## Thinking of starting a rational fan fiction based website blog/forum. * Author: u/squitar * * URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/2lmjve/thinking_of_starting_a_rational_fan_fiction_based/ * Score: 13 * Created: 2014-11-07T23:15:18 ### Post: I'm thinking of creating a rational fan fiction website. I want to add in the ability for anyone to post their stories and fans to rate them. There would be no subscription and would be ran simply for ad revnue/donations. Would anyone be interested in something like that? ### Comments: > **u/lehyde** [+6] *Nudist Beach* (38 minutes later) > > Do you think a separate site has advantages over using the existing solutions? > > And if you the answer is yes, the question remains whether you could re-use existing code. The excellent [archive of our own](http://archiveofourown.org/works/777002/chapters/1461984) (which also supports [contests](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/aliens_and_time_machines_prompts)) have their code [on github](https://github.com/otwcode/otwarchive) where you could fork it. (You could say forking other projects is a rationalist tradition as lesswrong is a fork of reddit ;-) >> **u/squitar** [+1] (44 minutes later) >> >> Haha thanks for the idea. I'm not really trying to pull off some amazing feat of creating the best fiction archive ever. I just want a friendly forum/blog for fictional authors to post and rate eachothers works. I know it's been done I was just hoping to cater more to the rational fiction niche. > **u/squitar** [+3] (4 minutes later) > > If the site got popular enough I'd also like to host rational writing contests with prizes. The winners chosen by the fans. >> **u/eaglejarl** [+1] (a day later) >> >> How do you see that working? "Challenge: write a story in genre about "? Is this a winner-takes-all based on the fan votes or what? > **u/squitar** [+3] (34 minutes later) > > Update: I've registered teh domain rationalfiction.com > **u/eaglejarl** [+3] (15 hours later) > > You're welcome to repost The Two Year Emperor. > > Also, there are several things that I dislike about FFN and would love to see in a new site -- if I could find them all, I would move off of FFN. > > * Threaded reviews / comments / whatever you call them. I want to be able to reply to my reviewers > * The ability to review a chapter more than once, for when I re-read. > * Daily views & visitors stats > * A posting process that requires fewer actions than the very clunky one on FFN. > * No f'ing link-eater or copy/paste disabler. Jesus H. Christ on a cracker, those things are just bloody annoying and they throw out the baby with the small amount of bathwater. >> **u/squitar** [+2] (22 hours later) >> >> I'll keep all of this in mind while developing rationalfiction.com >> I'm building the website alone so it make take a while(unless people want to help :D) however I will guarantee at least a little work everyday. I will try to improve on what ffn lacks and i will never use copy+paste disablers. If you want to help out feel free to make an account on my site and submit stories. Any stories submitted i while later convert into an archive containing all the chapters. >> **u/squitar** [+1] (a day later) >> >> Thanks again for your help and info eaglejarl. >> The dislikes of FFN gave me more of an idea of how I want to set the site up.(Once I get the basics down, I'm new to web development and wordpress) >>> **u/eaglejarl** [+2] (a day later) >>> >>> You're welcome. Other good features might include: >>> >>> * A 'fave' and 'follow' ability (this is something that FFN does have, and is good) >>> * The ability for readers to up- and down-vote a story for quality. Faves kinda covers this, but not really. >>> * An ability for readers to add a link to a "similar story" and up- and down-vote those links. If you saw a 'similar story' link with -5 votes you could assume that it was someone trolling for views and wasn't actually that similar. Link with votes below -1 or so should probably be hidden. >>> >>> What platform are you writing it in? Wordpress, you said? >>>> **u/squitar** [+1] (a day later) >>>> >>>> Thanks for the awesome ideas! Yeah I'm building it on Wordpress. I'm very new to all web development, but I'm willing to give it everything I can even if it takes a couple months to get going. > **u/squitar** [+2] (52 minutes later) > > Update: Domain registered and hosting found website construction has bugun > **u/MadScientist14159** [+2] *WIP: Sodium Hypochlorite (Rational Bleach) Eventually. Maybe.* (4 days later) > > Wouldn't that just be this subreddit? > **u/squitar** [+1] (58 minutes later) > > Is there anyone willing to let me use their stories as opening posts? > I need Authors >> **u/alexanderwales** [+6] *Time flies like an arrow* (an hour later) >> >> Sure, you can use anything I've posted to [my fanfic page.](https://www.fanfiction.net/u/4976703/alexanderwales) Though fanfic.net doesn't allow copy+paste, so you'd have to use an intermediary scraper, or dev tools to turn that off. And then there are the formatting concerns, like italics, bold, line breaks, etc. But so long as I don't have to do anything much with it, go ahead. >>> **u/PeridexisErrant** [+4] *put aside fear for courage, and death for life* (2 hours later) >>> >>> Or [an extension](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/selectable-for-fanfiction/jcidlhgdoojamkbpmhbpgldmajnobefd) which disables copypaste-disablers. >>> **u/squitar** [+1] (2 hours later) >>> >>> awesome thanks for the approval i look forward to hosting your stories >>> **u/Zephyr1011** [+1] *Potentially Unfriendly Aspiring Divinity* (10 hours later) >>> >>> That problem can be solved by copying from the mobile site >> **u/None** [+2] (an hour later) >> >> Paging /u/alexanderwales > **u/squitar** [+1] (3 hours later) > > Update: The site is now live although very basic and having 0 posts it is up now > **u/None** [+1] (9 hours later) > > Unfortunately, I'm on mobile, so I can't provide a link to the ever-appropriate "DO IT!" image. > **u/squitar** [+1] (a day later) > > UPDATE: I am currently working on archiving some stories and making the website a little more functional. I've still got to add in a comment/rating/review system however. So far i've got the first 5 chapters of The Metropolitan Man archived (thank you AlexanderWales) and The first 2 Chapters of Decagon (thank you theyellowwombat) > . I unfortunately haven't had much free time and probably won't have much more in the coming week, however I still want to add at least something everyday. Thanks again for you support guys! Please feel free to check things out at Rationalfiction.com to see how things are going. >> **u/squitar** [+1] (a day later) >> >> sidenote: I'm a borderline insomniac so most updates will be done during the hours of 2-6 a.m. central time. During these times I may put up a temporary site under construction splash page, but check back soon. >>> **u/squitar** [+1] (a day later) >>> >>> extra sidenote: I'm super excited to have eaglejarl's permission to archive The Two Year Emperor. Starting on that soon after The Metro Man >>>> **u/eaglejarl** [+1] (a day later) >>>> >>>> To make your life a bit easier, here's a copy of all the existing chapters: >>>> >>>> https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/3294457/two_year_emperor.tgz >>>>> **u/squitar** [+1] (a day later) >>>>> >>>>> definitely helps thanks again > **u/None** [+1] (12 minutes later) > > don't talk just do it >> **u/squitar** [+1] (17 minutes later) >> >> I'd like to see if there's a decent user base. >> (edit: if so i will begin work this evening) ---