john_amend_all

thisbluespirit

pedanther

Rules: How many letters of the alphabet have you used for starting a fic title? One fic per line, ‘A’ and 'The’ do not count for 'a’ and ’t’. Post your score out of 26 at the end, along with your total fic count.

• Ac Velut In Somnis (DW / Knightmare, 30179 words)
• Between the Old Year and the New (S&S / Lord Peter Wimsey, 4361 words)
• Child of the Gods (DW / Federation of the Hub, 3892 words)
• Death on the Marsh (DW / Doctor Syn, 19455 words)
• Extra-Curricular Activity (DW, 12014 words)
• False Arrest (DW, 943 words)
• Genius and Geniality (DW, 30233 words)
• How The Other Half Lives (DW, 3366 words)
• In the Bag (DW / Adam Adamant Lives!, 1843 words, major character death)
• Just Keep On Trying (DW / Portal, 3091 words)
• Klepsmnemon (DW, 36398 words)
• Legman (Red Dwarf / Miss Marple, 515 words)
• Mayhap You'll Never See Such Another (Professor X / Inspector Morose, 1239 words)
• Near Miss (DW / Blackadder, 100 words)
• Old Shame (DW, 1172 words)
• Party Piece (DW / Kaldor City, 1015 words)
• The Quest of the Chocolates (DW, 735 words)
• Red for Danger (AAL! / Green Knowe series, 594 words)
• Samantha's Turn (DW, 6355 words)
• Thy Ravish'd Hair (DW / The Goon Show, 3297 words)
• Unbearable (DW [This Time Round], 3696 words, author chose not to warn)
• Valen's Angels (B5, 864 words)
• With Hilarious Consequences (DW, 568 words)
• (For 'X' I'm afraid I've drawn a blank)
• You'll Have Had Your Alternate Reality (You'll Have Had Your Tea, 1000 words)
• Zombie (DW, 100 words)

Total score: 25/26, from 354 works on AO3.

I was pretty sure I wouldn't have any trouble with Z, and in the end I didn't even need to venture out of AO3 to exhume Zoë Heriot and the Elf-Knight to get there. If I ever do take up my keyboard again I'll have to consider what can be done with X, though.

thisbluespirit

Rules: give us the links to your fics with the most hits, second most kudos, third most comments, fourth most bookmarks, fifth most words, and fic with the fewest words.

lurking_latinist wondered who the AI-generated companions Duncan, Lloyd and Stardust might be.

I created some prompt text for the generator (basically, taking the companions' names and capsule biographies from TV Tropes, for Susan up to Harry). Then I'd add the requested character's name and hit the Big Blue Button.

While I'm still on the subject of AI, I recall seeing a Spectator article along 'Journalists are all doomed, we'll be replaced by AI text generators' lines. What caught my eye was the prediction that fanfic would be one of the first areas of writing to succumb to the robot hordes. I can certainly see a place for robot-generated fanfic (particularly for someone whose interest was in a niche pairing *cough* Jamie/Sam *cough*), but since fanfic is a hobby that scratches a writer's itch I find it hard to believe that there wouldn't still be humans doing it the old-fashioned way.

(I did once try to get an AI to generate Lucie/Karen, priming it with the text of Professional Development. It just output more bickering, except that each time Karen insulted Lucie she'd conclude her remark with a kiss).

"The museums are full of paintings done by robots under the 'direction' of the nominal human painter. Novelists dictate the broad outlines of their books to robotic 'assistants' who return with complete manuscripts, having 'amplified' certain sections."

I remember saying, a few years ago:

Also, it would be nice now and again to find a subcontractor to write sex scenes rather than fading to black.

For that particular scenario, it seems 2023 could be my lucky year. There are now a number of online services (seemingly based on variants of the GPT-3 AI model) where you give them a passage of text, click a button, and the computer will generate a few sentences saying what happened next. Click again, and another few sentences emerge, and so on. Most of them operate on a subscription model where you get the first hit (or a certain number of outputs) free, but after that you have to hand over regular cash payments, the amount corresponding to how many words you want per month. I suppose at least you get the words delivered, rather than having to send a large, muscular Goon round to collect them.

So, get your characters ready for smooching, hand your manuscript over to the generator, and sit back as it appends the perfect love scene? I decided to sample the delights of some of these services, and found it wasn't quite that straightforward.

So how did these generators perform as smut subcontractors?

thisbluespirit

romanajo123

1. Give me a list of two or more characters (same fandom, multiple fandoms, whatever, it's up to you, doesn't have to be a shared fandom, just whoever you want to write).
2. I'll use them to generate you 3 prompts from the Genremixer!
3. Go write tropey flashfic from any or all of them & link back here.

All profit with ficlets and drabbles! Or at the very least, amusing prompts to contemplate. \o/

romanajo123

Take a pairing (or two or more characters), and put them in this random generator, then post your favorite resulting prompts (as many as you wish) in a comment below and I will try to oblige you by writing at least one of them.

Memed from thisbluespirit: List the first sentence (or two if the first sentence is short) of each of the last ten fics you posted.

1. Constable Tegan Jovanka recognised the sound of the approaching car at once. (Crime Scene, DW AU)
2. "Coming out," Lucie called, clutching the skimpy motel towel protectively around her. (Off the Bed, DW)
3. At the discreet click of the door latch, Tegan froze where she was crouching, the detonator still in her hand. (In at the Top End, DW)
4. That's odd, Li Shou Yuing thought. (Out of Place, DW)
5. "But why don't you tell the prefects?" Gwendoline Lacey asked, as the group descended H G Wells High School's principal staircase. (Exchange Students, DW>TTR>TDTO)
6. "Miss Jones!" Adam gave the vase another look, as if to confirm that what he had seen had not been the product of a momentary hallucination. (Once Bitten, AAL! / DW)
7. "Well, here it is," the Twelfth Doctor said, gesturing at the dim outline of the building ahead. (A Quiet Night In, DW>TTR)
8. Adam made another attempt to break free from his bonds, but it seemed that the gamekeepers who had secured him had been old hands; the ropes did not so much as budge. (A Chance Encounter in the Plantation, AAL! / DW)
9. Tasha Lem shook her head decisively. "Doctor, I appreciate your concern, but the security systems are foolproof." (The Heart Does Not Grieve Over, DW)
10. Between the darkness and the fog it was barely possible for Mina to be sure they were not walking in circles. (Reunion, Dracula 1968 / DW)

Memed as usual from thisbluespirit: Top ten AO3 works by various metrics. ( Here goes )

romanajo123

Pick a trope from this list and provide a fandom/pairing/moresome and I’ll tell you something about the story I’d write for that combination (i.e. write a snippet from the story or write not!fic or tell you the title and summary for the story I would write). ( List below the cut )

thisbluespirit

List the first five (or so) lines of your last 20 stories (or however many you have altogether. WIPs count). See if there are any patterns.