Clowniac "or else 1 one star thx" lmao this is so tragic that it's actually hilarious :joy:
there definitely is a very biased reader viewpoint on this site, so hopefully as webnovel develops, more readers can become understanding of the author's pov. :hearts: if not, then.................... sweats
An Open Letter To All Readers - From Your Dear Authors
KoraL honestly, I think besides the "more chapters" demand, authors may also divide their longer chapters in 2 bc of ss costs, and the fact that readers don't understand that they're set automatically by word count, and not by the reader-- then they get mad that a 2500 word chapter costs 13 ss, so the author splits it into 2 and now the reader has to pay 7 ss per chapter (14 ss total). they feel like it's a bargain, but there are definitely much more problems w/ splitting chapters than slower updates/etc.
basically, it's never good to split your chapters :cry:
Elise_Elleneth yes, I agree that not having english as a native language should be used as an excuse.
but readers should definitely let the author do what they want with the characters. it's definitely a constant balance struggle of trying to please readers & writing what you actually want :( i end up listening to what my readers want, but also not altering any big plot points that I've planned already!
As someone who has been writing professionally for over a decade, I deeply disagree with your core assertion about how much a writer can write in a day/week.
The vast majority of professional authors who do literally nothing but write put out 2k or fewer words a day. Most put out 500-1000. You are considered a phenom or a freak if you can do 2500 or more every single day. And these numbers dont even factor editing, research, theming, and revisions, which collectively take 4-5 times as long as writing. In a list of over 100 well-known professional writers who have sold millions of copies, only two put out more than 2k a day.
And these are people whose lives revolve around writing.
I've read the "authors" on here who put out 2500+ words every day. The vast majority of them would fail a middle school grammar test, and read like a sugar-addled 12 year old wrote them. They have no coherent plot, one dimensional characters, shit dialogue, bad word usage and are riddled with tropes.
If you want quality writing, it takes time, and you would do well to respect the authors process if you want good stuff. This is a craft that takes time and effort to get right.
Or you can go find one of the thousands of tripe merchants on here who will gladly shovel walls of subpar gimmicky bullshit in your face if that's what you're looking for. But being rude or demanding to a writer who is striving for excellence, but isn't meeting your entitled whims, is inexcusable.
Readers are not owed anything by us. You are receiving what we do in most cases for free, regardless of the countless hours of planning and effort we put into our work. So be grateful. And if you find yourself bored by waiting, go get your instant gratification fix somewhere else rather than taking it out on us.
Gourmet_DAO From the reader’s point of view, the author writes too slowly, 3-4 chapters a week are few, the story is too interesting or you want to know something new. And the author slows down. I understand that he has his own life, but he can exert himself, give up all his affairs and start writing. After all, he himself put the yoke of the author of short stories around his neck, now he is obliged to write for readers.
"The author can just sacrifice everything else in their lives to make me and the other readers happy. After all, we deserve it, and they owe it to us because they started writing in the first place."
This is the most entitled, obnoxious, self-absorbed thing I have read on this site. Full stop.
If you feel this way, you are the reason this post exists, and the reason writers like me dont want to write here.
yaoyueyi I absolutely agree with you that each author has his own speed of writing the text. Like the quality of his writing. My English is not so good, it is possible that I could not fully convey my idea. This may be an excuse that my stories are not as good as those of authors who have native English. I don’t think so, why, because I have my own style, and it is far from fiction. But not entirely purely documentary. But my English is not so good to read. When I write a story, my English is gradually getting a little better. Yes, this is a hobby. I'm not a professional writer, I'm a technician. But I like to write prose. I have my readers. I have my own goal as an author, there are two of them:
1. share interesting material on the history of the Silk Road
2. To be able to write 1,000,000 words in 1 year (this is more likely for myself, to learn how to write 2,500 words a day at least)
My chapters were 5500 words -3300-2500 words each. Now I write 300-750 words per chapter. But I write.
Thanks for your feedback.
Clowniac There is a polemic question about the fact that the author owes nothing to the reader. There will be no readers, no writers.
I agree with you that the quality of the text is important, but if the plot is crap, then I would rather not read a very high-quality English text but with interesting content. Than excellent English without quality content.
It would be ideal - both the text was good and the content. But in practice, there are a million writers in the world, but not many read from them.
For example, I am now reading about 10 short stories, they write with some grammatical errors, but the content is interesting. There are novels where there is an editor, the text is smooth without errors, but the content is just water, it is not interesting to me.
Exactly as you write, the author does not owe anything to the reader, and so does the reader to the author. Everyone chooses for himself what to read.
Another thing is that there is such a thing as ethics, a culture of communication, rudeness, rudeness, is not acceptable. Putting pressure on the author, this is a bad manners. You can create in an atmosphere of joy and not pressure.
Thank you for your opinion.
- Edited
Clowniac Readers - respect the authors, they are not robots, they write as creative people, when there is inspiration. And when it is not there, then nothing good can be written.
But in life you and readers and authors should respect people, and not be rude, otherwise it will all return to you like a boomerang and affect your karma. You think that the Internet is a game, that you are in private, you can throw your shit on others and thereby increase your Sense of Greatness. Not thinking that you caused a heart injury to another person. But do not doubt, it is evil that you have done to you will return in 10 times the size. In the most difficult time for you, instead of helping you will have problems. This is how this world works.
Therefore, in the East, they say - do good deeds, do not offend people, because on Doomsday your good deeds will go to the one you offended if he did not forgive you. And his sins will go to you. Do a good deed, if people do not see, the fish will see. So it’s not worth it to offend people in vain. Everything will affect karma. But people do not understand this and are zealous in their misunderstanding of the world. This is a choice, and man is not a victim of his choice. Walking along the path of enlightenment or walking along the path of darkness.
yaoyueyi short stories meant novels
- Edited
Yueyue~ just write whenever you want.
Don't overwork yourself~
(Am glad my readers don't punish me for my slow updates haha)
-amputated leg BB
my dear readers are generally silent, I don’t know whether to be happy or sad?
The pressure of readers leaving you after you've just missed a daily update is daunting.
However, we should always remind ourselves of the reason why we truly write - NOT TO IMPRESS, BUT TO EXPRESS.
Don't give up if you feel like quitting! It's always that time when the diamond and rainbow are nearer! FIGHTING!
yaoyueyi Honestly even as a reader I get what you say. It’s the same with all forms of art, it’s always easy and fun to admire without caring so much for the hard work put on it.
As a reader the better the novel the more we want the next chap to come up sooner... but as sensible readers the most done would be commenting like “can’t wait for the next!” Or “you cliffs are killing me!” In a joking tone... more than that os unneeded.
The most I demand for authors and translators alike is to keep up with the schedule the proposed. Obviously I get live happens and sometimes it can’t be helped but nothing that a note saying “sorry, I’m having rl probs so the schedule this week/month will get messed” wouldn’t solve.
My only real problem with authors is the lack of compromise some have with their own novels, dropping them left and right as soon as a problem comes up and “just starting a new one” and even promoting them on the dropped novel notes... I confess this uncertainty keeps me away from the original works. I saw it happen many times with all kinds of novels, popular, fanfics, originals... as soon as there’s a block or a lost of interest... they jump ships.
Obviously I know not all authors are like that, just as you know not all readers are that ungrateful. It’s a sad situation.
yaoyueyi why worry about reviews when you can just delete them???
Acutelittletrap fair point :D thanks for that insight
Geraldrold the review is not the point. it's the constant, repetitive pressure of readers demanding more chapters and mass release though I've made my point clear that I'm not going to increase my schedule. that's what gets tiring after a while.
Acutelittletrap i'm not talking about writers breaking their update schedule? i can definitely see why readers have the right to complain about it-- it's just when the author sets the schedule very clear and sticks to it, yet readers still demand more and more mass release without relent that becomes problematic and actually really stressful on the author.
for example, when I first started writing on webnovel, I would only update once per three days. my readers were okay with it, but a lot did ask me for more and more chapters. then, i started updating five days a week. but the same complaints-- if not more-- kept coming, asking for more chapters and mass release over and over again. it really gets to the point that makes me wonder: when will they be satisfied?
so, I don't really know if the"entitlement" you're speaking of is directed to my original post? :sweat: but I would just like to make clear that I'm not talking about not having enough readers/how they feel about the quality of my work/etc. all I'm saying is that readers should think a little more in the author's point of view before they make demands that really don't feel too great in the author's perspective.