Big fan of the way Dracula Daily hasn't broken out of Tumblr in any real way
primarily, because I love being able to casually mention it to non-tumblr friends like I'm just that kind of cool, intellectual and cultural person who signs up to projects where you read a classic novel over the course of 6 months, and not because it's a big social media trend.
Whilst, actually it is a big social media trend, and I get to make and see lots of stupid memes and just, have fun with y'all in this space
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Idc anymore i think i'm a good enough writer that i can say that when i noticed the pattern in what exactly makes a book "good" on booktok (and, bc of that, what makes it popular and top bestseller lists), it feels almost demeaning and denigrating to the entire craft. Idk if i should blame the way tiktok-esque social media has utterly rotted everyone's ability to concentrate and read more than three sentences, but literally none of those books are objectively good.
(Yes, yes, art is subjective. HOWEVER. Art is subjective when you look at style, at themes, at motifs, at plots and characters. Art is still a craft, it still requires skill. I've seen beyond the tiktok quotes of these books. Not even their editors are good given the amount of typos/spelling mistakes. That is not something that you should find in a traditionally published book.)
You look at these books, and you know the only reason for their existence is to make money. I cannot and will not accept that as art.
(I'm on Tumblr, of course I have to explain every point. Artists who make money off their art =/= people who only create art meant to be profitable. There is a difference between an artist who hopes to monetise doing what they love, who creates what they wish to see more of and who happens to then create something that other people wish to see more of, and a person who looks at what's trending and decides that making an unholy frankenstein's monster of a book that mashes all those trending tropes and motifs together would get them rich quick. The fact that a lot of these booktok books become popular because of nepotism is just the cherry on top. It's soulless.)
And to finally say what I wanted to say, it's because none of these books have any deeper message or even artistic value to them. You will find a few out of context quotes or paragraphs, ones written specifically so they'd look deep and beautiful when taken out of context, so that people would post them, so that people would buy the books. Entire books written just so those few lines could become viral and make cash. It cannot even be compared to a hook line writers would post to get people interested in their works, because in booktok's case, those are the only lines of quality and in the context itself, they are often out of place and forced.
I just hate booktok, i hate what modern social media has done to art. It's all created to be quickly consumed, for the few ☆aesthetic☆ glances, and then discarded. Just to make more money for those who are already nepo babies. As if artists needed more obstacles to jump over.
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For anyone keeping track (no one), I have started watching the first Avengers film (MCU not the 60s TV show) but only while eating lunch so it's gonna take a while. So far Nick Fury has been assembling the Avengers (the film was initially released in the UK as Avengers Assemble - because of that 60s TV show - but it's not called that on D+ so I'm calling it what the Americans called it, just FYI) even though there's not yet anything for them to avenge as That Suit Guy (j/k I know his name too!!) isn't dead yet, and now they're on THE FUCKING VALIANT FROM DR WHO and I assume we're gonna continue assembling for a while as they're not all there yet.
MEANWHILE Loki (who is neither an alligator nor a woman in this???) is in a SECRET UNDERGROUND LAIR with a bunch of his stans who are... idk something technobabble that involves irridium and anti-protons. He is there looking for the tesseract on behalf of ???? who I know will be revealed 47 films from now as... no, wait, it wasn't, was it? That was just announced on a website or something? So it could be LITERALLY ANYONE. The Avengers (in-progress) also seem to be after that thing, but I have already forgotten why everyone is wanting it, assuming it was mentioned (it probably was).
Thor hasn't shown up yet, but Arrows Hawkeye is working as a Loki Stan and there's Steve Rogers and THE HULK and The Only Woman One, whose power is that she's a Cold War assassin (??) and I think this one is the film where she gets called a cunt (!) and honestly I am not sure which of the men she's getting officially shipped with, I think Arrows Hawkeye though? Fairly sure, as the alternative is that a man and a woman like each other as people but not in a lusty way, which would never happen obviously. (Hey I may ship mostly het* pairings but I don't always like it!)
Based on the Valiant (if u don't know who she is get da hell out of here!) I am guessing that the film ends with Loki dying in Thor's arms romantically but then I remembered that I know it can't because one of Loki got kidnapped from... either the end of this film or the start of the next one or POSSIBLY just from a later film's time-travel bit (???) but like... maybe they've edited this film secretly and I was right after all? But nobody else has watched it on Disney + recently so nobody knows yet? IT COULD HAPPEN.
Not sure what to make of this film so far, a lot's been going on yet also not much has been going on, and the one I like best so far (Suit Guy) is gonna die (NOT EVEN IN THOR'S ARMS ROMANTICALLY) and god Iron Man really hasn't aged well now that we have that one tech billionaire being a twat in public all the time to remind us what such people tend to be like. WHERE IS THOR????
*I say het but everyone in everything is bisexual, I know this because I thought of it and announced it on tumblr and will now say "I don't make the rules" to make it an objective FACT. I don't make the rules!!!
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yes I agree that you’re implicitly required to rec a fic you’re involved in which is why it HURTS WHEN PEOPLE DONT like oof. you said yes to work on it but then you didn’t like it that much hey. obviously I’d rather that than people rec something they don’t actually like, I’m not saying it should be disingenuous, it just hurts you know? ouch
nahhh i don't think ppl should feel obligated to do marketing for a fic they've already put time and energy into helping the writer with!
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tumblr ate the original version of this post, but tl;dr i'd gotten to thinking about the 'don't just like, reblog!!1!' discourse that seems to have intensified lately, and i think for me the issue is basically that artists seem to want to have their cake and eat it too when it comes to whether they're our peers, or actual professionals?
like—fundamentally my blog is my space to express my own taste in. period. that's what it's fundamentally primarily for. ergo i'm not going to reblog things i have mixed feelings about, because that would be misrepresenting my taste, unless i can append critique to them in order to clarify where my taste diverges. which i can do, with professional work!
but i'm pretty sure most tumblr artists would be upset to find criticism popping up in their notes. which is totally understandable! but like. if i have to discuss your work politely, rather than honestly, because you're a peer who's in the room with me—then yeah, if i don't like it enough, i won't reblog it, because if i don't have anything good to say, i shouldn't say anything. which isn't how we handle professional art! but it is how we handle our peers.
and it just seems to me like—you've got artists out here going 'i'm a struggling amateur, so you should do me a solid and toss me some free publicity! 🥺' but also 'i'm trying to make a living at this, so you should do me a solid and toss me some free publicity! 🥺' and i just feel like, which is it? because if you're my peer, then i'm only going to discuss your work publicly if i like it enough, because to do otherwise would be rude. and if you're a professional, then i don't owe it to you to subsidize your business by providing free advertising! if a business's products don't actually organically appeal to people, it should go under!
which maybe sounds harsh, but like. i have no desire to see making art restricted in any way. people should make whatever art they like, regardless of audience or quality, and derive joy from that! but like. if you want to make a living from your art, you should, actually, be making work of a quality that will speak for itself, in which case you shouldn't need to browbeat people into recommending it??
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