Work Room - Week 32

[clauderainsrm.livejournal.com]

Now that you know that it's an OPEN TOPIC - how are you going to proceed? Have you been storing up ideas, just in case something came up again? http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/581689.html

***

One thing that caught my attention over the last couple of weeks was the "assumption" of an entry.

I'm not really sure if I'd considered this before I saw it, but once I did, it clicked with me.

What I mean by that is - are you writing your entries with "the Idol audience" in mind, or are you writing toward a larger audience, some of whom might not know anything about Idol? (Those unfortunate people!)

What other assumptions are you making with your writing? What might need to be explained, if someone were coming across your entries for the very first time?

Comments

[mstrobel.livejournal.com]

Oh my god open topics are the BEST. This I have got to home game.

Oh yeah, that's how you do it. FIRST.

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

Hah! I'd have been first if I hadn't gotten all thinky about my comment.

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

This is an interesting question. I keep Idol in mind when I write, but I think I write for everyone. Except, I care more about the structure and word choices and sometimes tone than in my regular posts. But I guess I imagine that whoever is reading either has me friended, in which case they know about Idol, or they came through Idol, so I don't explain.

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

I clean up my idol pieces so that they are presented in a more professional manner. I label fiction as such ( though people have gotten confused before when I wrote realistic fiction). I think about presentation a lot more... But it's not Idol specific. It's because it's less journal like and more for an audience than my day to day ponderings.

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

When an idea hits me, I write it down. I never know if I'll get the chance to use it, but if I think "that'll be fun to write about", I put it on the list. I've used several ideas as they fit topics, but luckily the list continues to grow since most of the time new ideas hit me when I see the topic.

I have a few nonfiction ideas I would like to write about. Some funny, some serious. I have to see what kind of mood I'm in. Would people rather see funny again? Of the self-deprecating sort, I'm sure. Or would you rather read something serious? Or maybe even real life creepy or unusual? It all depends on what hits me (and if I have any dreams that inspire me), but I'm open to suggestions as well.

When I write, I write for a wider audience most of the time. I like sharing my writing with non-idol people and even RL folks lately. I've never considered writing purely for Idol... I'm not even sure I'd know how to do that?

[mstrobel.livejournal.com]

Ohhh you are good. I keep the ideas in my head, and then suddenly I have to write 9,000 words in ONE DAY.

Go creepy! I like creepy!

[n3m3sis42.livejournal.com]

I write with the Idol audience in mind, I guess? My serial has picked up a few fans on my regular friends list but I'm not really writing it for them. Mostly, I write what I feel inspired to write.

ETA: So I guess I write for me first, but then I try to keep Idol in mind in terms of length and stuff like that. And since it's Idol, I write less of my serial than I probably would otherwise, etc.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

I write for a general audience rather than specifically for Idol, and I also write for myself in that I write stuff I would want to read. I do write a lot of genre fiction, so my audience might not be the most general of general audiences. I try to avoid "pandering" to the Idol people, because I know if I tried that it would come out awkward and not-so-good. I keep Idol in mind when I'm writing, but I don't bend over backwards to "write for Idol," if that makes any sense.

Being as I have a bit of a serial (part of this complete breakfast!) problem, I suppose one humongous assumption I make is that people have read or will read previous entries in the series in order to fully understand what's going on. Somehow, miraculously, this serial habit of mine hasn't gotten me eliminated. Yet.

If someone were to wander across my journal, the rather large amount of backstory some entries have might need to be explained, haha.

It's funny, I never even thought I COULD write a serial story, and that's the majority of what I've written for Idol! :O

[medleymisty.livejournal.com]

I've been slacking lately, and I plan to sit down this weekend and put some actual effort into an entry. Not going to be doing anything Saturday anyway, since the current predictions say it'll be 106 to 108 degrees.

I'll probably do fiction. It's been a while. And I think I had an idea that I was saving, but I can't remember it right now.

I might do Seth. I love writing Seth, and I know he brings out my best. For a twist on it, though - maybe full text adult Seth?

Oh, I write for me. My nonfiction for Idol isn't really any different than the majority of my posts on my LJ from the last two years. And my fiction, well - Seth has all sorts of backstory, but I think for the most part you don't really need to know it to enjoy a single Seth story. You won't get all the meaning or all the symbolism or the foreshadowing, but it'll still be an okay read.

Sigh - there'll never be another audience like the one that read Valley (the Sims story where Seth originated) as I was writing it. I think you get more involved in stuff that you read as the author updates it, as opposed to coming along and reading the finished product later. So they were really all up into my characters and my story, and then....then I started writing 10, the story of teenage Seth.

And they found themselves identifying with Seth, when he'd been the scary murderer villain of Valley and they'd spent the last third of Valley being creeped out of their minds by him. Their reactions were delicious. :)

But yeah - my audience is me. I'm the only person that I write to please. Of course I want other people to read it and enjoy it and I love nice comments, but while I'm writing all I'm thinking is....I don't know. I don't know that I consciously think a lot when I write. It's all very instinctual.

I should probably go to bed now and get some sleep. Maybe I'll remember the idea I had tomorrow. If not - I'll figure something out. :)

Good night, fellow Idol peeps! Thank you for being awesome!

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

I definitely always try to keep my audience in mind, whether writing for "Idol" or for something else. Primarily, this tends to mean defining esoteric terms and making certain that, if I write about topics not likely to be familiar to all my readers, I make it accessible.

One of my poetry professors in grad school had a term I find myself using all the time. If a poem was too personal, too self-referential, he called it an "inside" poem. He urged us, always, to "open" our poems up to the reader: to allow them a way into the experience we were discussing. It's a useful idea to consider with any piece of writing.

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

Without realizing it, I've focused this season on writing "outside" type entries. In previous seasons, I've went very personal. While not always bad (I love personal nonfiction), I made it too personal and often struggled with wanting to share that side of me with anyone and everyone.

So maybe a similar concept, in a way. Those entries didn't go over as well either and I think it's because it was too much to share (and perhaps I held back in fear as well).

[beldarzfixon.livejournal.com]

I don't know if I'm writing "for the idol audience" so much as I'm writing something that is to be read.

I keep in mind that I want people to notice it -- find an opening that appropriately grabs them -- and keep reading through to the end: Make it flow, stay on topic, find fat wordy sentences and edit! edit! edit!, read it through to see if it's something I'd read if someone else wrote it, find the spots that need something more, or a distraction snipped away.

So much of this has become instinctual, that it's hard to describe in detail. I know this sounds like boasting as I do writing/editing for a living, but it's also a product of practice, and I think it's becoming second nature to everyone here, whether you've mucked through 31 weeks or closing in on 100. And even in the most modest "oh, I'm not a REAL writer" it's showing in the great quality of their work.

[medleymisty.livejournal.com]

That's what I meant! With the instinctual editing and pacing. Only I don't do the keeping people in mind part. :)

[theun4givables.livejournal.com]

I know I considered the Idol audience whenever writing something for LJI. However, these considerations never stopped me from writing what it is I wanted to write. My entry for vacation is proof enough for that. ;) I knew it might not go over well, but I did it anyway. My home game entry has more comments than that entry, lol.

Sometimes, you just gotta take risks.

[kickthehobbit.livejournal.com]

I'm going to write about trigger warnings, obvs! because we haven't heard enough from me about that!

:P

I consider my audience inasmuch as I go, "hm, do I put this behind a LJ cut or not?" when posting. that's about it.

as far as whether or not I have anything in mind for the topic—I kind of do, but at the same time I'm going, "ahhhhh nervous!" because omg fiction and omg I will not have my computer back until MONDAY. :(

[yachiru]

I am a horrible selfish bratty writer. I write things that please me. It always surprises me that people like things I like. o_0

No no no idea what I'm doing for the open topic. I thought of a fortune teller solving a murder or a man eating mermaid or a haunted hoarder house but they all seem derivative. I'm stuck like a turtle in a puddle of peanut butter.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Someone finds a dead body in a hoarder's house and a fortune teller solves the murder with the help of a man-eating mermaid? /random idea-mashing

Tough one.

[ellakite.livejournal.com]

I have tried to write "for my audience". Other times I've written what I wanted to write.

I honestly don't know whether it made a difference when I tried going one way or the other. Sometimes I've misjudged my audience, and some of my most popular work has been stuff I wrote for my own pleasure.

But this is perfect: even before I saw Gary's question, I was planning on signing in here tonight to ask for suggestions. Yeah, I'm "only" in the Home Game… but what would you folks like to see me write for an Open Topic?

Re: Tough one.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

I want to see you write the story we discussed before about the guy who saves a kid from a car wreck. :)

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

Since other Home Gamers are asking, is there anything anyone would like for me to write about? Open topics are so open.

[halfshellvenus.livejournal.com]

One of the hardest things for me to get a handle on was Idol's "early game".

I wrote stories I thought were solid and very good, but they did only fairly well in the voting. Some of that was probably because I was new and had no following (including on my friends' list!), but it also appeared that the early game is NOT the time to take an unusual approach to a prompt. My Week 2 entry for "Three Little Words" was not a traditional love story, and it seemed that not only had most people assumed the prompt meant ONLY those three words... some of them were prepared to write about it in complete abstraction other than that assumption! By Week 3, I decided I was not up to figuring out a good and safe direction to go with "Coprolite," so I took a bye and sat back and watched. :0

Like beldarzfixon, I do strive to make stories something that I think people will want to read. Around the middle-game, I often tried to write atypical takes on the prompt, in part so the story wouldn't get "lost in the crowd" of similarly-themed entries.

But sometimes... I write stories that I just really want to write, usually because I think that's a fun and funny approach to the prompt. Two 'crack' stories and this last satire went down that road. At that point, I hope that if I tell an interesting story and tell it well, that the audience may be persuaded that the K-Tel Writerizer, or a vignette involving subatomic particles hanging around the Quarketerium, is amusing enough to be worth a vote.

At some point, I expect I'll be proved wrong. :0

[n3m3sis42.livejournal.com]

Weird, because I wrote about love (sort of) for "Three Little Words" and I totally felt like I was the only one who went the obvious direction. My experiences during the early weeks were what taught me fairly quickly not to do the obvious takes on the topic. :)

[xo-kizzy-xo.livejournal.com]

How times have changed.

There was a point in the history of Idol where you'd never be caught saying "I'm building a portfolio" or "I'm writing for a wider audience". I suspect there were a few people back then who probably did such, but mentioning either would incur the wrath of quite a few fellow players. It would also paint a huge target on your back.

ANYWAY, I write for myself first, Idol second, and the wider audience third. If I don't like what I'm writing right off the bat, how can I expect anyone else to like it? But then again I'm also my toughest critic.

One thing I've noticed with my own writing is that I'm much less "inside" now than I used to be. I'm not sure why that is, but as somebody who has always been more of an "inside" writer, I find it quite interesting.

[medleymisty.livejournal.com]

Glad I found Idol now and not then, so I can participate! I would have run away from hateful judgmental people who put targets on other people's backs and have vendettas. Had my fill of that already, don't want to ever be in a community like that again.

[ashgaelsonaria.livejournal.com]

I usually just write.
The majority of people who frequint my LJ do so because they like to read what I write so I do not adjust - I don't think I could anyway.
They come for my serial tribute to Anne McCaffrey, or my Zombie stories, Or poetry or because of a combination of stuff. Possibly even the unrelated writings.
I have people who have added me to read my writing before I started Idol - some use cyrilic which I recognise but can not read. I also recognise but cant read Hebrew, Sanscrit, Arabic and even a few dead alphabits like Egyption hyrogliphics and Mayan Hyrogliphics.
Knowing what languige something is thou is not the same as reading and understanding it.

Adendum
I have asked before what sort of thing would you all like me to write?
Do you have a story or cheracter of mine you wish I would write more of?
My next instalment (or past) of Dragon Prime tossed up for your eyes?
Another Fine Zombie?
Which would make a good title for a sequil to My Fair Zombie.

Ignore the beady eyes, evil look and wringing hands - they mean nothing

[theun4givables.livejournal.com]

Since other home gamers are asking it, what would you guys like to see from me this week? I think I'm over run with too many ideas, lol.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Something from the Stellar universe maybe?

[imafarmgirl.livejournal.com]

Oh how I hate an open topic. Is there any topic anyone wishes I'd write more about? Probably not, which means I'll struggle my way through coming up with something.

[writingmoments.livejournal.com]

Your dreams? Like if you had a day that could be just like you wanted?

Unlimited money..what would you do first?

Something like that?

[sweeny-todd.livejournal.com]

I write for me. I write to challenge myself. I write funny stuff because I just don't think you can have enough out there.

I generally write fiction, although I sometimes feel like I have an amazing life that might be interesting to write about :-)

[writingmoments.livejournal.com]

I admire people who can write and be funny. I wish I was better at it!

[porn-this-way.livejournal.com]

Open topics make me cry inside. ;_; I'm tempted to just break out my iPod, hit shuffle, and the first song that comes up - that's my topic! (Now watch, knowing my luck, it'll be "let's talk about sex" or something.)

I most definitely write for the Idol audience, but I'd be a pretty lousy class clown if I didn't :p

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Heartbreaker armadillo country song! DO IT!!! ^_^

Great Writing Resource

[whipchick.livejournal.com]

If anyone's in New England, I just want to recommend a really fabulous place to take workshops. I took an ongoing class there when I was in the area, and dblicher is currently in their year-long nonfiction intensive, but they also offer weekend, week-long, and one-off workshops.

If there's one that really appeals to you, I'd say it's worth traveling. It's MFA/professional-quality instruction, reasonably priced, and in a supportive yet helpful environment. Scholarships are available, too.

Check 'em out -

http://grubstreet.org/

It's in Boston.

Re: Great Writing Resource

[xo-kizzy-xo.livejournal.com]

I would kill to attend Grub Street! They've been around for a long time. I just wish I had the extra money to even take one of their weekend intensives :(

[lilycobalt.livejournal.com]

I go back and forth on the audience question. Most of the time, I just write for myself. A few times, I think "Idol is going to love this take on the topic," but that doesn't necessarily mean that I'm right about it. One time, I thought Idol was going to hate my take on the topic and posted it anyway, because it was ten minutes before the deadline.

I think failing to consider my audience was one of the things that led to my undoing. I've discovered that I'm at my best as a writer when I can talk about my work. I don't feel like I need a formal beta as much as an informal chat about the story with someone so that I can separate out the swirl of ideas and make it make sense outside my own head. It's hard to get an audience for unadulterated idea swirl.

[m-malcontent.livejournal.com]

I write stuff that pleases me.....but I do have one overarching goal as far as idol is concerned.

Top 100, top 40 or top 10 are all very nice.

But I just want when people see m_malcontent or my Marvin the Martian icon for them to think, just for a second "Oh crap, what is HE gonna do."

That's it. It's the simple pleasures for me.

[dslartoo.livejournal.com]

What's the protocol for posting a Home Game entry? Since this is my first season and I've just been eliminated, I don't know the routine. Do we leave links to the entry in the regular Topic Thread if Gary doesn't create a Home Game thread?

cheers,
Phil

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

Only current contestants can post in the topic post.

If there's no Home Game post, links can be posted in any Green Room or Work room post.

[dslartoo.livejournal.com]

Home Game entry is here (http://dslartoo.livejournal.com/326607.html). I'll stick a link to it in the Home Game thread, if Gary creates one. Meanwhile, there it is.

My "Eliminated? Hah, you can't get rid of me THAT easily!" post is located here (http://dslartoo.livejournal.com/326276.html), for those who might want to see that. :)

cheers,
Phil