it would be great for your readers to have a category of works that are permanent wip's.  so many of the older stories, sad to say some of the very best, have been abandoned - 

How do you think this should be handled?

Allow the author to mark a story not only as complete or WIP, but also as "on hiatus" or "unfinished" (with the latter meaning that it won't be continued). Or have a WIP that hasn't been updated for more than a year automatically marked as "incomplete"?

The first option would give us a more accurate result, but only if the author bothers to hit the neccessary buttons. The second option would be more helpful for the readers, but an author might take exception to their fic being listed as "incomplete", just because they had to take a break from writing.

Could there possibly be a way of notifying the author that their fic was about to be put on the unfinished list if they dont respond to let you know they're still writing on it? Presumably, if they receive say a group generated email about this and there is no response within like, 3 or 4 weeks, then it's perfectly safe to assume that the fic is unfinished, right?

That's my opinion on what might be a way to keep from offending writers who are still writing their fics, and also not have to rely on writers who may not even be in the fandom anymore to mark the stories appropriately.

Whether or not it's actually practically feasible, on the other hand... :P lol

I know nothing about the technicalities of this sort of thing...just a thought ;)

*hugs*

DoS

Yeah, it's too unreliable to trust an author to come back to do it. I mean, if someone takes a year off, are they even going to remember where they had their fics, let alone actually come back to them (which is pretty rare)? And if it does get marked as a permanent WIP, then they can stop getting "annoying"  emails from readers saying when are you going to update again? which would be a win-win, as I see it.

I think that maybe 7 months is a good time period to consider a story going from WIP to "on hiatus" or abandoned - of course the author should be contacted about their work and if they plan to complete the story.

I suspect that many readers  look at WIP's and if a story has not been updated within 4 to 6 months they will not start reading the story - My impression is that if a story has not been updated in 6 months, the writer will probably not complete the work especially now that so many writers have move away from Buffyverse. 

 My impression is that if a story has not been updated in 6 months, the writer will probably not complete the work

Often writers are just busy with that awful thing called RL... I know of a few fics (not including my own) that are not updated very often, but that doesn't mean they are abandoned or will never be completed.

I believe we should most likely wait a year but agree with DreamsofSpike that we should get a email telling us about 30 days prior that it is going into unfinished stats. Now if and Author after it goes in decides to start writing it again will it be moved out or will this stay permant.

I now start checking the Author and if it is being updated or completed, there are some Authors I know that if they post a new fic I can read right away, but tend to hold back on the starting of to to make sure that it is getting updated, I currently have a long list of unfinished really good fics.

I have also seen on another site where the fic can go up for a challenge to get it complete if the Author has abandoned it, that might be an option as well.

smlcspike Sandra

Dia - is there some way to be notified if a writer starts working on a story that's been in limbo for awhile?  (Old lady here - I forget which stories I was reading.)

Spikez_Tart - If you add the stories to your favourites in your account, then you get an email notifying you when a story you are following is updated ^.^ I hope that helps

I have also seen on another site where the fic can go up for a challenge to get it complete if the Author has abandoned it, that might be an option as well.

I would only do this if the author says it's okay. I know I wouldn't want someone coming along and finishing my story without my permission - especially if I was just taking a break and planned to come back and finish it myself. 

It could be part of the email notification - tell them their fic will be listed as incomplete, and please let us know if they would like it to go up as a challenge to be completed by another author. If they say no, or don't respond, then don't list it as a challenge. But if they are fine with it, then yeah, that'd be okay.

the idea of "other author completion" (with permission from original writer) is a good way to both satisfy the readers and help develop the ff community, and its writers skills.  It must be a very good learning tool to take over characters and a fiction realm that the writer must work from.

There are some very fine stories, especially the longer works, that readers have very much enjoyed reading and still have an interest in reading the completed story. 

If nothing else, at least a notation that the writer plans to complete the work and that the work is temporarily "on Hold" would be very good for the readers.  It would be also good to keep track of these works - if piece continues to not be updated after an additional 4 months, the writer could renew the notice.   it could go into consideration for "Permanent WIP" or for "Other Author Completion."

As a reader, I just want to know that a work that I have enjoyed very much and have invested time in is going to eventually be completed.  I think that readers just want a notice on the status of a work - If the writer is still interested and invested in their work that is great, but if they have lost interest, which is also fine, they should just let the readers know. 

The great system this group has with "favorite writers" is a wonderful tool - if a reader wants to keep track of a particular story in this "works on hold" category they only have to add the author.  And there is nothing wrong with asking writers to post a notice on works that have not been updated for a long time. 

I have been thinking about starting my own group that features only sagas, long series, and novel length - does anyone think that this would be something readers would be interested in?

now that we are at another year I was wondering if  consideration for the "Permanent WIP"  could be discussed. 

We could start with works that have not been updated in two years.  I think this is a reasonable time frame and Readers can decide to begin any others works themselves.  

The reason that I bring this up again is that the search method for stories is by title which is very long.  You also have the authors list, but if a person is not familiar with an author they may not read those works.  There are many authors that your readers would like but the list for checking out works is too long.   

2 years shuld more then suffice shuldnt it? I mean even if an Author returns to the ficdom i dont see how they could fault an archive for labeling the fics Permanent WIP after such a hefty away period IRL or not.

I have a list of features, changes and whatnot that I'm currently working on. Fic-status "on Hiatus" is on that list. The idea is to allow the writer to label the fic "on hiatus" him/herself, as well as an automatic status-change after a fic has not been updated for x time. In both cases the author will be able to manually remove that label if they feel it no longer applies.

In addition, I thought that maybe after x*2 time the label will return, but this time it can only be removed by updating the fic. Haven't quite decided on that one though. Wouldn't want people to update with "non-chapters" or mark an unfinished story as complete just to avoid the "on hiatus" label. We'll see. But the stuff I mentioned in the first paragraph is definitely on my to-do list.

marking the unfinished complete to avoid a hiatus lable, how very very EVOL!!! beyond cheeky... I hope we dont boast with such evol authors at this archive. I suppose your job Dia is to be one evol thought ahead but still...

If you can come up with a method for removal from your titles list of the works that have not been updated within a reasonable time frame it would make allow your readers - that's me - to find works that are complete or have a good  chance of being completed. 

sorry to whine, I guess I am just getting really tired of getting interested in works that will never be finished. 

You can always search for completed fics only.

And as an author who suffers from terrible writer's block (seriously, nothing makes writing harder than 'hurry up and update!') and often goes months or in some cases years between chaps on her WIP's, I must say that having a fic of mine listed as being 'on hiatus' by someone other than me would probably just piss me off to the point that it would get pulled down and probably never updated again.

It's a new year and I would again like to bring up the ides of starting a category of Permanent WIP -  I know that we can search out only "completed" works, but this method also takes out a lot of the newer works.

Any chance that this new category could happen this year?  I know that it is a lot of work, but I also think that it would be a big improvement for the site.  There are just so many works out that will never ever be completed and that are making it more difficult for readers to search out work.