Open Novella Journal 2024

Round 2 (Weeks 6-9) Part One

As some may have noticed, I didn't update my journal through a good portion of round two.

Simply put, things happened, and I ended up losing a good chunk of my writing time last month, though I did manage to get all of my entries in before the deadline. Which, all nine ended up passing the first round, which isn't surprising given I've always said the way to pass the first round is to follow the rules - we're not disqualified because of a low score.

Of course, what was surprising was to have one of my stories end up being a round winner, although this year there's been a slight change in that the number of round winners this year for the first round wasn't limited to just five stories. I honestly don't know if I'd have made it to be a round winner had they kept the rule in place, yet I've also got an idea why they increased the number of round winners. 

Simply put, the original number was honestly base on the number of entries they got the first year, yet this number never changed despite the way the numbers for ONC increased, but the fact the number of round winners didn't increase from one round to another may have been discouraging for some. I wouldn't, though, say that's the reason for the drop in number of stories entered between this year and last.

That I chalk up to the fact I honestly think this year set home the idea that winging ONC is no longer going to cut it, but by winging it I mean submitting something someone knows doesn't qualify in hopes of drumming up publicity for their stories, which is rather weird for reasons I won't get into beyond the fact I'm actually quite fine with the numbers my stories get; actually, I kind of wish people would be less worried about the numbers they get and more focused on telling a story they enjoy.

Of the round winners, in fact, only one of the stories has broken 1k so far, and only a quarter of us twelve have gotten over five hundred views. At least one is still under a hundred views, though I think one should consider that to be two as I would like to point out views include our own views and I've gone back and edited the intro a few times as well as looked at the chapters I've posted at least once, if not twice if I've done an edit.

As for kudos, I've the lowest which highly has to do with the fact I'm writing fanfic. Only three have crossed over a hundred kudos, but one of them isn't someone who's crossed the five hundred mark.

It's similar within the ambassador picks to have a wide range of stories in there that have a wide range of views and kudos, but sometimes I think people place too much emphasis on views and kudos to measure their actual success here on Wattpad. The thing is, the popularity of work doesn't actually measure the quality of the work; Twilight is the example everyone goes to of a series that actually became popular but is remembered for having some serious narrative issues.

It's kind of like high school, in a way. 

The rich kids are often the popular kids because they've got all the latest trends, but often the fact things are handed to them on a silver spoon can go to their head which is where the trope of a spoiled rich kid comes from in a lot of stories. Then, you've the kid who is popular because they're super amazing at something, yet in this same regard not everyone who is super amazing is popular, such as your nerds, but there is no denying what they did is amazing despite this. On rare occasions you've also got a rich kid who's also gifted, but when I say gifted let's include charisma in among the gifts.

Writing is like that.

You've got, of course, writers who fulfill a reader's "want" which for many female readers is often that self-insertion romance, but it can also include representation regardless of the quality. You've then got writers who fulfill a reader's "need", such as quality writing which can include fulfilling the "need" for quality writing. Fulfilling a "want," in turn, often leads to popularity because it fulfills something then and there, whereas those who fulfill a "need" have a much harder time becoming popular because a "need" in writing takes more time to absorb the impact of.