I got a contract offer 2 days ago which popped up in my 'system notifications'. Judging by what others have said, it seems like WN is notifying contracts in this way.
It had a webnovel link for accepting and form link to reject it (which I did). Also had contact info for WN in case I had questions.
Overall, the email sounded like a cheesy infomercial for a get rich quick scheme.

    TomVanDyke I know this is long, but bare with me.

    The first link concerns 48 authors, from what I gathered. Quite a small pool of people, but there were some successes. 60% of them were published by Big Five. They got some hefty advances too. Only 3 people got less than $10k, the rest received much more (for the five big companies). The small companies went a bit worse, sure, but then I already said it depends on the draft (market, your ability to sell your story and so on). Some stories will simply not get a good contract. Most if not all people with contract an webnovel, wouldn't receive as much as a reply if they applied to any of those companies. (it took some of them years of writing to make a debut book). I'll also say that earning $10-20k on webnovel is not easy.

    "50% of published young adult authors made less than $10,000 last year. Only the top 11% made $50,000 or more." <- this is a bit misleading. Looking at the chart, I can also say that almost 50% made more than $10k.

    Also: "What helps increase and authors annual income?
    Having an agent! The average income for a published young adult author with an agent was $31,000. The average income for one without was $5,000."

    It goes into word count and so on, but there is not enough space for me to write about everything :D That article is quite long. I encourage people to check those statistics. They can be interesting, as long as you remember the small pool of authors.

    The other link is for period of 2005-2010, a bit old, but worth a look. Most of them are 10k and over (for the earn-out). As for the average advance, it would be in range as you said probably (considering all publishing houses of course). Those that offered less money or no money at all, were the small publishing companies. I assume it's easier to get into a smaller company, than a large publishing. Again, not bad pay-outs depending on the company.

    The 3rd link:
    "Median incomes of all published authors who were surveyed—including part-time, full-time, traditionally published, self-published, and hybrid-published authors—for all writing-related activities[1] was $6,080, down 3% from four years ago. This is down from a $10,500 median income in 2009 according the Authors Guild’s last survey[2]. Worse still, the median income for all published authors based solely on book-related activities[3] fell from $3,900 to $3,100, down 21%, while full-time traditionally published authors earned $12,400."

    Just to clarify, they are talking about median, not average. Here is what median is:
    The "middle" of a sorted list of numbers. To find the Median, place the numbers in value order and find the middle number. Example: find the Median of {13, 23, 11, 16, 15, 10, 26}. Put them in order: {10, 11, 13, 15, 16, 23, 26} The middle number is 15, so the median is 15. <- the average of that set is 16.28.

    If you click the link in the article, they give you more stats. Here's the link:
    https://www.authorsguild.org/industry-advocacy/six-takeaways-from-the-authors-guild-2018-authors-income-survey/

    Here is another thing:
    "Median income for full-time authors for all writing-related activities, however, was $20,300 in 2017, up 3% from 2013. Note, however, that is still considerably lower than the $25,000 median income full-time authors earned in 2009."

    There is also this:
    "Among the authors surveyed who ranked in the top decile for author-related earnings, self-published authors earned 50% less with a median of $154,000 compared to traditionally published authors in the top decile who earned a median of $305,000. " <- I know this concerns the top, but just shows the gap between people (like me) who publish by themselves, and those with a publishing house. I should also mention that Romance was really big with self published authors (I wonder why :D Looks at webnovel). You can read in full, with the link I provided.

    Of course I don't have any data from webnovel, they don't provide it. But look at an average contracted novel, and tell me they can reach those numbers on average (i.e. at least $5k for their novel with a specific word count in a year). Getting a contract from large or small publishing companies, is not easy. XD That is why I publish here. It's a nightmare to get into any company. The drafts you have to produce, the quality checks and so on. At the same time, it is much more rewarding. If I were to chose between webnovel, and a publishing company, I'd go for publishing company.

    By all means, it depends how you look at everything. The % you get for your book is also dependant on advance (2nd link). The smaller the advance, the larger share you get. (For example: Webnovel gives you no advance, and you have 50% of the net income). The companies that provided no advance, give you from 35% to 70% of the net income. Which is comparable to webnovel's rate.

    By the way, its Dave Gorman (he was a celebrity back then... but not a super known guy. It was something like year 2000? that googlewhack adventure boosted his fame) But it is true, he wrote some stuff for a show I believe, so perhaps not the best example on my part. Mark Gorman is a plastic surgeon :D because I thought you refer to another guy and checked it out.

    You were also sort of right about authors struggling with money (i.e. needing another job for a living).
    "More book authors, even those who consider themselves full-time writers, are forced to hold down multiple jobs to earn enough money to survive. This includes authors who have written books for decades and have survived on their writing in the past." (the link I provided, 4th topic). This is concerning literary authors. I wouldn't say "well-known" fantasy authors struggle, and need to find another job. Newbie authors, I would agree.

    All in all, they are not ripping you off that much, or at all. They invest in you (if they give advances), and if that investment pays out, you become more known and gain access to better price ranges. Most authors get some sort of advances though, this is evident with the links you provided. Whether you make it or not, it's up to you really, and some luck. Anyway, that is enough. You can tell me what you think, or not. Up to you. Thanks for reading.

      Cantiara
      First, I would like to congratulate on your recovery! Second, I appreciate your concern. Thank you, it sounds as if you know me personally.

      Finally, I agree with you I definitely need to pull myself out of these novels and spend some time in the real world outside of work but at the same time I've literally lost all interest in doing other things. So I find myself disengaged and have to force myself to participate in outside things. I guess thats a part of being an adult. (Constantly, being forced to do things you really don't want to do. Lol)

      S.n I believe I would have been a hermit in another life.

          Cantiara
          First, I would like to congratulate on your recovery! Second, I appreciate your concern. Thank you, it sounds as if you know me personally.

          Finally, I agree with you I definitely need to pull myself out of these novels and spend some time in the real world outside of work but at the same time I've literally lost all interest in doing other things. So I find myself disengaged and have to force myself to participate in outside things. I guess thats a part of being an adult. (Constantly, being forced to do things you really don't want to do. Lol)

          S.n I believe I would have been a hermit in another life.

              Damn! Looks like the original poster was good on their claim to ditch webnovel. They be gone. :flushed:

              I think this updated version of webnovel wants me to just focus on my studies. I love reading but I cant afford to spend money (even though some stories deserves it). 😅😅😅 I cant even buy books needed to my course😆

                p17 There's plenty of quality free stuff in the categories to distract you from your studies :grin: Just go to the bottom of the category lists to find them.

                Yeah. :pensive: premium stuff has zapped my coins. It's not so easy to get the freebie coins any more.

                Guess that's my cue to focus on writing :flushed:

                  burntpotato I buy coins and use the free ones. I'm a full time worker when I'm not in school. And I like to read new books cause otherwise I'm easily bored. And I don't just read on your website. So there are a lot of times When I go for days without using a single coin, even though I m on this site everyday for at least 15 min..I find it a little annoying when I am told my coins would expire ( not the paid could, but the other). I know full well this would happen, and I know I should be reasonable, but sometimes you don't want to be. And low-key that is where I am

                      Keilz

                      It's about being able to force yourself to do something despite of how you feel. Little by little, over and over again, until it becomes a habit.

                      You can do it, but take it easy, okay? Don't be too hard on yourself.

                      Also, losing the interest to do the stuff that you used to enjoy doing can also be a sign of burnout or depression. Make sure to take care of your mental health. Have you considered talking to a professional about this?

                        9 days later

                        NagatoSaitou You seem to think that I'm obligated to do something to fight WN's greed. I'm not, and I don't care enough to do anything more than complain about it. I don't EVER plan to spend money on low-quality novels like those on this site. Period. Call it a budgeting decision.

                          Reverend Insanity when translator is going on vacation and reduced how many chapter release per day. Nothing to complain about, he/she wants to rest and doesn't have too many stockpiled chapters, fine for me . Privileged Chapters are released when amount of chapters per day are reduced. Does that mean that there were enough chapters stockpiled to release them normaly on his 'vacation' and translator was simply fucking too lazy to transalate more chpters for Privileged Chapters thus he simply reduced the amout of how many normal chapters he will release to build stock of Privileged Chapters without doing any more work ?

                            GUERRRERO No, there wasn't enough. He did enough to last the week, to which Webnovel turned on Privilege for, eating into the stockpile he prepared for the entire week. So there won't be releases today and tomorrow.

                                Well time to read on pirate website sorry authors. Im going to sail.

                                  2 months later

                                  I'm upset and not satisfied that QI webnovel is now trying to rip us off so hard

                                  I think I will leave the platform too. Not worth it anymore like it used to be.

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