Taking my toys and going away...

I don't know how many, if any, of you are aware of the whole RedBootton uproar on fanfiction.net, but I've been encountering rumblings here and there and finally did some digging. 

What I decided, after reading what info I could find that came direct from the author, is that I don't like it.  Not because of the MA scare that has so many people upset, but rather the failure of the ff.net admins to address the rampant concerns of its members. Not because of the current searching the program is reported to do -- although I think the details of what criteria it uses are far too sketchy for comfort -- but rather because I worry what it will be searching for in three months time. When these self-appointed policemen have reported every MA story, every story in script format, every story that has a 'trollish' percent of grammar/spelling errors, what will they go after next? I've checked the sort of stories the 'Literate Union' consider to be 'shit' (as it was put by one of their members), and they have far fewer errors than what they are, currently, looking to have removed from the site. Will that change? Given the self-righteous nature of the program's author, I suspect the answer is yes.

I could be wrong -- I hope I'm wrong -- but I don't want to be there if or when the escalation happens.  I also don't want to post anywhere that I feel I have to constantly worry about a false positive getting my stories deleted -- and I do feel that way.  I feel that way, and I don't think I should have to.  I feel like... Big Brother is watching, and even if he's not watching me, it's not comfortable to know he's there. 

For the record, I acknowledge that the admins are not required to make a statement or acknowledge member concerns; but it is still something I feel they should do. In addition, I acknowledge that ff.net is a public site, and 'Lord Kelvin' and the 'Literate Union' have every right to report stories that are in violation of the TOS. Anyone in violation of the TOS has no room to whine if they get caught: you can think the rules are silly, and you can even decide to break them, but you do so willfully and have to be willing to accept the consequences. Admittedly, the chances of facing those consequences were far more slim before the 'Literate Union' decided to police the site. They grew exponentially with the release of RedBootton. But, the risk was always there. Complaining that it's unfair now is both foolish and overly self-entitled.

However, I also I think this move by Kelvin and the LU is a mistake, and can't imagine what they think they're going to accomplish in the long run. To use an analogy, ff.net is our little suburb, and instead of creating a neighborhood watch, these people have decided to become vigilantes. While super heroes are cool, nobody really wants one patrolling their neighborhood with his xray vision, reporting every minor infraction -- and if one did, it wouldn't really improve our quality of life. People would move away, property values would drop, and the last man out would be left holding the keys to a house he couldn't sell. To top it off, it really wouldn't matter that the vigilante had been obeying the letter of the law, because he'd completely failed to uphold the spirit. He's supposed to protect us, not make us feel persecuted, contantly needing to look over our shoulder for our own good. I don't know about anyone else, but I didn't feel (and still don't feel) threatened by the existence of poorly written fic on ff.net, but I do feel threatened by someone who apparently has a 100% success rate getting stories banned, and seems to have an axe to grind.

Even if he's not waving his axe at me, I don't like his attitude.

So:  I will be posting my stories on AO3 over the next few days, and deleting them off ff.net as I go.  
 
ETA:  Here's a link to my home on AO3.