Hiya, writers and frenz —
Lately the WriteOn! threads are split between two different, non-complementary kinds of comments. So, for this week, let’s talk about the idea of a separate, new group for writers whose main interest is to post excerpts or chapters from their Works In Progress unrelated to the given week's diary topic and challenge. Anyone can be in that group as well as the WriteOn! series in the R&BL group, of course: why not? :)
<big>UPDATES ARE BELOW, NOW IN BOXES LIKE THIS</big> |
WriteOn! was launched by SensibleShoes (already a professionally published author at the time) as a diary series (within the R&BL group) for professionals as well as aspirants here in DK. Together, they developed the series focus, organized around discussion and practice on a specific issue or skill each week, so we could explore and upgrade existing skill by writing to the given week’s challenge/exercise and reading one another’s challenges/practice, to learn from each other’s efforts as well as our own.<br>
The option of using characters and settings from our WIPs to meet the challenges was simply for the same purpose as the option of using “stock” (almost cliché/cardboard) genre characters and settings: just to save us time and effort rather than have to invent from scratch every time — nothing more.<br>
Big comments of unrelated-to-challenge chapters and excerpts from writers' works in progress are a recent development that create at least two kinds of impedance. They overshadow the material WriteOn diarists work hard to supply to all of us, and they obstruct the smooth flow of WriteOn threads: the comments of discussion and of upgrade-skills work that meet the challenges.<br>
But WIP writers clearly want to be able to post too.<br>
<big><big><big>We have received the go-ahead from our host group R&BL’s admin’n to initiate an additional diary series for WIP writers, tentatively entitled WriteOnFictionWIP </big> — each diary there would presumably be headed “Write On Fiction Works In Progress” — to post immediately after each week’s WriteOn!
The general plan at this point is:
- each WriteOn! diarist going forward will include at the top or foot of their diary a link to the tag-page for WriteOnWIP that WIP writers and their readers can ■click on to reach that list/page, ■click on the follow-button there in order to get each such post automatically delivery into their activity streams if they like, and in any case ■click on the latest wofwip post to put their comments there, or earlier ones to see what’s in those.
- each WriteOn! diarist — or someone working in tandem with them — will draft, queue, tag and schedule the wofwip diary, but without text or top-images, in order that those posts — being higher up the R&BL blogpages — not prevent readers at R&BL from being able to find WriteOn! as well.
- Commenters at wofwip can mutually co-host the thread there, or simply use it for those of their WIP chapters and exerpts that don’t write to the challenge of the given week’s WriteOn,
- It will be up to each WIP commenter at wofwip to include or omit — as desired — a request for feedback. Be clear so you’re not disappointed in any way.
- If the time comes that wofwip participants are able to handle their own independent series with actual diarists who know how to draft, queue and schedule, standard scheduling policy at R&BL is 2 hours between series diaries, so at that point wofwip could probably, have the next schedule slot (i.e., Thursdays, 7pmleftkost/10pmeast) or discuss with R&BL lead admin Brecht some other position in the R&BL schedule.</big></big>
Tags as currently known should be:
- WriteOnFictionWIP
- ReadersAndBooklovers
- Readers&Booklovers
- R&BL
- FreeWriters
|
Other proposals and updates previous to the current phase of progress are essentially moot now; only included in small print for anyone interested, below the next box, and see also the comment thread for discussion. Special thanks to Clio2 for the following, which initiated a workable direction:<br>
<big>….SenSho often put word limits. One or two hundred words.<br>
Would it make sense to have, maybe not a new group and diary series, but a regular diary to which various writers could append portions of their WIPs simply as comments? And maybe not expect everyone to finish reading and discussing all on one evening? Perhaps allow a week for people to browse and comment at their leisure? (I've forgotten how long comments stay open for Recs and responses, though any diary can be Rec'd indefinitely.) It could require less administrative lifting.<br>
I might feel more inclined to post bits of a WIP or experiments myself in a setting like that. Right now it can be iffy whether I have the bandwidth on a given evening just to do the exercise.<br>
If we tried out that, or something else, as an experiment and it doesn't work for us, it can easily enough be dropped,…</big><br>
METTLE FATIGUE:<br>
<big>That’s a [great] idea for how to have a dedicated separate venue. Thanks! ...<br>
I can’t speak for other WriteOn diarists, but I’m willing to go that extra mile for chapter writers. No actual diary text [or images], of course: it would be just to open a thread so WIP chapters and exerpts could be posted as comments there.<br>
It would need to be tagged for its name AND tagged R&BL.<br>
Then everyone here who wants to hop on over there to post or read chapters can just click on the R&BL tag at the foot of the evening’s WriteOn to get there, and click at the paper that comes up in order to follow the tag/find it the same way they find WriteOn [or they can tag-follow to get there.]…<br>
... I’ve kosmailed to R&BL lead admin Brecht to clear this idea with him [and get his advice & R&BL requirements].</big><br>
|
<small>ORIGINAL LESS GOOD IDEA<br>
As an experienced dk group admin and creator, mettle fatigue could start a new group of their own — thank you, Virginia Woolf! — for writers interested most in posting chapters and exerpts unrelated to WriteOn topics and challenges. WriteOn diarists could then link to that group weekly so folks here who’d like to can easily reach there to read non-challenge-related WIP material, cheer you on, offer feedback if you request it, and follow that group independently. Everyone who wants to post that kind of material can be added to that group and promoted to group management level by mettle fatigue, introduced to DK group-skills documents and the community tutorials for how to run groups and how to post diaries to’em.<br>
Pretty soon, the members of the new group — possible title “Fiction Works-In-Progress”?— should be able to run it entirely on their own!</small><br>
____________________________________________________________________
As before, everyone in both venues can still come practice and talk about writing skills here in WriteOn threads.<br>
There y’go, that’s this evening’s WriteOn topic.<br>
For everyone who also wants a writing challenge/practice/exercise:<br>
Write a scene of at least three characters together trying to work out how to do something differently than they used to, because of some problem with how they used to.<br>
Doesn't have to be dialogue alone - an action/event scene on the hoof, with all hands to the gears, is great too!<br>
Just <big>no unrelated WIP chapters or excerpts please</big>--- we DO need to discuss the idea of a new DK group especially for WIP writers, without anything overshadowing or obstructing that conversation. This actually is a topic we’ve visited before: the difficulty writers too often have about getting the time, space, and freedom to develop their skills and do their own work without other demands preventing it. Always will be a problem, I guess, and solved only by addressing it. Chime in with your thoughts and additional wrinkles, by all means! :)
​
​
​​<big>Write On! will be a regular Thursday night diary (5pm leftkost, 8 pm Eastern) until it isn’t.
Before signing a contract with any agent or publisher, please be sure to check them out on Preditors and Editors (at FB their last post seems to be in October 2023) Absolute Write, Critters.org, and/or Writer Beware.</big>
|
​P.S. For an understanding of issues about crit/feedback etc, including as SenSho originally addressed it/them as counterproductive in WriteOn, refer back to relevant passaes in 📚WriteOn: It's What?.