#fiction creators

[emeryleewho]

I genuinely wonder if people realize how many projects get abandoned because the readership "wasn't there", when in reality, the readership just stayed silent. It's a big thing in trad pub that book series get discontinued because readers pirate the books or wait until the series is finished to buy a copy, leading the publisher to think that nobody actually wants the book enough to continue the series, but it happens with indie creators too.

I've discontinued a lot of free, online series because it's not worth putting 3-5 hours a week into posting a project for no readers. Sometimes I finish the series for me but just never post it again, other times I don't finish it at all because it feels more worthwhile to put my time into other things. Sometimes I hear from readers who are sad or upset that I didn't finish something they were liking, but the *reason* it never got finished is because I didn't know anyone liked it. If you like something, tell the creator, tell your friends, make some noise about it. If you would be sad if a story never finished, make that interest known because one of my biggest considerations before discontinuing a series is "will people miss this? Will I be letting people down" and 9/10 times, I come to the conclusion of "no, it doesn't even seem like anyone's reading this" only to learn after I've moved on that apparently someone was.

[scipunk]

The Creator (2023)

[blkkizzat]

how to successfully report and remove your stolen fic on c.ai:

aka don't use fics for c.ai bots... a story of a c.ai creator who fucked around & found out:

for any other author who gets their shit stolen by ai bots on c.ai this is what you need to do:

create an c.ai account

submit a support ticket

choose DMCA & Counter Notice as the issue

under "additional information" you must provide the following: — a description of your fic that is being infringed (where you published it, date, where you post, under what names, etc) — a description of the bot that is infringing your work (include name of bot, what parts it is infringing and author's name at minimum). — a statement that you are the copyright holder have not authorized use of your property/fic in this manner nor given it to the author of the bot.

you will have to give your contact info including your full legal name, address and telephone number

provide the link to your original work (where you published it first) and the link to the bot.

Attachments (up to 5 allowed): — IMPORTANT: make sure at least one of these attachments is an electronic signature using your full legal name. i used this site to get one for free (i attached both signed and typed). — the other attachments I used to show proof of my fic vs their bot and the exact word for word similarities. and also when they blatantly said they were reuploading the bot on their profile which is likely why c.ai banned the rest of their bots.

extra tips:

if your ticket submission is successful you will get an email with a ticket number.

c.ai is pretty responsive (1-2 business days) so i would give it that long before submitting a new ticket.

you must submit EVERYTHING as I have wrote it or they will ask you to resubmit an entirely new ticket. following up with missing info did not work.

if the bot gets reuploaded you still have to submit an entirely new ticket (make sure to save and reference your old ticket number in new ticket).

everything i wrote here can be found under their tos in the DMCA section

hope this helps others authors. feel free to inbox or msg with any questions.

[orange-coloredsky-archive]

a development team that looks like this could not possibly have any preconceived biases against Black people. noooo way. its just a mistake that all of the Black people in fo4 are slaves or named after fascist colonizers or murdered or stereotypical conspiracy freaks. there is no way that the reality of this team is reflected in the art they create over and over and over and over and over and over and

[ID 1: A photo of the Fallout 4 development team taken from above and forward, showing a large crowd smiling at the camera, made up apparently entirely by white people, and almost entirely by white men. End ID.]

[writingwithcolor]

Non-offensive Historical terms for Black people in historical fiction

@pleasespellchimerical asked:

So writing historical fiction, with a white POV character. I'm not sure how to address race in the narration. I do have a Black main character, and I feel like it'd feel out of place to have the narrator refer to her as 'Black', that being a more modern term. Not sure how to do this without dipping into common historical terms that are considered racist today. Thoughts on how to handle this delicately, not pull readers out of the narrative? (fwiw, the POV character has a lot of respect for the Black character. The narration should show this)

There are non-offensive terms you can use, even in historical fiction. We can absolutely refer to Black people without slurs, and if slurs is all one can come up with, it’s time to go back to the drawing board. I cannot say which terms are best for your piece without knowing the time period, but hopefully the list below helps.

Historical terms to use for Black people (non-offensive)

African American documented as early as 1782 (documented in an ad in the Pennsylvania Journal). Note the identity isn’t accurate for non-American Black people.

African could refer to African people or “from 1722 as ‘of or pertaining to black Americans.’”

The place of origin could also be used. For example, “a Nigerian woman”

Africo-American documented as early as 1788.

People of Color documented as early as 1796 (with specific contexts, usually mixed people)

Afro American documented as early as 1817, 1831 (depending on source)

Black American documented as early as 1831 

Black was used in Old English to refer to dark-skinned people. Black was not capitalized until recent years, so “She was a young black woman.” would make sense to say, though “She was a young Black woman.” is the better standard today, although not universally adopted. I personally prefer it capitalized. 

Moor was used as early as the late 1400s for North African people, but had a somewhat flexible use where anyone visibly Black / Of African descent or the Afro Diaspora might be referred to or assumed as a Moor. Note, it has other meanings too, such as referring to Muslim people, but that doesn’t mean the person using it is going by the dictionary definition. Not really the way to go today, but okay in a historical setting (in my opinion).

Biracial (1860s), mixed race (1872), multiracial (1903) and multicultural (1940s) are also terms to refer to people of two or more races.

Occupation + description. Throughout history, many people have been referred to as their occupation. For example, the Carpenter, The Baker, the Blacksmith. Here’s an example of how you might go about using occupation and traits to identify a Black character in history. Here’s an example I came up with on the fly.

“You should go by Jerry’s. He’s the best blacksmith this town’s ever seen. Ya know, the real tall, dark-skinned, curly haired fellow. Family’s come here from Liberia.”

Offensive and less-sensitive terms for Black people 

Blacks was used in plural more, but this is generally offensive today (Even writing it gives me **Thee ick*)

Colored was mostly used post-civil war until the mid 20th century, when it became unacceptable. This is not to be conflated with the South African Coloured ethnic group.

Negro/Negroes were also used as early as the 1550s. Capitalization became common in the early 20th century. I'm sure you know it is offensive today, though, admittedly, was not generally seen as such until around the 1960s, when Black replaced it. It does have its contexts, such as the trope “The Magical Negro” but going around using the term or calling someone that today is a lot different. 

Mulatto referred to mixed people, generally Black and white, and is offensive today. 

The N-word, in all its forms, is explicitly a slur, and there is absolutely no need to use it, especially in a casual manner, in your story. We’ve written about handling the N-word and alluding to it “if need be” but there are other ways to show racism and tension without dropping the word willy-nilly.

Deciding what to use, a modern perspective

I’m in favor of authors relying on the less offensive, more acceptable terms. Particularly, authors outside of the race. Seldom use the offensive terms except from actual direct quotes.

You do not have to use those offensive terms or could at least avoid using them in excess. I know quite famous stories do, but that doesn’t mean we have to so eagerly go that route today. Honestly, from teachers to school, and fellow non-Black students, it’s the modern day glee that people seem to get when they “get a chance to say it” that makes it worse and also makes me not want to give people the chance. 

It goes back to historical accuracy only counting the most for an “authentic experience” when it means being able to use offensive terms or exclude BIPOC from stories. We’ve got to ask ourselves why we want to plaster certain words everywhere for the sake of accuracy when there are other just as accurate, acceptable words to use that hurt less people. 

Disclaimer: Opinions may vary on these matters. But just because someone from the group cosigns something by stating they’re not offended by it, doesn’t mean a whole lot of others are okay with it and their perspectives are now invalid! Also, of course, how one handles the use of these words as a Black person has a different connotation and freedom on how they use them.

~Mod Colette

The colonial context

Since no country was mentioned, I’m going to add a bit about the vocabulary surrounding Black people during slavery, especially in the Caribbean. Although, Colette adds, if your Black characters are slaves, this begs the question why we always gotta be slaves.

At the time, there were words used to describe people based on the percentage of Black blood they had. Those are words you may find during your searches but I advise you not to use them. As you will realize if you dive a bit into this system, it looks like a classifying table. At the time, people were trying to lighten their descent and those words were used for some as a sort of rank. Louisiana being French for a time, those expressions were also seen there until the end of the 19th century.

The fractions I use were the number of Black ancestors someone had to have to be called accordingly.

Short-list here :

½ : mûlatre or mulatto

¼ or ⅛ : quarteron or métis (depending on the island, I’m thinking about Saint-Domingue, Martinique and Guadeloupe)

1/16 : mamelouk

¾ : griffe or capre

⅞ : sacatra

In Saint-Domingue, it could go down to 1/64, where people were considered sang-mêlé (mixed blood for literal translation, but “HP and the Half-Blood Prince” is translated “HP et le Prince de Sang-Mêlé” in French, so I guess this is another translation possibility).

-Lydie

Use the 3rd person narrative to your advantage

If you are intent on illustrating historical changes in terminology consider something as simple as showing the contrast between using “black” for first person character narration, but “Black” for 3rd person narrator omniscient.

-Marika

Add a disclaimer

I liked how this was addressed in the new American Girl books it’s set in Harlem in the 1920’s and there’s a paragraph at the beginning that says “this book uses the common language of the time period and it’s not appropriate to use now”

-SK

More reading:

NYT: Use of ‘African-American’ Dates to Nation’s Early Days

The Etymology dictionary - great resource for historical fiction

Wikipedia: Person of Color

[jasonsthighholsters]

all comic fans know how to do is: develop superiority complexes based on their personal perceptions of a character, eat hot chip, and lie

[marypsue]

Man, it's cool and all if you see a metaphor for marginalisation in the monstrous, and if you want the power fantasy of 'what if you could just eat anybody who threatened you/pissed you off'. Me too.

However, as soon as you start saying 'no, these monsters are a 1:1 on Specific Marginalised Group, and you have to treat them in the fiction like they are directly representative of real human members of the marginalised group', BUT you also, in the fiction, make them hurt/kill/eat humans? And then try to shame me, your audience, for noticing or engaging with the bit where they kill people, because you made them directly representative of a real-world marginalised group? You have lost me, and also, I think, the plot.

[luxradium]

A recommendation to all the audio drama creators out there:

Always listen to your show in the way your audience is listening to your show.

We tend to edit using nice gear. Good over-the-ear headphones. Quiet rooms. But most of your audience will not listen to your show this way. A recent poll indicated that almost 20% of AD listeners listen with a *single* earbud in. Almost 10% listen on their phone speaker. That's a significant part of your audience that is listening in a mono environment or with tiny speakers (or both). You also likely have listeners with hearing loss in one of their ears*, and you want your show to be accessible to them. Before you release your show, make sure to listen to it at least once on a single earbud in a noisy environment. Is your show still legible this way? Can a listener still enjoy it like this, and understand all the plot beats and character moments? If not, it's a good idea to spend some more time on your edit so that they can. (And it's still definitely OK to make your show sound *great* for those who have a great audio setup! Just make sure the show still works for those who don't.) *You likely also have audience members with hearing loss in *both* ears. Transcripts are important. I'm behind in getting them posted for Metropolis, I need to get on that. (Episode 3 of Metropolis is live, BTW. Just waiting for Spotify to pick up the RSS feed before the big announcement. 😅)

[curatorofthisdigitalmorass]

The Creator (2023)

[duckprintspress]

HAPPY PRIDE MONTH, EVERYONE! We are thrilled to announce our second-annual Pride Bundles for Charity with two all-new short story bundles – 30 stories total! – that we are selling at a discount to raise money for our chosen queer charity!

Last year, our debut Pride bundles raised almost $350 for queer charities. This year, we’re back with a new General Imprint Bundle and a new Explicit Imprint Bundle, each discounted 20% from their list prices (and each including multiple stories that aren’t for sale and are usually only available to our backers on Patreon) and with 20% of the net profit going to Rainbow Railroad.

How This Works

you buy one or both bundles between now and July 8th, 2024.

we tally up all the proceeds earned and do some math-e-magic to figure out how much we’re donating!

before the end of July, we donate the raised money to Rainbow Railroad, we post the proof we’ve done so.

you get fantastic stories!

we all get that happy, glowy feeling of knowing that money has been well-spent on fantastic causes!

About the Press

Duck Prints Press is a queer-owned indie press, founded to publish original works by fancreators. We’ve been in operation for over 3 years, and in that time we’ve worked with well over 150 creators to publish six anthologies and almost 100 other stories, from shorts to novels, and we’ve got more on the works (our next anthology, our first erotica collection, will be crowdfunding within the next month!). The vast majority of our creators and their creations are queer/LGTBQIA+ (maybe even all, but we don’t out anyone and we don’t ask demography because, frankly, it’s none of our business).

25 of our authors have chosen to include their short stories in one or both of these short story bundles, and all our short story authors nominated potential charities and voted to select Rainbow Railroad as the beneficiary for our 2024 Pride Bundles.

About Rainbow Railroad

In countries around the world, LGBTQI+ people face violence and oppression simply because of who they love or who they are. Rainbow Railroad helps them get to safety! Rainbow Railroad is a global not-for-profit organization that helps at-risk LGBTQI+ people get to safety worldwide. Based in the United States and Canada, they’re an organization that helps LGBTQI+ people facing persecution based on their sexual orientation, gender identity and sex characteristics. In a time when there are more displaced people than ever, LGBTQI+ people are uniquely vulnerable due to systemic, state-enabled homophobia and transphobia. These factors either displace them in their own country or prevent them from escaping harm. 

Note: This charity isnot affiliated with the Press, do not know we’re doing this fundraiser, have not endorsed this in anyway and are, as such, utterly uninvolved in this beyond being the beneficiaries of our efforts! Text is from the Rainbow Railroad website.

About the Bundles

We are offering two bundles, one with 18 short stories published under our General Imprint, the other containing 12 stories published under our Explicit Imprint. The shop listings include details about and excerpts from all the stories. Here’s the gist…

Titles in the General Imprint Charity Bundle:

The Princess and the Maze by A. L. Heard

Of Loops and Weaves by Catherine E. Green

Glass Slipper: A Dance by Cedar D. McCafferty-Svec

Songs, Suppers, and Stories by D. V. Morse

Waiting for the Tide to Turn by Genevieve Maxwell

Chinaski’s Dirty Work by J. D. Harlock

Foundations by Johnathan Stern

Seal Island by K. B. Vimes

Into the Wyvern’s Lair by Mikki Madison

Sarisa by N. C. Farrell

Whispers of Atlantis: A Tale of Discovery and Belonging by Neo Scarlett

Be Not Afraid by Nicola Kapron

Awkward and Oblivious by R. L. Houck

Washer Wars: A Laundromat Feud by Samantha M. Piper

The Wayward Timekeeper by Terra P. Waters

if it’s meant to be by Tris Lawrence

Meet C(omm)ute by Violet J. Hayes

Chrysopoeia by Zel Howland

18 stories. 254 pages. 82,462 words of fiction!

Price: $22.50

Approximately 20% of the list price of this bundle will go to Rainbow Railroad.

Titles in the Explicit Imprint Charity Bundle:

Brambles, Pollen, and Other Natural Disasters by A. L. Heard

A night such as this by April Steenburgh

Theirs All Along by boneturtle

Orchidelirium by Dei Walker

Old Kings and New by Lyonel Loy

Weather the Storm by Lyn Weaver

Pretty 7 Days a Week by R. L. Houck

Adventures of the Scarlet Sentry: After Dark by Samantha M. Piper

Worlds Apart (but Still Close) by Sanne Burg

Taken at Sea by Shea Sullivan

Warm Anything You Want by Tris Lawrence

LA Photographs Itself by YF Ollwell

12 stories. 198 pages. 69,550 words.

Price: $21.50

Approximately 20% of the list price of this bundle will go to Rainbow Railroad.

Come get some great stories, support a queer-owned business this Pride, and benefit two fantastic causes. Win-win-win situations don’t get much better than this!

These bundles will only be available for one month, so don’t miss out. Visit our webstore between now and July 8th and get yours!

[scipunk]

The Creator (2023)

[podcast-bookclub]

Audio drama creators: what moment made you feel like you were *actually* a creator?

[arconinternet]

Space Patrol - British series (Videos, Roberta Leigh, produced 1962, aired 1963)

You can watch them here. From the Wikipedia article:

"The humanoids in his crew consist of the elfin Slim from Venus, and the stocky, ravenously sausage-mad Husky from the Red Planet, Mars. The imperfect Slavic accent variants and six-pointed star chest emblems of these two may have been a sly nod to the Jewish-Russian heritage of the English series creator/writer."

"The show reflected sex roles characteristic of the culture and era which produced it, but blonde and brainy Marla would often explicitly point out that "There are no dumb blondes on Venus." Indeed, the series was created and written by the prolific polymath artist Roberta Leigh, the first woman producer in Britain to have her own film company."

[defire]

I want to make whump films.

I'm considering forming a team of new filmmakers and actors from the whump community, to collaborate on mini series with survivor fiction/whump plotlines.

The goal would be to start bringing life to all of our whump stories that we never got to tell out loud. Eventually I would want us to be able to fund and produce high-quality episodic series on top of the existing content. Naturally there would be pain and angst all throughout each production.

So I'm wondering who would be interested in this.

*regular basis, meaning, creating a consistent stream of content with the goal of growing much bigger over time.

Bet I'm not the only one who would love to make this happen. I have more detailed ideas but I wanted to know if you guys are interested first.

Next update on this

[filmgifs]

THE CREATOR

2023, dir. Gareth Edwards