sorry that you feel your feelings are hurt. This is never the intent of any part of our exchange. The goal of the exchange is to promote rare pairings and characters and get them more exposure. For many of our rare pair shippers, this is the only time they are really guaranteed to get any comments on their work - and quite a few of those comments can come from community organization. Last night a few people decided to put together a list of fic that had less than 3 reviews in hopes of helping people find them; this is not so much intended as pity as it is a way to continually recognize the important work that others do in writing works. Works can be missed for reasons that have nothing to do with quality: different subjects, characters, etc. appeal to different people. Fic that is dedicated to someone who does not comment or fic that is dedicated to the community as a whole might be missed as it has no recip.We highly doubt, anon, that these reviews were born out of pity. First of all, the number of fics on that list were many - just under half the collection! - so it is doubtful your fics were singled out as particularly worthy of pity. More likely, people read them - whether from that list or just out of interest - and found them good. Rarely does anyone take time to comment on something they do not find worth doing so. I can’t speak for those making the list as I (along with mod K) were asleep when these plans were being made, but we do not find that they acted irresponsibly. To try to alleviate anxiety, they did not use names. I have told the creators of that spreadsheet (and everyone else) in the discord not to use names when linking to fics and artworks in order to stop someone from feeling bad for seeing their name on the list multiple times (as can certainly happen to us all) as it tends to send the message that “I suck!” and not what is actually true: people care about your fic enough that that they want to make sure it has more views, and thus more chance for recognition.Still, we doubt they meant to upset you anon. We do not have direct power to edit their speadsheet but we can certainly ask them to remove your works if you approach us privately; we will make sure your privacy is assured to the best of our ability.