Cunning plan on Readwave

[Jim]

I tried posting something to Wattpad and it just swallowed it, belched and whatever I fed in has just disappeared!

Anyway I've stuck something else on readwave http://www.readwave.com/how-to-make-a... because having looked at the 'cities' I'm supposed to be reaching, readwave does at least seem to get my stuff seen in the USA

[David]

I just tried to post something to Readwave and it looks like the whole site seems to have disappeared.

Is it just me?

If it has gone, does anyone know if it is permanent or temporary?

I noticed the last post on their Facebook page & Twitter are from sept 2014.

[Anna]

It's not you - it says 'Bad Gateway'.

.

[Gingerlily - The Full Wild]

Yep, I got that as well.

[Jim]

I did get through in the last 24hrs but it's not something you can rely on. It's a bit like the land at the top of the Faraway Tree. You've just got to hit that window or you've missed it until the next time :-(

Trouble is, I still cannot get Wattpad to post my stuff. Whether my computer doesn't have some particular bit of software needed to recognise stuff or something I don't know

[David]

Anna wrote: "It's not you - it says 'Bad Gateway'.

."

Ah, things are improving. I originally got nothing at all, just a blank page.

[David]

Jim wrote: "I did get through in the last 24hrs but it's not something you can rely on. It's a bit like the land at the top of the Faraway Tree. You've just got to hit that window or you've missed it until the..."

Readwave does seem rather half-arsed, and with their FB and Twitter not getting updated for over a year, I wonder if they are bothering that much any more, and are waiting for the site to die through neglect.

Wattpad can be a bugger, as they keep changing how you put a post up, but I seem to manage it in the end.

There is a help page/FAQ thing on how to put a post up, have you had a look at that?

You could try ABCtales. That one is pretty straightforward to post to.

[Philip]

David wrote: "Jim wrote: "I did get through in the last 24hrs but it's not something you can rely on. It's a bit like the land at the top of the Faraway Tree. You've just got to hit that window or you've missed ..."

I'm quite impressed with ABCtales so far. Seem to get intelligent feedback mostly.

[David]

Philip wrote: "I'm quite impressed with ABCtales so far. Seem to get intelligent feedback mostly."

They do seem nice people on the whole.

BTW Readwave seems to have reappeared.

They even sent me an email yesterday telling me how many readers I've had - which was nice.

[Jim]

I've stuck the Ballad of Stagbold Keep up on ABCtales to see how things work, and it's even been cherry picked. Not sure if that really means anything or not

[Patti (baconater)]

That's just peachy, Jim!

[Jim]

I was quite chuffed but not sure whether it was something to casually drop into conversation or not

[Patti (baconater)]

I think it'd be rude of you to not let us share your happy stuff, Jim.

[Philip]

Patti (baconater) wrote: "I think it'd be rude of you to not let us share your happy stuff, Jim."

Quite so!

[Jim]

shy retiring chap that I am

[David]

Jim wrote: "I've stuck the Ballad of Stagbold Keep up on ABCtales to see how things work, and it's even been cherry picked. Not sure if that really means anything or not"

It is a good thing. A very good thing indeed.

Well done.

AS far as I remember there are the red cherries, then gold cherries and then the Story of the Week / Poem of the Week.

Although that may have changed since the last time I received them.

[Jim]

I'll have to wait to see how far up the greasy pole I get

[Patti (baconater)]

Well, that sounded slightly pornographic.

[Rosemary (grooving with the Picts)]

haha

Well done Jim

[David]

Jim wrote: "I'll have to wait to see how far up the greasy pole I get"

A quick glance at the site shows they now also do a Pick of the Month which seems to be the pinnacle of that greasy pole now.

[Jim]

Ah well I know what to look out for :-)

[Patti (baconater)]

Jim wrote: "Ah well I know what to look out for :-)"

Pole grease?

[Jim]

Mind you, it has to be said that I decided to try the 'promoting' using sites like ABC and Readwave and suchlike. The idea is that these sites would encourage people to look at Flotsam or Jetsam and Lambent Dreams
Given that both are only 99p I thought if somebody enjoyed the free stuff, then 99p isn't really going to be a barrier to buying.

So via the blog etc Tallis has written 16118 words, much in stories and similar.

The resulting sales have not exactly been disappointing. After all, you'd have needed a sale to be disappointed over. There just hasn't been any sales of these two books.
At all.
On either .com or .co.uk

So I think I can say that, in all candor, it's not a particularly good way of selling books.
Perhaps people just wait for the next freebie?

[David]

Probably the vast majority of people on these various sites like Readwave, ABCtales, Wattpad and so on are only after a free read.

I suppose the hope is that the [very] occasional one eventually likes your stuff so much they eventually reach for their wallet.

I still think there is a lot of weight to the argument that when you are unknown visibility matters far more than sales. But the problem of converting the one to the other still remains.

[Jim]

Well the amount of free stuff that goes onto these sites, and the fact they have grading systems so you can cherry pick, then you can probably read away quite happily for long periods without feeling the urge to buy

I'm left wondering whether most of the writers on that forum mainly write on the forum and don't publish 'professionally'

[David]

Jim wrote: "I'm left wondering whether most of the writers on that forum mainly write on the forum and don't publish 'professionally'"

Maybe. It is possible.

There is also the observation that some have made that those who read online and those who read books - whether ebooks or paper - are not the same audience. So maybe it is not that surprising there is very little crossover.

[Jim]

Yes I can see that, two almost separate worlds

[Alicia]

There are grownup writers on Wattpad - someone to talk to in the middle of the night when you're writing - and I ended up with nice quotes I could use (I asked permission to use words already present as comments on the serialized version of Pride's Children) for the book description.

In general, my short story, Too Late, did amazingly well - being featured and acquiring 57K 'reads.' Which means about ten thousand people read it - not a small number.

Some of those people went on to read the novel, and some of those finished it (it's long). But it isn't a site to generate either sales or reviews in quantity - most of the kids read on their phones and don't even vote or comment.

It's part of the social media aspect of putting yourself where potential readers can find you, and everything takes time and a bit of work. I'm glad I've been there, but don't know how much new work I will put up.

However, when finishing, the notion that there were people READING was very encouraging. Otherwise, you get little feedback during the course of writing.

Maybe some of them will remember when they get older and have disposable income.

[David]

Alicia wrote: "There are grownup writers on Wattpad - someone to talk to in the middle of the night when you're writing - and I ended up with nice quotes I could use (I asked permission to use words already prese..."

Congratulations, it is good to see someone getting that many reads.

I do quite like Wattpad, although mine haven't taken off like yours, and it does look like a good place to get some writing seen and read, if you can get noticed in the first place.

So it may be an idea for you to keep your presence up at Wattpad by putting more stuff on there, as others have done quite well once they have established an audience there.

[Philip]

Jim wrote: "Well the amount of free stuff that goes onto these sites, and the fact they have grading systems so you can cherry pick, then you can probably read away quite happily for long periods without feeli..."

I think that's probably right and, I suspect, any attempt to promote your wares (and by 'your' I mean me) is rather disapproved of.

[David]

Just had an email from Readwave:

[...]
ReadWave needs an owner who has passion and a vision for what it could become.

With this in mind, we've decided to either find a new owner for Readwave or draw this chapter to an end and close the site.
[...]

It looks like the end for it then.

[Jim]

I went and looked

"Dear ReadWavers,

It's been over two years since we started this journey with you - striving to create a thriving community of readers and writers wrapped in the most beautiful experience possible.

As I'm sure you've noticed, over the last 6 months the team behind ReadWave have been involved in other projects and we haven't been able to give it the love it deserves. ReadWave needs an owner who has passion and a vision for what it could become.

With this in mind, we've decided to either find a new owner for Readwave or draw this chapter to an end and close the site.

Our timeframe for deciding is before the 20th of December, so please copy and paste your ReadWave stories to a word document to ensure your work is not lost.

If you'd like to buy ReadWave from us, email offers@readwave.com with your offer before the 11th December and we'll get back to you with next steps. We'd like to be transparent with any potential buyers so here are our metrics:
- 55,377 stories
- 18,157 registered users
- 1,316 logins in Nov.15
- 337,877 pageviews in Nov. 2015
- 186,287 uniques in Nov.15

Finally, we'd like to thank you for all your support over the years - it's been truly wonderful to build this community with you.

Onwards and upwards!

The ReadWave Team"


Not a lot of registered users is it?

Jim

[David]

Jim wrote: "I went and looked

Not a lot of registered users is it?"

Not really, no.

I did wonder how they thought they were going to make any money on it.

I doubt if anyone will buy it either, as there doesn't seem much there worth paying for.

[Jim]

Certainly I don't honestly think it's worth more than a couple of grand to have it shifted across onto your own computer system.
Unless it's so cheap one of the big boys buys it out of habit, I don't think it'll still exist by Christmas

[David]

It doesn't seem to be a site enough people are interested in to keep on with.

It will probably end up as yet another failed experiment that everyone forgets about in a few months.

[Jim]

It looks an interesting site (nice and clean to load) but I'm trying to work out the business model behind thinkerbeat. The smaller competitions are free and pay small prizes, which you might well be able to fund using advertising, and because the winners are voted for by the membership they should be close to free to run once you've got the software in place.
Mind you given the way writers have to whip up groups of friends to vote for them in competitions you might merely be re-running the usual beauty parade
The 'sponsors' who provide the prize money for the larger competitions intrigue me. Sponsors sponsor because they see a long term benefit.
Also in the books section it mentions that writers can advertise books free for a period, so I assume after that there will be a charge? I missed seeing how much the charge would be and when it starts.