it was 2004 when i started reading HPfanfic and it was easy by then to spot the good ones (either because there weren't too many crappy stories or my taste for fan fiction wasn't yet refined).

 

I started Reading in 2003, on fictionally no less, there were some good ones if you could get to them. Though the best year I think was summer 2004.

Dark fics really started out in 2003, the first one I read was not really about Harry turning dark, but he was possessed by Slytherin's sword and went tottaly badass on the evil god/uber-strong thing, then came back to his sences. Wish I could remember what that was.

Also back in 2004-2005, it was almost completely H/Hr or H/CC.

 

I came into Fanfiction in '05, so I can't really say. Besides, I started in Star Wars ficts, then expanded into the other categories. However, nowadays, I am basically turned off the Harry ficts... they keep turning Harry into some magical creature and then the romances . Its hard to find decently written stories. And then the masses that are on fanfict, annoy me greatly.

 

I started reading fanfiction many, many years ago. About '98 I think and, to my utmost embarassment, it was pokemon fiction. The only excuse is that it was at the peak of its popularity back then. But I read one fic, which really disturbed me (since I was really young) and I quit for a while. When OoTP came out I started reading HP fanfiction and have been going every since.

My refined tastes have limited the amount of good fics I find but there is still the odd gem amongst the rubbish. Good fics back then were definately H/Hr and were mostly vampire/werewolf!Harry. Now I prefer darker fics with time-travel or AUs.

Couldn't tell you the best year as I have no sense of time keeping what-so-ever.

Aekiel

 

I've been reading fanfic since about 1997 and I'll tell you now, Fanfiction.net is a bane because it allows any idiot to post something and call themselves a writer.

 

You know, I can't help but think of the HP fanfiction I read back in '02 as some of the best stories. But I simply can't recall if its just nostalgia for what was actually original at the time or if the quality of stories was just better back then.

I just wish fanfiction would recede to a time when there was far less H/G... I really hate that pairing. But most of all, I wish Nighttime Sunshine would have completed 'Like a Phoenix He Shall Rise'. I've contemplated writing endings to that story for myself but have never had the confidance to do so.

 

Been reading since late '02 and I must agree FFN is both a blessing and curse it has one of the best formats ive seen but they have "technical difficulties" and the cess pool of H/G fangirl fics or with naruto countless cheap atempts at the cliche Naru/Hina

 

I've been reading some fanfictions (not on FF.net) since 2002. I've been then translating some fanfictions to French (Polaris' Forrest of Mysteries, Keepers of Secrets, Web of Lies and also Luna the Moonmonster's HP and the Amulet of Time series), until I learned English well enough to read other fanfictions without really needing to translate every few words.

Anyway, back to the topic, 2002-2003 is the best fanfiction years. After that a lot of crap came out such as slash fics and other clichés.

 

I'd also say late 2004 was the best time in ff, especially for dark stories; but is it just my wishful thinking or are there lately some fics of exceedingly high quality where the authors try to set their stories apart through their writing style or the athmosphere they create as they can no longer come up with REALLY new story plots? ('a bungle in the junge' or 'blessed' come to mind as an exception)

 

Heh, my first introduction to fanfiction was somewhere in the 90's, and it was ChronoTrigger fanfics (yeah baby!). But for HP fiction, I'd have to go with late 03 and 04 as the best era, when dark!harry was getting good, and there wasn't an appalling amount of clichés in every frigging fic.

Edit: Well, fuck, I only checked the dates of the last couple of posts, sorry bout this.

 

After being introduced to Barb's work through Kazaa ( roughly mid 2002 ) , I spotted a link to sugarquill.net.Some good stories there,but oh my satan,after 1 month I could never look at a H/G story again.

I then took a look at ff.net - and,man, was I scarred for life ..*cringes*..the first story I tried to read there was HP/LV,HP/SS mpreg with Harry losing the baby.O_O.Back then I had no idea what slash meant,let alone mpreg.I was like WTF - those things actually exist in fanfiction?

As for the trends..the best years would have to be late 2002 - early 2003.Barb was authoring the Triangle Prophecy (huge letdown,what with that ending) and there more than 200 long,quality fics in ff.net to read.Discovered Ruskbyte,Draco664,Horst Pollman & dozens of talented authors.Those were the days..

 

I'm not really sure what the best year is, but I'm tempted to say '04 or '05 since that's when I really hit the independant!Harry fiction. I started reading in 2002, I think, but it was a pretty limited pool of stories so I can't really judge.

Out of curiosity, has anyone who's been in the HP fandom a long time been tried to compile a timeline of sorts? It would be interesting to see the rise of the different genres and defining fics since HP fanfics really started going.

 

I can not give any single year the title of "Best Fanfiction Year"; however I can give the years of what I call the 'Golden Age of FanFiction', 2003 till mid-2005.

 

I think everyone can agree, that they found the most acceptable stories when they started reading ff as their expectations were not nearly as high as they are now.
But I can't really give an "best" year as I joined ff in '05, but these days its hard to find any new "perfect" ff like Jbern's work or Harry Potter and the Hero's Path.