Alison's blog isn't yet a book - and she's not sure what she wants to do with it now. It's still open...
She went to O'Reilly Emerging Technologies conference - and felt there was a lot of talk about digitising backlist - and that's not what she's wanted to do. By doing it as part of her course the online novel took over her life - but cost "time" not anything else.
Its an interesting point... for a publisher its the finished product that seems to important - not the process. I'm thinking this goes back to Mil Millington a few years ago who wrote a great funny blog that then got turned into a less great, less funny novel but with a plot rather than anything else.
As for Naomi, Perplex City made money through selling trading cards.
Whats interesting about all these stories is the "audience building" that was involved - and how that audience actually had an effect on the story themselves.
Alison had previously researched "women online" and found out that most readers of chick lit were looking for the books, not the web, so it was a very new way of taking that story out there.
Alison felt that because chick lit readers want escapism there was less ways they wanted to interact - in terms of changing the story - far more interested in "socialising" around the story - again, another theme of today, that there's different ways of interaction - and the author is such a key component of that relationship; as is the kind of audience, the type of genre....
Tim has asked the question about at what point the author "reveals" themselves - Alison felt that her readers wanted the story to be real - but because it was part of her course she'd made it clear that it was a story. For Naomi, during the project she was always "hidden" - the expectation of game players isn't that there's an "author" behind the project. The narrative and game design were both equally as important.
All 3 case studies were about creating a community... what lessons are learnt for bringing opportunities to writers to take on projects such as this?
Some writers are very happy to promote themselves on line, like Meet The Author websites, and blogs, says Alison, but others who are less so. She thinks you should nurture those writers who want to do that - and in this case, its maybe identifying something in the work which can interest a community.
Chris Meade feels that all the projects are more "in the real world" of our everyday life than a reading by an author in a theatre.
Alison feels that what you read online needs ot be more byte sized - more "putdownable". We read online in bursts and its less permanent.
Naomi says that Perplex City ended up being one and a half million words in total - a very long novel!
Lots of people have met in the real world - even 3 marriages! - after playing Perplex City. Maybe the literary community is catching up with cult film and tv. Maybe poetry has a lot of similarity to this kind of world - Steven Waling made this point recently on his blog stevenwaling.blogspot.com that maybe poetry is very similar to a cult TV programme.
Alison says that writers should be more relaxed about giving work out to be used/reused/remixed.
Can these techniques help writers become better and more skilled writers?
Naomi says that people love to give advice on line - and when you admit to having a problem it really brings people in to respond.
Also - what happens when the author/reader relationship is reversed/changed. Tim Wright involved some readers of the Teletroscope blog http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telectroscope by getting them to go along to an event as his brother Paul - 3 turned up and everyone went along with the subterfuge.
Showing posts with label alison norrington. Show all posts
Showing posts with label alison norrington. Show all posts
Monday, 24 November 2008
Here's Alison...
Next "on stage" is Alison Norrington - who is going to talk about her writing and new media experiences.
A few people have had to go - but Naomi and Dean from the Poetry Trust have arrived with new copies of the Poetry Paper.
"immersing reader with emerging platforms" is Alison Norrington's presentation. She'd released 3 chick-lit books and wanted to always bring something else to the stories - and has done a course in new media and literature.
She researched her market - women readers and the publishers who were publishing chick lit.
Some publishers were thinking about "added value" but others went "do you mean the internet?
Her 4th novel "Staying single" was partly written and published via a blog. It didnt work to do it as chapters - she had to cut up into shorter chunks - and so she had to rewrite how she was writing it. It had to bring people back the next day - also allowed for subscribers...
The project became too big for one person - she was creating podcast chapters, a sister site called www.sophiedilemma.com - even took videos and created an email address for the character.
She came in for some criticism from people putting videos on the website. She created a bit of a community around the documentary element of the story. She asked people to send in their chat up lines, how they'd been dumped etc. Had around 7000 hits, 600 subscribers. Most popular part of the story was the documentaries on Youtube. This was part of her course - actually promoting the book as she wrote it.
Its amazing the amount of additional work she did - even using Machinima and Second Life as well as keeping forums going - even writing Sophie's "column" for the blog.
Halfway through the story she went on holiday and her character Sophie came on holiday with her - her "editor told her to go". 83 people asked for postcards from Sophie... proving that people liked to have something real.
"Sophie" did receive some rather dodgy emails - as well as some supportive ones. The business cards she put everywhere were really successful in bringing much in.
Shes showing a little video now of "chat up lines" - some are really bad. Might even work... so quite a clever bit of viral marketing, called "Pulling Power".
These were genuine comments that came to the website. Alison also went into the Second Life every Wednesday night to meet people at a particular time.
She was interviewed by a number of newspapers including Daily Mail and Woman's Own - she felt an obligation to keep it going as she developed the audience.
The blog allowed her to write things that were contemporary.
She even created a cover for the magazine that "Sophie" wrote for - and would have liked to write some of the articles if she'd had the time.
Her next project is called "I love NY" - she realises she needs to spend a lot more time in pre-production this time round - in order to cover the bases before launching the project. Has a Facebook page, and is looking at a collaboration maybe pitched to TV.
The new project is likely to include mobile content as well as actual projects - and she wants to bring something into the story that will make it more exciting - by real life interaction/viral marketing.
But all things need to lead back to the novel....
http://www.sophie-stayingsingle.blogspot.com/
A few people have had to go - but Naomi and Dean from the Poetry Trust have arrived with new copies of the Poetry Paper.
"immersing reader with emerging platforms" is Alison Norrington's presentation. She'd released 3 chick-lit books and wanted to always bring something else to the stories - and has done a course in new media and literature.
She researched her market - women readers and the publishers who were publishing chick lit.
Some publishers were thinking about "added value" but others went "do you mean the internet?
Her 4th novel "Staying single" was partly written and published via a blog. It didnt work to do it as chapters - she had to cut up into shorter chunks - and so she had to rewrite how she was writing it. It had to bring people back the next day - also allowed for subscribers...
The project became too big for one person - she was creating podcast chapters, a sister site called www.sophiedilemma.com - even took videos and created an email address for the character.
She came in for some criticism from people putting videos on the website. She created a bit of a community around the documentary element of the story. She asked people to send in their chat up lines, how they'd been dumped etc. Had around 7000 hits, 600 subscribers. Most popular part of the story was the documentaries on Youtube. This was part of her course - actually promoting the book as she wrote it.
Its amazing the amount of additional work she did - even using Machinima and Second Life as well as keeping forums going - even writing Sophie's "column" for the blog.
Halfway through the story she went on holiday and her character Sophie came on holiday with her - her "editor told her to go". 83 people asked for postcards from Sophie... proving that people liked to have something real.
"Sophie" did receive some rather dodgy emails - as well as some supportive ones. The business cards she put everywhere were really successful in bringing much in.
Shes showing a little video now of "chat up lines" - some are really bad. Might even work... so quite a clever bit of viral marketing, called "Pulling Power".
These were genuine comments that came to the website. Alison also went into the Second Life every Wednesday night to meet people at a particular time.
She was interviewed by a number of newspapers including Daily Mail and Woman's Own - she felt an obligation to keep it going as she developed the audience.
The blog allowed her to write things that were contemporary.
She even created a cover for the magazine that "Sophie" wrote for - and would have liked to write some of the articles if she'd had the time.
Her next project is called "I love NY" - she realises she needs to spend a lot more time in pre-production this time round - in order to cover the bases before launching the project. Has a Facebook page, and is looking at a collaboration maybe pitched to TV.
The new project is likely to include mobile content as well as actual projects - and she wants to bring something into the story that will make it more exciting - by real life interaction/viral marketing.
But all things need to lead back to the novel....
http://www.sophie-stayingsingle.blogspot.com/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)