Who Wants Daily Smut?
Lately I'm finding it hard to remember how I ever managed to finish writing a single book, let alone a couple a year.
It's like going back to the gym after taking a long break from working out regularly. All the creative muscles are atrophied. Everything seems so hard. I'm incredibly frustrated by the memory of the way things used to be and the reality of what I can do now.
Of course, having been through this before with actual workouts I know that it will all come back eventually. It's just a matter of enforcing routines, getting back into the rhythm. It's always awkward in the beginning. Your mind remembers what to do, but your body has forgotten.
The same is true for writing.
One of the things I really miss about fanfiction is the idea of writing prompts. We used to have giant festivals of porn-- anonymous kink memes-- where anyone in the community could request a situation and any author who wanted to take it on could write a short story. The M/M community has a yearly event with a similar format, except instead of a challenge people write for fun it's increasingly becoming SERIUZ BUZINESS. Coming from the tradition of kink memes it was quite a shock to see people expecting a story written under a strict deadline with nearly every creative detail dictated to me to reflect the same standard of quality as books I could develop at my own pace and had complete freedom with.
Writing prompts, to me, are not about producing good stories. They are about stretching your author-muscles, challenging yourself, experimenting, exploring ideas, being silly. They are supposed to be fun, not a vehicle to collect reviews and launch a career.
So here's the deal: I've been playing around with this idea of doing a mailing list that sends out regular writing prompts. Write a short story and submit it. Everyday the whole list gets a few smutty stories in our mailboxes to enjoy.
But would anyone else participate? I'm not going to lie, mailing lists are a lot of work. :(
That's why I've set up a little LaunchRock page. If 300 people sign up for the mailing list, I'll set it up and manage it. So if this sounds like fu to you, even if you have no interest in writing anything sign up and send it to around to anyone else you know that would like daily free porn.
The Daily Smutty
It's like going back to the gym after taking a long break from working out regularly. All the creative muscles are atrophied. Everything seems so hard. I'm incredibly frustrated by the memory of the way things used to be and the reality of what I can do now.
Of course, having been through this before with actual workouts I know that it will all come back eventually. It's just a matter of enforcing routines, getting back into the rhythm. It's always awkward in the beginning. Your mind remembers what to do, but your body has forgotten.
The same is true for writing.
One of the things I really miss about fanfiction is the idea of writing prompts. We used to have giant festivals of porn-- anonymous kink memes-- where anyone in the community could request a situation and any author who wanted to take it on could write a short story. The M/M community has a yearly event with a similar format, except instead of a challenge people write for fun it's increasingly becoming SERIUZ BUZINESS. Coming from the tradition of kink memes it was quite a shock to see people expecting a story written under a strict deadline with nearly every creative detail dictated to me to reflect the same standard of quality as books I could develop at my own pace and had complete freedom with.
Writing prompts, to me, are not about producing good stories. They are about stretching your author-muscles, challenging yourself, experimenting, exploring ideas, being silly. They are supposed to be fun, not a vehicle to collect reviews and launch a career.
So here's the deal: I've been playing around with this idea of doing a mailing list that sends out regular writing prompts. Write a short story and submit it. Everyday the whole list gets a few smutty stories in our mailboxes to enjoy.
But would anyone else participate? I'm not going to lie, mailing lists are a lot of work. :(
That's why I've set up a little LaunchRock page. If 300 people sign up for the mailing list, I'll set it up and manage it. So if this sounds like fu to you, even if you have no interest in writing anything sign up and send it to around to anyone else you know that would like daily free porn.
The Daily Smutty
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It's a different thing than what it appears to be for sure :/ I can see the reviewer's point of view too: the organizers set up listings for each story so by the reviewer's not reviewing as they normally would it basically becomes an easy way for people to pad their scores. And some writers clearly see it as a guilt free way to promote themselves outside of the normal ghettos of self-promotion within the group.
Isa wrote: "It's a different thing than what it appears to be for sure :/ I can see the reviewer's point of view too: the organizers set up listings for each story so by the reviewer's not reviewing as they no..."I've been reading some stories, although I've fallen behind, and I've only found maybe about two stories that I thought were probably less than 3 stars. And with all the nay-critics throwing their 'meh' reviews and comments in, I don't think I need to give the 2.5 stars vote a 2 star because, those Negative Nannies are already swarming like a hive of wasps. I'll just up my rating to 3 stars.
And if they can justify their low 1-2 ratings and comments, I certainly can justify my star ratings on the effort and time someone put into the story and event. Too bad if those aren't the critic's criteria for rating a story. I'm not writing my review or giving stars for their pleasure.
I actually miss when you did snarky book reviews. I'm so fond of smut, but spot-on, just a little mean, smart-ass book reviews would be even more fun. It takes a lot of creativity to snark the way you do.
Katyna wrote: "I actually miss when you did snarky book reviews. I'm so fond of smut, but spot-on, just a little mean, smart-ass book reviews would be even more fun. It takes a lot of creativity to snark the wa..."LOL. I miss having time to READ @_@
The M/M community has a yearly event with a similar format, except instead of a challenge people write for fun it's increasingly becoming SERIUZ BUZINESS. Coming from the tradition of kink memes it was quite a shock to see people expecting a story written under a strict deadline with nearly every creative detail dictated to me to reflect the same standard of quality as books I could develop at my own pace and had complete freedom with.
Yup, I agree. Some of the reviewers seemed to take too much joy in tearing down the writers. And if those writers happened to be new ones, putting themselves out there in the event for the first time, it didn't matter to the critics that they may have crushed the hearts of the writers enough to stop them writing. The critics would probably say 'develop a thicker skin.' I'm guessing by thicker skin, they meant, colder hearts like the ones they themselves seemed to be burdened with.