Dale’s Comments (group member since Sep 15, 2017)

Dale’s comments from the Navigating Indieworld Discussing All Things Indie group.

New from Lit Up: Rush, Rush, Rush.

This was supposed to be my entry for part 2 of round 1 of the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Competition. Unfortunately, they scheduled it for the same weekend we were moving to our new home, so I had very little time for writing. I finished a first draft and managed one editing pass, but by then the deadline was upon me and I was still over the word count limit. I never got to submit it. I cleaned it up a bit more for posting on Medium. I hope you enjoy it.

Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger) wrote: "Dale,
Thank you for your kind words on my Haikus. I was going to stop writing them altogether, but maybe I won't. You are correct, on the detail sheet listing our articles, they don't make much bec..."

You're quite welcome!

Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger) wrote: "Dale,
Your Haiku is brilliant!!

I would like to add something without causing a stir. We've read articles about how vague the payments are from Medium. I read that one component is in your stats, ..."

Thanks, Sam! As for payments, the whole subject is murky. I tried once to untangle it, with some help from the Medium support staff, and basically learned that claps are the main "signal" they look at, but only claps from paid members count. There is no good way to tell in a given pay period how many claps you have from paid members. Also, it's not really the absolute number of claps, but the percentage of a paid member's total claps that go to your stories. 1 clap out of 10 total earns you the same amount as 100 claps out of 1,000 total.

There are other "signals" too, but they don't count for as much. (Time spent reading is one of them, but again, it only would be counted when paid members read.) They say they've been asked by many writers for greater transparency. So far, that doesn't seem to have been a priority for them, because no enhancements to earnings reporting have been made as far as I can tell.

Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger) wrote: "Dale wrote: "In the "I couldn't resist" category, a bit of haiku inspired by a satirical piece on Medium now requiring writers to write one "How to make money on Medium" article and 10 haiku per mo..."

I actually did wonder if you might be negatively affected by all that, but I hoped you wouldn't be. A good haiku is tough to write (at least, I think so), and I would never criticize anyone for trying. I don't think you should give up on them. At the same time, I thought the satirical piece was great and (me being me) couldn't resist the challenge to write a haiku about making money on Medium in response to it.

By the by, in case you didn't notice, your "Raining Leaves" poem was distributed by the curators this morning.

In the "I couldn't resist" category, a bit of haiku inspired by a satirical piece on Medium now requiring writers to write one "How to make money on Medium" article and 10 haiku per month. (The link to that piece is in my story.) I'm not a poet, but I think this one works. ;-)

Where the Money Goes

Thank you, all!

A new fiction piece from Lit Up: Hot Ice. This was my first round entry for the NYC Midnight flash fiction contest. It came in 5th in my group of 30 writers.

D.J. wrote: "Thanks.

One that almost contains humour. Almost:
https://medium.com/@debzcooper/swappi..."

It has its moments. ;-)

A new fiction piece in Curiosity Never Killed the Writer: The Bamboo Carrier

Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger) wrote: "Dale, I think you should compile all these helpful articles into a book. Other people do it, except yours would be based you your actual experience as a self-published author... or would you not be..."

I could probably do that, if and when I have enough of them. I haven't thought that far ahead yet . . . or even counted them up. I am hoping to do a compilation or two of my short stories, but that's another thing that hasn't gotten too far as yet. But thank you for the suggestion and encouragement!

My latest on fiction writing in Publishous: Character Arcs

Alex wrote: "Dale wrote: "A new short story for you, in "Don't Wake the Mage": Road Trip."

The link doesn't seem to work, Dale, it just brings me back to this thread."

Had a slight punctuation error. I've fixed it now. Thanks for letting me know.

A new short story for you, in "Don't Wake the Mage": Road Trip.

Finally, a new fiction piece via Lit Up: Do Not Open.

Not about publishing per se, but definitely a writing-related GRRR!

Early this summer, a member of my creative writing workshop convinced me to enter the NYC Midnight flash fiction competition. This is an annual contest that consists of four rounds spaced a few months apart. Writers are assigned to groups of about 15 entrants. Each group is then assigned a genre, a location, and an object. Assignments are posted at midnight on the Friday the round begins, and writers have 48 hours to write, polish, and submit their entries. Everyone participates in rounds 1 and 2, gaining points for how they place in their groups. The scores from those rounds are added together and used to determine who advances to round 3. Top writers from round 3 advance to round 4 for the final competition.

I placed 5th in my group in round 1, which I figured put me in good standing to make it to round 3. Unfortunately, round 2 was scheduled for the same weekend we ended up moving to our new home! So the time was not spent writing, but loading and unloading furniture and boxes, assembling beds, running to the store to get essentials that we couldn't find in all those boxes, etc. I probably had 4 hours at most for writing.

I finished a first draft very late on Saturday. Very late on Sunday, I started revising it. When I finished and looked at the clock, it was 12:02 AM, three minutes past the deadline, and my story was 120 words over the 1,000 word limit.

GRRRRRR!

Oh, well . . .

Sam (Rescue Dog Mom, Writer, Hugger) wrote: "Great article, Dale! Thank you! Hugs!"

You're welcome, and thank you!

I finally have a new Writing Cooperative article: Needy Characters, which deals with subplots.

Congratulations, all!

Hi Alex,

I set up my account several months ago but have done very little with it, so I may not be much help. That said, I set up "universal book links" for my books, which can then be used in various promos both on and off Story Origin. What these links do is provide a Story Origin page where all sources for your books (Amazon, B&N, Apple, etc.) can be accessed in one place. Users can pick the source they want for their purchase/download. I also tried a newsletter swap, but I'm really not sure how well that worked out. I found it a bit confusing. After that, everything started up with my job change, house change, and whatnot, and I've had very little time for either writing or marketing, so I didn't do much else with it.

I'll be in again this year. I already have an account with StoryOrigin, although I haven't done much with it. I'll await further instructions.