If you have free time, feel free to read this novel. It is a story about new authors and their struggles on writing their stories in this platform called Webnovels.
Take note that these are "real conversations" by some of your favorite authors in Webnovels and how they spend their days while writing your favorite stories in this platform. Maybe this will give you a better understanding on what it's like to be an author here in Webnovels.
Reinesse Those two are two different things indeed when it comes to legality and whatnot, but when it comes to your argument of it having a simple logic, it's still the same thing, hence the analogy.
I was not even the one that got bothered by this thread. As yaoyueyi said, she intended it to be a helpful reminder, and those who aren't unreasonable can just read it and ignore it, which I did. I read and ignored.
But there was a debate here between a reader whose feathers got ruffled because of the post vs. multiple authors. And while I understand the authors' arguments, but I also understand where that reader was coming from.
So, my point from my previous post was, just like authors don't want to be generalized into one label, don't compartmentalize readers into one box either. If you were going to address this letter to ALL readers, then expect there that would be readers that got offended.
And yes, most readers I've interacted with here are polite and reasonable readers just as you described, but as I said, don't compartmentalize. Not all readers are like that. Some readers purely see themselves as customers.
And when your work is available for purchase, then there will always be expectations from paying customers. And if you add to it their lack of understanding of how things work here, you get those demanding comments.
Hence, my advice to yaoyueyi was, don't let those kinds of comments get to her.
yaoyueyi
I totally agree with you dear author and I apologise on behalf of my fellow readers........ I also wanna thank all the authors of webnovel with all my sincerity for putting their heart and soul to write all the amazing stories and sharing with us( the happy readers)
Once again thank you dear authors of webnovel....
Elyon way to go to promote ur novel
Elyon way to go to promote ur novel
As a premium reader and a contracted author I actually understand 40fantasy. Hehehe...
As an author, comments like 'more chapters pls' 'author mass release please' 'more, more, more' where is the 9 am update?'... etc. makes me happy. Hahahaha... Or maybe I am just not normal XD.
We don't know them and they don't know us. I know some readers who are sitting in the hospital bed and reading is the only thing that is making them a little happy. I know authors like myself who get sick and stop writing for a while. Point is, we all undergo something behind this facade that we create online. So let's look at the positive side of everything instead. And be happy everyday!
Yeah no I'm with you. When writing the more activity I see in the audience of readers the happier I get. This is because I can see that the text is interesting and connecting with the readers.
That's why I love being there in person to see how someone reacts to my work. Sometimes they chuckle, sometimes I leave empty portions of the story for later to see if my msg was understood, even when the reader doesn't necessarily like the genre I am writing with a good enough delivery they are able to relate and connect to the character even without noticing, and for me that's always an accomplishment as a writer.
Hell even when they start envisioning a possible ending at least I notice that it caught their interest even if they choose not to read. I don't know XD. I just have fun writing, and reading
I'm probably going to waste people's time, but here's a perspective from that of a writer. I know I have been told multiple times that I have no right to call myself an author, and that I don't deserve to be a writer, and that I should give up because of my lack of talent and f off from the website (yeah, people actually said that to me), but whatever.
I maintain a daily release schedule by virtue of writing quite a few chapters and stockpiling them before I finally took the first step and published them. Obviously months went by and nobody read them, I received no comments, no sign that people were reading them. That was fine, I didn't really care. Then came the abuse, the insults, the bad reviews. Mixed with them were some people who liked what I was writing, and left some comments or reviews. So I kept writing.
Then I fell seriously sick for two to three weeks, and didn't write at all. As you can imagine, my stockpile began running out at an alarming rate. By the time I recovered enough to write, my stockpile was dangerously low to the point I almost couldn't maintain a daily update.
Around this point of time, someone demanded mass release. I had to explain to them that I was busy (I was also doing an eight-week exam on top of having just recovered from an illness) and couldn't indulge them. However, there were quite a few of these demands, and I sort of forced myself to not only juggle with my exam but also try to write 2-3 chapters a day. And as you know, it takes me 3-4 hours to write just one chapter. So I didn't sleep, I didn't eat much, just so I could rebuild my stockpile to ensure a steady daily release (and I was writing 2 stories at a time), and probably start saving up enough for a mass release.
You can probably tell that it didn't turn out very well for me. I fell sick again from overwork, had a fever and stuff. And while I was sick, someone left a one-star review, calling my story garbage and essentially told me to stop writing. Can you imagine how it feels to spend all that effort, invest all that time, overwork to the point of falling sick, just to get a single one-star review telling me my story was garbage and insinuating that I should delete it?
Shortly after that, I had a flood of people complaining about one of my stories, spamming low reviews. I learned that apparently one writer's fans had discovered my story, which was similar to his, and they all decided to downvote it to oblivion so that their favorite writer could climb above me in the ranking or something. Someone even reported me for plagiarism and forced me to delete the story and I did.
That was fine. I got rid of it and focused on my other story. Managed to stockpile enough for a mass release. The second (or was it third?) time I did a mass release, guess what? Some guy comes in with another review, telling me, "drop + delete" - at first I thought he was telling me to drop and delete my story, but later he clarified and claimed that he meant he was dropping it and deleting it from his Library. Okay. But whatever the case, it feels like I got slapped in the face for trying to fulfil the request of providing mass release.
So yeah. What was the point? You might tell me, "do it for the readers who love your story" - but they are a tiny minority compared to the people who hate my story or hate me for whatever reason. You might tell me to ignore the haters, but their words and comments still hurt. It's so easy to tell people to ignore insults, but if it's physical if I got punched by someone in real life, are you going to tell me to ignore it and shrug it off? Just because the wounds are emotional and not physical, just because the wounds are invisible and cannot be seen, doesn't mean they don't exist. Pyschological damage and verbal abuse is not something one can just "ignore" or "pretend" it doesn't happen. They have very real effects on your health and your life.
Perhaps commenters should think about that more before just callously leaving a "this story is trash" review - and best of all, they never actually explain why the story is trash or why the characters are retarded. Just "can't stand the beta MC" (what the hell does beta even mean?) or "the story is garbage." It's so easy for you to take less than a minute to write a couple of sentences condemning my story that I spent hours to write for each chapter. The least you could do is at least elaborate why you think the story is trash or boring, or why you hate the character instead of delivering cruel, throwaway lines that you didn't even give much thought into writing.
You might think it's just words. But words have very real effects on the people you deliver them to.
Tomoyuki Nobody is telling you to ignore the emotional pain you were (I believe still are) enduring. I hope this was not a response to my post in which I was sharing about my physical illness? Me sharing it doesn't mean that it negates your mental struggle. If you feel that way, then I apologize for that. It was never the intention. And if it wasn't a response to my post, let me apologize as well for getting ahead of myself.
I'm not gonna tell you to ignore the haters who left you those offensive comments because it is definitely not okay what they did. Psychological damage is indeed something that needs to be taken seriously. Not all scars show, doesn't mean there were no wounds.
So, no, I'm not gonna tell you to ignore the haters, but, what I'll tell you is:
1) Have you tried looking for professional help? You've admitted about the psychological damage that you've suffered, and seeing how you chose the opening sentence of your post (and also from what I've seen in some of your other posts), you probably have a constant, critical, and shaming inner voice, who keeps telling you that you're not worth it. In the opening of your post, you wrote, "I'm probably going to waste people's time...".
Why do you think that way? Because you're not. And even if other people think and/or say you're wasting their time, so what? They can choose not to waste their time by not reading your post. It's their time, their choice, it's on them, not on you. And from the story that you've shared in your post above, I can also tell that you're the kind of person with a heightened or excessive sense of responsibility. You were trying to meet those readers' demand for a mass release, even when you were not feeling well. Now, if you don't know this already, but these are all characteristics of a depression. So, if you haven't sought and/or received some professional help, I sincerely hope that you would.
2) Don't ever let someone else's distorted or unfair perception about you undermine your own self-worth. Some people will always be critical to you, no matter what you do. When this happens, learn not to take it personally. Because it's really more about them than it's about you. I know this is easier said than done. But at one point, this is just something that you really need to learn to be more at peace.
3) There was this saying, and I've learned that this is especially true, primarily in the past months of my life: Life is too short to stress yourself with people who don't even deserve to be an issue in your life.
4) So, more self-love, please. You are not a nobody (as you yourself declared on your profile description), and sometimes it's absolutely necessary to salute people with your middle finger and tell them to "GOEST & FUCKETH THEMSELVES!"
Sincerely.
Cantiara No, usually my readers tell me that. Wasn't referring to you, sorry for not being clear. I'm just sharing the writer's side of things (if I can call myself a writer at that, as I said, I don't deserve to call myself one). Was inspired by you sharing your experience, but it wasn't meant to be a direct response. Sorry about that.
I can't afford to. Psychiatrist treatment costs way too much for someone like me who's only working part-time.
As you said, it's something that is easier said than done. And ties in to what my other readers tell me, to ignore the hurtful comments.
Not so much stressed as I am hurt, actually. Even if I try to ignore it and distract myself, it's still there, gnawing at my heart. As I said, the psychological damage is real, and words will spill over to affect the other party's life. Someone once said that words are something you can give but can never take back, because once they're said and heard, there is no "un-saying" or "un-hearing" them. Just like a punch or a slap.
I honestly don't think it's a good idea to curse and swear at other people. I can't go around complaining about other people verbally abusing me on one hand, and then verbally abuse them on the other. I don't think it's fair or acceptable behavior on my part.
Thank you for your post, though.
And there you go again, undermining your self-worth. Saying you don't deserve to call yourself a writer. Don't do that.
And you're not willing to let the haters taste their own dose of meds is because you still put too much focus on their well-being, more than your own. And by doing this, you're only discounting your own hurt and sorrow and therefore struggling with your self-compassion. Another red flag for a depression.
If you're on discord, you can DM me, if you want, whenever you need someone to chat with. I'm not a professional counselor, and therefore may not be able to offer you a sound advice from an expert's point of view, but you can always tell me whenever something is bothering you. It always helps if you get it off your chest.
If you feel uncomfortable about it, that's okay too. Or if you already have some friends you can share your struggles with, that's good. Just try to take care of yourself more.
Cantiara Good night. Don't worry about me, I'll live.
I don't have Discord. I received a lot of abuse and insults on Discord, which was why I deleted my Discord account and never returned. Got burned too much by it. That's actually where the bulk of the insults come from, where people (sometimes other writers even) tell me I should give up writing because I don't have talent, or that I am lowering the standard of the website with my atrocious writing. There was one time where one guy saw my story in Trending, and basically proceeded to take lines from my first chapter and ripped it apart in front of everyone in the main Discord channel, much to everyone's amusement. After a while, I couldn't stand the influx of PMs and stuff, and I just deleted my Discord altogether.
yaoyueyi My take on your post. 
Well said ans remember , you always come first because this is your story . You are writing a story to share to the world and we the readers must be patient so you can be as creative as you want. 
Clowniac hi I can’t find your novel
Tomoyuki I hate hearing assholes. Abusing from an individual because they feel safe form the other end of the screen. F those people I have little to no care for any disrespectful, inconsiderate, individuals. I'm in only one discord server and that's my own that was built by coincidence, with a small group that dont wish to be in any big community just have a place to talk, feel safe and joke around every now and then we deal with vants, depression and a variety of dellemas. We are just a dysfunctional group of close strangers.
Hope you get better.
And truth be told getting a person to look at your book means you did something right. Getting them to read it and share their thoughts shows that it did something. Any person who takes the time to look at your book, then read, and still have the time to comment. They are bull shiting when they say you don't deserve to be a writer. I know if to give a book a chance by the first few sentences, and afterwards it's up to the author. I read on a regular basis and I don't believe in the thought of a bad story. Only things I see are different styles of delivery and editing issues. I have yet to see any author struggle with story.
The fact that you are willing to write and share your work you are truly amazing and I respect you to the fullest. I had opportunities to publish, and surfed various writing outlets and never really took any major opportunities, just jumped in and out of scenes to develop and learn from more veteran writers. This is gonna be the first time I publish a full composition to a community of people. And I'm still nervous and questioning if I should publish or not. I have a few stories hidden away that I've shared with several people throughout my life that I met along the way and were interested in just looking into what I was doing. Hell I even orally delivered hrs of content, that felt like mins to me. But some people remember me from. Those truly interested and invested in your writing will always share their true thoughts, show their appreciation and aim to help and develop your craft everyone else is just there for attention.
Guess one thing I tell every writer is the best story you can write is one that you yourself is willing to read.
You won't find my other writing under this name. The only things under this pseudonym are on this site.
That said, you're welcome to read the work I post on this site, if you'd like! <3
