🌈Ranibow Sprimkle🌈

i hate finding things out about the writers of the fanfics i read

uhm no the fic about those teenagers fucking isnt silly anymore youre 28 years old

...Who do you think built AO3?

OP I have bad news for you about most professional writers, too

Okay, so, looks like Google Docs might actually start implementing their rule about not sharing explicit content. (This includes writing.) How in the ever loving fuck am I supposed to back up 1,000+ stories that equate to 3 million+ words into fucking Microsoft Word????? And efficiently, for that matter?! HELP.

I figured out how to move all my stuff onto Microsoft Word!

See those three dots next to the folder name? Click on that.

Then it'll give you the download option.

Once downloaded, it'll save the folder as a compressed zip file! All the documents inside are changed to Word files, and you can view and edit them now.

Now I know how to move 3 million+ words onto my laptop. It'll still take a bit, but not nearly as long as I'd imagined.

I would like to add that I am not trying to fear-monger. However, it is part of Google Drive’s TOS to not share explicit material, be it sexual or violent. (So, basically what I write.)

This occurrence seems to be rare. Read about it here.

Besides, it is better to have everything on your own hard drive vs Google docs. You retain more ownership over your work that way.

Someone pointed out that I did not provide the ToS, which, my bad. Again, not trying to cause a panic or anything. Just saying that Google is not a safe place to keep your writing/art.

This is the specific part of the ToS that I was looking at:

And this is the part that says they can restrict access to your writing or remove it entirely for breaking the ToS:

So, yeah. An author lost access to their writing due to sharing it with beta and alpha readers. It seems like an isolated incident as far as I’m aware, but you can never be too careful. Back up your stuff if you can.

Source @ X

ID: tweets from @boulevarddouble:

okay SO. Just FYI i have an insider contact and i asked him about this new google drive nsfw scare.

"What I think has happened is that drive has made several updates to its spam/abuse filtering and one of the focuses is trying to catch spammers who share explicit things in docs with random emails. Which is good in theory, but has the potential to hit false positives."

his recommendation is to keep NSFW words out of your doc titles and instead of sharing the "open link", share directly with you beta's email addresses.

It is also more likely to flag up explicit images, though that is less likely to be a fic problem.

/end ID

"Read Banned Books" a new full page cartoon essay published in The New York Times Arts & Leisure section today.

A good day to reblog this, I just found out The Deep & Dark Blue is on another new ban list, this time in Colorado. Hooray.

nothing will ever amaze me the way fanfiction authors do. like, you wrote silly little stories about my favorite little guys? and i can read them?? for free??? that’s fucking wild.

you poured your heart and soul and very being into your writing and then put it out there for anyone to read? insane.

you spend a truly incredible amount of time writing novel-length, high quality stories, again, FOR FREE, that anyone can read, again, FOR FREE??

shoutout to every single fic author in existence, you guys are fucking incredible and i love all of you so much

I keep seeing posts talking about the WGA/Sag-Aftra strike, which yes, good, but in all this "support writers" sentiment I'm seeing no one talk about book writers, which I think is something people should know more about right now.

We are at an all-time high for book bans, namely targeting queer & PoC-authored books. This means that a lot of schools and libraries are no longer stocking diverse YA books, and if you're not in publishing, you may not realize this but school & libraries are by far one of the biggest markets for diverse YA books.

This means that in 2023, YA book sales are down. This is also in part because Barnes & Noble (the largest physical book retailer in the U.S.) is no longer really stocking YA hardcovers. This means that marginalized authors and debut authors are struggling to sell books.

But it's a LOT worse than that. In the past couple of years, marginalized authors are *really* struggling to get new book deals. Most books are acquired by a publisher about 2 years before they release to the public, so this isn't all that noticeable yet, but a LOT of marginalized authors I've spoken to (myself included) have been unable to sell a new YA book since 2020. So while I had a book out last year, even if I sell one right now, you won't see it until 2025-2026. That's three to four years without a new release or the income I get from publishing those books.

On top of that, Big 5 publishers have started closing imprints (namely their diverse imprints) and have started telling their marginalized YA authors to just go. I've had multiple authors tell me their publisher basically said, "eh, we don't care to put in the work for you anymore. You can just go somewhere else". Of the authors who *are* getting offered new contracts, we're being offered pay far below the cost of living and we're being handed contracts that split our payments 4 or 5 ways and require we sign over our work to be used to train AI so they can replace us a few years down the road.

Authors are freelancers who own our IPs, which means we can't unionize the way Hollywood writers can, and despite authors showing up in droves to support HarperCollins employees when they went on strike for fair wages, we're being hung out to dry when it comes to our own rights.

If you enjoy diverse books, especially diverse YA, please understand that many of the authors you loved over the past 3-5 years are being forced out of the industry. We're being exploited, and we have no way to defend ourselves. Our books sales are drying up thanks to anti-queer legislation, our rights are being eaten up by AI, and our publishers are degrading us while profiting of us and refusing to share those profits with us.

Within the publishing industry, we've all been watching this decline happen over the last decade, but outside of it, I know most people have no idea what's going on so please spread the word. And if you care about diverse books especially in YA, please support marginalized authors in any way you can. The industry needs to be reminded that it needs us before we're all eliminated from it.

This. :/

A Single Man, Christopher Isherwood (b. 26 August 1904)

the in-universe explanations were (get this) also written by the writer

2019’s Top Authors & Poets

We wrote a list of the people who’ve written the words you love the most. You’re welcome.

The number in italics indicates how many spots a name moved up or down from the previous year. Bolded names weren’t on the list last year.

I just imagine all 20 of us at the best dinner party in history.

It’s humbling to be at #1. I’m all alone in a house in the Scottish Highlands otherwise I would hug somebody. But it’s only me.

So thank you from only me.

And I really wish Terry was here. I don’t think any of the love for Crowley and Aziraphale (and the rest of the characters) on Tumblr would have surprised him at all. But I think he would have felt very vindicated. He said no to several would be Good Omens adaptations before he asked me to do it, because he wanted it to still be Good Omens. And I like to think that it was.

YES PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

Ooh I didn’t know that! I’ll def keep that in mind. Signal boost!

why would i pay for a book? either get it second hand or find a pdf

Because if you acquire a book, it presumably means you want to read it, and hope to find enjoyment and entertainment in its contents.  Those contents were generated by someone who is very likely living below the poverty line for their region, who depends on book sales (new book sales) to eat.  If no one buys my books, I stop writing or I starve.  Those are my choices.

Your choices are buy new, buy used, go to a library, or illegally download a file you have not paid for.  The first benefits the author.  The second benefits your local economy.  The third benefits your community.  The fourth benefits no one, and it violates copyright law.

For smaller unknown Autors I buy new, for well known big authors I buy second hand.

How do you make that determination?  And do you work for a financial institution that magically gives you access to their finances?  Some authors I consider to be well-known and very important are living absolutely hand-to-mouth, and are in danger of not getting another contract due to low sales.  Appearances and reality are not always identical.

What’s the difference?

Rest in power, Ursala Le Guin