The Unfortunate Bio of TheWalkingDaryl

Just A Few Thoughts (29/10/17)

Hello.

(See, I remembered to greet this time; be proud).

So something got me thinking today.

For those of you who don't know (which is a lot of ye), I get tagged in a lot of contests and stuff on here.

Now, I have no problem with it. It gives me something to read and do in amongst my writing.

But I've found a common theme in amongst all that I get tagged in. I see all the ones that people tag me in and I look at them to see what they're about because you never know when I might be able to enter one.

The thing that I notice, is that for one, a lot of these contest runners have hardly any followers.
They also say in the rules, that you have to follow them or your entry won't be accepted.

Does anyone else find this kinda...wrong?

Now I know that I miss a lot of messages from my followers when they're done on the person's message board, so I assume others do too. Idk how many people even see mine in amongst all the people they follow.

Why do so many contest runners insist on people following them just to have a chance at their story maybe getting looked at?
Shit if I ran one I wouldn't ever ask to be followed; followers are earned, not bought. If you add the book in your library, you get the notifications of the updates so why follow when it'll be the same shit in the update as on the message board? Or they say on their message board to check the book. Um...wha...?

Now personally, I wouldn't mind entering some contests because a couple of my works I'd like to get more recognition for them, seeing as I work rather hard on them and a lot of them don't get discovered. If they do it's by pure chance.

But the rules that some of these people set are kinda ridiculous, which means I haven't found any yet that I can enter my works into because they're so damn specific.

There was one that said they were judging on 'how true to the real person' the characters are.
Obviously this was for a fanfic contest, but they seem to be missing the point.

The whole point of stories are to give your characters life. Character being the main word here.
You have a lot of freedom with characters when it comes to stories, so why do they have to be as close to the real person as possible?

This goes above me; I don't get it. Isn't the whole purpose of a story to create your own world with your own characters, even if it's fanfic?
If it's not then shit, I've been doing it wrong for a very long time.

How're you meant to know what the real person is actually like?
Obviously there're some aspects of what you see with them but a lot of it is you inventing a character.
Hard for me to explain but I hope I'm getting my point across.

When it comes to these 'rules' that people set for these contests, it makes me wonder how come people enter them at all.

Like some are so chock full of rules that  you have to sit down for an hour just to figure out which of your stories fit those guidelines. (None of mine apparently).
I have no problems with the rules, but some are a bit extreme in my opinion.

Most of my stuff I can't enter into any I've been tagged in because of some rules. I'm not about to follow someone who's works I have no interest in or that I will just end up unfollowing after the contest. I'm specific with who I follow that doesn't follow me, and I only follow 8 people that don't follow me because it's what I do. But I'm not about to follow someone just temporarily for a shot at a contest I no doubt won't win because they probably don't like actual storylines. Maybe I'm just bitter.

Would it be too much to ask someone to run a contest where I can put one of my works up there?
Shit, sometimes I think I've got it and then suddenly a rule comes up and I'm like "Well, that's me out."

It's irritating because I try very hard to promote my stuff (though I've slacked off a fuck load on Instagram because it was doing nothing, so I haven't been trying much the past two months with promoting stuff), and I can't get any new readers.

But these people that run these contests, they are gonna shout out people who are on the top five or whatever, but like who's even gonna see it? What validates your shoutout if you've just conned a bunch of people into following you because of a contest?? How is your shoutout above others? Most people would've already known of the people that entered the contest so yes. You see what I mean or nah?

Yes, not getting your works noticed fucking sucks, especially when you work so hard on them and all these 'top' stories have heaps more than you and they're crap and the author hasn't been on as long as you, but it's the way it goes.

I've been here for nearly 4 Years now and I still struggle.

I'm very grateful to anyone who reads my stuff and I'm always on top of everything when it comes to answering comments or messages I receive. (FYI, I'm a generally nice person, so I'm always real happy to talk to anyone that messages me, though beware: if it's disrespectful, you'll find out that I don't take it).

I appreciate every single person that reads anything of mine, even if it's just one story. There're about 6 people on here that I see a lot of the time and you guys are awesome. (I'm sure you can figure out who you are). A couple people who used to read my stuff have disappeared, which sucks seeing as they were top readers, but there're 6 of you who (even now) are sticking with me and I appreciate it so damn much.

I've been rather lucky in the way of comments on my stories.
I haven't really had any disrespect towards me or the stories, which is nice.
I don't actually get that many comments and I love receiving comments; makes me feel more connected with everyone reading. Obviously not everyone likes commenting; you'll find that I only leave comments on other people's stuff when I really want to or need to. It's always nice to wake up to nice comments.

There's only really been one incident on one of my stories that I almost had to step in on.
Luckily it got resolved before I intervened but it was kinda rude towards one of the characters (they were having a go at the actual person they were based off) and someone else stepped in and pretty well just told them to go away and sort their shit out.
That's the only real time I've almost had to step in.

I always answer comments, if I can. Obviously there're some that I don't need to respond to, but it's always nice to respond so that people know that I do know what's happening in my stories and so they know I've seen the comment.
(I see everything you guys do that sets off my notifications, beware haha)

It's kinda nice to chat like this. It is, no?
Know you can always disturb me and message me if you feel like chatting.

Hope you all have a good day.

*waves*