Agreed: tact and phrasing is everything here, and it's best to wrap every negative/critical comment in at least three negative ones. :) Also, your example
"Oh, I hate character Y, can't stand him/her, useless waste of space, but your fic is okay by me anyway, so, congratulations!"
made me grin, until I started thinking what my reaction to it would be. Loud-mouthed as I am about being able to take criticism, in truth I'm still a bit of a wimp about it - which is also why I think I need the practice. Only this week I got a comment (on ff.net, which is weirder in any case since you don't know the commenters) that started with "Not a bad piece" and then went on to some generalisms, and the first half-hour afterward I was all like, "what the hell kind of a vague comment is that? Do you mean it's okay; or it's pretty bad but could be worse; or it's just not your thing; or you just have a weird way of saying you liked it?" So theory and practice: miles apart. *g* The two main rules I try to follow is: when it's a genre or pairing I'm not very fond of, I either don't comment at all, or I only judge the fic on technique and style; and whenever I do criticize, I try to make it as concrete as possible. As you say, "A's reaction here seems somewhat artificial to me" sounds like the good kind of comment to make.
I'm curious: is the "Hate character Y" remark one you got from personal experience?
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"Oh, I hate character Y, can't stand him/her, useless waste of space, but your fic is okay by me anyway, so, congratulations!"
made me grin, until I started thinking what my reaction to it would be. Loud-mouthed as I am about being able to take criticism, in truth I'm still a bit of a wimp about it - which is also why I think I need the practice. Only this week I got a comment (on ff.net, which is weirder in any case since you don't know the commenters) that started with "Not a bad piece" and then went on to some generalisms, and the first half-hour afterward I was all like, "what the hell kind of a vague comment is that? Do you mean it's okay; or it's pretty bad but could be worse; or it's just not your thing; or you just have a weird way of saying you liked it?" So theory and practice: miles apart. *g* The two main rules I try to follow is: when it's a genre or pairing I'm not very fond of, I either don't comment at all, or I only judge the fic on technique and style; and whenever I do criticize, I try to make it as concrete as possible. As you say, "A's reaction here seems somewhat artificial to me" sounds like the good kind of comment to make.
I'm curious: is the "Hate character Y" remark one you got from personal experience?