What we dread the most besides our object of fangirlism dying in the book: Spoilers!

[author_by_night]

(Yet another HP related post. I'm sorry, non-Harry Potter guys; I love you. I promise when Jean Auel actually finishes her next book, or when there's a new Heroes episode... but for now, I have HP on the noggin.)

That said...

On Sugar Quill, there is a thread I feel is rather brilliant on avoiding spoilers and spoiling people. However, being the writer I am, I couldn't reply with something that would merit a post - that would require shutting up. ;) 

Feel free to add on; these are just my general opinions on how to avoid spoilers and spoiling.


Avoiding Spoilers and Spoiling

The best way to do this? Don't assume. Some of you will know the saying they have for the word "assume"; whether or not you do, it is safe to say that assumptions can ruin everything, and that's usually where the trouble begins.

So, never assume that: 

- People will just scroll past uncut LJ posts. If you don't know how to make a cut for LJ, find out before July 21st. People won't always do that - I got a friend very pissed off at me after OoTP because I was new to LJ, didn't make a cut, and spoiled her. I don't know why she didn't scroll past - maybe she assumed there'd be a cut, or maybe her computer was slow and she accidentally saw. That's not the point... the point is, she didn't scroll past, and I may have ruined the entire book for her. Yikes, right?

- People will realize/care that they might spoil someone. People can be unaware that they are acting as walking spoilers - look at the scenario I cited above. And some simply don't care. So when checking the HP portion of your flist, and/or messageboards, and/or anything else fandom related, proceed with utmost caution. Whether they're trying to be cruel or just don't realize what they're doing, people will post threads that are seemingly spoiler free but have every spoiler in the first sentence. 

And if possible? Avoid anything related to spoilers. That'll make it easier. But... see the next point.

-People will avoid fandom places until they've finished. It seems obvious that people should just not go to forums until reading the book, but that's not an option for everyone. Time zones are different, for one - Ida Spoyler from London may have finished her book at 2 PM her time, but Lemi Finich from New York might be reading the boards she moderates or her flist before work at 9 AM her time, unable to read the book until midnight UK time - only seven in the evening hers.

Not to mention that everyone reads at different rates, has different time flexibility, etc. 

Again, it's still wise to avoid fandom places until every single word has been read,  but that's not always an option for whatever reason. 

 -People won't pick up on hints. Hints are very, very bad, because unless you're hinting to someone who doesn't know you, or being very vague about it? They're easy enough to decode. Don't tell someone it's "too bad Ship X never happened" in a happy voice like I did with Remus/Tonks.

Of course, throwing your friends off completely can be fun when done right. Like when I told my non-fandom friend that Harry got with Draco in HBP, and she fell for it. Poor girl...

- Spoilers before the books are always fake. For some reason or another, there's somehow always leaks. Before book four, someone said Cedric Diggory died; I didn't even remember who the heck that was, but when we saw him in book four? Yep. So don't read "I know who dies!!" threads. Really.

- Someone actually wants to be spoiled. I've worded things wrong before and been spoiled; I've also almost spoiled people because I misunderstood them. Always ask "are you sure you want to know more?"

- Your friends have the same idea of what'll happen. It may seem obvious to you that Voldemort is defeated, but that might be an actual spoiler to some people. 

And that's pretty much all I have for now. Anyone else?

Comments

[valerie-valerah.livejournal.com]

Hmm, that seems like a pretty complete list to me.

"Ida Spoyler" and "Lemi Finich" made me el oh el. Siriusly :P

[julibeth.livejournal.com]

Very nice meta, hon! and you made great points here. When dealing with spoilers, you really can't assume anything.

[nore-fortuna.livejournal.com]

Can I say as a mod, I hate new material.. because you always have some numskull that forgets about the black-out spoiler tags thus the moderators get spoiled and that sucks.

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

Yikes. Yeah, that must be rough...

What are you the mod of, out of curiosity? Was not aware you were one.

[nore-fortuna.livejournal.com]

The Basilisk Cafe (http://www.thebasiliskcafe.net/) (a Tom Riddle fansite), The Mirror of Erised (http://erised.thebasiliskcafe.net/) (a H/G fansite), and MDMFans/Fiction Archive (http://mina.sapphireisle.org/) (Mina de Malfois fansites)

I have moderated a lot of small fansites... those are my current ones. =)

[dudley-doright.livejournal.com]

your icon makes me happy =)

Here via the Daily Snitch

[gmth.livejournal.com]

Here's another one for your list: Don't assume that if you say you want to remain unspoiled, people will respect that. Before the launch of HBP I had posted something about not wanting to be spoiled, and someone on my f-list posted a comment to that very post that contained a spoiler. It was a tiny, minor one, but a spoiler nonetheless. So yeah, I learned.

Re: Here via the Daily Snitch

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

Good point. I'm not too worried about anyone on my flist, but trolls, certainly.

Here via the Snitch

[lyras.livejournal.com]

All good tips - thank you! I hope this post gets widely read; I'll be linking to it when I next post to my LJ, if that's all right with you?

Re: Here via the Snitch

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

Oh, sure - thank you! I definitely like to think I have stuff that'll help people, and the comments have terrific stuff too. So yeah.

Re: Here via the Snitch

[lyras.livejournal.com]

Just in case you're interested, I posted a couple of weeks ago about ways to minimise your chances of being spoiled using LJ's friending, message notification and friends filtering features. It's here.

I didn't link to it originally because your post is more about unintentional spoilers than malicious spoiler trolls, but maybe there's some stuff there that might be useful to you/others. :)

Re: Here via the Snitch

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

Well, there definitely are malicious spoiler trolls to - I've encountered them, in this fandom and, more recently, in Heroes fandom. (Well, actually, in some of those cases I couldn't tell if the posters were just clueless or trolls. The forum for Heroes that I go to doesn't exactly have a large population of members who understand netiquette or posess great maturity.)

I probably will find a way to filter my comms, because I do belong to some that have spoilery potential. And definitely no site visiting. Because when I was thinking about that, I realized two sites and a few groups I belong to are extremely ship-specific. So if a character of one of the site's Chosen Ship dies? Yep. (Or if that ship stops being canon for other reasons, but that better not happen!)

[aidenfire]

Also--might be overdoing it for some, but if you really don't want to spoiled, turn off your friends notifications (what if someone friends you with a name like harrydies or something?). Turn off non-friend comments.

Absolutely don't watch communities that don't have BOTH moderated submissions and mods you trust, even non hp comms. I got spoiled for HBP--the big one--from randomthought.

[aidenfire]

(for the record, the lj name isn't a spoiler, I was just making that up out of my head)

[author-by-night.livejournal.com]

I think the name thing is a bit harder to avoid, just because you might still see it on someone elses's flist. But yes, gotta be careful with comms - put them under filters.