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Post by Denrave on Sept 24, 2016 9:27:18 GMT
Ok, first I have to explain the background and the thoughts I was having so that the questions I will be asking toward the end of this post make sense, but please stick with me.
However long ago it was, I was watching some Ghostbusters reviews and wondering if there was a way to use social media in a proactive way to promote a thing, while running counter to something that you disapprove of. I was frankly baffled that so many people were in an uproar over the Ghostbusters movie when there wasn't a mainstream outcry over the 50 Shades movie. Later that night, I dreamed that I was part of a book company that specialized in not-50 Shades Books. By which I mean, books that were very specifically geared towards audiences that didn't want to read abuse disguised as romance, or who liked to read about kink that didn't sacrifice kindness or just basic human decency. Then somehow the thought snowballed into a more concrete concept. The idea is simple, a startup publishing company specializing in romance books that are very specifically geared toward women who are sick of romance novels normalizing dangerous ideas. Or even just a fundraiser with as many romance authors as are willing to join in, people who want to get into writing and as many established authors as possible who are willing to cater to this crowd that obviously exists.
Now, the basic idea started because of the next movie coming out and wondering how you would publicize your company without directly challenging or referencing 50 Shades? I was thinking if you could get a bunch of authors who were all part of this project who were willing to write a book for the cause. Start an online fundraiser for abuse prevention services, and center your campaign around the fund raiser, but also promote stories donated or bought from these authors. For example, start advertising in October (DV awareness month) about the fundraiser and promoting the books. That's usually about the time that articles start picking up to drum up interest in the making of the 50 Shades movies right? So, like keep an eye on the 50 Shades media, and every time that a new piece of info drops about 50 Shades, just drop an excerpt from an author, or an ad or promotional piece about the anti-abuse romance that you are trying to promote as part of your new paradigm. Don't ever even mention 50 Shades or anything about the author. I think that would be important, because a direct challenge would just rally her supporters and make them accuse you of attacking her work. We won't even reference 50 Shades, we would just... very pointedly offering an alternative to what E.L. James has been releasing.
You could probably drop a line to the 50 Shades is Abuse crew and they would help circulate the word about a promising alternative to what the publishing industry has been trying to feed us. Working with abuse services to run a fundraiser might allow for cross promotional efforts. The book company would support a bunch of anti-DV groups, and ask them nicely to spread the word about your new company, or even just about the project if all you could do is get some authors together to contribute to this. Now, after drumming up interest with the target audience and running an ad campaign that runs concurrently with 50 Shades marketing, we would release the book/s on a special first day sale, maybe at a book signing event where you would also hand over the money raised over the last few months... on the same day as the movie opens.
That was just a little daydream that I had that was quickly squashed and shoved to the back of my head, because real life does that. Then one of my friends was telling me about how she's never read the books or seen the movie, but she was tempted to see what it was all about. I explained some of the plot to her, and as an abuse survivor, she was super pissed about this series. It made me remember all of this weird vision that I had in my head, and now I can't help but wonder if this were actually possible. How can I convince people to agree to this? How would you go about finding authors and or a publishing company willing to help out with this project? If you could find authors and a publishing company, what abuse services would you contact? And how would you create a centralized hub for keeping in contact with all of them? How could we make sure that no one references 50 Shades (it's really super hard when trying to talk about where this idea is coming from) in a way that would generate drama that would accidentally promote that rubbish?
The real question here, my fellow Trout-Followers (Troutians?) is... what can I do to make this a thing that really exists?
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Post by muskratthemink on Sept 24, 2016 12:51:25 GMT
I'm going to start off by saying that this is a freaking awesome idea, and that if I could work with deadlines, I'd totally join in as one of the authors. As for drumming up hype, I'd say just keep talking to people who hate the series and somehow bring this up in the conversation. It's amazing what the word of mouth can do! As you get more supporters, ask them to do whatever they can to help promote the idea, set up a donation page, and there's plenty of ways to get in contact with authors. Facebook has dozens of writer communities, and there's also DeviantArt, FictionPress, AO3, and tons of other sites where writers post their work. Asking around is bound to get you a few people!
Sad to say I can't really offer anything on how to start up the company itself, afraid I'm clueless on that front. But there are places online where you can make your own website, sometimes for free, and that would at least help to promote the cause. Every little bit helps with projects like this.
And this is unrelated, but I love your avatar.
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Post by Denrave on Sept 25, 2016 7:02:52 GMT
Thanks. I've been trying to look into options during my downtime today. You know, this doesn't even require starting a publishing company or have to be for this movie. We could start a go fund me or whatever in October of this year and run it all the way to the next film. In the interim you could just try to get authors to agree to join you, and start getting their books published with create space. It would probably be better if we could get an experienced publishing group on board, but we could still do it without one. We could use the next year to run the stories through beta readers and editors to make sure that the writing is solid and if there is an abusive element hidden in there that it gets addressed. Then start promoting any short story anthologies or books that have been donated to the cause between October and February of next year, just in time for the final movie.
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Post by muskratthemink on Sept 25, 2016 12:40:06 GMT
That would work, too. I'll go on the sites I mentioned and put the word out to my followers, then I'll try tackling some of those writers' pages on Facebook.
Just one thing, though, how should I word it so people become interested, but there's no mention of the 50 Shades franchise?
Edit: Wait, just thought of another question. Do the books have to be strictly romance, or can they be other genres, but have romance in them? I feel like we'd get more writers interested that way.
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Post by Denrave on Sept 27, 2016 11:54:45 GMT
I was more thinking of not mentioning 50 Shades in terms of not stirring up EEL's fans and maybe not getting attacked by her publishing company for whatever reason they'll come up with. Maybe we should take it as a stance against not 50 Shades specifically, but of problematic themes in romances in general. The 50 Shades series is more of a catalyst and the most obvious example, which is why I was thinking of running an ad campaign concurrently with that movie schedule. Honestly, I trust the antis to make that connection on their own if we pitch it as anti-problematic themes in romance campaign and then very specifically circle our own timing with the release of the movies. In answer to your question, I was thinking of romance stories only because this is very specifically a romance protest because romances are largely aimed at females and should ultimately be a safe escape for females of any age. On the other hand, if the writing is good and has a strong romance element with a showing of a healthy relationship then I don't see why we couldn't allow other genres to jump on board. Also, thanks for jumping on board with this. Seeing support for the idea is very heartening. <3
(p.s. Changing my screen name to Denrave to match my twitter so that all of my social media matches up.)
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Post by muskratthemink on Sept 27, 2016 14:48:21 GMT
One writer's already contacted me, saying she'd like to join in, but she's worried her stuff is a little too raunchy. I haven't read it myself yet, but I did say I'd ask what the limits would be considering content and get back to her. So, what will the limits be?
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Post by Denrave on Sept 30, 2016 7:53:39 GMT
Sorry I haven't been on much the last couple of days, I've been down with a migraine.
Ok, I think if we opening it up to genres outside of straight romance then the limits will have to depend on how many people will agree to join the project. For instance, if we get a bunch of YA authors then we can group those together into one book, and if we get several erotic stories then we could group those together in a separate book. If we get several short story or short novels of a similar genre then we can bundle those into an anthology. I would be more worried about how much editing each book will take than degree of content, because I see no problem with having various degrees of romance and sex in novels as long as the characters are all on board and have the capacity to make informed consent. With ebooks and print-on-demand it should be possible to break those up into separate books if necessary. Some other considerations:
--We need editors or beta readers if we get some authors on board. I think you can set books on Createspace and just follow the guidelines for printing on that, but it might be easier to get input from someone with firsthand experience with their system. We might need some people with experience with formatting books. Cover art is also a consideration. Once we have an idea how many authors are willing to work on the project we will need to reach out to artists to see if any would be willing to work on our books, or figure out a way to make simple covers ourselves.
--What are our submission/acceptance guidelines? I'm less worried about content in terms of what kinks are displayed so much as quality of writing and not normalizing abuse. We will need a style guide, however, to make sure that the books are close to being ready to release as possible when we get them.
--Since we are trying to match up books to reading interests, do we need to have a label system like in fanfiction so if there are some elements that have the potential to make people upset they could know that a book isn't for them before they buy it? (If the publishing community is going to steal something from the fanfic community then it could at least be the useful ideas that make it easier for readers to find stories that they will like.)
--How are we going to organize any money we raise for this? Are we using any of the money from that to help start the books/promotion and then donate the rest to charities, or are we running that separately and then putting any money from the books back toward any expenses that were incurred during the process and then donating the remainder of that to DV organizations?
--Do we need to set up a website to track the money raised and document the use of the funds to ensure that everyone knows where the money or time they are donating is going to? What kind of costs do we need to anticipate for marketing if not publication?
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Post by muskratthemink on Oct 1, 2016 1:03:16 GMT
Migraines, I've been there. Hope you're feeling better!
Makes sense, I'm just hoping we get some more people interested. I've still just got the one person who's contacted me. I'll post announcements on a few more of my sites and see what comes of it. I've also got a new e-book publishing site we can use: pronoun. It takes you through all the steps of publishing and your books get featured on several other sites and it's completely free.
I think they have beta reader communities on fanfiction.net, I could start looking there. I'm not really sure where else to look, though.
I could look up a few templates and get started on outlining a guide, or I could send them to you and we could trade-off with it.
How about PayPal or GoFundMe, like you suggested? I'm not really the best at financial stuff.
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Post by Denrave on Oct 1, 2016 6:54:28 GMT
Thanks. I'm still super light sensitive for some reason, so computer screens are painful to look at without sunglasses, but the actual migraines seem to be passing.
Hmmm... I wonder if we should recommend Critique Circle for online beta reads? We can also compile a list of writing resources for people who want to edit their work before it gets edited to make sure that it is as good as they can get it before submission. There's Edit Minion for free, and Grammarly has a limited free version that can help as well.
Also on Good Reads you can find people willing to beta, right? Maybe we should reach out to people on there who offer to beta who also hated the book? I don't know what the etiquette is begging complete strangers to read our stuff, so some trial and error may be required. I'm thinking we should also consider contacting Jenny and some of the other people who have reviewed or recapped the books. They might have more ideas if not be willing to actively participate.
Can't hurt to ask, especially for a good cause.
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Post by muskratthemink on Oct 1, 2016 14:27:02 GMT
The light sensitivity tends to stick around a while, at least until the fit's passed completely. I used to get migraines when I was little, to the point I'd be throwing up.
Never heard of Critique Circle or Edit Minion, but you're certainly right about free Grammarly being limited. I've got a Good Reads account, even if I don't use it, so I could start spreading the word there, too. And I still have to check out the Beta community on FanFiction...
No, it never hurts to ask. The worst she can do is say no, right?
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Post by slnasmith on Jan 20, 2018 5:10:44 GMT
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Post by ameosy on May 25, 2021 17:09:18 GMT
I am very curious about whether the readers of this book will really try BDSM. I secretly searched to find some BDSM props. I was a little curious and a little scared. I have never tried this before. Do you have any suggestions?
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