I'm trying to get big on twitter first because now every publisher demands you to have a big platform in social media, but I unironically still have zero followers despite all my tweets being S tier.
Hell, I'd follow you, anon. fwiw though, don't sink too much time into the Twitter thing, or into the traditional publishing thing. Trad works best if you already have a fanbase; until then, try to pump out crap on indie and market through sites like booksirens and bookbub, as well as YouTube, Twitter, and TikTok ads. Unless you're a female author who does romance or YA, or you only want a publisher to do cross-continent book releases, the regular publishing route is mostly dead.
I actually am big on Twitter, but I'm a faithful Catholic who has a lot of right-wing views and is skeptical of the American Project, so I have to assume I'm radioactive to most publishers.
I've gotten a few short stories and a few poems published but I'm still waiting for my big breakthrough as an artist. I don't know how to make people really notice my art. How do you as an artist get the spotlight on you? I'm confident enough in my abilities that I know if I got a big break I wouldn't squander it, and my writing is good enough that I know I could win the appeal of many.
I just don't know how you get the world's eyes on you in a positive, productive way. I've already tried the traditional publishing game and it hasn't worked out for me, so I don't know what to do.
>I actually am big on Twitter >I've already tried the traditional publishing game
Coming from crowd funded comics off youtube, 10% conversion of sub count was reliable. If you're big on twitter that can be monetized, literally just do it and have paypig tiers/rewards that make sense. Have review copies sent out to mutuals and do interviews. You're in an envious position traditional or self-publishing wise. Hell, if traditional publishers knew about your sub count that will give you better entree than the material's quality, deadass fr no cap on god.
I have a Substack I've put stuff on in the past, and I have a Patreon but it has no subscriptions. I've got a large story that I've given thoughts to serializing and trying to spread around via social media (I've got a decent Facebook presence too). I'm very confident in it but I keep wondering what to do with it. 10, 20, 30 years ago I would have just kept hacking away at submitting query letters to literary agents for the first book. But now the field of publishing literature is so different and strange that I confess I'm uncertain what the right move is.
I have so much confidence in my writing, and in this particular story, that I know if I can find it an audience it will be a hit. I've just struggled and doubted over how to make sure I find that audience. I'm afraid of a misstep that leads to failure, because this story is my baby and I don't want to misfire with it.
8 months ago
Anonymous
Damn, I completely forgot about Facebook. That is actually a good place to run ads on because it's full of boomers (who read) and foreigners (who also read). I should also add to my previous reply that if you do YouTube, make sure to have a cult of personality (probably like you already do on Twitter). A significant number of people do actually buy a book because they like the author.
And one last thing: any author out there today, from Sanderson to the Red Rising guy to even me didn't get to where they were with a one-and-done. A book can be out for several years before it becomes popular, especially if attached to a series. (Ex. Red Rising was I believe originally published around 2015ish?)
It's just a matter of plugging away at things and, like I mentioned before, continuous and targeted marketing. On YouTube, Prodvigate is a Google partner and their AI is pretty good at managing Google ads for your YouTube channel if you don't know where to start; on Twitter, its own UI makes it very easy to do the ads yourself without a 3rd party, and on Twitter, the UI is more complicated, but the one benefit is that you can target followers of accounts who are in your niche (so say I was writing fantasy and thought "Hey that other niche fantasy author on Twitter has some loyal fans" you can list that guy's account in your ad campaign so that your posts get shown to his kinds of followers)
8 months ago
Anonymous
That Anon again, you seem pretty firmly committed to going the self-published route, as opposed to avoiding traditional publishing. Are you convinced there's no value left in tradpub?
8 months ago
Anonymous
I actually like traditional publishing, but only when it comes to marketing internationally. Otherwise, they're dead weight. They take way too big of a royalties chunk and provide really shitty services in return. Consider this:
To market traditionally, first an agent takes a per cent, then the publisher takes a per cent, which goes to an editor who steps all over your toes (especially if you do all your own editing). You get little-to-no say in cover design, and you don't have the same degree of freedom as if you went indie. Meanwhile, who's on their email lists? Probably the same people on bookbub lists, or any of the other marketing lists that will charge you less.
There's a reason the indie industry has outpaced trad marketing so brutally over the past several years and that's it. An individual working on their own flexible terms and hiring their own marketing team can likely beat a traditional publisher in almost any category except romance or YA (and if they beat in YA, the publishers will come to them; there was some author who did a book about something with shadows and bones. I can't remember the title, but she worked hard at it, and once it got popular, the publishers dropped six figures on her for a book deal.)
I see them as being useful for extension of an already-established bestseller or franchise.
8 months ago
Anonymous
Interesting, Anon.
You seem to know a lot about how to publish books and get them read. And you think that, if I am new to the game, self-publishing is the way to go?
In particular, the story I want to get out into the world is, I think, of high quality, but it's a bit unusual, not just in content but in form as well. It's definitely not romance, and while its four main characters are teenagers I would not class it as YA. It also plays around with elements of philosophy, metaphysics, religion, and references to the great works of Western literature.
It's an odd beast. A buddy of mine who's been reading it thinks I'm a genius. So I know the work has quality. But from what you say, its oddity makes me think I should self-publish it. I've already had doors slammed in my face trying to get it published traditionally, maybe it's time to give up on that completely.
Ah I'm going to sound like a mega d-bag saying most of this, but I can give you a run-down and share as much as I can think of right now (some or all of which you probably know).
Artists don't get big breaks. Outside of my writing, I do a variety of things including YouTube and investing, and my cash position is more than enough to let me funnel money into marketing for my creative projects. Everything is marketing. Everything. You can have stellar writing (and I know many people who do and are extremely talented) but general consumers work against you. We have a lot of mediocre writing, movies, art, etc... out there because unfortunately that's what the highest number of people are able to understand and consume--i.e. "engagement".
I'll give you an example. Say TikTok measures watch-time, and you put up an interesting piece of media like a painting that you want to discuss and show off. You'll get views, I'm sure, but you're also competing with a girl who posts this:
Notice how you had to wait about 10 seconds just to get to the point of the video? That 10 seconds is "engagement" and TikTok doesn't care if the audience is bored during those 10 seconds. It only cares if their eyes are on the screen. It might take you a month to produce your product; it takes her 15 or so seconds to produce hers. Yours is clearly more valuable, but hers wins out, and she can post the same type of thing over and over again each day, with TikTok serving her videos to different audiences each time. That's bad because TikTok has some of the most impulsive consumers. They *will* buy your book in a way that traditional publishing readers probably won't.
The worst part, and the truth of the industry, is that ideas that are too complex or meaningful are harder to understand, and most people engage in the arts as a comfort sport and not for the intellectual stimulation. Modern (large) publishers have evolved to fit impulsive and dumb markets, and as a result, they've pretty much sacrificed their ability to market other genres to really push forward with romance and YA.
Okay, so what do you do? Your best option is to a) start a YouTube channel and grow it (either by talking about your own stuff or by grifting onto YA like Cosmere or Red Rising), then use it to promote your stuff, while b) setting up smaller outlets on Twitter (which you already have) and TikTok and using their built-in promotions to market your writing. I like TikTok a lot for that, actually, because you can have virtually no following, yet spend some amount of money and get thousands of eyes on an ad. Twitter though is an actual piece of shit. Half of it's bots; other half is midwits. The only way to get engagement is to post those cheesy 10-part threads and ask braindead questions from your audiences. Do anything short of that and you'll find that within a few weeks to a year, your engagement will either stagnate or crash.
Traditional publishers are braindead and sluggish, but making a boutique publisher is actually pretty difficult. It would take time, resources, leadership, and clever marketing (which IQfy could absolutely pull off--but the question is: what happens when we plug away at things and don't get our A24 moment within the 1st year? The 2nd year? The 3rd? How committed would everyone be to holding things together until that happens?
All that said, I think it'd be a cool idea, and if successful it'd upturn the traditional publishing industry (and likely a chunk of the indie industry) as a whole. Networking support from similar-minded authors on IQfy would give everyone a much more sturdy starting block in the same way that old groups on Harper Collins' Authonomy site used to help boost authors a decade ago.
8 months ago
Anonymous
I'd be extremely happy to be published by a IQfy publisher. I've been an Anon for half my life at this point; and IQfy in particular has improved me as a writer in numerous ways, not the least by introducing me to writers who have been a great influence on my own work. If IQfy actually tried to start a publishing company I'd be the first one to submit to it.
8 months ago
Anonymous
I love you boys, snarky as you are and I hope IQfy does do a publisher thing at some point.
Plus, once I have a better presence on social media, I'll come back here and try to help platform as many of you as I can.
8 months ago
Anonymous
Give them the mustard, old boy.
8 months ago
Anonymous
Consider joining the & discord and connecting with some of those guys, they've been getting more active on social media stuff and are a really supportive community despite IQfy's reputation
8 months ago
Anonymous
>& discord
What is the & discord? Is it the same as the supposed IQfy official discord server? Because I joined it thinking I was going to meet my IQfy bros, but it was awful. Full of zoomers that I doubt use IQfy at all.
8 months ago
Anonymous
Nope, totally different scene. The editor and several IQfy writers hang out there. I think I know of the one you're talking about.
https://discord.gg/gMQvUwzP
8 months ago
Anonymous
SUGOI!!!
8 months ago
Anonymous
I want you bros to give it to me straight: what's the deal with &? I know they're "/lit/'s literary journal," but beyond that, are they to be taken seriously at all? What is the most honest opinion of them by people on this board?
In theory, IQfy trying to get a serious literary project off the ground has great potential, but it's just as likely to be completely moronic.
8 months ago
Anonymous
>"If IQfy actually tried to start a publishing company I'd be the first one to submit to it." >Here is a IQfy community who could either help you or could fill that role >"Hurmph humph, what even IS this (most well known and longest running) IQfy community, upon reflection it could be great or not great in fact!
LMAO you're a such a fricking LARPER m8
Is your name Brittany Sellner? If you have an audience you can sell, crowdfund or just sell to your fans and remember you have to market yourself. Remind your fans you have a product to sell. Look at how much Brandon Sanderson made from crowdfunding and his writing is middle school anime tier
North America was around 5% or under Catholic in 1800 and most of the blue and green in USA/Canada was only notionally held. Latinos never existed in large numbers for example within modern Texas borders in significant numbers because the comanche and apache and shit kept raping the living frick out of them. Most of the Louisiana territory was notionally held by the French and was never colonised at all, only traversed by furtrappers who were more interested in money, booze and fricking indian sex slaves
That Anon again, you seem pretty firmly committed to going the self-published route, as opposed to avoiding traditional publishing. Are you convinced there's no value left in tradpub?
I'd be extremely happy to be published by a IQfy publisher. I've been an Anon for half my life at this point; and IQfy in particular has improved me as a writer in numerous ways, not the least by introducing me to writers who have been a great influence on my own work. If IQfy actually tried to start a publishing company I'd be the first one to submit to it.
Interesting, Anon.
You seem to know a lot about how to publish books and get them read. And you think that, if I am new to the game, self-publishing is the way to go?
In particular, the story I want to get out into the world is, I think, of high quality, but it's a bit unusual, not just in content but in form as well. It's definitely not romance, and while its four main characters are teenagers I would not class it as YA. It also plays around with elements of philosophy, metaphysics, religion, and references to the great works of Western literature.
It's an odd beast. A buddy of mine who's been reading it thinks I'm a genius. So I know the work has quality. But from what you say, its oddity makes me think I should self-publish it. I've already had doors slammed in my face trying to get it published traditionally, maybe it's time to give up on that completely.
>I'm a faithful Catholic who has a lot of right-wing views and is skeptical of the American Project
Wow not like the other girls then. Sorry c**t you had your moment 2020-2022 but nobody cares anymore.
twitter is just for clout chasers, interactions bait and culture war, which is pretty fun not gonna lie. Either way the moment you stop acting like a moron and quote tweeting the latest controversial tiktok you are forgotten, nobody gives a shit about anything, its just the laughs and blackpills
I started using tweeter yesterday because I wanted a place to post my AI assisted art, and I'm still just getting the hang of it, but so far I don't really get it. The algorithm doesn't seem to push anything you post unless you already have followers, and the only way of getting notoriety is by interacting with people, but replying to anything that was posted more than a few hours ago is like talking to a void. It moves way too fast, and the only people that get to reply early to anything are those who spend all day on twitter. Not to mention everyone is so dumb, man. I'm very right wing, but there are so many people doing the WE MUST RETVRN AND RECLAIM OUR CIVILIZATION shtick without any self awareness that it makes me appreciate how sober /misc/ is in comparison.
The publishers want you to have an audience that buys books, not a mass of twitter followers who like your memes and hot takes. Spending your time on social media is a complete waste of time, you are just working for Elon for free. If you really want to make it you need to write stories above all else. If you want marketing advice, at minimum you should get a website and start building an email list. Email is ideal because you are building a direct channel to communicate with people who voluntarily signed up to hear from you. Cannot be deplatformed or rug pulled. Goodreads might be an okay investment. Substack might be an okay investment. Web novel platforms might be okay. All other forms of social media or digital platform participation should be driven by the cold logic of where your target audience is.
Modern publishing is as contraselected as you can get. It's basically designed from top to bottom to filter out anyone who might have something interesting to say and leave only the nepotism charity cases and the talentless conformist morons unaffected.
My parents would never have tolerated this
When I was a kid I would be made to go around and greet every person by name, hug the women and shake the hands of the men
If I hid in my room my parents would have taken away my gameboy for a week or so
Seethe why? If you read it in context I think you will get it. He's proving relativists that there is such a thing as objectively good art. I'd say he makes a lot of sense.
Seethe why? If you read it in context I think you will get it. He's proving relativists that there is such a thing as objectively good art. I'd say he makes a lot of sense.
Forgot to post the context
https://twitter.com/oldbooksguy/status/1695775948569018481
Maybe if the definition of “world” is limited to one dusty shelf of Mulgabimbie library and all the audience is limited to Lewis Woolston’s most immediate kin (except the ones that don’t read at all).
Because fame is gatekept. Modern literature is a way for secret societies to communicate via ciphered schemes presented in cryptic forms of writing, the kind only the initiated can understand - or those few schizos like myself who arrived to it naturally. There an ideal to be followed and if you don't comfort to it, you're shit out of luck. You can still go throug and manifest your Magnun Opus anyway, but it won't get a reach beyond 100-400 readers, and about 1/20th of those will be lit-glowies who are there to appropriate your ideas for the next loser they want to push into the spotlight. And then what? You see an inferior version of yourself publishing your very same but this time castrated and slightly altered - enough to dodge IP-theft laws - story. At the end of the day, you'll just end up as another new body to join the pile of the countless unrecognized geniuses whose ideas live on - in a very corrupted sense - due to deceitful parasitism.
Of course, you could just be a natural, by which I mean a naturally born conformist wienerroach parasite who might not be in the 'club', but who still does operate and thinks exactly like them. Those guys they love, and even sometimes initiate them if the writing strikes a cord, but at stage you need to live and breathe the corrupt and perverse onions-symbolism. Sheep styling themselves as wolves that thin the herd and all that. Do keep in mind that the very same people who think like that can't fight, can't frick without pills and are dumber than most unless it's related to social parasitism, guile and subterfuge. If you want to be that, then go ahead. I even suspect that if you're original enough with your ideas, they just might end up implementing them. But not all of us are like that.
The only way I see myself ever publishing is if I ever somehow write a 4D Chess story that manages to trick the parasites into thinking that I'm part of their Gestalt, when in reality I'm advocating something against the gestalt. But that kind of depth filters too many people to be viable and reach is what I want, not to mention the fact that it is an incredibly grueling and time-consuming task.
Modern publishing is as contraselected as you can get. It's basically designed from top to bottom to filter out anyone who might have something interesting to say and leave only the nepotism charity cases and the talentless conformist morons unaffected.
Because I ignorantly wrote a YA Urban Fantasy novel with little romance and a heterosexual male protagonist, blind to how much the market's changed over the years. I've been at a standstill since realizing, contemplating all the options. >Change protagonist's gender to female? >Age characters up and market as adult? >Trunk it and start working on an unrelated novel? >Self-publish through Amazon? >Go the Royal Road+Patreon route?
Discovering how little publishers actually do for you nowadays and how poorly authors are being paid, I'm leaning heavily toward the latter. Even if there's a chance I make nothing at all, at least I'll be in control of my own destiny. The older I get the less the idea of seeing my book on the shelf of a bookstore and having to do book signings appeal to me.
My earlier attempts at fiction were sad. And my experience was so limited and underfed that I couldn't even tell how bad they were.
I feel like I only just recently have the experience and knowledge to write well, but I thought the same thing back then.
I don't write and have zero desire to.
I'm trying to get big on twitter first because now every publisher demands you to have a big platform in social media, but I unironically still have zero followers despite all my tweets being S tier.
Hell, I'd follow you, anon. fwiw though, don't sink too much time into the Twitter thing, or into the traditional publishing thing. Trad works best if you already have a fanbase; until then, try to pump out crap on indie and market through sites like booksirens and bookbub, as well as YouTube, Twitter, and TikTok ads. Unless you're a female author who does romance or YA, or you only want a publisher to do cross-continent book releases, the regular publishing route is mostly dead.
I actually am big on Twitter, but I'm a faithful Catholic who has a lot of right-wing views and is skeptical of the American Project, so I have to assume I'm radioactive to most publishers.
I've gotten a few short stories and a few poems published but I'm still waiting for my big breakthrough as an artist. I don't know how to make people really notice my art. How do you as an artist get the spotlight on you? I'm confident enough in my abilities that I know if I got a big break I wouldn't squander it, and my writing is good enough that I know I could win the appeal of many.
I just don't know how you get the world's eyes on you in a positive, productive way. I've already tried the traditional publishing game and it hasn't worked out for me, so I don't know what to do.
>I actually am big on Twitter
>I've already tried the traditional publishing game
Coming from crowd funded comics off youtube, 10% conversion of sub count was reliable. If you're big on twitter that can be monetized, literally just do it and have paypig tiers/rewards that make sense. Have review copies sent out to mutuals and do interviews. You're in an envious position traditional or self-publishing wise. Hell, if traditional publishers knew about your sub count that will give you better entree than the material's quality, deadass fr no cap on god.
That's interesting to know.
I have a Substack I've put stuff on in the past, and I have a Patreon but it has no subscriptions. I've got a large story that I've given thoughts to serializing and trying to spread around via social media (I've got a decent Facebook presence too). I'm very confident in it but I keep wondering what to do with it. 10, 20, 30 years ago I would have just kept hacking away at submitting query letters to literary agents for the first book. But now the field of publishing literature is so different and strange that I confess I'm uncertain what the right move is.
I have so much confidence in my writing, and in this particular story, that I know if I can find it an audience it will be a hit. I've just struggled and doubted over how to make sure I find that audience. I'm afraid of a misstep that leads to failure, because this story is my baby and I don't want to misfire with it.
Damn, I completely forgot about Facebook. That is actually a good place to run ads on because it's full of boomers (who read) and foreigners (who also read). I should also add to my previous reply that if you do YouTube, make sure to have a cult of personality (probably like you already do on Twitter). A significant number of people do actually buy a book because they like the author.
And one last thing: any author out there today, from Sanderson to the Red Rising guy to even me didn't get to where they were with a one-and-done. A book can be out for several years before it becomes popular, especially if attached to a series. (Ex. Red Rising was I believe originally published around 2015ish?)
It's just a matter of plugging away at things and, like I mentioned before, continuous and targeted marketing. On YouTube, Prodvigate is a Google partner and their AI is pretty good at managing Google ads for your YouTube channel if you don't know where to start; on Twitter, its own UI makes it very easy to do the ads yourself without a 3rd party, and on Twitter, the UI is more complicated, but the one benefit is that you can target followers of accounts who are in your niche (so say I was writing fantasy and thought "Hey that other niche fantasy author on Twitter has some loyal fans" you can list that guy's account in your ad campaign so that your posts get shown to his kinds of followers)
That Anon again, you seem pretty firmly committed to going the self-published route, as opposed to avoiding traditional publishing. Are you convinced there's no value left in tradpub?
I actually like traditional publishing, but only when it comes to marketing internationally. Otherwise, they're dead weight. They take way too big of a royalties chunk and provide really shitty services in return. Consider this:
To market traditionally, first an agent takes a per cent, then the publisher takes a per cent, which goes to an editor who steps all over your toes (especially if you do all your own editing). You get little-to-no say in cover design, and you don't have the same degree of freedom as if you went indie. Meanwhile, who's on their email lists? Probably the same people on bookbub lists, or any of the other marketing lists that will charge you less.
There's a reason the indie industry has outpaced trad marketing so brutally over the past several years and that's it. An individual working on their own flexible terms and hiring their own marketing team can likely beat a traditional publisher in almost any category except romance or YA (and if they beat in YA, the publishers will come to them; there was some author who did a book about something with shadows and bones. I can't remember the title, but she worked hard at it, and once it got popular, the publishers dropped six figures on her for a book deal.)
I see them as being useful for extension of an already-established bestseller or franchise.
Interesting, Anon.
You seem to know a lot about how to publish books and get them read. And you think that, if I am new to the game, self-publishing is the way to go?
In particular, the story I want to get out into the world is, I think, of high quality, but it's a bit unusual, not just in content but in form as well. It's definitely not romance, and while its four main characters are teenagers I would not class it as YA. It also plays around with elements of philosophy, metaphysics, religion, and references to the great works of Western literature.
It's an odd beast. A buddy of mine who's been reading it thinks I'm a genius. So I know the work has quality. But from what you say, its oddity makes me think I should self-publish it. I've already had doors slammed in my face trying to get it published traditionally, maybe it's time to give up on that completely.
Post substack
Ah I'm going to sound like a mega d-bag saying most of this, but I can give you a run-down and share as much as I can think of right now (some or all of which you probably know).
Artists don't get big breaks. Outside of my writing, I do a variety of things including YouTube and investing, and my cash position is more than enough to let me funnel money into marketing for my creative projects. Everything is marketing. Everything. You can have stellar writing (and I know many people who do and are extremely talented) but general consumers work against you. We have a lot of mediocre writing, movies, art, etc... out there because unfortunately that's what the highest number of people are able to understand and consume--i.e. "engagement".
I'll give you an example. Say TikTok measures watch-time, and you put up an interesting piece of media like a painting that you want to discuss and show off. You'll get views, I'm sure, but you're also competing with a girl who posts this:
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/vDAej2HHaYw?feature=share
Notice how you had to wait about 10 seconds just to get to the point of the video? That 10 seconds is "engagement" and TikTok doesn't care if the audience is bored during those 10 seconds. It only cares if their eyes are on the screen. It might take you a month to produce your product; it takes her 15 or so seconds to produce hers. Yours is clearly more valuable, but hers wins out, and she can post the same type of thing over and over again each day, with TikTok serving her videos to different audiences each time. That's bad because TikTok has some of the most impulsive consumers. They *will* buy your book in a way that traditional publishing readers probably won't.
The worst part, and the truth of the industry, is that ideas that are too complex or meaningful are harder to understand, and most people engage in the arts as a comfort sport and not for the intellectual stimulation. Modern (large) publishers have evolved to fit impulsive and dumb markets, and as a result, they've pretty much sacrificed their ability to market other genres to really push forward with romance and YA.
Okay, so what do you do? Your best option is to a) start a YouTube channel and grow it (either by talking about your own stuff or by grifting onto YA like Cosmere or Red Rising), then use it to promote your stuff, while b) setting up smaller outlets on Twitter (which you already have) and TikTok and using their built-in promotions to market your writing. I like TikTok a lot for that, actually, because you can have virtually no following, yet spend some amount of money and get thousands of eyes on an ad. Twitter though is an actual piece of shit. Half of it's bots; other half is midwits. The only way to get engagement is to post those cheesy 10-part threads and ask braindead questions from your audiences. Do anything short of that and you'll find that within a few weeks to a year, your engagement will either stagnate or crash.
IQfy should start its own publisher. If it publishes something genuinely good, it may attract some attention.
Traditional publishers are braindead and sluggish, but making a boutique publisher is actually pretty difficult. It would take time, resources, leadership, and clever marketing (which IQfy could absolutely pull off--but the question is: what happens when we plug away at things and don't get our A24 moment within the 1st year? The 2nd year? The 3rd? How committed would everyone be to holding things together until that happens?
All that said, I think it'd be a cool idea, and if successful it'd upturn the traditional publishing industry (and likely a chunk of the indie industry) as a whole. Networking support from similar-minded authors on IQfy would give everyone a much more sturdy starting block in the same way that old groups on Harper Collins' Authonomy site used to help boost authors a decade ago.
I'd be extremely happy to be published by a IQfy publisher. I've been an Anon for half my life at this point; and IQfy in particular has improved me as a writer in numerous ways, not the least by introducing me to writers who have been a great influence on my own work. If IQfy actually tried to start a publishing company I'd be the first one to submit to it.
I love you boys, snarky as you are and I hope IQfy does do a publisher thing at some point.
Plus, once I have a better presence on social media, I'll come back here and try to help platform as many of you as I can.
Give them the mustard, old boy.
Consider joining the & discord and connecting with some of those guys, they've been getting more active on social media stuff and are a really supportive community despite IQfy's reputation
>& discord
What is the & discord? Is it the same as the supposed IQfy official discord server? Because I joined it thinking I was going to meet my IQfy bros, but it was awful. Full of zoomers that I doubt use IQfy at all.
Nope, totally different scene. The editor and several IQfy writers hang out there. I think I know of the one you're talking about.
https://discord.gg/gMQvUwzP
SUGOI!!!
I want you bros to give it to me straight: what's the deal with &? I know they're "/lit/'s literary journal," but beyond that, are they to be taken seriously at all? What is the most honest opinion of them by people on this board?
In theory, IQfy trying to get a serious literary project off the ground has great potential, but it's just as likely to be completely moronic.
>"If IQfy actually tried to start a publishing company I'd be the first one to submit to it."
>Here is a IQfy community who could either help you or could fill that role
>"Hurmph humph, what even IS this (most well known and longest running) IQfy community, upon reflection it could be great or not great in fact!
LMAO you're a such a fricking LARPER m8
Any advice on how getting big on twitter?
Don't appeal to everyone. Offer catharsis-identity-novelty-insight as a single package. Never give it all away.
Is your name Brittany Sellner? If you have an audience you can sell, crowdfund or just sell to your fans and remember you have to market yourself. Remind your fans you have a product to sell. Look at how much Brandon Sanderson made from crowdfunding and his writing is middle school anime tier
North America was around 5% or under Catholic in 1800 and most of the blue and green in USA/Canada was only notionally held. Latinos never existed in large numbers for example within modern Texas borders in significant numbers because the comanche and apache and shit kept raping the living frick out of them. Most of the Louisiana territory was notionally held by the French and was never colonised at all, only traversed by furtrappers who were more interested in money, booze and fricking indian sex slaves
Post some stuff.
Asuka is so hot, bros.
Darth Killhoon?
>I'm a faithful Catholic who has a lot of right-wing views and is skeptical of the American Project
Wow not like the other girls then. Sorry c**t you had your moment 2020-2022 but nobody cares anymore.
eurocringe post
twitter is just for clout chasers, interactions bait and culture war, which is pretty fun not gonna lie. Either way the moment you stop acting like a moron and quote tweeting the latest controversial tiktok you are forgotten, nobody gives a shit about anything, its just the laughs and blackpills
I started using tweeter yesterday because I wanted a place to post my AI assisted art, and I'm still just getting the hang of it, but so far I don't really get it. The algorithm doesn't seem to push anything you post unless you already have followers, and the only way of getting notoriety is by interacting with people, but replying to anything that was posted more than a few hours ago is like talking to a void. It moves way too fast, and the only people that get to reply early to anything are those who spend all day on twitter. Not to mention everyone is so dumb, man. I'm very right wing, but there are so many people doing the WE MUST RETVRN AND RECLAIM OUR CIVILIZATION shtick without any self awareness that it makes me appreciate how sober /misc/ is in comparison.
The publishers want you to have an audience that buys books, not a mass of twitter followers who like your memes and hot takes. Spending your time on social media is a complete waste of time, you are just working for Elon for free. If you really want to make it you need to write stories above all else. If you want marketing advice, at minimum you should get a website and start building an email list. Email is ideal because you are building a direct channel to communicate with people who voluntarily signed up to hear from you. Cannot be deplatformed or rug pulled. Goodreads might be an okay investment. Substack might be an okay investment. Web novel platforms might be okay. All other forms of social media or digital platform participation should be driven by the cold logic of where your target audience is.
What a based post
Because everyone and their mom wants to be a world-famous author. There's only room for so many, anon.
Because I'm too depressed to finish something longer than a short story each year.
I'll never be better than the best authors and no, the two cakes comic isn't very good.
I hate the attention. I burnt 3 of my novels each 70000+ words long last week
Pic related.
I'm simply afraid of success.
Because my shit would get me banned everywhere
My parents would never have tolerated this
When I was a kid I would be made to go around and greet every person by name, hug the women and shake the hands of the men
If I hid in my room my parents would have taken away my gameboy for a week or so
Honestly, not too well, but I found the perfect guide to make sure I'm making objectively good art, so hopefully with this I can get published.
I cannot muster the energy to seethe at this "guide"
Seethe why? If you read it in context I think you will get it. He's proving relativists that there is such a thing as objectively good art. I'd say he makes a lot of sense.
a list of assertions does not a proof make you fricking imbecile
Forgot to post the context
https://twitter.com/oldbooksguy/status/1695775948569018481
I am
Based. You're unironically an example for IQfy. One day I'll read your books, anon.
thankyou kind anon
Maybe if the definition of “world” is limited to one dusty shelf of Mulgabimbie library and all the audience is limited to Lewis Woolston’s most immediate kin (except the ones that don’t read at all).
Because fame is gatekept. Modern literature is a way for secret societies to communicate via ciphered schemes presented in cryptic forms of writing, the kind only the initiated can understand - or those few schizos like myself who arrived to it naturally. There an ideal to be followed and if you don't comfort to it, you're shit out of luck. You can still go throug and manifest your Magnun Opus anyway, but it won't get a reach beyond 100-400 readers, and about 1/20th of those will be lit-glowies who are there to appropriate your ideas for the next loser they want to push into the spotlight. And then what? You see an inferior version of yourself publishing your very same but this time castrated and slightly altered - enough to dodge IP-theft laws - story. At the end of the day, you'll just end up as another new body to join the pile of the countless unrecognized geniuses whose ideas live on - in a very corrupted sense - due to deceitful parasitism.
Of course, you could just be a natural, by which I mean a naturally born conformist wienerroach parasite who might not be in the 'club', but who still does operate and thinks exactly like them. Those guys they love, and even sometimes initiate them if the writing strikes a cord, but at stage you need to live and breathe the corrupt and perverse onions-symbolism. Sheep styling themselves as wolves that thin the herd and all that. Do keep in mind that the very same people who think like that can't fight, can't frick without pills and are dumber than most unless it's related to social parasitism, guile and subterfuge. If you want to be that, then go ahead. I even suspect that if you're original enough with your ideas, they just might end up implementing them. But not all of us are like that.
The only way I see myself ever publishing is if I ever somehow write a 4D Chess story that manages to trick the parasites into thinking that I'm part of their Gestalt, when in reality I'm advocating something against the gestalt. But that kind of depth filters too many people to be viable and reach is what I want, not to mention the fact that it is an incredibly grueling and time-consuming task.
I did not enjoy writing to market. I enjoy writing what I want to read. Sometimes that overlaps with a niche audience.
My diary will only be published upon my death.
the israelites are conspiring against me and holding me back
Modern publishing is as contraselected as you can get. It's basically designed from top to bottom to filter out anyone who might have something interesting to say and leave only the nepotism charity cases and the talentless conformist morons unaffected.
Because I ignorantly wrote a YA Urban Fantasy novel with little romance and a heterosexual male protagonist, blind to how much the market's changed over the years. I've been at a standstill since realizing, contemplating all the options.
>Change protagonist's gender to female?
>Age characters up and market as adult?
>Trunk it and start working on an unrelated novel?
>Self-publish through Amazon?
>Go the Royal Road+Patreon route?
Discovering how little publishers actually do for you nowadays and how poorly authors are being paid, I'm leaning heavily toward the latter. Even if there's a chance I make nothing at all, at least I'll be in control of my own destiny. The older I get the less the idea of seeing my book on the shelf of a bookstore and having to do book signings appeal to me.
My earlier attempts at fiction were sad. And my experience was so limited and underfed that I couldn't even tell how bad they were.
I feel like I only just recently have the experience and knowledge to write well, but I thought the same thing back then.