Spike's Genre Failure: Don't Post (Content)
Spike's Genre Failure: Don't Post (Content)
Twilight Sparkle, a pretty perspicacious purple pony, shook her head. "Spike. I don't think your fanfiction about the Power Ponies comics is going to be approved to be read at the annual convention."(Author's Note 1)
Spike, her dashingly delightful diminuitive dragon, widened his sad brotherly-puppy-doggish eyes. "But why Twilight?"
"I have a list." Twilight's voice was heavy with disturbance. "But I'm not sure you'll want to hear it."
"I do!" Spike insisted, "I do!" He puffed out his chest. "How can I improve if I don't know what I did wrong?"
Twilight sighed. "First, look at what the official rules-list indicates ponies can and cannot prepare for the fan convention."
"There's a list?" Spike's forehead creased up in contemplative consternation.
"It's right here." Twilight turned around the convention's invitation ticket. On the back, in minuscule font, there was a block of text.
Spike took out his trusty magnifying glass and squinted through it. "Hey, the list IS right here. That wasn't an ink stain!"
"You need to check everything when reading, Spike. Sometimes twice. There can be hidden meaning!" Twilight noted. "Or typsos [sic-typos]. Anyway, here are the problems."
"Plural problems? Not just one?" Spike shivered.
"Most definitely plural. Anyway: First, it's not clear your story is actually a story. It starts with a list, a long list-"
Spike spoke up. "How else will we know what the villain has done or plans to do?"
"No one wants to read thirteen pages of a list--except me. Which is why I read this one. But, more important, it was against the rules. Spike, this isn't the 'Recent Crimes' page in the Foal Free Press!"
"Their 'Recent Crimes' page is misnamed--"
"A misnomer," Twilight corrected.
"Yeah. It isn't even half a page long on a busy week!" Spike noted, not helping his argument.(Author's Note 2)
"At least when Rainbow Dash isn't in town..." Twilight muttered.
"Come on Twilight, Rainbow's speeding violations only make it into the Press when she hits somepony. It's not fair to keep ragging on her like that. The real criminal in Ponyville is whicheverpony's shoplifting those expensive and beautiful items from Sofas and Quills and our other luxurious vendors!"
"You know," Twilight noted. "The 'Skulking Shoplifter's' crimes tend to not occur whenever our friends are out of town on a friendship emergency...oh no." Twilight hastily wrote a note to herself.
"You got an idea who it might be?" Spike asked.
Twilight thought, for a moment, about a dear generous pony friend of hers who always seemed to own the newest items and everything on trend. But it couldn't be her. It shouldn't be her. Then, Twilight considered another dear and kind pony friend of hers who appeared to be destitute, without any source of income, who gave all she had to help animals and woodland creatures... oh no. Twilight didn't want to contemplate that, so she continued her critique.
"Leaving aside the lists. At the end of 'this story' you have three pages of author's notes, then two pages appear to be some chat you had with Derpy--"
"That was a 'letter to the editor', like real comic books have."
"Anyways, after that you've polled Ponyville residents on what they want to see happen in your 'story' and you included the results. The last page is a preview of 'Issue 2'."
"That's what comic books do!" Spike insisted.
"But that's all against the rules."
"They're more like guidelines," Spike said, "if those are real rules, they're stupid."
Twilight put a hoof to her forehead and sighed. "Let's continue... The prohibition on meta stories also may have been violated."
"The what? I didn't write about any meta-monster."
"Meta stories are 'defined broadly as any story about the fandom and its members.'"
"I mean I wrote about some of my friends like Deep Pony and Golden Tassel."(Author's Note 3)
"Are they your friends, really, Spike, or are they just some ponies whose fanzines you subscribe to or who read your stories?"
Spike sputtered, "When you put it that way, but--"
"I'm the Princess of Friendship, Spike. I know true friends." Her tone softened. "These penpals could become friends, but it's unlikely." She swallowed. "You can't just trust anypony whose writings you read or who reads your work. Sorry. I just felt like I had to give you this advice. Maybe they're nice, but maybe they're actually somecreatures reaching evil tendrils from beyond the weakening doors of Tartarus and who are using fiction for dread purposes! Dread purposes!" Twilight repeated the warning, her nostrils flared and eyes wide. "Nopony's ever done an exhaustive survey of just *what* is in there..." Twilight hyperventilated a bit, but eventually returned to reason. "Anyway," she continued. "For purposes of being accepted at the convention, it doesn't matter either way since you apparently wrote your fanfiction around some sort of in-joke with them and their 'zines'. Is that true?"
"Yeah," Spike nodded.
"Well, in-jokes with little relevance to anyone outside a small group of ponies are against the rules and the jokes weren't funny," Twilight deadpanned.
"Oh," Spike hung his head.
"Don't worry," Twilight said, "at least you didn't violate this next rule--no 'inserting comments between the lines of anotherpony's copy-pasted story.'"
"Uhh," Spike sputtered.
"Where could you possibly have done that!"
"One of my 'friends'--I mean penpals--and I collaborated and that was how we made that pony's submission. We were commenting on Power Ponies Episode 9, Season 5. I better warn--"
"Fair enough." Twilight ruffled her list. "I need to get going soon. We're almost done."
"Okay," Spike's voice was dry.
"The villain's first list also includes a soliloquy discussing a 'manual' on villainy. Manuals are prohibited. And the second list features a 'user's guide' to some superweapon."
"User's guides aren't allowed?"
"Exactly." Twilight bobbed her head.
"And finally, your lists were written in greentext."
"No way!" Spike crossed his arms. "My ink's black!"
"Greentext doesn't have to be green." Twilight explained. "And not all text that is green is prohibited."
"What kind of garbage is that? What does that even mean?"
"'Greentext' started relatively recently as a pejorative term to refer to works written by a crank pony who writes angry ALLCAPS LETTERS IN GREEN to Princess Celestia's top royal guard Knighty, with contradictory complaints. It's jargon for 'bullet-pointed dialogue.'" (Nopony remembers the crank pony's name. (Since we aren't ponies, I'll tell you who. It was Lyra Heartstrings). 
).
"Then why don't ponies just say bullet-pointed dialogue?"
"Do you even know what a bullet is?" Twilight asked.
"Sure."
Twilight blinked.
"It's comic jargon," Spike explained.
"Even I had to look up what a bullet was," Twilight noted.
"What is it?" Spike asked, "I know what it 'is' but I don't know why it's that."
"Something violent to do with explosions...involved with fireworks. The term originates from deep in Equestria's past," Twilight pondered. "Whatever it is, it means whatever this is." She showed Spike a picture of a dotted point.
"That's a dot." Spike noted.
"Indeed," Twilight nodded, "a 'bullet' is the comic synonym for a dot."
Spike nodded in response.
"Bullets are dots are greentext. Got it?"
Spike nodded again--almost hypnotically bobbing.
"Anyway, your lists are 'written essentially in bullet-point format' and that's not allowed."
Spike sighed long and hard. "I guess I've got some re-writing to do." Rejected fanwork in claw, he headed off.
Twilight put away her list, smiling, but troubled. She'd saved Spike the embarrassment of showing up at the convention with his very rules-breaking story only to have it turned down. But maybe the censors might have let it get through?
She looked over the proceedings of past fanfiction conventions--they'd apparently published a "Manual on How to Please Your Kirin"--I suppose you wouldn't want one to turn into an angry Nirik... An "How To" guide on making noodles and... "Fluttershy's a Hack and Quibble Pants Fibs About Fiction", which seemed like a meta story about members of the community.
"Wait," Twilight thought aloud. "Is Fluttershy a fanfiction writer?" She shook her head. "Naah... but I can see Quibble Pants writing weird stories in a misguided attempt to bond with his fellow ponies. Yes... whicheverpony wrote that probably just inserted Fluttershy's name for attention." But... the reference merited later investigation.
Twilight threw aside those stories, wondering if Spike's piece could have been accepted just like the apparent rule-breaking works had been?
"Naaaahh," Twilight shrugged. "His wasn't good enough."
Author's Note
"Twilight...Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! Spike's fiction WAS good enough."
This has been a PSA, not on behalf of FimFiction.Net.
Note 1. For those of you whom are going, have fun at Everfree Northwest. 
While you're living it up, 
Twilight is here, laying down THE LAW. 
Note 2. For those who enjoy reading about crimes of the Mane Six:
(warning: it's a bit mean toward our little ponies, and uncouth)
TA Cursory Background Check
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- Secret Not-Embedded-In-This-Author's-Note-Tale-That-Is-Not-Really-A-Greentext tale. For the link, look above and find the Sad Applejack!
Note 3. To Users Named In the Text
- Thank you again for the permission. (Note: they did not read this tale, so they are not responsible for any good or bad--it's my responsibility. They are so brave! 
).
- I just used the names of users who I subscribed to or who subscribed to me. No "friendship" or penpal relationship is necessarily extant. Indeed, asking for permission to cite an individual's name may have been our first interaction(!)
FimFiction.net Site Rules and Guidelines:
Don’t Post (Genres)
- Things that obviously aren’t stories: lists, polls, previews, author notes, chat logs, etc.
- Meta stories, defined broadly as any story about the site or its users. What constitutes meta is largely up to staff discretion.
- Stories written as an in-joke between a small group of people, with little relevance to anyone outside that group. Colloquially known as “circle-jerking.”
- MST3k-style fics — for example, inserting comments between the lines of a copy-pasted story.
- “Manuals” or “User Guides”
- Greentext stories, or stories that are written essentially in bullet-point format. It doesn’t matter if the text isn’t green, or if you’ve omitted the > (greater-than) symbol. If it’s in the general format, it’s not allowed.
Preview of Next Update: "Unpublished Stories and Chapters" with... Fluttershy. (But to be safe, this story is marked as "Complete" since it stands on its own and Fluttershy may be too afraid to write and publish her next chapter). 
