Also Kimi Koi Limit from the same author.

https://dynasty-scans.com/series/kimi_koi_limit

Far better in every single way and shorter so the angst can't make a dent in your heart.

I hated and hate that vicious story more than any other so far mentioned in comments to Liberty.

Also Kimi Koi Limit from the same author.

https://dynasty-scans.com/series/kimi_koi_limit

Far better in every single way and shorter so the angst can't make a dent in your heart.

I hated and hate that vicious story more than any other so far mentioned in comments to Liberty.

I hated it too, to be honest. And I also hated Octave. For me all these stories (including Liberty) feature main characters who do horrible things and never face any consequences. I hate that kind of stories.

That been said, Liberty has a chance to redeem itself a bit if Maki doesn't take Liz back right away. Let Liz face some consequences for a change. That wouldn't totally fix the story at this point, but at least it wouldn't be total trash like Kimi Koi or Octave.

Some readers don't regard stories as tribunals where their job is to sit in judgment on the behavior of imaginary human beings, but as works of narrative art.

To me this series isn't crappy because the collection of fictional actions called "Liz" is represented as doing unethical or distasteful things and getting away with them; it's bad because the writer sucks at creating consistent characters, at supplying credible motivations, at constructing coherent plots, and at staging effective scenes.

As to that last point, the sequence when Liz jumps out of the car, then has a flashback to what happened two minutes before, and then flashes all the way back to high school, etc. is just wretched manga storytelling, whether the character's behavior happens to meet a reader's individual ethical standards or not.

Judging a story for its technical execution is fine and all. But execution alone doesn't make a story enjoyable. Griping storylines and compelling characters make a story enjoyable. And I don't find anything compelling about shitty people doing shitty things and getting away with it. I'm sure there are some folks out there who like that sort of shit and that's okay. I'm just not one of them.

Judging a story for its technical execution is fine and all. But execution alone doesn't make a story enjoyable. Griping storylines and compelling characters make a story enjoyable. And I don't find anything compelling about shitty people doing shitty things and getting away with it. I'm sure there are some folks out there who like that sort of shit and that's okay. I'm just not one of them.

And then there are those readers who like the sort of shit where as long as in the end the "best" imaginary person (or the most "relatable" imaginary person) has the "best" imaginary outcome and/or the "worst" imaginary person gets the imaginary punishment they "deserve," then that story is "gripping" and "compelling" no matter how shitty and half-assed the story is in getting there.

It takes all kinds, after all.

Which is why I said "execution ALONE doesn't make a story enjoyable." Ideally, you want the whole package. Though, characters I can like is the most important to me.

Anyway, it looks like you're arguing for the sake of arguing. You like what you like and I like what I like. We don't have to agree.

last edited at Nov 30, 2021 10:26PM

Which is why I said "execution ALONE doesn't make a story enjoyable." Ideally, you want the whole package. Though, characters I can like is the most important to me.

Anyway, it looks like you're arguing for the sake of arguing. You like what you like and I like what I like. We don't have to agree.

I'm just surprised at how many 21st century readers seem to agree with the mid-1950s censors who crippled US comics for a generation by a literal rule that "good must always triumph over evil."

I'm just surprised at how many 21st century readers seem to agree with the mid-1950s censors who crippled US comics for a generation by a literal rule that "good must always triumph over evil."

Well, it might seem that way to a person who didn't recognize the difference between wanting only stories in which good triumphed and wanting only stories in which evil were never treated as something other than evil.

I'm just surprised at how many 21st century readers seem to agree with the mid-1950s censors who crippled US comics for a generation by a literal rule that "good must always triumph over evil."

Well, it might seem that way to a person who didn't recognize the difference between wanting only stories in which good triumphed and wanting only stories in which evil were never treated as something other than evil.

LoL. Your craft skills fabricating with straw are truly outstanding.

We do seem to agree that in this series the author seems to want us to admire a character who acts like a piece of shit, and that’s bad writing, however.

I'm just surprised at how many 21st century readers seem to agree with the mid-1950s censors who crippled US comics for a generation by a literal rule that "good must always triumph over evil."

Well, it might seem that way to a person who didn't recognize the difference between wanting only stories in which good triumphed and wanting only stories in which evil were never treated as something other than evil.

LoL. Your craft skills fabricating with straw are truly outstanding.

Ah, no. Using the word “seem”, you set-up a straw-man. I noted the least implausible way for things to seem as you proposed them to seem. Of course, I didn't assert that you were sincere in your claim of how things seemed; an announcement that you were just taking a cheap shot wouldn't contradict me at all.

We do seem to agree that in this series the author seems to want us to admire a character who acts like a piece of shit,

No, I don't go that far. The writer seems to want to lead the audience to sympathy. Whether she'll want us to admire that character is unclear to me.

and that’s bad writing, however.

Indeed, wanting us to admire such a character would be bad writing, because prescribing with a broken moral compass is bad writing. And, for the same reason, wanting us to sympathize with a character who behaves as she does is bad writing. And wanting to normalize some of the behavior in the other series was bad writing.

Nearly any reader will accept a story in which what he or she regards as goodness does not triumph, and instead what the reader regards as evil is successful, if the reader is still somehow led to believe that a perverse morality is not being advanced. (In the simplest such cases, the message is that goodness faces a very great challenge.)

last edited at Dec 1, 2021 9:07AM

And wanting to normalize some of the behavior in the other series was bad writing.

Ah, now we come to it--the "normalization" thesis.

This is not the place to debate the pros and cons of those other series, but the depiction of "bad" behavior (as defined by individual readers) even without dire consequences for the offending character does not necessarily amount to the author's endorsement of or advocacy for that particular behavior, nor does a reader's appreciating the execution of such a story constitute the perpetuation of that behavior in real life.

Some of the greatest stories in all of literature examine how characters get into situations where they end up acting very badly indeed.* As I started out saying, if readers want to act as hanging judges in a tribunal on the behavior of imaginary human beings, that's their prerogative. That's not the only way to read a story, though.

• Note: Liberty is not one of those stories.

I for one really love Octave
Definitely my third favorite yuri series and just one of my fav series in general
A big reason for that was because it had such a flawed protag that made mistakes and did actually learn from them (and paid a price)

A big reason I and many others probably don't like Liberty is how horribly confused it is
When it started out I was hooked on the first couple chapters because of how alluring and mysterious Liz appeared to be and how their relationship escalated in a pretty great way
Then the drama with those fucking earrings happened
Then Liz stopped becoming alluring or mysterious and she morphed into an abusive bitch
Then Maki morphed into either a potted plant or a sponge
Then Liz's ex arrived and Liz jumped on her like she was catching a last minute train
And like, I'm cool with reading a story about shitty characters doing shitty things (if it is done right)
But what I'm not cool with is all the confused messaging about acceptance that the author is trying to cram into the story.
Like, I'm good with the whole acceptance and tolerance thing but this really isn't the story to do it in and these clearly aren't the type of role models to be funneling these messages through.
Also, there is barely any fucking time spent to developing this relationship at all.
We get one slave contract and some riding yo' girl to the bathroom nonsense before the ex shows up and starts slamming Liz like an express train through a concrete barrier.
The author seems to want us to care about his relationship when almost zero work has been done to actually show it.

last edited at Dec 1, 2021 7:36PM

I for one really love Octave
Definitely my third favorite yuri series and just one of my fav series in general
A big reason for that was because it had such a flawed protag that made mistakes and did actually learn from them (and paid a price)

A big reason I and many others probably don't like Liberty is how horribly confused it is
When it started out I was hooked on the first couple chapters because of how alluring and mysterious Liz appeared to be and how their relationship escalated in a pretty great way
Then the drama with those fucking earrings happened
Then Liz stopped becoming alluring or mysterious and she morphed into an abusive bitch
Then Maki morphed into either a potted plant or a sponge
Then Liz's ex arrived and Liz jumped on her like she was catching a last minute train
And like, I'm cool with reading a story about shitty characters doing shitty things (if it is done right)
But what I'm not cool with is all the confused messaging about acceptance that the author is trying to cram into the story.
Like, I'm good with the whole acceptance and tolerance thing but this really isn't the story to do it in and these clearly aren't the type of role models to be funneling these messages through.
Also, there is barely any fucking time spent to developing this relationship at all.
We get one slave contract and some riding yo' girl to the bathroom nonsense before the ex shows up and starts slamming Liz like an express train through a concrete barrier.
The author seems to want us to care about this relationship when almost zero work has been done to actually show it.

Yes to all.

I’ve said all along—if this were going to be the story of how Maki learned that she was a sub and she helped Liz learn to channel her negative impulses into a mutually satisfying kink relationship, well, bring it on.

But this is just a mess. The only hope now is that it becomes bizarre enough to be interesting.

last edited at Dec 1, 2021 8:03PM

LMAO @ people who think Octave was remotely close to a good story with well written characters who actually learned from their mistakes. The only thing the MC in Octave learned is that semen tastes nasty.

The only thing the MC in Octave learned is that semen tastes nasty.

Since that false detail was invented by you, it literally is an example of “headcanon.”

Pardon me for having missed some things in this thread. Anyone is welcome to head to the FAQ thread to talk about rules and modding. Responses and references here will be removed. Thank you for your understanding.

Oeconomist posted:

Nope. But, before you get to the heart of your screw-up, we get some blah-blah-blah:

So far, that theory (which could have been expressed in one brief sentence)

Get that all in your head at once.

Talking down to others who have differing opinions from you does not make your argumentation look any better. It's also not in compliance with rule 1. It is entirely possible to have civil, reasoned conversations without denigrating your intellectual opponents. I hope you'll keep that in mind next time. You may consider this point for your posts on this same page as well. Thank you.

Blastaar posted:

Which is why I said "execution ALONE doesn't make a story enjoyable." Ideally, you want the whole package. Though, characters I can like is the most important to me.

Anyway, it looks like you're arguing for the sake of arguing. You like what you like and I like what I like. We don't have to agree.

I'm just surprised at how many 21st century readers seem to agree with the mid-1950s censors who crippled US comics for a generation by a literal rule that "good must always triumph over evil."

Not every post deems a response, it was really not necessary to continue this. Kazu-kun was dropping it. That's usually a good sign to do the same. Your mockery of 0economist afterwards is no good either. Again, it is entirely possible to disagree or even disregard entirely without spoiling the entire conversation. Thank you.

last edited at Dec 2, 2021 9:06PM

I will not address your tone, as that is for the staff to handle. About your actual points, though.

Most people do relatively well in their debut work. I'm not referring to attempted debuts, but to work that finds a publisher.

Implying only "quality" works get published. Because that was the crux of your whole argument up until this post, the lack of quality of writing here, and why such a work is not getting better ("lack of competence or lack of incentive to do better"). Let us forget for a moment that cancellations and axing would not be a thing if every work that got published was automatically a "quality" work (and let us also forget that it is popularity that actually dictates this, not quality), but the very fact this series was published undermines your entire point. Garbage debuts get published all the time, and they get axed all the time, so why would you treat "finding a publisher" as an actual argument is somewhat baffling.

Experience is neither necessary nor sufficient to explain ability, so lack of ability cannot be explained by lack of experience.

Writing is in part both a gift and a product of experience, and how much the two are relevant to a particular writer varies greatly. An "able" writer without any experience would still produce mostly garbage, and an ungifted writer with lots of experience can produce good results. Both the language skills and the adeptness at using the writing tropes come largely from experience, arguing that they are not connected is just nonsensical.

Publishers can find sufficiently able writers without debuting bad writers who don't illustrate.

So why have they done so here? I mean, I know why, even you know why, so the better question is, what is the point of this argument?

The commercial publication of writing exhibiting lack of quality cannot be explained in terms of the lack of experience of the writer.

Now, this is something you did not argue before. Your whole point was the lack of quality and whether or not it was caused by a "lack of competence" or a "lack of incentive to do better". At no point prior did you argue about the commercial aspect. "Why is this so bad and why is it not getting better" (what you argued) is not the same as "why is this being published despite being bad" (what you brought up out of nowhere here).

Putting that aside, yes, a work with subpar writing being published can not be explained in terms of the lack of experience of the writer. It can, however, be explained by something I wrote in my response to Altair.

Soap opera sells. Like, when you think about it, most soap opera features contrived plots, badly done and inconsistent characterisations, and plenty of morally reprehensible characters, so this fits perfectly. And as I said, this stuff sells well.

To make things really funny, you brought this up yourself, but failed to grasp the implications.

I'm reminded... of some of what I've heard and read about willful inconsistency in soap operas.

Apparently, either you have not read enough, or alternatively, you never saw a single soap opera in your life. Put it bluntly, garbage sells, and almost no genre is as full of garbage as soap opera. It sells exceedingly well, actually. The commercial success was never surprising here, nor was it even a point of argument in the previous discussion, including your own posts in this thread. And this will now be a recurring theme in the rest of your comment.

You linked the writing problems to either a lack of competence or a lack of incentive in terms of readers demanding better storytelling.

To keep doing this, she needs a publisher.

You are confusing writing quality with popularity. Yes, she needs a publisher. If her not-exactly-stellar writing is popular, why in the world would she not get a publisher?

Lack of competence is certainly a factor, it can not not be with someone who is not a professional writer and is basically doing this for the first time.

Not unless a publisher publishes it. And a publisher won't keep publishing it if the number of people buying the contents discernibly declines.

Again, what we discussed before your baffling doubling down is the quality of writing. Lack of competence, largely stemming from a lack of experience, is a factor. I already covered how your argument of experience somehow being irrelevant in this case is nonsensical. As for the publishing aspect, again, you seem oblivious to the fact that utter garbage can and does sell exceptionally well, and is published all the time. Why is the publishing aspect even being brought up here?

But the lack of incentive, in the way you presented it, is simply not a factor at all, in my opinion.

Your opinion absurdly imagines commercial publication as something else.

Again, we have been debating the author's writing and her motivations behind it. I know very well what "commercial publication" is and how it operates. What I am saying here is that commercial publication in all likelihood does not matter to this particular writer.

I do not think she would radically alter her course if some of the readers did rebel.

She'd have no choice but radical change of some sort. She'd have to abandon the work, or write better, or fund its publication herself. With money or sweet-talk, she'd have to persuade Momono Moto to keep drawing it, or find another artist, or draw it herself.

Read the bolded part. She is not a professional writer, she has a solid career as a voice actress that does not involve writing at all, this is basically a vanity project for her. I stand by what I said, I do not see her compromising on what she wants to do with this series because of reader rebellion or publication issues. Which is, again, why the "commercial publication" is not any kind of argument here, why it is irrelevant, and why your sudden need to hang every single argument you have onto it is, well, baffling.

So, given that her publisher puts-up with it because, for some reason, the readers put up with it, she doesn't have an incentive to do better. Get that all in your head at once.

Yes, the publisher "puts up with it" because the readers "put up with it". I will even be magnanimous and once again reveal to you why the readers "put up with it". Soap opera garbage sells well.

Your next point about the incentive is the same one I already addressed. She indeed probably lacks this particular incentive, however, my point was not that she does not lack it, she obviously does, my point was that she lacks it for reasons different than what you were going for. You are arguing she lacks the incentive because the publisher "puts up with her", I am arguing she lacks it because it is simply not a factor for her at all, whatever the publisher does or does not put up with. She is doing this for fun and apparently, this is what fun looks like for her.

Of course, it is not really surprising you glossed over this, since your interpretation of the writer's motivations was literally as follows:

I think that people who write stuff of this sort are themselves either unfaithful people trying further to normalize infidelity, or victims of infidelity trying to rationalize their continued attachments to their abusers.

Ah, well, that's awkward. Same-time posts are always a bother but luckily I think you did all right. Thanks.

A bit of a clarifying note, though, because sometimes me hopping in kills conversation. That's not my intention at all. The argument is perfectly fine and I have no issues with it continuing. At this point we're not really talking about the story, but it's related enough to be fine with me. So long as insults stay out of it, and we stay sorta on topic, please continue.

Just wanted to clarify. Thanks.

We do seem to agree that in this series the author seems to want us to admire a character who acts like a piece of shit,

No, I don't go that far. The writer seems to want to lead the audience to sympathy. Whether she'll want us to admire that character is unclear to me.

and that’s bad writing, however.

Indeed, wanting us to admire such a character would be bad writing, because prescribing with a broken moral compass is bad writing. And, for the same reason, wanting us to sympathize with a character who behaves as she does is bad writing. And wanting to normalize some of the behavior in the other series was bad writing.

It is not bad writing because the author wants us to sympathise with Liz, it is bad writing because the author has not given us sufficient nor satisfactory reasons for why Liz acts as a piece of shit. The issue is not how she behaves, the issue is that we are given only a rudimentary "dumped in high school" backstory to handwave (as opposed to actually explaining it) her awfulness. There is nothing to sympathise with here, and yet the author seems to be going for it anyway. That is bad writing. It is not about a moral compass, it is about a poorly done characterisation where a character randomly behaves as a borderline sociopath with no explanation beyond "her last girlfriend dumped her".

Based on what I remember of his previous posts, I believe Blastaar was going for that with "acts like a piece of shit", rather than just stopping at the literal confines of that statement (he will correct me if I am wrong).

The "normalisation" argument I will not even touch upon, as Blastaar already did so and did so well.

Nearly any reader will accept a story in which what he or she regards as goodness does not triumph, and instead what the reader regards as evil is successful, if the reader is still somehow led to believe that a perverse morality is not being advanced. (In the simplest such cases, the message is that goodness faces a very great challenge.)

I will, however, ask for specific examples and details as to how exactly are either Octave or Liberty "normalising" or "advancing" a "perverse morality". You seem to have great in-depth knowledge about the personal driving forces of individual writers and what they are trying to accomplish with their works, up to and including labelling a carefree author who is clearly just having fun as either being a victim of abuse or abuser herself, because clearly only such people would write a story about infidelity.

So I want actual scenes and panels, linked here, that clearly show how these series are normalising and advancing morally dubious behaviour.

It is not about a moral compass, it is about a poorly done characterisation where a character randomly behaves as a borderline sociopath with no explanation beyond "her last girlfriend dumped her".

Based on what I remember of his previous posts, I believe Blastaar was going for that with "acts like a piece of shit", rather than just stopping at the literal confines of that statement (he will correct me if I am wrong).

Absolutely right—it’s not the behavior per se that I’m reacting against, it’s the laughably weak justification given for it. That scene where Liz slaps Maki for giving her a birthday present was the turning point of the series. I can even imagine an alternative version of this story where the author showed why being dumped could have such a deforming effect on Liz’s psyche. But we’re just presented with a common yuri trope that amounts to garden-variety “past sorrow in love.”

It’s as if that trope where a character does poorly on a school test, then ends up studying with their love object instead were used to explain why the character then spun out of control into drug addiction and prostitution—it’s not completely impossible to imagine that working in a story without being utterly ludicrous, but it would take a hell of a lot more careful setup and character development than simply reporting that it happened.

the depiction of "bad" behavior (as defined by individual readers) even without dire consequences for the offending character does not necessarily amount to the author's endorsement of or advocacy for that particular behavior,

No one said that it did.

nor does a reader's appreciating the execution of such a story constitute the perpetuation of that behavior in real life.

No one said that a reader's appreciation (in and of itself) of a story in which there are no dire consequences for badly behaving characters constituted any manner of endorsement of such behavior.

Once again, you have set-up straw men.

the depiction of "bad" behavior (as defined by individual readers) even without dire consequences for the offending character does not necessarily amount to the author's endorsement of or advocacy for that particular behavior,

No one said that it did.

nor does a reader's appreciating the execution of such a story constitute the perpetuation of that behavior in real life.

No one said that a reader's appreciation (in and of itself) of a story in which there are no dire consequences for badly behaving characters constituted any manner of endorsement of such behavior.

Once again, you have set-up straw men.

Well, then, since I’m obviously unable to grasp what you mean by “normalize,” further discussion on this topic is useless, so please let’s leave it there.

Once again, you have set-up straw men.

Well, then, since I’m obviously unable to grasp what you mean by “normalize,” further discussion on this topic is useless, so please let’s leave it there.

I imagine that you have a reasonably good idea of what “normalize” means, but you mischaracterized by what devices these stories are held to work to normalize inhumane behavior. I would quite agree that a constructive discussion is too unlikely to attempt.

That's a pity, because the peculiar challenges of writing about romantic or sexual pathology and maintaining one's moral bearings with neither a happy ending nor a smiting of villains are certainly interesting.

I will not address your tone, as that is for the staff to handle.

Pay attention to your own tone.

About your actual points, though.

Most people do relatively well in their debut work. I'm not referring to attempted debuts, but to work that finds a publisher.

Implying only "quality" works get published.

No. Implying that debut work will typically be of about the same quality as non-debut work.

Because that was the crux of your whole argument up until this post, the lack of quality of writing here, and why such a work is not getting better ("lack of competence or lack of incentive to do better").

Nope. You've imputed a belief that buyers want better work to me, but where did I say that? It flies in the face of what I've actually said. Indeed, as will be seen below, while you never identify an instance of my claiming that typical buyers much want better work, you observe me saying quite the contrary.

Let us forget for a moment that cancellations and axing would not be a thing if every work that got published was automatically a "quality" work

No, let's not forget that, nor let anyone imagine that it would be a point in your favor. If the author of Liberty was concerned that continuing as she has would get her cancelled, then she wouldn't continue as she has, unless she were unable to do better. So: “lack of incentive or lack of competence”.

(and let us also forget that it is popularity that actually dictates this, not quality),

If bad work as such is popular, an incentive exists to continue doing bad work. If work is popular for reasons other than being better or worse, then less incentive exists than otherwise to better work.

but the very fact this series was published undermines your entire point.

No, you simply guessed that I meant something other than what I actually said.

Garbage debuts get published all the time, and they get axed all the time, so why would you treat "finding a publisher" as an actual argument is somewhat baffling.

You're baffled because you imputed a presumption to my claim that is neither there nor consonant with what I said.

Experience is neither necessary nor sufficient to explain ability, so lack of ability cannot be explained by lack of experience.

Writing is in part both a gift and a product of experience, and how much the two are relevant to a particular writer varies greatly.

And thus some writers do not merely debut well, but offer brilliant work with a first submission.

An "able" writer without any experience would still produce mostly garbage,

You have to put “able” in quotation marks here because otherwise you offer a self-contradiction. And the more literal truth isn't helpful to you. That more literal truth is that raw talent varies greatly across people, and that some people who become quite skilled with experience are poor without it. That truth doesn't contradict what I said.

and an ungifted writer with lots of experience can produce good results.

Yet some would-be writers work feverishly for decades and remain poor writers.

Both the language skills and the adeptness at using the writing tropes come largely from experience,

For most writers, indeed. But raw talent varies considerably across writers.

arguing that they are not connected is just nonsensical.

I didn't say that they were unconnected.

My point was and is that this work being debut work does not explain why it is poor work because publishers are not compelled to turn poor writers into better writers by publishing poor work. [1] Writers get experience without being published, and [2] some writers don't even need the experience of multiple attempts.

Publishers can find sufficiently able writers without debuting bad writers who don't illustrate.

So why have they done so here?

There are multiple possibilities, but the unifying theme is that the readers care more about something else and so they don't incentivize better work, so the publisher doesn't incentivize better work. So the only incentive would come from the writer's desire to do good work for some other reason. She might have such incentive but, if she does, she lacks the competence to do better work.

Now, let's look back at those words of mine that you quoted: “lack of competence or lack of incentive to do better”.

I mean, I know why, even you know why,

Do you really think, at this point, that you should have been writing as if I were obtuse?

so the better question is, what is the point of this argument?

Well, I raised the question of whether the writer were not doing better work because she lacked ability or because she lacked incentive, and reiterated it when someone said that the writer likes stories full of drama. Then you wrote that debuting (being commercially published for the first time) and a love of drama explained the poor quality of her work, and I tersely explained why her debuting was not an explanation and again noted that the explanation was in lack of competence or lack of incentive. Since them, it's been a series of objections from you and responses from me noting why those objections are unreasonable.

The commercial publication of writing exhibiting lack of quality cannot be explained in terms of the lack of experience of the writer.

Now, this is something you did not argue before.

Wrong. You simply failed to consider what a debut were, and I finally spelled it out for you.

Your whole point was the lack of quality and whether or not it was caused by a "lack of competence" or a "lack of incentive to do better". At no point prior did you argue about the commercial aspect.

Wrong. Your initial response to me was about debuting, so you put commercial publication on the table, though evidently without recognizing what you were talking-about. Further, you simply failed to ponder what incentives a writer may have, and I finally spelled it out for you.

"Why is this so bad and why is it not getting better" (what you argued) is not the same as "why is this being published despite being bad" (what you brought up out of nowhere here).

Nope. It isn't a story mysteriously existing by itself; it is a commercial product. My spelling things out didn't introduce a new argument.

Putting that aside,

It's not yours to put aside.

yes, a work with subpar writing being published can not be explained in terms of the lack of experience of the writer. It can, however, be explained by something I wrote in my response to Altair.

Soap opera sells. Like, when you think about it, most soap opera features contrived plots, badly done and inconsistent characterisations, and plenty of morally reprehensible characters, so this fits perfectly. And as I said, this stuff sells well.

To make things really funny, you brought this up yourself, but failed to grasp the implications.

Nope. You really shouldn't write as if I am obtuse.

I'm reminded... of some of what I've heard and read about willful inconsistency in soap operas.

I made that comparison, in the same comment in which I first raised the issue of competence and incentives. In spite of my having made the comparison and having made it there, you added a presupposition that conflicted with the comparison and even with my remarks in the absence of such a comparison.

Apparently, either you have not read enough, or alternatively, you never saw a single soap opera in your life. Put it bluntly, garbage sells, and almost no genre is as full of garbage as soap opera. It sells exceedingly well, actually. The commercial success was never surprising here, nor was it even a point of argument in the previous discussion, including your own posts in this thread. And this will now be a recurring theme in the rest of your comment.

Again: That is an issue of incentives.

You linked the writing problems to either a lack of competence or a lack of incentive in terms of readers demanding better storytelling.

To keep doing this, she needs a publisher.

You are confusing writing quality with popularity.

Nope. Review what I actually wrote: “lack of competence or lack of incentive to do better”.

Yes, she needs a publisher. If her not-exactly-stellar writing is popular, why in the world would she not get a publisher?

She cannot avoid radical change if she no longer has a publisher. Cessation would be radical change; self-publication would compel radical change. Your claim that she would not make a radical change in the face of a reader rebellion cannot withstand scrutiny.

Lack of competence is certainly a factor, it can not not be with someone who is not a professional writer and is basically doing this for the first time.

Not unless a publisher publishes it. And a publisher won't keep publishing it if the number of people buying the contents discernibly declines.

Again, what we discussed before your baffling doubling down is the quality of writing.

What we discussed was “lack of competence or lack of incentive to do better”.

Lack of competence, largely stemming from a lack of experience, is a factor. I already covered how your argument of experience somehow being irrelevant in this case is nonsensical.

Except that that wasn't my argument, nor your original argument. You confused debuting with lacking experience. I noted both the difference, and that some writers do well without experience.

As for the publishing aspect, again, you seem oblivious to the fact that utter garbage can and does sell exceptionally well, and is published all the time.

No, the obliviousness was yours to the incentives faced by writers.

Why is the publishing aspect even being brought up here?

Because [1] work that debuts is by definition published and [2] writers who care about publication are incentivized by it. (They may not be incentivized to do better.)

But the lack of incentive, in the way you presented it, is simply not a factor at all, in my opinion.

Your opinion absurdly imagines commercial publication as something else.

Again, we have been debating the author's writing and her motivations behind it.

You brought up the subject of her debuting, and you did so in your first move. Further, in pondering the incentives of a writer who is being published, we shoulf consider the desire to be published, however slight that desire may be.

I know very well what "commercial publication" is and how it operates.

But you failed to bring that knowledge to bear when I wrote of incentives and when you wrote of debuting. So I had to spell it out.

What I am saying here is that commercial publication in all likelihood does not matter to this particular writer.

In which case, what you are saying is that an incentive to be published does not motivate her. That cannot be literally true (otherwise, she would not submit work), but it might be that her incentive is minimal.

I do not think she would radically alter her course if some of the readers did rebel.

She'd have no choice but radical change of some sort. She'd have to abandon the work, or write better, or fund its publication herself. With money or sweet-talk, she'd have to persuade Momono Moto to keep drawing it, or find another artist, or draw it herself.

Read the bolded part.

Read my response, which shows that the possibilities are exhausted by radical change. If the readers rebel, then she does different work (a radical change) or she stops (a radical change) or she self-publishes (a radical change).

She is not a professional writer, she has a solid career as a voice actress that does not involve writing at all, this is basically a vanity project for her.

Stopping or self-publishing is a radical change.

I stand by what I said, I do not see her compromising on what she wants to do with this series because of reader rebellion or publication issues.

Stopping or self-publishing is a radical change.

Which is, again, why the "commercial publication" is not any kind of argument here, why it is irrelevant, and why your sudden need to hang every single argument you have onto it is, well, baffling.

Baffling because you ignored what was entailed by “lack of competence or lack of incentive to do better”.

So, given that her publisher puts-up with it because, for some reason, the readers put up with it, she doesn't have an incentive to do better. Get that all in your head at once.

Yes, the publisher "puts up with it" because the readers "put up with it". I will even be magnanimous and once again reveal to you why the readers "put up with it". Soap opera garbage sells well.

So: “ lack of incentive to do better ” from that potential source. Yes, very plausibly.

Your next point about the incentive is the same one I already addressed.

So far, you haven't addressed it.

She indeed probably lacks this particular incentive, however, my point was not that she does not lack it, she obviously does,

Indeed.

my point was that she lacks it for reasons different than what you were going for.

I was not going for one and only one incentive. More to the point, in noting that she would have to make a radical change if the readers rebelled, I was rebutting a false claim that you'd made and have reiterated.

You are arguing she lacks the incentive because the publisher "puts up with her",

No, I'm arguing that of all the things that might have incentivized her to do better, most have been eliminated; but that, if some were there, then her poor writing would have in part to be attributable to imcompetence (the suggestion of an earlier commentator).

One of the potential sources of incentives are the readers and thence the publishers. But they put up with her. Even if she cared a lot about being published, the readers and publishers do not provide incentive to do better.

I am arguing she lacks it because it is simply not a factor for her at all, whatever the publisher does or does not put up with. She is doing this for fun and apparently, this is what fun looks like for her.

My claim that she had “lack of competence or lack of incentive to do better” is not somehow a refutation when you now insist that she has a lack of incentive to do better. Rather, you have made an unacknowledged concession.

Of course, it is not really surprising you glossed over this,

An obvious, point is not glossed-over for being left unstated, especially when the point is moot (because the publisher puts up with her).

since your interpretation of the writer's motivations was literally as follows:

I think that people who write stuff of this sort are themselves either unfaithful people trying further to normalize infidelity, or victims of infidelity trying to rationalize their continued attachments to their abusers.

That previous assertion of mine, behind which I continue to stand, says nothing about the general sloppiness of this work. When I first raised the issues of competence and incentives, it was in response to the apparently rhetorical question of “Would the writer be so incompetent as to introduce some random person just to manufacture fake drama?”.

I will, however, ask for specific examples and details as to how exactly are either Octave or Liberty "normalising" or "advancing" a "perverse morality". You seem to have great in-depth knowledge about the personal driving forces of individual writers and what they are trying to accomplish with their works, up to and including labelling a carefree author who is clearly just having fun as either being a victim of abuse or abuser herself, because clearly only such people would write a story about infidelity.

A snide, straw-man remark of that sort, on top of how you've argued in discussion about the significance of incentives to what Kitta Izumi writes, makes me disbelieve that I would want to attempt a second discussion with you, and especially that I would want a second discussion on a deeper topic. Perhaps I could imagine doing it after the earlier discussion comes to a close, and after you've apologized for the straw man; but, really, how likely is that?

Also, don't misquote me. I don't use “normalising”.