This is sarcasm at its finest.

You got me for awhile there (or slightly confused), until I scrolled down to the "OC" part, explaining that a Mary-Sue was absolutely acceptable--when we all know Mary-Sues are a downright abomination to the general world of fanfiction.

This was just absolutely amusing!

~kugen

Day late and a dollar short!! I ran across this article and wow!! Most excellent.

Now this, is pure brilliance. I seriously am wondering how many people took this seriously... The last part just cracked me up; but it is sad that that's true for quite a bit of fanfiction these days...

Submissive Naruto...? XD Haha, Sas-uke is totally the submissive one in that realtionship! [Although I prefer ItaSasu...]

:D Smut need no plot what so ever!

@SomeGuy:

You know, I feel inclined to agree...but then it felt good inside knowing I might have made someone feel like an idiot too.

this made me cry little happy tears.
-barrel rolls-

i love it how many people actually took this seriously,
it almost made me pee my pants.

but not really.
but you get the point.

Hahaha this is brilliant! It made me laugh all the way, its a shame that so many fanfiction writers actually do that though...

I was going to say "I hope some people take this seriously", but I can see that some people already have. Shh, shh, Naruto. I think that's gonna be my new tagline.

@Calaya:

I'm finding these days, now that there's no possibility for "accidental" thumbs-downs, that it's far funnier now to watch people draw the wrong conclusions from these sorts of ironic humour articles.

Before it was kinda funny already because it led to an even better joke - a meta-joke, maybe? But now that you can't get a string of thumbs down from people who didn't get said-joke (which just sucks in general for writers, y'know), it's even better! I'm just thinking back to one from the old site where a whole slew of people commented back going "Oh! It was all a joke! I feel so bad about what I said before!" That side of things is slightly less tragic now.

Oh, these shenanigans on the internet. This is hilarious. Keep up the good work.

I hope everyone realises this piece is being ironic...

Well my OC is like totally meant for Ed and she's an alchemist and her hair and eyes are like mine and she is as cool as me...if I lived in fantasy land!

For a brief moment I really thought this was serious, then realised it simply could not be on common sense grounds. Thus, it became amusing. I'm not off to write a smutty fanfic with no storyline and all the dirty words I think I know the meaning of.

@:

SHUT UP OK, I'M WORKING ON IT. >_>;;

And I promised Avril that something from the Overture-verse will be posted by early next week. AND IT WILL, DAMNIT. IT WILL.

@:

Well yeah, Jae's usually considered the girl. But not so much the blackmailing, controlling girl as he is the blushing virgin who constantly runs around in an apron-type girl. >_>;

@:

Jaejoong wears the pants in the relationship.

OMG. You and I are two of the, like, ten YunJae fans who think so too! :D

@:

...OR THE OTHER WAY AROUND??

@:

OMG I FOUND ONE THAT I TOTALLY FORGOT I WROTE, BUT THAT'S SURPRISINGLY PRETTY GOOD.

It's like YunJae without the painfully obvious ghei factor.

So wait, does that make me Yunho to your Jae?

@:

SIGH. You know, I haven't looked at those fics in years, but if you really want to read them, then I'll go looking for the better ones. ._.

....How do you always get me to do shit like this?? ._.;

@:

Believe me, you really won't want to be friends with me after reading the 'cest. xDD;;

Why are you always plotting to kill me? :((

@:

Yes to the YunJae, still no to the Uchihacest. :3

@:

No, because the majority of what I wrote back then was horrible. xDDD

SIGH. Fine, I can write a small bad/good YunJae thing just for you if you really, really want it. :3

i personaly don't like little writer's notes. they're annoying.

@:

.............*used to be an Uchihacest writer, but you will never see those fanfics* :D

But writing YunJae for this would keep me away from the actual fanfics that I'm planning to write. :3

Ahh, what a nice way to laugh off exams. C:

What makes it all the more interesting is how fanfiction authors so often do all of this.

The one that gets me the most? Despite the fact that the characters are already speaking Japanese, the authors throw in Japanese words. For example, say if Naruto was speaking, "Wow! Dattebayo! Gomen nasai, I didn't see you there neko, so I stepped on your tail! Wasn't that cat just kawaii?" *dies*

Thanks again for the hysterical article. >:D

Most of this must be sarcasm.....

I'm glad that you had saved this. It really is a proper guide to fanfiction. I write it myself and I know how that stuff can turn out. -_-'

@Pleiades Rising:

With tears welling up, she screamed at the sky, "Why can't I have what I want?! I want life!!!

Story of my life, man. Story of my life.

@SomeGuy:

Sixteen, I believe it was. Yes! The original was fifteen, and the 'gome freaked out about not getting it in in time, and someone said something along the lines of "there's something poetic about a final sixteen!"

Yeah yeah, I know...

You already know my thoughts on this, bell. XD I printed out the original and shoved it at my friends to read at school. Fun times were had. I dunno what happened to it, though, so I was beginning to miss it...

Why of course authorial intention is primary! All authors should, must, spell everything out to us. They know the story far better than we readers do, don't they? Perhaps they can mess with the point of view: Switch from omniscient point of view, to limited omniscient, to first-person, and to objective point of view (all in a span of four paragraphs, no less.)

That's quite a handy way of aiding us less knowledgeable readers; the omniscient point of view can tell us everything we need to know! Isn't that brilliant? We don't have to interpret a character's internal suffering, for it can be boldly spelled out for us--word by word by word by word.

Let's take something non-anime as an example. Ernest Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants will be transformed from artsy claptrap to a heartrending, pure, eternally true performance of the heart.

Hemingway presents his story to us readers in the objective point of view. While doing this, we are presented with the "bare facts". Why does he do this to us?! It imposes too much creative work upon us! Here is an excerpt:

The girl stood up and walked to the end of the station. Across, on the other side, were fields of grain and trees along the banks of the Ebro. Far away, beyond the river, were mountains. The shadow of a cloud moved across the filed of grain and she saw the river through the trees.

"And we could have all this," she said. "And we could have everything and every day we make it more impossible."

That doesn't tell us anything meaningful! Let's make it fan fiction worthy:

The girl stood up and walked to the end of the station, feeling so very alone in an indifferent world. Across, on the other side, were fields of beautiful grain and flourishing trees along the banks of the Ebro, which flowed and teemed with glorious life. Far away, beyond the river, were mountains, serene and pure; one could imagine a holy guru pondering the secrets of life atop such a painted vision of nature. The ominous, yet cooling, shadow of a cloud glided across the field of grain, gently caressing it, and she saw the lively river through the trees--filled with birds, singing songs of life and nature.

"And we could have all this," she sighed sadly, for she knew that it was not her destined fate in this cruel world. "And we could have everything and every day we make it more impossible." She turned, shaking to her very soul. With tears welling up, she screamed at the sky, "Why can't I have what I want?! I want life!!!"

You have taught me the ways of fan fiction, Bellpickle! I salute you, as does that hack Hemingway.

@Dagger IX1:

It was a doozy batch of articles that day - like, almost twenty, wasn't it? So yeah, I wouldn't sweat it.

As for actual thing for the author . . . you know I loved it the first time around, and it's still gold now. I'll also say that I love it even more now that you took out that unnecessary "By the way this was a joke in case you didn't catch that" bit at the end from before. It's just so much tastier now.

Also, I hope you don't mind I dicked around with the page layout a little. If that's bothering you, I can change that back for you no problem.

But anyway, yay! Glad to see this back.

@bellpickle:

Let's just pretend I've recycled those synapses for remembering kanji or something. Or for completely useless information like the names of characters in anime and games that I'll probably never watch or play. ;_;

@Dagger IX1:

This was in the last batch of Articles, so yeah.

...It's okay, Dagger. We still love you. :3

@bellpickle:

*is a comment ninja*

Did they? Oh, hey, come to think of it, they did. ^^;; Well, there was a gap between when the Articles section first appeared and when I started modding it, IIRC, so if you submitted it early... either that, or it's just my terrible memory again. (Which is actually a huge bonus when it comes to rereading books and stuff--they feel fresh every time!)

@Dagger IX1:

DAMN, I WAS SUPPOSED TO GET FIRST COMMENT. *fistshake*
?? But didn't all articles go through you before being published back in the day...?

For the hell of admitting it (because I was probably too much of a pretentious arse to do so when I first wrote this): a good amount of this is, in some way, self-parody. Honestly, as if I don't read plotless smut.

Lovable prince Touga XDXDXDXD

I remember the Naruto section of this from your MyO, but I don't think I ever saw the rest. It's a very enjoyable read. The last section in particular cracked me up (patronizing translation notes and those damn ellipses--not to mention description catchphrases, which are, like, my worst enemy).