starwatcher: Western windmill, clouds in background, trees around base. (Default)
StarWatcher ([personal profile] starwatcher) wrote in [personal profile] briarwood 2009-01-28 05:16 pm (UTC)

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Good points -- and it takes practice for beta and author to work well together. Once I know I won't offend the author, I'll make more nit-picky suggestions, if they're needed. In the beginning, I might let a word slide because it's 'good enough'; later, I'll offer an alternative that I think would more clearly/elegantly express her intention.

That said -- just because the author thanks her beta, it doesn't mean that she took ALL of the beta's suggestions. If the author said, "Thanks for the suggestion, but canon doesn't really matter and this is the way I want to write him," but fixed a few spelling errors that the beta pointed out, she'll feel she should thank her beta, without realizing that her story looks only 'half-beta'd' to the reader.

Of course, different people have different strengths in the beta process, and some things can slip through even the most carefully-beta'd story. But I no longer have an automatic reaction of, "Boy, she needs a better beta!" because it takes two to tango.
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