2013-10-31

Communities of fanfic writers took their writing group practices online decades ago. On the Media reported on a commercial copy of these spaces, dubbing it "virtual workshopping. A website from Penguin Publishing, Book Country, enables thousands of writers to exchange manuscripts and notes and self-publish their work. A few have even gotten traditional publishing deals through the site." Other than the book deals, the mechanisms sound familiar. "[I]f a writer has written something that is just awful, not very many people will comment on it or they will comment briefly and respectfully but not say very much; there's a sort of graceful fade away. And the second thing that can happen is a manuscript that might seem terrible to one reader seems fantastic to another, because they are the right audience for it. You can find sub-categories and niche audiences that you wouldn't otherwise access."

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Communities of fanfic writers took their writing group practices online decades ago. On the Media reported on a commercial copy of these spaces, dubbing it "virtual workshopping. A website from Penguin Publishing, Book Country, enables thousands of writers to exchange manuscripts and notes and self-publish their work. A few have even gotten traditional publishing deals through the site." Other than the book deals, the mechanisms sound familiar. "[I]f a writer has written something that is just awful, not very many people will comment on it or they will comment briefly and respectfully but not say very much; there's a sort of graceful fade away. And the second thing that can happen is a manuscript that might seem terrible to one reader seems fantastic to another, because they are the right audience for it. You can find sub-categories and niche audiences that you wouldn't otherwise access."

( Read more... )