I haven’t posted lately about the Fiction Workshop at the PALnet MSP Discord. We’ve been busy! MSP (the MinnowSupport Project) has grown by leaps and bounds, becoming a staple for new Steemit users hoping to call this platform home. Along with this influx of members has come a fresh wave of talented writers, people whose words have the power to touch hearts and minds. We are so pleased that they’re finding us, and finding a tribe where they belong.
At first, I considered tagging our core group of writers and mini-mods, and recognizing by name people I simply could not host the Workshop without. Then I remembered that I always forget at least one person, and any hurt feelings simply wouldn’t be worth it. So, let me just do it this way: if you are part of our editing and critique team who regularly contributes in the queue, if you are an SFT curator, mini-mod, or participant in the radio shows on Tuesdays, then you are the heart and soul of this group. You are the infrastructure. The bones. You are the framework that all our accomplishments hang on, and I love you.
Our core group has remained fairly constant since the Workshop’s inception. This speaks volumes about the integrity of our program. Our people work hard. We work together. There is so much solidarity among us that we have this “mind meld” thing happening, like old married folk who finish each other’s sentences. Unfortunately, it’s so powerful that it intimidates a lot of first-time visitors. It’s like they’ve come up against a wall of Borg. But listen, we’re really not trying to be scary. And if you hang around a bit, you’ll get assimilated, too. There are no “outsiders” in the Fiction Workshop. Just newbies. And you won’t stay new for long.
Here’s how the workshop works: a bunch of us in different time zones hang out round the clock in Fiction Workshop chat, talking about anything that strikes us, whether it be Donald Maas, or dogs, or Elmore Leonard’s Ten Rules on Writing, or raccoons, or the major conflicts in literature, or purple “back massagers,” or Deep POV, or the fact that none of us are wearing any pants. Let’s not forget the space enema. Or man fiction. There’s just no telling what we might be saying when you drop in.
At the same time, any number of us might be having simultaneous conversations off-channel via DM, or through Google Docs from the submissions queue. The spreadsheet with all the current works-in-progress can be found in the pinned documents by clicking the pushpin icon in the top right corner of your browser. If you would like to submit a piece for critique, you will find “fiction workshop submissions” just underneath “fiction workshop” in the list of text channels on the left side of your browser window. You click a link there that takes you to our website, and the process should be self-explanatory from there.
We have a proven track record for helping minnow authors establish a presence on Steemit. “Curie” may be the loveliest word on the Steemit platform. “Curie” is love. Curie is a curation team that has become very well established on Steemit, with an upvote that can inject some serious cash into a newbie’s empty wallet. This often causes the post to trend in the writing and fiction categories, which brings more exposure, which brings more upvotes, fans, and followers. Curie curators know about the Fiction Workshop. They know our writers consistently produce outstanding stories. Our writers consistently get “Curied.” See where this is going?
Another point I must make is that in a recent contest on Steemit, workshopped stories (stories that the authors had submitted for critique prior to posting) took $250 out of a $300 total SBD prize. What am I saying? Okay, here it is: fiction critiqued and polished through the Workshop is outperforming fiction by authors of similar rank and rep score across the platform. No, none of our folks are @Ezzy just yet, but we ….
Okay, I’m going to stop right there and digress. We love Ezzy. He was a recent guest on our Fictioneers streaming radio show, and that episode may well have been the best show we’ve aired to date. Listen to the broadcast with Ezzy HERE.
We definitely have our ears to the ground about the formula for success on Steemit as well as in the mainstream publishing world. We want our writers to succeed across the board. We’re listening to the words of people like Ezzy, and Elmore Leonard, and Diana Gabaldon because clearly they understand the market. And we want to teach our writers to understand it as well.
So, what does the Fiction Workshop have on the ball now? Well, let’s see—we have a new website just for us, with a public side and a members-only side. The members-only side is filled with boring stuff like image watermarks and formatting code for posts. The public side has all the neat information and articles. Writers submit stories for critique through this website. This link is in the “fiction workshop submissions” channel on Discord.
We also have The SFT. The SFT is a curation trail with some similarities to Curie, in that we choose certain stories each week to upvote and collect online. However, our requirements for curation differ significantly from Curie’s, so there is no conflict. Our upvote also doesn’t provide as much payout, but we try to offer curated authors a small amount of SBD because we feel that work worthy of being curated by SFT standards deserves at least a token of payment. What really sets The SFT apart from other curation efforts, however, is the SFT Library. This is a repository for links to all the stories curated by The SFT, sorted by genre. It’s somewhat prestigious to have stories shelved in the library, because the only work you’ll find there is fiction our curators feel is worthy of publication in the mainstream market. Trust me when I say this—some of our curators are qualified to know.
Earlier, I mentioned the Fictioneers weekly radio show. We get two hours a week on MSP Waves Radio to talk about all things writing. We usually have a guest, and we always have a good time. Get information about format and show times HERE. The blurb on that page says it all.
We also run Steemshelves. Steemshelves is a little like the SFT Library, only for non-curated work. It’s a pay-per service--@2SBD per link. It serves to help authors collect serialized work in one location, with one link. There is no limit to the number of posts you can shelve. ALL Steemshelves profit goes to The SFT. Not a single curator takes a dime of SFT payout or monies transferred by Steemshelves. One hundred percent of all funds raised will go toward author rewards for curated stories, and eventually the operating costs of Steemhouse Publishing.
Yes, we have been busy at the Fiction Workshop. And we’re proud of what we’ve accomplished! So, if you write fiction and want to be part of an effective peer critique group, we’d love it if you join us. Wallet and rep score don’t matter. It’s a project run by minnows, but MSP has honorary whale and guest members, too. Just click the linked image below, and follow the path to our door. The MSP Fictioneers offer you an open invitation!
