#writingcommunitity — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #writingcommunitity, aggregated by home.social.
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Intro Post 2/2
I sometimes write "sample stories" directly. While hashtags may prompt me, I've also had ideas that want out and complain if I repress them. I use this as an excuse to write side stories or explore characters. Part of why I am on Mastodon is introduce myself as an author who is actually writing."Being chatty," is usually off-topic from writing. This includes politics, things I've read, photos, or discussing other art and creative endeavors I've discovered thanks to my followers and feeds. I make a point of promoting other author's books and publications when I see them by boosting. which I consider being both collegial and friendly. I boost especially creative artwork, also, and critique when I think my opinion might prove useful to the artist.
Below are spotlight sample stories and posts. There are plenty others that you can look for after you read these. I am writing two sets of stories right now. Inklings is a fantasy romance about a woman named Wintereyes who has befriended wolves. And squirrels. And dragons.... Hashtag: #RSInklingsStory. I am also writing a few stories in what I call the Reluctance series. Hashtag #RSReluctanceStory. Reluctant Accomplice is half-complete and I am starting a short story Reluctant Father right now. The Reluctance series is SF in a universe with a few extra natural laws (that are "reluctant") in which humans have been reengineered and interstellar travel is in the background. For reasons of not wanting to explain things to the Mastodon audience, I use terms like "magic" that aren't used the mainline stories. "Day angels" and other types of people are mentioned, but you'll have to pick up what they are from context, if you can, where it matters. I won't explain my jargon. After reading enough stories, you'll catch the drift. One main character, referred to as the "devil-girl" is a recurring character, as is the main antagonist (provisionally named "Director Rainy Days") who's the protagonist of her own stories.
Click and read:
#Mastodon #boostingIsSharing #writer #author #writing #fiction #sf #sciencefiction #fantasy #romance #writersOfMastodon #writingCommunitity #uspol #writersCoffeeClub #wordWeavers #pennedpossibilites
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CW: Intro Post 1/2
Note: Updated for use as a link for friends and pinning.
Most of my current web presence as an author is on Mastodon under the handle @sfwrtr. To view my profile, click this link: https://eldritch.cafe/deck/@sfwrtr
What follows is TL;DR detail explaining Mastodon and how it works. There are clickable links at the end of the second part of this post, but knowing how to drive the car is far better than being buckled into the child seat...
Mastodon is organized around "feeds" and "toots." A toot is the same thing as a post on Facebook, eX-Twitter, or other social media, and is a term used interchangeably. It is a single unit of information that might also contain images. A feed is a list of posts with the most recent at the top. My profile is a feed of my posts. Common feeds are:
"Local," posted by account on the "instance" server hosting my account.
"Global," all feeds accessible at the time (aka federated).
"Home," which is customized and discussed below. Other than your home feed, you don't see these feeds unless you click on a button to see them.
Unlike eX-Twitter, Mastodon has no algorithm. Instead, you have a home feed, which shown by clicking a home-shaped button. This feed is customized by you by "following" the account handles of other people you are interested in. For example, you can follow me @sfwrtr. It's done by clicking their handle, which is a link, and clicking Follow. You can also choose to follow keywords, called hashtags. These are also links and begin with a hash/pound-sign. Readers are most interested in hashtags commonly used by others. When you follow a hashtag and another user's post includes a hashtag in the text, that post shows up in your home feed. I commonly use the following hashtags because of my interests and with whom I wish to communicate:
#writer #author #writing #fiction #sf #sciencefiction #fantasy #romance #writersOfMastodon #writingCommunitity.
Because Mastodon has no algorithms, and it exists in reaction to commercialism, trolling, and the hostile environment of eX-twitter, you will find things called content warnings. You'll see CW: text. You'll see a "See More" button. You'll see images marked as sensitive. CWs exist. You can make what you want of it, but ought consider using them in your posts for sensitive topics that might bother others. Click to reveal or hide things. You can mute threads so sets of posts are hidden. You can block hashtags: block #uspol for example if you don't want to see posts about US politics. You can block people, for obvious reasons.
A person's profile is a separate feed. It includes volunteered information. I have pinned some representative posts that always remain at the top. These introduce me and include a few posts in which I list sample stories. Below that you will find my most recent posts, reply posts, posts of other people I have favorited, and posts that I have boosted. By boosting a post, I redirect it so it shows up in the feeds of people who follow me. It's how we share on Mastodon. You will also find a list of my followers, people who receive in their feeds whatever things I post.
Although you can read what I've written publicly (most of it is tagged as public), I recommend signing up for your own account. I will provide an invite to my friends so as to make that process as simple as possible. Ask me for this.
My writing output can be classified into three categories: Hashtag responses, sample stories, and being chatty.
"Hashtag responses," also called hashtag games or challenges, are responses to questions or prompts. Some of them like #writersCoffeeClub and #wordWeavers are posted en masse at the beginning of the month. Another, #pennedpossibilites, is posted daily. I try to answer them on a daily basis. I use them to think through characters, writing technique, plot, or as a way to provide advice to writers. Sometimes the hashtags prompt me to write as one of my characters, or may result in my writing a small story. My account is hosted on an instance server that allows me to "toot" 5000 characters. Most others are restricted to 500. I can use the limit to write around 800 words; sometimes I do. 800 makes for a concise short story.