For example, if you're writing a part where mc reads a forum post on a phone or whatnot, how do you make it flow better? clarity: my mc is reading a Q&A thingy right now, how do i make it so its not just 'Q: blahblahblah' 'A: blahblahblah' Or is this inherently a bad method of infodump? Should I not write the specifics of the forums, and have the mc just summarize the things that's on there?
You need to insert some stupid filler comments and make it kinda funny (or something else) since you only need create a certain atmosphere
What I noticed is usually they will put funny weird username like ILikePotato: hey hey do u know... MyCatFellFromRoof: what ILikePotato: that potato is actually a fruit??!! Then there's going to be a additional commenter between the two main conversations WhataNonsense: Commenter above, read my username. MC also found the comments are ridiculous, so he skims through until he found what he's looking for. After this maybe you could put the info dump? At the start since it is a forum you could put title and maybe hashtag? Title: Potato is actually a fruit #Controversy#Whodoesn'tlikePotato#PotatoRocks Usually I found this kind of style in other novels lolol
You can pick usernames from here for random yet believable ones. If you dont go the summary route. Although what ppl above described is a chat room style. On forums ppl stay on topic. Chat rooms more random with multiple things going on.
I haven't seen a Forum Style Comments Section truly used overly much, with most authors mostly using Chat Room Style Conversation, even if the chat room in question tends to be on a forum. The difference is simple, like Little Evil says, Forums have a narrowly set topic that people mostly stick to, while Chat Rooms may have a broad topic that people regularly deviate from. If you are planning on focusing on set thing/s for an entire chapter, and how the interested general public is reacting to that thing/s, then Forum Style Comment Section can be the way to go, just so long as you ensure that you change forum pages when you change conversations. If you are planning on just viewing how the interested general public is acting to a more general situation, then a Chat Room Style Conversation is better. And I would consider something like "Reaction to Released Developer Notes About 10+ Upcoming Features" to be closer to a Chat Room over a Forum Comments Section. Because it's more like a Youtube Comments Section, and people often seem to say whatever they want without thinking that anyone would ever read what they said there, particularly on popular pages. As for it being useful as an info dump... Info Dumps themselves are things you should try to avoid. Information is better given out in portions, and entering it in chapters that you just know that numerous readers are going to actively skip, because there most certainly will be people who skip forum chapters, is a good way to ensure that many people never learn about it until you blindside them with the information that's relevant to your MC that you hid in that chapter later on.
Given its the internet some flame also doesn't hurt. Given the example someone may recommend the op to eat a potato fruit salad. Granted that this should get you banned on anything that isn't telegram or parler...
hmm...explore shf for research purposes! ahahaha...you'll totally not delay writing... on scribblehub forum... - you have people answer mid size convos like bit thought out reasons/suggestions and sometimes with provided links - you have people spam messages on forum. either attention, just for fun, or grinding for stuff - you have people respond op serious question threads with a joke or troll response - you have debates and arguments. maybe name calling will occur. maybe few messages in a small or few paragraphs spaced out by some one or two sentence comment on a thread.
Ask on https://www.reddit.com/r/WormFanfic/ or https://www.reddit.com/r/Fanfiction/ because a popular feature of Worm fanfics is PHO forum, I've never read a fanfic that had a bad forum chapter. LMS had some nice forums as well but that's old and you likely won't help much help there, other than inspiration, then again it's a small part of a very long story. 'member the massacre guy?