Now, I admit, this isn't a super high priority idea, but, I think it would be fairly easy to do, and useful enough to be worth suggesting. At present, the default category for a story is BDSM because it's the first alphabetically. This is a problem because I see a lot of stories which aren't BDSM categorized that way when first published... Now that alone is a good reason to add the "Anything" category, but there's another one too, in that, a lot of stories fit it better than most other categories. There are many stories that are basically a 'stone soup' pot of fetishes, with some threads including elements from EVERY other category. Reclassifying them as "Anything" would make that status clear... Further Suggestions/Comments?
For this purpose, I would rather offer an empty default in the categories list, leading to an error if someone doesn't choose a category. Isn't the miscellaneous category equally fitting for that?
This would solve that part of the problem, yes, but see below. That's how it's presently being used a lot of the time: but, I feel that's not quite what it's really meant for. The misc category, to my mind, should be for those things that defy the conventional categorization cases we have thus far, such as, for example, a CHYOA erotic poem, or a Gaslamp Fantasy story. It's where you file all the special little snowflakes that won't pigeonhole ANYWHERE. "Anything", by contrast, is for the kitchen sink stories, that are like "BDSM? Incest? Aliens? Wizards? Inceastous Dominatrix Alien Wizards? Come on in!!!" See the difference?
I need a bit of convincing. If a story stradles two or three catagories I think it would be better to put it in the catagory closest to the core of the story. If it is a story that "promises" you can do anything, there is still a unifying premise to all the treads: fan fiction, mind control, fantasy.
Why? Do you have an actual logical argument against this concept, or is that just a reactionary "NOPE!"?
BOTH! Why create new categories that lump subjects together when it would be better to select multiple categories such as incest, interracial, and alien in the future. It would be far clearer to the reader what subject material is being pushed by the writer. Misc and anything would be far more confusing for a reader looking for a unique subject.
Yep, that's actually a very good point. My basic idea here was to have the whole "Anything" area be a stopgap to buy time for the full re-org: but, there's this saying that should have come to mind earlier: "Noting is as permanent as a temporary solution."
