"Spam" or Advertising (Threads and Updates)
In the past, like when I first started my account of Wattpad, the ONLY way to get word out on a story ON WATTPAD was to post an advert or message on another user's message board and actually ASK. Yeah, it was a lot of work, but it was worth it. If I had not done that, if I had let my pride win, I would have only informed my friends and family on Facebook (which I do not have anymore.) Wisely, I advertised whatever way I could, spending hours messaging perfect strangers, politely asking if they were interested in reading a chapter or two of a story of mine. Things were good back then.
A lot has turned sour.
People began to complain, contacting the Wattpad staff and reporting these sort of messages as "spam." This resulted in Wattpad banning copied messages asking user's ON THEIR MESSAGE BOARD to check out another person's story. This caused a lot of commotion amongst the Wattpad community mainly because it was the most efficient and common way to get reads and comments. Seeing this as an issue, the Wattpad team decided to design the "Community" page where the "Clubs" discussion board was introduced.
In the beginning, the "Clubs" page was very useful and was seen as a promising solution to the former "spam" issue. But then things began to get too cluttered. User's were being informed every single message to a thread they were apart of, creating a mass of email notifications which were just TOO many to get through. I, myself, had spent afternoons going through each message in case of any information I might find useful or important, but 98% of the time the messages were adverts by the same people, just in different threads.
Wattpad managed to fix this issue (or they thought it would), as well, placing a tiny square underneath the message dialog box allowing the user to choose whether they add a discussion to a list. See, Wattpad messed up with this function. Instead of leaving this box empty to check off themselves they automatically checked it for the user. For those who do not have the time to uncheck this box it was a hassle and very annoying. But that is a format issue...
Spam is a lunchmeat. NOT AN ADVERT FOR A STORY.
According to dictionary.com, the word "spam" is a trademark , a canned pork product, a noun, a disruptive message, especially a COMMERCIAL message, sent through a network or e-mail, and a verb, to send spam (to.) Now, every website has a different explanation or "definition" of what spam is. According to Wattpad's Code of Conduct page, this is what SPAM is:
There’s a fine line between promoting your stories and spamming. The more you can make your message personal and relevant, the less likely you are to be reported for spam. Don’t promote your stories as a comment on other people’s stories. Do not link to e-commerce or other similar sites, or post comments to promote other products or services. We consider this spam and nobody likes spam. Comments, messages and club posts sent via bots will result in immediate deletion of accounts. However, you are welcomed to link your published novels that are for sale on your own profile.
SO your message, whatever it may be, has to be personal and relevant. Technically, every post on Wattpad IS personal because this website is promoted as a place to meet new people just like a social network. Two, how can one person determine, based off of "their position" in a conversation, whether something said is relevant? If someone just reads a message from a notification posted on a thread they are involved in what another user says and finds it irrelevant they can report it as spam?! Are you serious?
Three, how are we, the common user, able to identify whether a comment, message or club post are sent via bots? Honestly, I had no idea that bots exsisted on Wattpad. And the only difference I can think of that seperates a bot from a human user is usage and what the content of the posts are about... Now, the last bit I highlightened completely drives me mad.
SO ANY PERSON WHO IS PUBLISHED CAN NOTIFY WATTPAD THAT THEY ARE A PUBLISHED WRITER AND BE GIVEN A BOOST WITH GAINING A FOLLOWING ON WATTPAD???
Everyone else, including myself, slave to gain a following using the "Share Your Story" Club and other social networking sites, spending hours to get word out, and those who are published, who create an account on Wattpad just for the sake of it, get the better end of the deal because Wattpad wants to promote those people because they are published? What about the rest of us? I don't think that's fair, especially to the users who have been posting for such a long time.
All I can say; "Agree to disagree."
