ratherastory | Keeping track of fic (or not, as it happens)

God, but this is a huge fandom.

I keep stumbling across fics that I really want to read, but unless they're reasonably short (6,000 words or less), I don't always have time to read them on the spot. So I try to keep them in mind for a later date. Sometimes I come across a list of recommendations, and think "Cool! I should totally go through those at some point."

Alas for me, the list has now become far too unmanageable to keep in my head. Combine that with the list of fics I might want to re-read but don't necessarily want to put in my Rec Master Post, because while I enjoyed them they're not necessarily SO awesome that I think everyone should rush out and read them. I've already lost track of a bunch of stories that I read once, enjoyed, but didn't bother writing down anywhere.

All that together, and you get a very sad and disorganized camper.

So, flist, I appeal to you: how do YOU keep track of fic that you want to read? Do you bookmark it? Do you not bother keeping track?

I'm thinking of keeping some sort of Master List, maybe an Excel file, which lists stories by title, author, and brief summary. If I get extra ambitious, I might try to sort it by genre. I'm wondering, though, if this isn't the OCD/anal-retentive part of my personality coming to the fore.

Thoughts? Anyone? Bueller?

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Yup, I tend to bookmark as I go. Then either keep it as a bookmark or delete once I'm done. For ones I know I will never want to be without, I add them to my list on Delicious. And it's quite useful to bookmark Masterfic lists of favourite authors on Delicious. That way it's one entry, but with a lot of easy-to-find favourites.

I've got a crazy list of bookmarked fic. Some of it's WIP's and some of it's finished. I try to go through and read a few a week, but it's really gotten out of hand. I think a Master List would be out of the question for me, but I'm a disorganized mess and you seem to very much not be a disorganized mess!
"I'm wondering, though, if this isn't the OCD/anal-retentive part of my personality coming to the fore." And so what if it is? LOL. If you want a Master List (and it doesn't cut into your writing time!), you should have a list!

Let's see, I've gone through saving copies of the fic on my hard-drive, keeping links in a notepad file, emailing them to myself. . . .

These days, I use del.icio.us. Online bookmarking accessible from anywhere, FTW!

In truth? I don't keep track. Because of that, I run across stories all the time that seem really really familiar, and I don't know why until somewhere in the middle of the story I realize I've read it. Like, a year ago. It happened last night, actually. Maybe I should keep track too.

I haven't been doing this very much recently, but what I had been doing was this:

Anything I found worth reading - that is, written well enough or entertaining enough, not necessarily the best of the best - I rec'd over at spngenlove.

Of course, there have been a few stories I've read that aren't quite gen that I really liked, and that was the flaw in that plan.

Still, for a while it seemed like a pretty good system. Help others get to the good stuff, and if need be, I could peruse the spngenlove delicious list,.

I use delicious.com. It's easy and you can make tags to keep track of things you want to rec, things you want to reread someday, things you haven't read yet, etc. If you use firefox you can add a little gizmo that makes it super-easy to use, too, even right-clicking on links to save them to delicious. And I follow some prolific reccers, so it's basically like a non-stop rec machine. I find lots of awesome fics that way that I'd see otherwise.

Hrm. I may have to cave and sign up. Is there a way of backing up delicious lists in case the site ever goes tits-up?

Everything cuts into my writing time, alas!

I may cave in and go poking at that site after all. I've managed to resist thus far.

See, that's my problem. I find myself re-reading some of the shorter fictions that I'd forgotten because they really weren't that memorable. Then something occurs to me during the day, and I spend hours trying to find that *one fic* in which this particular scene happened, and I can't post questions to

spnstoryfinders every time that happens, because the moderators would boot me for spamming the comm. ;)

There is that, but I've been finding more and more fics that aren't really gen. that I'd like to keep track of.

Besides, I don't really have the kind of time and energy that would allow me to be a full-time reccer on a community.

A lot of people are recommending "delicious," and I may give in and join the Dark Side.

I'm starting to think I may join the Dark Side, now that so many people have recommended "delicious" in one way or another.

Thanks!

*waves* Another delicious user. I tend to go trolling for fic and then add it in large amounts to my delicious account with a to read tag. As I read them, I either delete or mark them as a favorite if it's one that I just love to pieces.

If it does go sunny side up, well, I'd be screwed and lose them all. But, it's a division of yahoo, so I can't imagine that it would just poo itself and vanish. Here's hoping.

Okay, okay, I give up! Uncle! I will check it out when I get home tonight. :)

It's far less insidious than Facebook from what I can tell, and you can lock down your bookmarks so no one else can see them.

I've found it terribly useful.

I do have a Facebook account for my friends who refuse to communicate in any other fashion, but FB bores me to tears.

I am getting recommendations for it right, left and center, so I think I'll sign up when I get home tonight. Then I can bookmark to my geeky heart's delight!

And tag them and organize them! And I think there are widgets to sync your del.icio.us bookmarks with browser bookmarks, too. . . .

I have a pact with my best friend's husband to never join Facebook.

Hee!

I joined up back in 2007 before I knew any better. :P

Oooh: widgets!

I tend to bookmark on my toolbar if I've started but don't have time to finish, or if I'm interested but don't have time to read it right now. I do that with rec lists, too, if I haven't gone through them yet. And I add to my memories the fic that I might want to read again. I have separate tags in my memories for ones I LOVED, as opposed to the ones that were not favorites but I'd probably like to read again. :)

I'm thinking "delicious" at this point, because it means I'll be able to access it from multiple places. :)

Oh, yes! I love when other people do that because it's so easy to navigate. I think I want one, I just haven't gotten around to signing up yet.

Also, I love your icon :)

I use my memories feature and Firefox Speed Dial and I have more tabs open than I can count. Once in a while I'll read something and save the story or close the tab - depending on whether I want to remember it or not. But the tabs keep multiplying. It's a disease!
So not organized nor helpful. Sorry.

It's owned by Yahoo and it's hugely popular and I doubt Yahoo would ever want to commit a commercial suicide by going offline with delicious without giving people a fair warning time first.

Also, if there's no other way to back-up (I haven't explored the options), you can return to the basics and just regularly save the bookmarks' page as an html file on your computer. You can view as much as 100 bookmarks on one page, so even if you have a huge collection of a thousand links or the like, you will only need to save ten pages.

Excel file :DDD

I use my delicious... I can organize it then with tags. If I haven't read a fic I'll just tag it .toread and maybe a few general things... if I don't have time to tag it I'll tag a fic I've read .addtobm.

http://delicious.com/surevesta

I have one bookmark folder entitled "Fanfiction" and one entitled "To Read" - of course, I just keep adding things and forget to get rid of ones I'm done with in the latter folder o_o But the attempt is there!

Keeping track of fic (or not, as it happens)

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