For the record, I'm a reader, not a writer. I saw your comments in the bloodclaim thread, came to your LJ to find out whether you are a writer, and found this post.
I feel there is in essence an agreement in fanfiction: a writer writes a fic, a reader reads and comments.
I strongly disagree. Fanfic writer aren't obligated to finish anything. We readers are lucky to be able to read so much good fiction, for free. Reader comments -- which usually take only a few minutes to compose and post -- are lovely, and writers value them, but they're nowhere near adequate compensation for the writer's output, which probably took many hours of a writer's time (and often hours of a beta's time, too).
Readers have no right to demand or attempt to guilt-trip a writer into finishing a story if the writer doesn't want to finish it.
NO ONE has the right to dictate what another person should do in their spare time.
Put yourself in the writer's shoes. Writing is something they do as a hobby, for FUN, in their precious free time. They don't get paid.
Have you ever started something but not finished it? Sometimes writers start stories that they have every intention of finishing, but find out later that it isn't working, or they've lost interest in it, or whatever. When that happens, the joy of writing it disappears, and it becomes drudgery. Why on earth should they continue to work on it if it's not fun anymore? That would be masochistic.
How would you feel if someone tried to tell you what you should be doing in your spare time? ("No, don't read that; read this instead!") You wouldn't like it, would you? I respectfully suggest that you stop doing it to others.
No one has the right to dictate what another person should do in their spare time.
I feel there is in essence an agreement in fanfiction: a writer writes a fic, a reader reads and comments.
I strongly disagree. Fanfic writer aren't obligated to finish anything. We readers are lucky to be able to read so much good fiction, for free. Reader comments -- which usually take only a few minutes to compose and post -- are lovely, and writers value them, but they're nowhere near adequate compensation for the writer's output, which probably took many hours of a writer's time (and often hours of a beta's time, too).
Readers have no right to demand or attempt to guilt-trip a writer into finishing a story if the writer doesn't want to finish it.
NO ONE has the right to dictate what another person should do in their spare time.
Put yourself in the writer's shoes. Writing is something they do as a hobby, for FUN, in their precious free time. They don't get paid.
Have you ever started something but not finished it? Sometimes writers start stories that they have every intention of finishing, but find out later that it isn't working, or they've lost interest in it, or whatever. When that happens, the joy of writing it disappears, and it becomes drudgery. Why on earth should they continue to work on it if it's not fun anymore? That would be masochistic.
How would you feel if someone tried to tell you what you should be doing in your spare time? ("No, don't read that; read this instead!") You wouldn't like it, would you? I respectfully suggest that you stop doing it to others.