Feels different

Of course the site evolved over time. Years ago, imo, the site had less Kink stories. As the site changed I just previewed the new stories looking for tags and descriptions I liked. It’s not difficult. As someone who’s been on a couple sites that changed significantly I can attest that online forums never stay the same or if they do they tend to die off. Adaption is the key to survival.

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I’ve been running email lists since 1995. Perhaps the most frequent complaint is something like “It’s no longer as good as it used to be.” Part of this reflects the difference between the complainer’s initial discovery of the list and what happens after they’ve been on it a few years—where the routine of information becomes standard (even repetitive) and there is rarely anything that compares to the initial discovery.

Things change. People change. I look at my favorite stories and some of them don’t appeal to me anymore (even those I was crazy about when I first discovered them) and some of them appeal to me even more but for different reasons. Change - and how to adapt to it - is part of life.

I know I mention Proust way too much in this forum (he can be life-changing). Right now I’m thinking not the famous initial scene with the madeleine, but near the end with the bell, where the reader recognizes he’s treading over what he did at the outset but now everything is different because he is different (and of course the reader is different as well), and how that has given him greater insight into life.

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All these comments suggesting the change is normal and part of the kink growing, I’ll just point out MCStories.com has literally not changed a thing in over a decade and they still get a new batch of stories every week, many as traditional as the ones that were first there when it started. But let’s put a pin in that for now.

It’s not about the natural progression of the fetish or the community evolving its tastes. It’s just a matter of demographics.

The M4M hypno community is incredibly small in comparison to the wider audience. There are few writers creating for it, and fewer writers creating exclusively for it. That has always been true, but it’s increasingly apparent now because the site is no longer a place exclusively for that niche.

I agree, I find it sad and annoying to visit the front page of a site I used to frequent and see nothing but stories I have no interest in. But the fallacy is believing that if that content wasn’t there, that there would be MORE standard hypno stuff. That content is simply not being made. Without these other stories, you’d have a stagnant feed that sees a new story every few days. Which is how NCMC/Gayspiralstories used to be.

So for MCStories, a much bigger community with more active writers, the site gets fresh content all the time. It didn’t grow stagnant, and because it retained its purpose as a place for a specific niche, it didn’t get overrun by other kinks.

It sucks. It really sucks. But it’s ultimately a matter of what writers want to write about and that can’t be helped.

And as an aside, I agree it’s really very obnoxious how condescending people here can be when people voice their displeasure about this. It isn’t an attack on the site itself or anyone else’s kinks to voice sadness that something you like is vanishing, there’s no need for this defensiveness anytime someone brings it up.

I also really don’t like the subtle suggestion that there’s something wrong with people who have no interest in other kinks.

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First of all, I appreciate your honest and well-thought-through posting.

I understand what you’re getting at. And a part of me agrees. In the end, it’s a conflict of interest.

MCStories is not limited to gay stories like GSS is. So it’s natural that they see more input.

What I still don’t get from your posting is why you don’t just adapt GSS with the existing tools to be just the way you want it to be. Granted, selecting only a couple of GSS categories in the category filter will reduce the number of new stories shown to you considerably. But isn’t that exactly what you want?

I can’t change the fact that there are not so many new stories written that fit into your window of interest. It’s just the way it is. I want to attract more authors to the site, to cover more kinks. That also means that your kink will get more attention because more authors also mean more authors that might write a story about a kink that interests you.

You could argue that we’re pushing away classic hypno writers because they might not feel “home” on GSS any longer.

So, I ask the writers, do you think that that’s the case? Please be honest about it.

In the end, it’s a matter of turning GSS back to be exclusively “MC”-related by default (without the need for the user to click on “Pure” or to select categories himself). But then we’d lose a huge amount of readers which can’t be bothered to check out the other sites, even though they might be interested in the stories posted there.

Since we made that change, the number of reads, comments, and ratings for those stories skyrocketed, as well as the number of authors submitting such stories.

On one hand, that confirms your feeling. On the other hand, it’s exactly what I want. Therefore: Conflict of goals.

But since you can manually turn GSS into the way it used to be, I think I’ve done everything to please everyone. Don’t you agree?

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This is a small thing, but I find it a bit weird that a transformation story fits under GaySpiralStories and not GayKinky. There have been a few stories where i get to the end and i’m not sure what to rate them on Mind Control, because they don’t have mind control, but a 0.5 isn’t fair. I just don’t rate mind control on those ones of course.

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That’s a historical thing, as TF stories were always a big part of GSS, even before I took over and even on NCMC.

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I rate the “mind control” rating according to the quality of the transformation.

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That’s exactly how this rating category is meant to be used. The brain rating covers all reality or mind-altering aspects, including any transformation of people - which usually also include some effects on their mind as well, after all.

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I think you’ve done a tremendous job Martin. You’ve balanced natural evolution of new ideas and kinks with classic Hypno. You’ve made separate story areas to meet the demand of more selective writers and readers while keeping them also linked to the main site. People can even search for what they want using tags. That’s great. I dislike having to scroll through long lists of stories with only the titles as a guide. With the search feature I’ve found some awesome stories I didn’t know about. I think you’re about as fair and open as a site owner can be. You care about your authors and readers. That is a rare and special thing. You’re doing your best. I trust you. CF

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Stimmt!

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The word “Curse” in Narcissus Cursed Men Collection seems to be enclosing transformation, yes :slight_smile: It’s funny how things seems to be inherited to the point it is easy to lose track.

I agree! I’ve found myself reading things I didn’t think I would and it’s partially thanks to this changes. And when I’m in the mood for reading only MC, I hit pure and get rid of the rest. I also use the search engine to find specific tags. So I feel I’ve got plenty of options to find what I’m looking for. To me this changes in the site have not been a problem so far :smiley:

I can’t say about the effect on authors, though, since I don’t upload stories much often and I tend to write regardless of what’s been uploaded before.

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Tangential question: Although I read it for years, I never understood the name “Narcissus Cursed Men Collection.” Narcissus fell in love with himself; is that saying that these stories are about masturbation? And what’s the curse? Can anyone explain that title?

No I actually can’t. I’ve asked myself that very same question many times. Maybe anyone else can answer that?

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I always assumed it was a backronym, where the words are chosen in order to fit the initials. NC and MC had been used for years as story codes to indicate Non-Consensual and Mind Control, so Narcissus Cursed Men Collection is a clever way to wink at a site full of NC and MC stories.

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My guess is that the men who were changed were self-centered and therefore narcissists. They bought on their own punishment and were cursed to transform. It’s a different twist on the Narcissus story. Their own arrogance sealed their fate like Narcissus’ obsession with himself caused his demise.

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I completely agree. I leave ratings on the stories I love or whose kinks engage with mine, or if something is particularly well written even though it doesn’t necessarily engage with my kinks. I absolutely do not leave low ratings just because I don’t like the kinks. Martin has made it very, very easy to determine if you aren’t going to be engaged with a story with tags, highlighted icons, filters, and so much more. It’s honestly better than some professional for-pay sites out there.

(I will say that while I am generous with the hotness, wankability (heh), and MC icons, I will ruthlessly crush the hopes and dreams of anyone who doesn’t bother editing their story or gives zero fucks about the rudiments of cause and effect, unless of course the story is about fucking with cause and effect. Writing Style and Idea get brutally truthful ratings from me, and I don’t apologize for that)

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Only better than “some”?! :grimacing:

Just kidding :blush:
But please let me know if you miss anything!

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You could argue that we’re pushing away classic hypno writers because they might not feel “home” on GSS any longer.

So, I ask the writers, do you think that that’s the case? Please be honest about it.

I feel the opposite. I can write hypno and it’s welcome. I also don’t need to worry if I’m in the mood to write something else (with or without hypno elements as a back seat to other kinks) knowing I have a great place to post it.

That’s pretty much the answer so you can stop reading now.

But, to expand:

I think it’s the best of both worlds. You’ve added so much customisation over your time at the helm that it’s so easy to curate one’s own preferences no matter how broad or narrow those may be.

I love a good mind control story but I also appreciate the branching out of tales that I’ve gotten to experience from some very talented writers.

As a reader, I’m always excited to see new stories and they can even be a more-than-once a day occurrence in my time zone.

Even if the tags aren’t what I’m looking for, the fact the site has so many authors contributing is a wonderful thing.

I look in on MCStories but while it has content, I only want M/M content and that seems to be 0-3 stories per week at most. This week was 0.

GSS/GKS is my go-to site. The interface with synopses and tags makes the reading experience perfect for me. It’s effortless and no other site compares for me.

While I understand if you’re only looking for that type of story (and one site’s name is, yes, specifically spiral, I concede) there are ways to do that so whoever wants that experience can enjoy the site their way.

I don’t see the benefit in gatekeeping the content so everyone else with more flexible tastes or definitions can’t enjoy their experience as well.

bak2jak2 has an excellent point that the only thing that gatekeeping guarantees is that when there’s postings they’ll be more likely what you want. It doesn’t guarantee the frequency of those postings.

As a writer, I have an idea and I want to write and post about it. If this site restricted me so I had to write the kinks in a particular way, well, I think I’d just have to post elsewhere or not write after all instead of trying to shoe-horn my story into that checkbox.

My concern would be that that damages creativity and engagement. If GSS did that then when I DID write something that would fit, I may just stick to wherever I’ve been posting until now that accepted my other ideas and not bother seeking out the exclusive fenced off site as it would be out of my posting routine anyway.

The purists may still be waiting 2 months for a story that matches their tastes to be posted but in the mean time, whatever other percentage of readers have had a deluge of varied content to enjoy that said purists can elect not to be bothered by.

Everybody wins in the current system.

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I second a lot of what you’ve said, Evan. Not just MCstories but ReadOnlyMind are largely catering to the female subject. Doesn’t mean that they don’t have good stories, just that you have to go looking for a story that male-centered. Even the mind control literature group on Discord also leans towards female stories. I asked for some advice about writing male-centered stories and got crickets in return. GSS really is the only place out there for this kind of fiction and the community of authors who produce it. I enjoy engaging with the readers of my stories and the authors of the stories I read and like. There’s nothing like GSS out there.

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I feel as though there’s an ebb and flow in the kinds of stories that present from time to time. While there are many stories I’m not particularly interested in, there are more than enough that keep my fetish satiated and even when there is a dry-spell of stories that I want to read, I go back and read my favorites over and over again.

So, I guess for me, regardless of what stories will appear, I’m sticking it out here on GSS. The community we’ve created and cultivated here is a great group of people. The number of amazing interactions I’ve had relating to both the stories I’ve appreciated and the stories I’ve written are quite important to me. I’ll be continuing to post all the stories I create here…and hopefully they continue to resonate with the audience here. Endless thanks to Martin for keeping this community flourishing through all the changes.

Eager to continue adding to the sexy stories here with my colleagues <3

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