If wishes were horses...

[sarea]

You know what D/G needs? Its own site, where writers can register and post their D/G-oriented fic. All ratings would be accepted. The rules would be, "D/G, and whatever the hell other ships you want." Portkey and Checkmated are both fine sites, but they're H/Hr and R/Hr oriented, which means that a D/G writer is in this awkward position of having two places to archive his/her fic, depending on what the subpairings in the story are. This also means that sometimes, story direction gets decided by where the story can get posted, which is not the ideal way to plan a story -- and yet, who can blame a writer for doing so?

After corresponding with the lovely bunny_wabit, I now know for sure that you can't "break" the H/Hr ship on Portkey regardless of which ship pairing you're placing the story under. And because it's an H/Hr-focused site, the reverse isn't true for the others (you can post H/Hr stories that break the other ships). That is completely the prerogative of the site's maintainers, and I respect that. Sure, it bothers me a little, but the main issue is that that means, even though Portkey is a D/G-friendly site, I can't post the whole spectrum of what I might write wrt D/G. I can only post D/G + H/Hr or D/G + no Harry romance + no Hermione romance fics. That is way limiting for me. From what I can tell of the rules at Checkmated, it's the exact same kind of limitation, only w/ R/Hr instead of H/Hr. And in fact, I'm not even allowed the option of D/G without R/Hr, which at least at Portkey would be acceptable (meaning D/G only).

I'm just throwing this out there, mainly to vent, and maybe with the hopes that someone who can actually do something about it will hear my plea. I don't have the expertise, personality, or resources to create/maintain such a site, but something like that would rock my socks off.

Comments

[fearthainn.livejournal.com]

Ok, LJ just ate my post and now I have to retype it. Unimpressed, LJ, unimpressed!

Magical Theory makes no restrictions on accompanying ships, so long as D/G is the focus of the story. The only caveat is that because it's hosted on Yahoo we can't allow NC-17 rated stories, what with their TOS and all. (It's also not automated, which means that updates come when the archive team (which right now is basically me and Emily) gets around to it. Which hasn't happened in a while, what with our general unwillingness to tackle the slush pile. Not to mention I'm lazy, and it's far too easy to talk Emily out of doing it. Hee.)

It would be nice to have an automated archive for D/G (less work for me!) but time and money are the main factors there, I think.

[fearthainn.livejournal.com]

I was also going to add, the main reason I archive in only three places - my personal site, FF.net and MT when I get around to getting my own stories up there...you'd think being an admin would mean I'd give myself posting privilages, but I'm just as lazy about my own stories as I am about everyone else's - is that this way I don't have to worry about restrictions enforced by other archives.

And certainly part of this is laziness on my part. For example, I was invited to archive at the new Draco-oriented archive, Unredeemed.net, but I probably won't submit anything new to them because they require their authors to have an archive-assigned beta, whcih is a restriction I don't care for. I have four betas already and no desire to post on a site that would require me to pick up a fifth for no reason other than to post on their site. It's much easier to simply not post there. I could probably post on Checkmated, but again with the laziness...I don't know if my stories would meet their guidelines, and I'm not overly interested in finding out. I find that if an archive has too many restrictions I just won't bother. I'm pretty happy with the niche I already have. :)

[sarea-okelani.livejournal.com]

Exactly. Part of my rant is because it's so frustrating to have to post in multiple locations, because one story doesn't fit one particular archive's restrictions. I am really lazy, and I would LOVE for there to be just ONE PLACE that I could go to post my stories. Or two places. Two would be tolerable. Now, however, it's this crazy system of, "Well does this story belong there, or not?"

And yes, unfortunately, the NC-17 thing is a big deal for me. Sex plays a role in many of my stories -- whether because it's a smutlet, or because it's a natural part of a longer story -- and I'd love for there to be a place where restrictions wrt ratings do not exist. Otherwise I'm having to create NC-17 and non-NC-17 versions, and that's just even more work for me to do, and I'm lazy enough as it is. <g> And not only that -- again, I don't want to decide on what goes into a story on the basis of whether or not the archive I want to submit to will take it. I want to be able to just write a story, however it might turn out to be, and know that I can post it. Period.

[fearthainn.livejournal.com]

I think MT would accept NC-17 ratings if our hosting would allow us to - I know we used to have them, but Yahoo cracked down on adult sites and Emily took them down so she wouldn't end up losing her site entirely. And that's another roadblock to setting up such a site...ISPs that will allow hosting of adult content, be they stories or pics or what-have-you, are hard to find. I know my host has a clause that doesn't allow for adult content, so I don't post NC-17 fic to my personal site. Which, as you said, changes what and how I write, as well as affecting where I post things and who my audience is. I don't write a lot of adult fic, but I don't really have a place to put it even if I did...I don't think I'd want to post it on my own site , just because dude. My grandmother reads my website! I don't want my grandma reading my smut!

[sarea-okelani.livejournal.com]

Hee, yeah, don't blame ya.

There are so many Web hosts and all that I can barely keep track of them. However, I don't blame anyone for adhering to their provider's policies ... it's just frustrating that they exist. Especially because in XF, this was rarely a problem -- and there was a lot of adult content (because the stories were written for an adult audience, which is who most of us target, imho). I don't know if people simply had their own servers, or if the providers were willing to look the other way because XF, unlike HP, does not have the stigma of being oriented toward children, or if we all just thought that the risks were worth it -- i.e., I have a backup of all my pages, so if they shut me down, I'll just move elsewhere. Whatever it was, it was just not. a big. deal.

I think most ISPs look the other way unless someone raises a stink about it. The TOS of the host for mine and Jade's site is a bit gray about sexual content. I figure this means we'll post what we think falls within the TOS, and if they disagree, then we'll take it down or move elsewhere. And this is a service we're paying for. Even during the years when we used free Web hosting (like Angelfire or Geocities or Tripod or what have you), it was extremely rare that we heard of a case of someone having to take their site down. My XF fic has been on Angelfire for years and years -- still is -- and it's never been an issue.

So either HP people are just really conscientious, or hosts are much more stringent w/ this fandom, or ... I don't even know what. Some combination of the two. <g>

[fearthainn.livejournal.com]

Personally I think the strange moral attitude behind adult HP fic is because it's a children's book. (Won't somebody please think of the children!?) Obviously there are hosting sites out there for whom it is not a big deal, but the decision behind taking NC-17 fic down off the MT archive was because at the time Yahoo WAS cracking down and TOS-ing anyone and everyone in sight. A number of people lost their geocities websites because of adult content, and MT decided, better safe than sorry.

I can understand the reasoning behind most hosting providers not allowing adult content - it's mostly geared to preventing people setting up porn sites on their servers, which cause a HUGE amount of traffic and spam and general hassle. But that means that mild-mannered writers of erotica get the shaft. I mean, I could probably get away posting high-rated stuff anyway, but it's not worth it to me. I know my web-host and she's a great gal, and I'd rather not be a headache for her. (Ironically, all the NC-17 fic I've ever written is only archived at my Yahoo group. Hee.)