For me, the main killer of the AO3 prompt meme is that there's no way to comment on prompts - I get why they don't do that - I suggested it strongly back when it was first coded, and got a good list of reason why it wasn't worth it - but for me a huge part of DW/LJ prompt memes is that the possibility of getting comments on my prompts, or even long discussion threads about them. That's a lot more likely than getting a fill, in most memes, and can be just as fun! (It also means that if you're thinking of filling, you can test the waters first and see if your idea will be actually welcome.)
Other problems include the lack of true anonymity, which means lbr it's never going to support a healthy kinkmeme (even moreso now than when it was first coded, I think), Also the general high amount of buy-in that is needed even just to post a prompt - I can't just breeze by and drop off a stupid idea, I have to "sign up" and fill out a whole form, and then iirc if I want to add more prompts later I have to edit my original signup, and really it's not worth it for my stupid idea, is it really. (I was going to drop off an MDZS one in yours just to see, but it requires canonical tags only, and I am way too lazy to go look up the MDZS canonicals just to drop off a test prompt! There are ways around this for a mod, iirc, but they have their own downsides and require a lot more mod work.) It's also really not intuitive for prompt-posting at all.if you haven't
And is there a way to turn off claiming? Every prompt collection I've played with includes claiming, and not all prompt collections want or need it, for several different reasons.
It might be a really cool way to organize unfilled prompts from a meme held on lj/dw, having a mod enter everything would preserve anonymity, except there's no way, iirc, for users to mark prompts as interesting except by claiming them, and I also don't think there's any way to link prompts to fills except by claiming them and filling them on AO3, both of which are major downsides to its usefulness for that. (If I were a real coder I might be tempted to pull out just the prompt collection code and try to turn it into a stand-alone archive for indexing DW kinkmemes, except at that point it's probably easier to start from scratch.)
I've considered trying to make a private prompt collection just for my own bunnies that I wouldn't mind other people writing too, but see above about the downsides, and a Google Sheets works for that too.
It *is* pretty useful for a prompt-claiming fest, where there's a list of semi-anon prompts for participants and then each participant claims a prompt and fills it without it actually being an exchange. Those kind of fests were really popular on LJ back before AO3 existed, and I think it's probably the main thing they had in mind when coding it. But by the time it went up, I almost never saw that kind of fest anymore - it seems like that part of fest culture was subsumed by exchanges (which is probably partly AO3's fault for making them a whole lot easier!) and partly by kinkmemes (which don't work on AO3) and, I think, partly by purity culture, since a couple of the last ones I saw on LJ had huge problems with people attacking "problematic" prompts before claiming even started.
...apparently I still have lots of Thoughts on this huh.
no subject
Other problems include the lack of true anonymity, which means lbr it's never going to support a healthy kinkmeme (even moreso now than when it was first coded, I think), Also the general high amount of buy-in that is needed even just to post a prompt - I can't just breeze by and drop off a stupid idea, I have to "sign up" and fill out a whole form, and then iirc if I want to add more prompts later I have to edit my original signup, and really it's not worth it for my stupid idea, is it really. (I was going to drop off an MDZS one in yours just to see, but it requires canonical tags only, and I am way too lazy to go look up the MDZS canonicals just to drop off a test prompt! There are ways around this for a mod, iirc, but they have their own downsides and require a lot more mod work.) It's also really not intuitive for prompt-posting at all.if you haven't
And is there a way to turn off claiming? Every prompt collection I've played with includes claiming, and not all prompt collections want or need it, for several different reasons.
It might be a really cool way to organize unfilled prompts from a meme held on lj/dw, having a mod enter everything would preserve anonymity, except there's no way, iirc, for users to mark prompts as interesting except by claiming them, and I also don't think there's any way to link prompts to fills except by claiming them and filling them on AO3, both of which are major downsides to its usefulness for that. (If I were a real coder I might be tempted to pull out just the prompt collection code and try to turn it into a stand-alone archive for indexing DW kinkmemes, except at that point it's probably easier to start from scratch.)
I've considered trying to make a private prompt collection just for my own bunnies that I wouldn't mind other people writing too, but see above about the downsides, and a Google Sheets works for that too.
It *is* pretty useful for a prompt-claiming fest, where there's a list of semi-anon prompts for participants and then each participant claims a prompt and fills it without it actually being an exchange. Those kind of fests were really popular on LJ back before AO3 existed, and I think it's probably the main thing they had in mind when coding it. But by the time it went up, I almost never saw that kind of fest anymore - it seems like that part of fest culture was subsumed by exchanges (which is probably partly AO3's fault for making them a whole lot easier!) and partly by kinkmemes (which don't work on AO3) and, I think, partly by purity culture, since a couple of the last ones I saw on LJ had huge problems with people attacking "problematic" prompts before claiming even started.
...apparently I still have lots of Thoughts on this huh.