#i'm not tagging it with much but as long as this reaches its target audience (me and my favorite brother ever) then that's good enough

[dragonfruitghosts]

On October 17th 2021 I made a silly little Sally Face oc that was eventually put into the void of ocs I barely ever used. Then I met my best friend and brother, who said something in our discord dms along the lines of "give Larry a boyfriend" and I took that as a challenge.

And now we (me and @o0mangomadness0o) are celebrating Elliot Drew's funny little birthday tonight. As much as would love to go in depth about how much this character (and the oc x canon ship that goes along with it) means to me but I'm gonna save that for this whole Au's anniversary thing.

Anyways here's the boyfailure's birthday art. I love these two they're so silly <3

[romanarose]

Hello there ✨️ love your work 💕 I'm a long time fan 🫶🏼. I've been on tumblr a few years now, but I'd never found the courage to post anything of my own til now. I've been feeling a little optimistic these days, and genuinely excited about posting some of my writing and sharing it with the people out here. Do you have any advice on how to start posting and interacting from scratch? Cause I'm low-key nervous abt it and it seems like my target audience has already formed a solid community I don't know how to get into 🥺

Wow, this might be the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me wowie!!!!!!

okay let me tell my advice

The numbers don't equal quality. Certain things appeal to people more, like shorter stories, straight up smut, Joel Miller gets way more than when I write Marc. I think one of my best works was my Marc X Jewish!Reader series, Seattle, but it idnt get anywhere really even at the height of moon knight popularity bc people dont read OC's esp ethnic oc's. Put your heart into it and those who enjoy it will enjoy it. I had a William Miller series that averaged like 8-20 notes per chapter but I had a handful of readers I knew adored it and thats what mattered

This site is so much better with interaction. PLEASE DON"T ONLY INTERACT FOR THE SAKE OF GETTING FRIENDS WHO"LL REBLOG!! However, if you dont already, make sure you are reblogging stories and leaving nice words! Me personally, if someone reblogs regularly and leave nice words, espcially things that show they really paid attention, I usually just follow back bc I love friends. Im happy to get to know you!

Yes, it's hard sometimes to break it. It took a few months for me to get into the Oscar Issac writer circles, and then when I started writing Pedro it took a while too but I always reblogged and tried to communicate and I made friends. Isn't it crazy we can just.... become friends with our fav writers? Obvs Im not friends with all my favs but MOST of my favs became my friends <3

It's kinda annoying to me bc Im bad at it but aesthetics help. Title, a picture to catch eyes, summary, warnings, note. Try to make it look nice. Im really had at this LMFAOOOOOO. My lovely friends have made my best looking banners. If you have graphic design skills, use them! i wish i didn't have to but it does help catch readers when you have an interesting headers and everything looks pretty.

Few technicals. Use the readmore option. No one wants to reblog a LOOOOOONG story and clog up the feeds. Use as many correct tags as you can. Tag any triggering content. And I'm the worst at this but proof read. Im bad at proof reading, everyone who reads my work knows spelling, grammar, wrong words are a common issue I have bc Im bad at typing. When I still had word on my laptop I started typing in word and using text to speach to help me catch stuff!

Keep at it! IDK where you know my work, weather moon knight, triple frontier or tlou or whatever but all those fandoms right now are like.... a little less active. So don't be dissapointed if it takes a while. With TLOU, theres SOOOOOOO many amazing writers. With Moon Knight theres just less buzz rn. If you write for lesser known characters like Llewyn Davis or Will Miller, you probs won't reach the notes of established writers in Joel Miller. Just the reality. the point is keep going, find what you like and what gets people excited and go from there

This is the most important. Write what you want. I mean it. I love writing Will Miller because he's my special man <3 even though it's a small fanbase. My series Rooms On Fire, a lot have lost interest bc its a long series. That's okay! I love the series and it makes me happy to write it. I wrote a few Miguel O'Hara stories because, I'm being honest here, I wanted to capitalize on the hype. Guess what? They weren't good. I'm not proud of them. Since then, I write what Im inspired to.

THIS SHOULD BE FUN AND IF AT ANY POINT, IT"S NOT FUN STOP AND FIGURE OUT WHY

feel free to say hi off anon! I'm always happy to get to know new people. If you like Triple Frontier, I have a discord server that is pretty much open to everyone! I'm trying to revive it and you can share your works and meet knew people!

Anon or not, let me know if you have any questions!

[jackofacetrades]

I've had a similar thing happening to me. Either a really long and detailed analysis on a show I love on tumblr, or a fic with an unlikely crossover and even unlikelier pairing. I don't write much either, so each piece I write is sort of special, so it being ignored kinda sting.

But I could avoid feeling bad about it in two ways:

like @murieltheawful said, i remember why I wrote them: for myself. I loved these ideas, I wanted to put them into something, out there, even if it's just for me. Now I can come back to it whenever I want and re-read it.

the second one is direct reassurance from friends! if my friends (irl or from fandom) read it and liked it, then it was also worth it and my need for community is mostly fulfilled.

(I lied there is a third way) finally, i take a step back and think about why it didn't reach its audience: on tumblr or ao3, it's mostly a matter of 1) timing (during the day, or even how much longer after the finale aired?), 2) how much that ship/fandom is popular (either it's a rare pair and no one will read it, or it's a way too famous pair in an overflowing fandom, and it'll be swallowed immediately by the rest). There can also be the matter of tags: did I tag correctly (enough, but not too much?) for the targetted audience to find my post/fic?

I want to talk more about the second point, because it resonates with a lot of ao3cotd posts about community. What we want is connection and interaction, but especially community. Even if just one friend read and like what we wrote, it feels enough.

I shared that super long ass analysis post with a friend of mine, with whom I've watched that show. They loved it and told me I could be proud of it. They don't have tumblr. This post has a grand total of 0 notes. But I wrote it, and they read it and agreed with it, was moved by it, and therefore it was all worth the 3-4h I spent writing it. We talked about it some more, and I was happy. It doesn't sting that much (I admit it stings a bit still) that absolutely no one else read it or found it or agreed with it. Because my friend did. It's the same for that rarepair crossover fic. I shared it with a fandom friend (from one of the fandom crossover), they didn't even knew the other fandom, they read it, liked it a lot, kudoed it, commented on it. They can't wait for the next chapter (that I want to write but can't find the time nor energy, it's another problem). This fic has 3 kudos: my fandom friend, my irl friend and a stranger.

One friend is worth so much more than a hundred strangers.

I understand though it can be difficult to share fics with irl friends, and difficult to make friends in fandom. If you can and there is, try and find a fandom community (there are lots on Discord). I tried it a bit, enjoyed it a bit, but I'm not available enough and it's too much for me, I can't really interact. I stay on the outskirts and barely participate. Instead, I made friends the "old" way, I'd say? (and in the last few years, so it still works!)

The way I found to make friends in fandom is by commenting on fics I love. I tend to comment overenthusiastically, especially on long and totally finished old fics. I comment on nearly every chapter, while I binge read it, or when I take my time over it, saying I can't wait to read the next chap the next day. Like for a show, I like to talk about and comment on what I consume. I often got bewildered answers, saying I totally made their day, even made them re-read that fic they'd written so long ago. How much they loved it. I shout theories, all I think about what's happening, etc. They follow my journey through their fic. I make call backs to the canon, I catch the references when I can, talk about them. I had long discussions in the comment section about some things that had nothing to do with the fic at some point. I ask questions. Where did they find this idea, it's so good? Have you seen this or that? This scene made me think about it! At that point, I want to read all their stories, and usually do so and we keep chatting in the comment section. Until we finally exchange contact info or our tumblr to keep chatting for real. I even asked one of them to beta my work (my english was a bit rusty at the beginning), if they can/want? etc

I've made two long lasting friends like that. I've lost contact with others. One of them I befriended two times without knowing it, because they were under two different accounts, one of them incognito (they used to be a BNF and didn't want that associated with their new fic which was really different, iirc). It was all very fun and extraordinary.

This kind of interaction is what I look for in fandom. It can be very lonely otherwise, and I don't think I would have stayed long here if I hadn't meet people with whom to talk and gush and share all these wonders with.

So one advice: do not necessarily wait for others to come to you. Go to others. Be the reader you'd like to have in your comments section (if that's you ofc, it doesn't work if it doesn't come from the heart and is genuine). Connect to others and then you'll have others come to you too. Even if it's one person, it'll be enough.

Other ideas I had: crosspost your fic (ao3, tumblr, other), maybe at different times, make sure you tag correctly so that it can be find, ask for advices and opinions on forums/discords (there's always someone willing to help, in general). Don't be too afraid. And i'll finish with a Neil Gaiman: don't dwell too much on it and start writing the next bit/story. Keep writing, focus on what's next and never on what's over.

any advice about how to deal with posting a fic and getting radio silence? I know ppl aren’t owed engagement ofc, but I feel embarrassed at having spent so long on something no one cares about, and although I liked thinking about the characters and fandom before (and was considering writing more about them), now I can’t think about it without feeling that overpowering embarrassment 😭 part of me wants to delete the fic, but that would mean having to open ao3 and look at it again LMAO

sorry for the venting, I know this is probably a me problem, but has anyone else felt this, and if so, is there any way to make this pervasive shame go away??

*hugs* This is a very painful thing to experience and there isn't really any way to make it just go away, unfortunately. However, you can reflect on it a bit, when you're ready to.

Writing and posting are separate activities. If you've enjoyed writing the story but you haven't enjoyed posting it to the Archive, you can always continue writing just for yourself. This may or may not be something you'd enjoy - you know better than I do whether some of your enjoyment came from the anticipation of a reaction to your work.

Try to analyze where your embarrassment is coming from. Is it worrying that your story was poorly written? A lack of a reaction doesn't mean that the story is bad. Being unpopular doesn't mean it's bad, either. If your story is good to you, then it's a good story.

Is your embarrassment from feeling like you were "caught trying." Is it a cringe at the idea that you put effort into something that someone else doesn't (appear to) find valuable?

Is it actually embarrassment at all? Are you feeling a different kind of hurt instead? Did you hope that someone in particular would read your story and now you feel ignored? Did you hope to be embraced by your community and now you feel shunned?

These are difficult questions that I'm asking and you might not want to think about them right now. That's okay. You don't need to if you don't want to. You can definitely delete the fic and pretend it never happened. Or you can log out of that AO3 account and create a new one and never look back. Maybe you just need to take a week or a month off for a hiatus of sorts and when the ache isn't as bad, you'll be able to face it all again.

When I felt this way, it was because I felt like I'd put something into my community and that I'd been ignored. But since that time, I've found one person who gives me all of the community support I used to get from an entire fandom, and now when I post something on AO3 I don't actually need a response anymore. I get all of the fun and excitement and validation etc from my conversations and RP threads with my best friend.

Once you've got a little distance from the pain of this moment, try to figure out what it is that you were hoping to get and then figure out how you can get it. Maybe it's through posting fic to AO3, but maybe it's not.

Let's see what others can suggest. This is not something you're experiencing alone, anon. So very many of your fellow fan writers have experienced this too ❤️

[chinzhilla-main]

i was tagged by a couple people (i know @bebecas and @cowboydiaz for sure but i think there were some others? sorry if i missed you!) to do a couple different 2021 round-ups, so i decided to do my 21 favorite creations from last year! 2021 was the year i started giffing, so it was interesting (and embarrassing kakjsdf) to go back and look at how i've grown as a creator over the year.

not going to tag anyone in particular but if we're mutuals please feel free to throw yours in my tracking tag (#userbon), which seems to be working now!!

here are my 21 favorite creations, in chronological order, with some director's commentary:

happy birthday dean winchester (january) - this was my first edit to perform pretty well and i think it holds up. i'm still happy with the coloring i was able to achieve considering how little i knew at that time

dean + john the revelator (april) - my first attempt at multiple gifs per canvas and again, i still think it looks pretty good. it was also my first time really playing around with typography, which has become one of my favorite parts of editing

destiel + tgd (may) - i rewatched the get down (which i will be bitter over FOREVER but that's not what this post is about) with my sister and as soon as zeke said 'calm almost like how god must be calm' i was like WAIT and then this was born

the rest is under the cut cause this got pretty long

buddie + the terrifying possibility of both (july) - ngl i actually think this is very ugly now BUT i was galaxy-brained for using this quote for them, and i think this is still my most popular buddie edit

destiel x reddie parallels (july) - this was a pretty niche post and i had several near-breakdowns making it but it reached its target audience and i was called evil for it so. a success.

buck + badass smartass etc (july) - speaks for itself. i also added dumbass which is not in the original because well. he is <3

cas + killer queen (july) - this was not a super difficult or involved edit but i'm really happy with the final product, particularly the typography

destiel + famous movie couples (august) - i think this is my favorite thing i've made this year in terms of concept. it took forever but it was so worth it

buddie + just say yes (august) - i was like i wanna make an edit using as many gifs and techniques as possible just to see how it turns out and then i did and it's busy and gaudy but that's my brand and i love it

athena and maddie for 911ww (august) - another set of very busy gifs but again i think it turned out super well. i may be the only one who likes my kitschy gifs but by god i will keep making them.

happy birthday supernatural (september) - if you're at all familiar with my editing style you know that i'm nearly incapable of just doing basic gifs because by god if i'm not putting myself through photoshop hell is it even worth it. so i decided for this ep that i was gonna play around with colors and typography and i liked it so much that that's just how i do episode edits now

on the head of a pin (september) - this one was pure experimentation (based on this incredible edit by cristina) and was super fun to make

buddie + jolene (september) - not to be too obnoxious but i really went off with that broken glass panel. AND i had to recolor m*gan w*st's eyes in the second one. AND it's just really well composed. this is one of my favorite edits i've ever made actually

buddie + can't fight this feeling pt. 2 (october) - the first panel is def my favorite of this one but i like all of it a lot (i'm also holding out on making the final part of this mini series for if when they go canon)

nov 5 edit (november) - this was not the vision i had for this edit and i was pretty frustrated with it by the time it was posted but the response to it was so positive that it really changed my opinion on it so thanks y'all!

buddie + hooked on a feeling (november) - similar to the killer queen edit this one isn't super complicated but i just think it turned out really pretty

merlin, the dragon's call (december) - i'm pretty sure this was my first edit for something other than spn or 9-1-1 and i really really love the last gif in particular

buck + the calendar amv (december) - my first amv! it took ages but was so satisfying and honestly i think it's fucking awesome. one of my favorite things i've ever done

buddie + paper rings amv (december) - so i had the idea to do this amv for my 9-1-1 secret santa gift back in early dec, which is why i made the calendar one in the first place, so i could learn how to make one with lower stakes. i think this one's just as good if not better and was arguably more fun to make since it didn't make me sad aksdjfkj

marvel x spn (december) - my last edit of 2021! i made like three different versions of all these gifs because i felt like nothing was working but i the finished product was worth it and the response has been very gratifying! a good edit to end the year on :)

[alittlefrenchtree]

What would a good pr look like for you? Or, are there any principles you would suggest? I'm genuinely asking out of curiosity, cause we see so many things done badly (in a movie related industry), that even someone inexperienced like me can notice it all. You don't have to answer this if you don't feel comfortable, of course. Have a nice day :)

Hi there! Thank you for asking and for being so kind while doing it. I don't mind talking about this at all, don't worry 😊

I'm going to try to not take too long to answer but I already know I'm going to fail so I apologize in advance 😉 (edit after writing it: it's enormous, i'm so sorry. Hopefully, it's interesting. I'm crossing fingers for it to be at least readable 🤞).

Disclamer before I even try to start: I'm not a pr person (why do I even bother opening my mouth then? Idk either). I've already said it before but I always like a little bit of context, so. I'm not a pr person but I've studied (for about 3 seconds) fields close to pr or even directly related to pr in college, worked more or less close to a pr department (for about 3 other seconds) and have now been working... for let's say the other side of one fence for at least a good 5 minutes. I'm not close to pr people but I can see some effects of what they're doing on a regular basis. It's not pretty clear but i'm just saying that even if I'm not a pr person, I've been evolving around the field for a while, and even more than that, I've been watching (too) many public people from up close for way too many years. That doesn't make me an expert obviously, but I think it makes me at least someone who knows where to look and how to look in most cases. Obviously I won't say too many stupid things.

Ok, that being said.

In theory, a good pr move is a pr move that: a) reach its targeted audience in the way that was planned b) improve or doesn't hurt the image of the person/brand and c) make the people/entity who give the person/brand money happy (or at least, isn't hurting the rich people/brand's values). Some pr are more specifically designed for one or two of these goals, the three being the perfect combo.

I've said it before but it's always a important reminder that just a pr move not being good for me doesn't mean it's not a good pr move at all. It's most likely mean that I'm not in the targeted audience.

About principles... Again, I'm not sure if I can give a straight answer but, it's what I like about public relations. For me, even if of course you can learn things in theory, the beauty of pr is to completely adapt to the client. Trying to transpose pre-existing patterns on different people or different brands is not doomed to fail but, still in my opinion, very limited. So the only important principles for me are, a) to know (and respect) the audience you want to talk to and b) to not twist too much the identity of your client (whether it's a person, a person that has become a brand, or a brand).

The b) yet, is still debatable. If your client (person/person-brand/brand) is either shy or boring or extremely detestable or all of the above, you can think the only way to make them catchy is to completely twist them. For me, it could have been a good idea until... a few years ago. Before social media, twisting a nature for public image purpose could work. Before social media, public entities and audiences weren't talking that much together, so it was doable. Say I was an asshole singer in the 80's. All my pr people had to do is to make sure I appear somehow lovable during the 5 weeks a year I was promoting something (while all I was doing is around 2 things on tv, 3 things on radio and 5 things on written press) and I could be an asshole the rest of the year and nobody would know nothing about. At worst, someone would have a bad experience with me, but that someone would just talk about it to their four friends and two parents and that's about it. Or it would be a vague rumor, but no one would care that much. Like many things today, social media has changed things. Many public person have social media accounts, which means twisting the nature of the client is... way more complicated and more likely doomed to fail at some point. Of course you can be a public entity and not have any form of social media presence. First, it's going to be rarer with time because in the majority of the cases, it's shooting yourself (or your activity) in the foot. But even more importantly, not having social media account for yourself doesn't prevent you from their effects, because everyone else around you has social media accounts. Say I'm still an asshole singer in... say a post-covid world because otherwise it's too complicated. I'm still doing that 5 weeks promo tour to present my new album but this time, my agent is documenting everything on their own social media accounts to promote their own selves and work (because unlike me, they're smart and know social media are part of the business). During that tour, the media I'll interact with will probably be more plenty than the ones I would have met in the 80s because there are way more media than before. Every one of them has their own media accounts, for which they're going to create social media content (of backstage,...). Even more, some media are only social media based and will propose mostly content based on my personality. Remember that one person who had a bad experience with me in the 80's but had mostly no consequence? Now that person can share this with their 135 followers on Twitter who all have a RT button or on a post on their Instagram account and tagged their story on my account (if I have one) or on every fan account or on my agent account or on my mom account or everywhere people go when they want to lurk/stalk content about me. And well, you know the Internet, if 100 people knows, everyone knows. Even outside of my 5 weeks promo, every person I meet can morph into a viral story on the Internet. Which let me circle back to what I was saying in the first place. In a time where the flow of content is almost non-stop and the (media) public place is almost everywhere, having a pr strategy based on something dramatically opposed to who you are is tricky and not really viable in a long term. Especially when, in my opinion, you can work with everything in pr. You can adjust certain things, choose to hide some other parts, highlight other without changing everything. If you're good enough, you can make the most boring person relatable to an audience and work from that. I think the easiest way to make pr works is to based it on something real. Even if you then make it ten times bigger for public purpose, starting from something real makes everything easier.

When I wrote the post earlier, about public relations being interesting, I was mostly referring to what I see happening on Twitch and with streamers lately (if you're not familiar with this universe yet, just imagine a youtuber who only is only making live content and who mostly live on paid subscriptions from viewers instead of advertisement). It's nothing revolutionary, but I do appreciate the predominant transparency I hear in some of them. Yet again, because of the nature of their activity, transparency with their audience is in itself a good pr move. When you've spent 9hours a day, 6days a week live streaming for an audience without any edit or filter, transparency is often required. But still, it was really refreshing to hear that guy, who is and has been considered as the number one streamer in France for many years having that kind of speech. He was explaining how this thing he did hadn't making him earn any money but was good for his image and how that other thing he did was for money and many others things like these. And you find out that thing that could be badly perceive by the audience (such as doing something for money when you are supposed to have a job of passion) isn't at all perceive as so when you're explaining it to the audience and why you're doing it, where the money goes next and what you're going to do with it, etc.

What I like about pr is that, the possibilities of creativity are endless. Especially now, with all the new (that aren't that new anymore) technologies and the internet and the social media and the fact that everybody with a smartphone or an internet access is reachable from anywhere in the world. When I see something as the Travis Scott event on Fortnite and I see that you can virtually gather together 28 millions of people from all over the world for a concert (especially during a global pandemic), it's like, fucking mind-blowing and absolutely genius in so many levels. When we talk about pr, I wish people would think about stuff like events like that instead of just a set up lie or something to mislead the audience or something. But it also comes from pr people and teams and from public people themselves to not see pr as a mean to an end (selling something to an audience, making some rich people happy, etc.) but as a science as much as an art, and an occasion to produce something interesting, exciting and to create emotions.

Have a nice day/everning/night as well, Nonny. Thank you for stopping by 💜

[blue-shaded]

Hi, new anon, but been on the site and with some of the communities mentioned, for years. Your blog is how I found out some info on what happened to another blog I followed. I swear I'm not trying to convince you to do anything- just wondering if you ever considered using nicknames for the content creators you talk about? That way people who are looking for discourse, who have their own doubts about their favorite creator, can search tumblr and within your own blog with "[content creator nickname] discourse" and your blog, and similar blogs, would show up. I've been reading through the blog for a couple of days and from personal experience, I'm having issues corroborating claims and proof across many tags, and I think it'd just be easier to find specific posts on your blog, especially since Tumblr's search function is already a nightmare. (1/2)

This would also keep the more trivial discourse out of the main tag. Like I said, I've been reading through the blog- I've seen other discourse blogs (some who used to be connected to GuruGossiper but are long gone) use nicknames for content creators. I understand putting grievances that are on levels of exposing racism and bigotry in the main tag, but it seems like if we try to just use the Latest filter to see edits, art, etc., this blog shows up with the more petty complaints and in-fighting (relatively trivial in comparison to the above in bold) from everyone you respond to. It makes your blog seem like a vicious hate-blog where everyone is just arguing with each other, and if you're trying to reach the community on such serious topics, I'm not sure this is working too well. This is definitely not the most vitriolic discourse blog I've encountered, but I wonder if the main-tag method is counter-intuitive to the objective. Hoping this blog doesn't dissolve into nonsense, tbh. (2/2)

I don't want to use nicknames for content creators. Simply because it's partially ignoring the problem or trying to cover it up which is entirely against what I'm standing for. I don't even dare to become part of the problem. Tumblr's search function is defenitely fucked up. I agree. However that's also why my masterlist exists. So the evidence and the claims are in one tight and handy place WITH the sources to back it up. I don't put anything up on that list unless it's actually proven to be a thing. I also do not want to keep discourse out of the main tag. because 1: I dont want to satisfy the hateful stannies with that. and 2: The discourse is about that content creator so I will use that tag no matter what. If people don't want to see discourse they can block me. It's not like I'm going to share anything else ever, so they'd get rid of the discourse all in one handy click. And for the people who were crying "but you cant do that on mobile" Apps exist, and tumblr has its own blacklist function so go to hell. The people who think I'm hate-blog are stuck in their echochamber of believing that. The people that matter on this blog know exactly who I am and what I stand for so I don't really care about the opinion of some equally 'hateful' content creator stans to begin with. They really don't matter to me enough to be changing anything up purely because they don't want to see what's already in front of them. If they hate to see it so much they can take matters into their own hands and not unrightfully expect of me to solve their problem. This blog won't dissolve into nonsense. It'll always be here since there's still people that have valid concerns. And if you can't handle that you can take it upon yourself to leave this place alone. It's not like you are my target audience anyway.