I'm amazed by the intense and quick responses to my previous (and first) blog.
For those that haven't read it, I complained about losing my Premier service after finishing a story I left unfinished more than 10 years ago. Reading it back, it's whinny, unclear, and the only reason I don't delete it is my firm belief that one's words have meaning, and should not be deleted, just corrected.
So, I have to issue an apology for the site's managers, and a clarification for everyone else.
I did lose my Premiere service when I finished my story. But it was mainly due to my own inaction, not due to any "punishment" coded into the site.
The system did automatically lowered my account tier. But have I contacted the administrators back then, they would have informed me I qualified as a "grandfather" (God, I feel old!) and restored my Premium service at once.
Instead, I did nothing. I assumed that things were the way they should. That my previous Premiere service was the mistake and that the system had just figure out I should't have it.
I thank you all for your amazing response. I didn't think so many people would read my blog, much less respond to it. And in reading your responses I realized I sent a message I didn't intend.
I love this site, and to the creators and administrator I have nothing but the utmost respect. It was my own believes and lack of communication that resulted in me venting unjust accusations. I'm sorry, and I will try to be more diligent from now on.
Tod
I had been a member of this site for many, many years. I was never an active member, I just read what I liked, and left a few comments here and there, along with a vote for stories I liked.
Back then, the site was much smaller. There were stories with a score of 10, and there were no age limits for the characters.
It was then that I published my first stories, just to see if I could. Those first ones were in Spanish, and over the years I managed to more or less translate them to English.
Then I went away for a few years, and when I returned I found the site had changed a lot. Now there was a much bigger difference between readers and authors, there were a lot of resources for authors and there were a lot, and I mean a lot more stories.
Also, there was a new "premiere" user tier. And apparently, since I had written some, I was automatically placed there. So I had access to all the new features, able to read premiere stories and chapters and create lists of favorites and such. I enjoyed this new site for a while, I found new authors I liked, and resumed lurking around.
Then, I decided it was time to give some more to the site. I had an unfinished story on my account, so I decided to finish it once and for all. A few months later the story was finished and I felt very accomplished as I followed the new instructions and published it, marking it "complete". It was a wonderful feeling.
Which, unfortunately, didn't last long. The next time I logged in to the site, I found weird things. My library wasn't loading, and when I tried to read some stories I couldn't.
It took me some digging to discover the problem. Apparently, since the premier membership had been created, the required story length for an author to automatically get it had changed. When it was first created, I had gotten it automatically, but upon publishing my new story, the system detected I didn't have the required length of text, and it kicked me out.
So, as a reward for finishing the story I left undo years ago, I lost all the premier benefits of the site. If I had known the result, I would have left my story unfinished forever.
Tod