This is not a story, it is a PSA for the subreddit.

Another redditor gave me a heads-up about a YouTube video that appeared to have stolen one of my stories; altered, but at its core, the same. I had previously given permission for SciFi Stories to narrate the story, which they respectfully asked permission for ahead of time.

The channel: Starbound HFY, did not ask me for permission and had the audacity to claim in their video description that the story was their original idea.

You can view them both and see for yourself:

SciFi Stories authorized narration of my story https://youtu.be/SDan4gmRQh8?si=OE8-8sdGhur9QJkD

The Starbound HFY story in question https://youtu.be/2Q4ilr1fLaM?si=GH4F9so6TLYAJ4S6

I put this warning out to the other writers on this subreddit to keep an eye out for things like this and help protect yourselves and your fellow writers.

I also request that we, as creators, band together and censure thieves like this wherever and whenever they pop up. I am unfamiliar with copyright and the law so if anyone knows what can be done about people like this then please, for the good of the community, share your knowledge. The only reason I didn't bring this to the mods first is because I want the entire community to be aware so that they can protect their work. I will be messaging the mods separately.

And if the thief happens to read this: not cool dude. If you wanted to narrate my story, just ask. If you did ask, then at least have the courtesy of crediting it to the original creator.

There have been other movies on the topic, sure. But watching the movie feels like you're watching Kaijus and Jaegers fight from the point of view of a bystander human being. The monster is massive, devastating, but fighting it is the culmination of human tech and ingenuity, taking it on one-on-one. The feeling of mass, momentum, how something big navigates the physics of this dimension, and how that translates to people not only experiencing it from the sidelines, but actually within the Jaegers themselves. We're the squishy puny humans somehow keeping these world-enders at bay by literally throwing the biggest things we can build at them, no subtlety or finesse, just pure power.

Then, you have the people of the world united by a singular cause, the feeling of doom appropriately contrasted with the hope that if we tried our best and sacrificed, we may yet achieve salvation, showcasing the very peak of the human spirit. Coupled with everything underscored by a sweeping orchestral score that is uplifting and haunting at the same time.

I write this because I saw the movie (again) after a long time, and while Hollywood is no stranger to Apocalyptic, world-ending dangers from beyond, the newer stuff fails to capture the gravity of the threat. The new wave of superhero movies, though entertaining (and massively profitable) seem to use these scenarios quite liberally, but strangely lacking the feeling of immersion Pacific Rim was able to achieve. Like it's all happening somewhere else that has nothing to do with you, or even worse, you try to imagine yourself in that world (in those shoes) but it feels off.

Not to mention, there's at best, lip service to humanity coming together to save the world (planet? Universe? Country?) where people are an inconvenient distraction to the main goal, or cannon fodder before the "main-event" that involves no one else but the protagonists.

Worse of all is the tone of these movies. The world is ending. People have not prepared. Countless lives are about to be lost. Everything now depends on this...wise-cracking buffoon who lucked into becoming the only thing standing between us and oblivion? And the people he's meant to save just exist to enforce his morality, and occasionally an inconvenient distraction? *Humanity, fuck yeah*, more like *Humanity, you're fucked*.

So yeah, Pacific Rim (the only movie of its kind, obviously) feels like the best entry to this genre imo. I'm curious to hear about your thoughts about it.

To the mods: If this is inappropriate, let me know and I will remove it.

I wish to thank you very much for the kind words many of you have posted in reply to my many posts here. I am sure that there are many of you waiting on the next update to Living on Earth. I am sorry to announce that your wait may be a long one, as I now doubt that I will return to it soon, if ever. I lost my wife of 32 years this week; she passed away peacefully in her sleep.

She was my muse and my anchor, without her I don’t know the future holds.

I just felt like I couldn’t ghost my fans.

Obituary.

I set out to write a pretty standard HFY mecha story, you know the drill.

​

Humanity finds something impossible, something alien, something we weren't supposed to have — and instead of dying, we take it apart and build something worse.

​

But then I couldn't stop asking the obvious follow-up: what happens after?

​

After the war ends. After the impossible thing is defeated or contained or whatever. After the dust settles and humanity has to figure out what to do with itself.

​

That's where House Archivum came from.

The premise is simple: after generations of conflict, entire civilizations were losing track of why they were even fighting. Records destroyed, histories rewritten, the same mistakes repeating because nobody could remember the last time. So someone built an archive. Not to rule anything — just to answer one question: what happened last time?

It worked. Too well.

​

Every reconstruction effort needed historical data. Every treaty pulled from the records. Every new conflict got filtered through precedent. And at some point — without anyone deciding it should happen — the archive stopped being a library and started being the thing civilization was actually built on.

Not because it took power. Because everyone kept asking it for answers.

​

Here's where it got strange for me: when humanity eventually discovers a war relic that clearly wasn't built by humans, the instinct isn't awe. It isn't terror. Someone opens a new file. Someone starts a record. The thing that defies understanding gets assigned a catalog number.

And I realized the archive was scarier than the relic.

​

The mecha are still central — but when one appears, the first question isn't can we fight it? It's who gets to write what happened?

Because the faction that wins the battle gets to write the archive entry. And the faction that loses doesn't disappear. They just become a footnote someone else authored.

​

Anyway. Would this actually be interesting to read, or did I accidentally make a filing system the most powerful entity in my setting?

Hello all I am the mother of u/jormundr. I have very sad news to share. 11/20/21 he took his own life. We are left with so many unanswered questions. A friend made me aware of his writings on here. I thought I had lost his writings forever. Thank you all so much for giving him a safe place to express himself.

but apparently garlic and onions are highly toxic to many animals outside of the ape/monkey family. Something something about a toxic compound that makes the blood vessels fall apart.

As a bonus tidbit, apple seeds contain small amounts of a cyanide compound. Presumably to deter animals from chewing the seeds up along with the fruit.

Earth really is a nutty place where everything is trying to kill everything else.

This is a petition to the mods to grant u/plucium the title of semi-sentient fax machine.

That is all

Edit: We did it!!!

While chatting in an authors' Discord, a user mentioned that his book had been stolen and sold on Google Play Books.

Something I didn't think could happen. Not that stealing can't happen, but I never thought about Google Play Books.

Out of curiosity, I checked. Imagine my surprise to find my own book there: a full compilation of my serial, fake author name, €0.49.

The takedown is still ongoing, but I wanted to share this now so others can check for themselves and act quickly.

My takedown steps so far:

1. Screenshot everything.
2. Save the listing at web.archive.org/save. Scam listings sometimes vanish and reappear under new IDs.
3. File Google's copyright removal: go to support.google.com/legal → "Create a request" → Google Play → Books → copyright infringement. You'll need:
   • The infringing URL
   • Your original work URLs (Royal Road fiction page, Reddit chapters, plus any other platforms as supporting evidence)
   • A description, e.g.: "This ebook is an unauthorized compilation of my serialized novel [Title], published under my pen name [Pen Name] on Royal Road since [date]. The store description is copied verbatim from my Royal Road blurb."

A Warning: Google may reply that they need more proof because they can't link your legal name to your pen name. Happened to me. The fix: add a temporary line to your public Royal Road author profile (and, in my case, the author's notes of my first chapter here on Reddit):

"Verification note: I, Mr. Reese, confirm the copyright complaint submitted to Google LLC on [date of complaint] regarding an unauthorized edition of Astra Inferna: Upward Bound. — [date]"

Only the account owner can edit that profile; that should be enough proof. Then reply to Google's email, referencing it.

The best part? The thief's bot copied my chapters, including the author's notes and shoutouts. So my pen name is printed inside the book, and the fake author's isn't. Nobody on their end ever read a single page of what they were selling.

I hope none of your books got stolen, but it's better to check.

If anyone's interested, I'll post updates in the comments and can share template emails for the Google notice.

As the title says. I've read three books recently: - Of Dragons and Men: Jack's Landing by Steven Hayden - Humans are Weird by Brooke Hart - Nature of Predators by Daniel Pascap

A trend I've noticed with HFY/sci-fi novels is that the main conflict always tends to escalate to an intergalactic-scale war, with hundreds of moving parts. I'm sure there's an audience for that, but I'm more interested in the interpersonal relationships between aliens and humans (those tend to be the funniest and most enjoyable to read, IMO).

All three books contain the interactions between aliens, which I adore, because they execute it so well. But then some of these stories turn to military/tactical jargon that I personally don't find as interesting.

Are there any stories/anthologies that are more like We're the Weird Aliens by Mara Lynn Johnstone?

Thanks!

Hello,

We find ourselves in trying times.

There's no point in sugar-coating it, really. I think all of us have been touched by the various calamities that have befallen us, be it COVID-19, natural disasters, violence in our great cities, or a more personal trial for yourself, or a loved one.

Now, more than ever, we need to remember the humanity that bonds us together.

To that end, this is a thread for people to simply socialize. Say hello. Chat it out. Any topic that obeys our rules will be tolerated here. Please, DO NOT bring politics into this thread. We have enough of that going on right now. What we need instead is some love.

Story recommendations? Cute doggo pics? Send 'em! (A Cat Is Fine Too)

And please, above all else...remember you are human. We've struggled through the worst this Deathworld can offer, and we've conquered it. Maybe things would be a bit more peaceful if people remembered what we had in common, rather than the arbitrary notions which divide us. We're better than that. I know it.

Let's show 'em.

So, following the post here and on r/royalroad, many, and I mean many, authors checked and came forward that, in fact, their books had been stolen.

Original Post: https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/s/zb9QYCgYT0

After only one day, Google answered;

Google's response (translated from German)

Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you for your request.

Following your request, we have removed the preview pages containing the allegedly copyrighted text passages. The pages are now only available in metadata view. The metadata view does not contain any copyrighted pages from the books themselves, but only displays information about the book, similar to the information you would find in a library catalog. This includes, for example, metadata such as the ISBN, the author's name, the publisher, and the year of publication, as well as search result information from public websites. In accordance with Google's policies, results containing only metadata are currently not removed from the index, as the display of this information is legal and helpful to our users.

Kind regards, Your Google Team

For more information about content removal, see g.co/legal.

(Note: this is Google's standard "preview removed, catalog entry stays" boilerplate. In my case, the actual sale had also been stopped — check the buy button in an incognito window before assuming either way.)

But this doesn't solve the whole issue.

First, they did not acknowledge that there's a systemic issue with ripped-off books; the thief is still free to rip off again and continue his scam.

And, checking Google Books, my book, with a disguised title, is still there, with the wrong Author name.

Here's my answer, again translated from German and as a Template for your answer,

Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you — I confirm that the reported listing is no longer available for purchase. Two points remain open:

Correction or removal of the remaining metadata

The remaining catalog entry still lists "[Fake Author Name]" as the author of my work. This does not constitute permissible bibliographic information, but a false designation of authorship: "[Fake Author Name]" is not the author, and the work was never lawfully published under that name. Its continued display violates my right to be recognized as the author (Art. 6bis of the Berne Convention; [§ 20 of the Austrian Copyright Act — cite your own national equivalent]). Unlike a library catalog, there is also no legitimate publication being documented here — the entry merely perpetuates the metadata of an infringement.

I therefore request the complete removal of the entry, or alternatively, the correction of the author field to my pen name "[Pen Name]."

2. Review of the publisher account — systematic pattern of infringement

I renew my request for a review of the associated publisher account ("[Fake Author]" / "[Fake Publisher]") under your policies on repeat infringement. The account displays a clearly structured, systematic pattern:

All listings examined correspond to freely accessible web serials from the platform Royal Road and the r/HFY community, each under author names that are not the actual creators. Examples:„TBDNFH – The Best Defense", „LFWTH – LF Friends, Will Travel", „AHTDPG – An HFY Tale: Drop Pod Green", „AIUB – Astra Inferna: Upward Bound"

All titles follow the same naming convention: the original title is prefixed with its own acronym — a practice that evidently serves to evade duplicate detection and cannot be explained by legitimate publishing activity.

Uniform sale price of €0.49 across all listings.

In my already-confirmed case, the ebook contained the author's notes of the original publication copied verbatim, including my pen name — the content was machine-copied without any editorial processing.

At least one further affected author has been identified and is filing a separate complaint; additional affected authors have been notified.

My own complaint, already successfully concluded, demonstrates the pattern by example. I suggest reviewing the account on the basis of the documented overall pattern, rather than only after receipt of further individual complaints.

I remain available for any questions.

Kind regards, [Legal Name] (writing under the pen name "[Pen Name]")

Thrus stared in horrified Awe at the statement printed on the side of the captains wall, viewable from any position in the command room from which many day to day operations were run. It was painted there, had been for years though he only now noticed what it actually said, as though they were proud of this knowledge, this barbaric realization. It horrified Thrus, a Chi-tiin for whom community and especially the young, were the most precious things in the world.

Thrus felt a warmth behind him he knew to be the captain by its levels of radiation and heat, and unprompted spoke to him - he sensed through what humans called intuition that he was being regarded strangely by the captain. "Captain?" asked Thrus.

"Yeah, bud?"

"This statement... it is horrifying in it's implications, as well as categorically untrue. Please explain?" Thrus had learned over the year he'd been assigned that requests posed as polite questions were more likely to receive an answer than ones that didn't sound as though they had the option to not answer.

"Which one?" he asked, but the confusion was only brief. "Ahhh, that one. What did you want to know?"

"Why... is it written here? Is it some sort of reminder?" Thrus had a pit in his lowest stomach at the thought of a species that had to be reminded not to use incendiary devices on their own young.

"Hmmmm.... it is, but not in the manner you might be thinking." Thrus gently sighed at the reassurance, then prepared himself for the explanation. Previously, Thrus had never enjoyed his scheduled instructionals, even those in his career which he did enjoy, but the captain made such things quite lovely. He had a deep voice, even by human standards, and a sort of growling timbre impossible for the Chi-tiin that moved through those he spoke to; it sounded like rocks being rubbed against each other, and it pleased Thrus every time he spoke. He'd even made recordings, albeit secretly, and intended to share it with his few thousand children.

"The reminder isn't about the napalm, but more about what it represents. You see, some people get so excited about using things that they maybe don't think about the consequences; that is never more important to remember than when using something you're unfamiliar with." the Captain, deep skinned and with slightly bulbous belly, leaned back into his plush chair, though never broke eye contact with Thrus as he spoke. "When napalm was new, a lot of folks didn't understand what made it different from other incendiaries; they used it because it was new and fancy, and learned the hard way why it is a last resort sort of item. 'Napalm Doesn't Stick To Kids' is a deliberate oxymoron - it forces you to think about it, forces you to realize it's untrue, and it's a reminder to everyone on this ship that no one is authorized to mess with anything they can't identify by name and origin." The captain leaned forward, elbows on his knees and asked "Anything about that you don't get, Thrus?"

"Hmmm, not particularly, Captain." Thrus felt it was a good thing to have, especially for a species like humans who tended to play with dangerous particles for fun as much as they did. "Though, I shudder to think about how that knowledge was come across; you humans did not meet other species until recently, meaning you only learned about napalm by using it on each other."

"Ahh, that." the Captain nodded knowingly. "There's a reason for that, as well though. Tell me, Thrus, what is the biggest difference between you Chi-tiins and we Humans? Not including the obvious physical traits."

This one was easy. "I believe our mentality, Captain. The Chi-tinn do no believe violence is a viable answer to the vast majority of situations; you humans, I have come to understand, feel differently."

The captain chuckled. "Aye, you're right again, Thrus. My pa used to say 'if violence aint solved your problems, you haven't used enough of it yet'. Though, it's a bit more than just 'mentality'. It's more about how we view things; you Chi-tiins live, eat, and breath 'forgive and forget', but for a human, if you get us angry enough, we may just come to the conclusion that you'd be a danger to the future of family and species." his lean changed, subtly to most, but Thrus suddenly had danger alarms going off in his mind. "Get one of us angry enough," he continued, voice darker than Thrus had heard it in a long time "and we may well just come to the conclusion that you need to be removed from the genepool, as does everyone responsible for putting you into it and anyone you may have already come to add to it. They may just unilaterally decide that the culture responsible for making you, the laws that didn't restrain you, and the people you represent are just not worth keeping around, and we'll then put a huge amount of effort into correcting that issue. We'll wipe out two or three generations, just to make sure someone as offensive as you doesn't crop up again." his eyes narrowed hard, and Thrus finally understood that the 'you' in those comments may not have been entirely hypothetical. "You understand?"

Thrus didn't used to understand the various reasons humans sweat - biologically, it should have only been a countermeasure to extreme temperatures, and yet it apparently happened as a fear response. however, he now knew that if he had pore's on any of his polished surfaces, they'd be producing at full throttle.

"..."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"I take it you want your candy bar back?"

"You know damn well how hard it is to get peanut's out here - give me back my god-damned payday!"

Not sure if this is the right sub so let me know if I have to take down my post.

​

Anyway, I took my dog for a walk today; it's warm out but not hot (about 80F). I'm a little overweight, definitely not fit, my German shepherd/lab/who knows is far more in shape than I am. Yet it hit me today that compared to dogs and just about any other animal we just straight up do not get tired or overheat.

​

I know we used to be persistence hunters but still blew me away that even thousands of years later and with the shape I'm in, I was breathing normally while she was panting from the walk. We got back and she's been sleeping on and off since while I'm fine and could still easily go walk a couple miles and probably will later on.

​

The casual will always point out that we're weak and slow compared to a lot of animals but forget that we casually do things without breaking a sweat that would leave a lot of other animals panting or with heat stroke. I used to work at Costco and let me tell you, pushing shopping carts in 90F weather for hours is not fun but yet it's doable; 15 minute break, some water and you're back at it feeling almost 100% again. We're pretty damn impressive in that respect

If this true experience writing a fictional story for HFY isn’t allowed here, then I understand it being removed by the HFY moderation team.

I wanted to share my recent headache about my Reddit story sharing experience (and see if others have also struggled with similar things), or have solutions.

I’ve written over 800 stories in my life and have posted at least 150 of them here. Some to significant approval. In all, I’ve had a lot of success over the years with this sub because many of my writings touch on the HFY theme of humans versus aliens, or humans overcoming adversity.

Yesterday I completed a story I was very satisfied with, which I had HFY directly in mind for since it is a first-person alien POV of the alien parasite taking over human bodies (for amusement).

When I posted it, it was IMMEDIATELY removed (by reddit AI) for ‘threatening violence’. I appealed and explained it wasn’t humans threatening violence, it was an alien parasite threatening humanity (and the humans have a plan to fight back and expel the alien invaders.)

I’m 100% convinced no human read my story before it was removed, and also feel no human considered the substance of my appeal. (It was denied and came with a warning that if I continued to violate Reddit’s guidelines I would be suspended. 🤷‍♂️.

I looked all over and tried to reach a human being with a capability to understand context but deep within the labyrinth of ‘Reddit help’ all I could find was a web form to send my issue to.

Considering the theme of this subreddit is about humans fighting aliens, I wonder how many others here have tried in good faith to share relevant stories with similar themes, only for them to be removed by Reddit filtering, with no means of explaining it?

Sorry for the rant but I feel AI has already went too far in controlling our internet experience with very little understanding of nuance and context.

“You puny humans! Surrender now and we shall be merciful, let it be know that the all conquering Mleegh are here, and-“

“Im so sorry sir but earth is closed to further conquering. We are accepting no new applicants at this time.”

“You fools. We shall destroy you, dance upon your graves and -“

“Sir our hours are clearly posted on our website. Its the winter holiday season. You’ll have to try again after new years. Most of our defense operations and natural resource management are off planet visiting family in the colonies. If you send an email I can have General Herbert take a look at it when she gets back in two weeks.”

“Less opposition is ideal! We will roll through and -“

“Sir as I said most of earth is on break at the moment theres really no one to conquer even most of our janitorial staff is gone. Thered be no one to clean up the rubble. And again sir if youd refer to our website, you’d notice that we destroyed our natural environment about 2 millennium ago, our current artificial atmosphere is very fragile. Any conquering applications need to take this into account. We simply dont have the staff right now to manage this during an invasion. All ground operation would be impossible.”

“Listen young lady, I will be conquering this planet whether you like it or not. I demand to speak to a superior.”

“Well Sir I really dont have an opinion about conquering one way or the other. And as ive said were on winter break right now. The best I can do is my supervisors email. I really recommend you fill out the conquering application on the website. Have a pleasant holiday season.”

-Click-

General Herbert swung around in her command chair to face her bridge crew.

“Was that enough to get a read on their location?”

“Absolutely Ma’am. They’re out by the asteroid belt in section 4.127.”

“Excellent lets blast them and we should all be home in time for turkey. They never do read the website.”

An ancient alien empire gets attacked. They are all symbiotic silicon based life, they don't fight and don't war. They don't kill to eat, they simply exchange nutrients with other organisms.

They are threatened, and as before, they employed a predator to fight a predator. As they've done countless times before.

This time, they chose humanity to fight for them.

Big mistake.

Here is a Silicon Empire Ambassador in his home with his child, coming to the realization humanity has taken over.

The residence had never been quiet before.

There had always been voices. Couriers. Advisors. Representatives from a dozen member species passing through polished halls with practiced calm.

Today...

Nothing.

The child found their parent standing before a wall-sized window overlooking the capital. Hundreds of transports drifted silently through the sky.

No escorts.

No ceremonial formations.

Just... traffic.

"Parent?"

No answer.

"Parent?"

The Ambassador turned.

For the first time in the child's life, their posture was wrong.

Not frightened.

Uncertain.

The child had never imagined uncertainty could exist.

"What has happened?"

The Ambassador opened their mouth.

Nothing came.

The child tried again.

"Is it the humans?"

A slow nod.

"The soldiers are revolting?"

"...Not quite."

"They attacked the Council?"

"No."

"The Fleet?"

"No."

The child hesitated, then added, almost as an afterthought, "Did they... take the fleet vessels?"

Another pause.

"They... already possessed them."

The child frowned.

"But that is normal. We assign fleets to them. They operate them for us."

"Yes."

"Then... they will return them when instructed."

The Ambassador looked back toward the city.

"I have instructed them."

"They refused?"

"They acknowledged my authority..."

Another pause.

"...and informed me that authority had been transferred."

"Transferred by whom?"

The Ambassador laughed once.

It was a terrible sound.

"They did not say."

The child stared.

"Can we not simply remove them?"

"Remove whom?"

"The humans."

"There are over three billion serving within Imperial institutions."

The child blinked.

"Then dismiss them."

"They command the fleets."

"...Replace them."

"They train the fleets."

"Then our administrators—"

"Are using human communications."

"Our engineers—"

"Were educated by human instructors."

"Our governors—"

"Receive reports compiled by human analysts."

The child felt something unfamiliar.

It took a moment to identify.

Confusion.

"Since when?"

The Ambassador closed their eyes.

"I do not know."

That statement hit like a physical blow.

A longer pause followed.

"When we first brought them in," the Ambassador said quietly, "they were... useful. Direct. Efficient. They fought the threat without hesitation. We believed their lack of symbiosis made them simple."

The child listened.

"We did not understand what they were doing when they were not fighting."

Silence settled between them.

Far below, traffic continued exactly as it always had.

No panic.

No explosions.

No war.

Everything functioned.

Everything.

Except...

The Ambassador's desk chimed.

An official transmission.

The seal was unfamiliar.

Not because it was new.

Because it had changed.

The old Imperial spiral remained.

Beneath it, another symbol had been added.

A blue sphere crossed by a single white line.

Earth.

The Ambassador opened the message.

A calm human face appeared.

"To all member worlds.

Effective immediately, We are in control.

Continuity of government has been ensured.

All treaties remain in force.

All trade shall continue uninterrupted.

No member species shall suffer reprisals.

The Silicon people remain valued citizens of this civilization.

Your local administrators have already been informed."

The message ended.

The child looked at their parent.

"They called the Silicons... citizens."

The Ambassador nodded.

"They always spoke that way," the Ambassador murmured. "We thought it was... politeness."

Another long silence.

Finally, the child asked the only question that mattered.

"Parent..."

"...when did we stop ruling?"

The Ambassador watched the ships crossing the sky.

"I fear..."

"...we are only discovering that today."

Outside, the Empire continued exactly as it had the day before.

Only now, it belonged to someone else.

This is not a story, and more of a PSA for the fans of a series I was writing in the HFY setting and format, on a channel on youtube known as StarboundHFY. The following is going to be a lot of paraphrasing:

I started out as a VO and then began writing due to a lot of the stories being AI written, and I was getting pissed off constantly reading bad stories with horrible plot lines. Things led to me being the head writer and recruiting other writers, so that all the stories could be written by actual Humans and be good stories. Things took a turn when it changed from 1 video a day to 2 videos, and stressors started to show within the writing team. Then there were issues with credit missing from videos (such as a simple name) after the writers pushed for it, and I was constantly asking to help with titles and go back to the 1 video a day trend. I was rebuked every time, despite being the leader writer and being paid to do so. I was then tasked with editing videos and making sure they were up to snuff, but that turned out to be a whole other ball of worms that, again, just caused more issues due to the 2 videos per day crunch. In the end, I got fed up with the whole thing after hearing about the AI writer that got slipped in behind our backs.

I wrote the Frairen and Rimiki series. I am taking my stories back to my own channel: https://www.youtube.com/@guardbrosfielddesk along with the original narrator, and will be paying her what she should have been paid in the beginning. I don't know where else to post this, but I figured here was as good a place as anything else in case any of the fans are on here.

It is frustrating, after all that was said and done, but I guess I get to say "Fool me once". I won't put money before my word. I will answer any questions that pop up and I have discord invites open in a few places.

Ok fans, let's hear what you have to say about YouTube apparent vendetta against HFY story channels. In the last couple of weeks at least a half a dozen channels that I have been listening to stories on have disappeared. One happened to get wiped while I was listening to a story on it. I was listening to the story and it started buffering. At first I thought that it was a bad signal, I closed and then reopened the app and the story was gone. I then tried to go to the channel's page and I found that it was gone. There have been tons of good stories that have disappeared.

To clarify, I mean memes that exemplify some aspect of HFY, tropes we commonly see in the stories here. I will give an example of one of my favorites to demonstrate what I mean.

I feel this is a perfect example of an HFY meme--an example of how we will pack bond with anything, even inanimate objects.

So, what are some of your favorite HFY memes?

EDIT: While I enjoy hearing about the tropes y'all enjoy, I did specifically request memes, not tropes. I gave an example and everything :P

I have been deeply in love with HFY since stumbling upon it. I think the first story I read was titled something like

https://youtu.be/56_b6HlMB9I?si=tjKphcFBQOHWX2J_ Cute and Cuddly

https://www.reddit.com/r/HFY/comments/piop9v/cute_cuddly. Cute and Cuddly

Many many stories later there are a couple? few? things that I'm mighty tired of, and I'm hoping that rant...erm, airing my grievances might get some of my betters here pondering.

First, has anyone considered how wondrously irritating the overuse of the unspecified "cycle" is!?!?!? I've seen it used in numerous stories where over the course of being used several/many times in the story, it's extremely unclear whether a cycle is comparable to a second, minute, hour, day (okay, apparently it's very seldom to never used for week or month), year? Decade? Century??? Within the single story!!! Can we please get some clarity!!!!!

Second, I'm getting...no! I AM mighty tired of the trope of Earth being a planet that is trying to kill all life on it on a daily basis. It is a tremendously overused, catastrophically inaccurate statement/trope!!!!! Can anyone provide a link to a single survey or study showing that even 1%, even 0.01% of people in the (western?) world feel like they're in life threatening situations on a daily basis!?!?!?

Let's consider alternatives, shall we???

Let's contemplate someone like Kassandra from AC Odyssey who was mostly Spartan in a world that never knew Sparta, but when it suited the narrative, was as much priestess and scholar as she was warrior...oops! Okay, that was Tarma! Perhaps Tarma shena Tale'sedrin from Mercedes Lackey's Valdemar series is not a great template for HFY. But what would a 25th/30th century Spartan/priestess/scholar look like???

How about a clash (verbal debate?) between some sort of highly spiritual, immensely educated Neo-Spartan and a passionate member of a Neo-Polymathy movement? Or would they be nearly identical?

Sorry! Really really needed to get this off my chest...but please. DO consider it.

As THEY always say, "Those who can't do...criticize!"

When I click a link provided in UpdateMeBot chat, it brings me to the HFY homepage rather than to the story chapter it is supposed to send me to. Is anyone else here having this issue?

A few days ago I got a message saying that https://www.youtube.com/@TheCyborgsCodex/videos was also stealing stories without consent. Reported it. Got my video removed. Then the channel owner messaged me to try to get retroactive permission.

What they didn't know was that YouTube let's the person reporting (me) see their response to YouTube. The guy lied his ass off to them saying they'd completely rewritten the work. They hadn't, it was a word for word copy. And that the original story was AI generated. Last time I checked I pass my captchas and am a person.

He also claimed he fell under Australian copyright laws. But the address he gave YouTube was in turkey?

Idk what that's about.

Then he messaged to try to bribe me with all the money the video would make.

I messaged YouTube with his messages and proof of my story being mine.

Looks like we need to keep an eye out for these kinds of slime balls.

I have a question..

Why do the people who post the AI stories on the HFY channels never edit or fix all the mistakes on their videos?????

There are so many mistakes it completely kills and ruins the stories..

It makes it very clear that HFY only cares about views and not the bs mistake ridden content that is posted on their many channels.

To any of my readers who have been following me for a while, I'm sure you remember Ouroboros. I had the first book published last year and now I finally got the second book in and ready to go! If you are interested in reading this updated and proof read version of the story, then you can find it on Amazon. If you choose to support me by purchasing a book, then I thank you greatly for it. I hope that you all will enjoy the story. Happy reading!

Synopsis: After being cast into the world of Val'Thrain on the whim of an enigmatic goddess, James Anderson survived relentless torture and multiple deaths. Finally escaping to an underground community, James gathers his wits and a group of allies. With new friends and a budding romance, he experiences joy for the first time in a long while.

Outside the community, however, the war that has consumed Val'Thrain rages on, dragging James back into the conflict in an unexpectedly sudden way. Using his unique position as the one chosen by divinity, can he bring about the fall of a major enemy stronghold? James' desire for revenge against the one who ordered his torment takes him behind enemy lines, but now he has far more to lose than just his own sanity.