Ten-Sided: Dissecting a Disaster Part I

Ten-Sided was supposed to be a blog fiction written by 10 writers with 10 characters using a many to many format. It was commisioned by the New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc. When I first found it I thought that it was just tedious. Now that I've forced myself to read all of it, I realize now that describing it as anything short of "total bloody clusterf***" would be an understatement. So, why did I force myself to read it? I wanted to see if I could figure out what went wrong. Sometimes figuring out what doesn't work can be as important as figuring out what does work.

One thing I wanted to point out. I really wanted to see if I could point to an alternative opinion on the piece. I wanted to end the whole series with:

But don't listen to me. I'm just a white collar worker with delusions of being a literary critic who thinks Moby Dick sucks. The whole thing could've been the deepest, and genius work of art since Hamlet. After all this person(s) thought it was great.(insert link here)

The reason I can't end with that is because I couldn't find anyone who wrote something favorable about the project. In fact, I couldn't find anyone who had written anything about the project after it started. I found tons of articles announcing the beginning of the project(see here, here, here, here, and here) and one announcing the related fictohedran project, but not a single article written about the project once it completed. I'm forced to conclude that either A.) Everyone learned from their mom that, "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all" or B.) I'm the first human being that forced myself to read all of it. Based on my experience with most internet forums, I'm leaning towards option 'B'.

Moving along now... let's get to the dissection of this thing. Let's start with the rules the writers were to abide by in creating their blog fiction:

Ten-sided explores a new form of creative practice that comments on and employs the decentralized nature of creation through blogs. Ten fiction writers collaborate with one another using a simple set of rules:

• Each author creates a fictional character for use during the project. There are no limitations as to what these characters might be.
• Each author is responsible for creating and maintaining a blog in the voice of that fictional character, and is required to employ RSS or Atom or both, so it will be easy for readers and the other authors to follow along. This blog will last for three months, from March 18, 2006, to June 18, 2006.
• All ten fictional characters are somehow connected, but the nature of those connections cannot be decided beforehand, they can only be discovered, or perhaps asserted, during the process of writing.
• Any sort of pre-planned coordination regarding the narrative is forbidden. Authors are supposed to only take their cues from the public writings of others.

The website also tried to predict the end result.

The resulting improvisation resembles a jazz performance or a session of exquisite corpse, but in a new form of creative practice that comments on and employs the multivocal nature of blogging communities.

Personally, I think the jazz performance was a bad analogy. At a Jazz performance everyone agrees ahead of time that they are playing jazz. Ten-Sided was more like a punk rocker, pep-band drummer, country banjoist, and Broadway singer trying to improvise. No matter how good they are, they have very different styles and interests.

One rule was that all of the characters had to somehow relate to the other characters. The problem is, how do you get the following characters all to relate to one another?
A member of Mi6,
A Homeless New York Musician,
A Depressed Gambling Addict,
A Cat Killer under house arrest,
A doll maker,
A nerdy scifi author,
A guy who lives with his mother that can't tell the difference between dreams and reality,
A bi-polar pack rat,
A father who's daughter is missing, and
A psychotic under house arrest.

I don't care if you're Henry David Thoreau, you're going to be hard pressed to force all of these characters into a relationship. So did the writers of Ten-Sided. Many of the relationships were very light and just barely mentioning each other. One of the characters pretended to be a singer. Poof, everyone's character "connected" by listening to his music. Problem was, that wasn't really interacting with that character - and not that interesting. No one even used going to an Ezra Kire concert as a method of meeting someone.

So let that be the first goal of a multi-character blog fiction. Find someway for the characters to quickly establish a relationship.

The problem with Ten-Sided was the rules were the perfect blend off being, at the same time, too harsh and not harsh enough. The rule saying they couldn't collaborate outside of the narrative meant that they couldn't plan any meetings between their characters. Therefore, no one knew how to get their characters to meet one another. Nobody could say, "hey, my character plays online video games. If your character does the same, they could meet online". Or "My character is going to an Ezra Kire concert, if your character goes they can meet and... who knows!". One way to fix it is that they could've eliminated the no outside interaction rule.

Another way they could've fixed the problem was they could've been more restrictive and added a rule. A rule could've been that each character must already know at least 1 or 2 of the other characters. That way 10 writers don't have to worry about how they're going to connect with all of these different people.

That's enough for now. In my next post, I'm going to try and tackle the "plot", of Ten-Sided. I think you'll be amused. If you're a fan of the TV show Lost, you might even like it.

12 Things to Note When Reading Fiction Online

As I mentioned before posting has been light here as I try to finish up a long and difficult to read blog fiction. However, I'm noticing some more things as I'm spending pro-longed times reading these blogs.

First of all, it's true, your eyeballs really do get tired reading all that text on a computer screen.

Second, unlike most web surfing, you can't read blogs while the tv is on. Even if it's a thinking-absent reality tv show. The commercials will still distract you.

Third, Laptops get hot after you've got one on your lap after an hour of blog reading.

Fourth, Laptops aren't good for reading in bed

Fifth, Laptops aren't good for reading in the bathroom either

Sixth, I wonder if an iPhone would be good for reading blog fiction. If they are, I want an iPhone

Seventh, Even if the answer to number 6 is "no", I still want an iPhone

Eighth, I should've made this list a numbered list

9. If someone interrupts you while reading a book, it's okay to hold up a finger to stop them while finishing a paragraph. If you're reading from a computer screen and you do this, you're a "jerk".

10. It's easier to get away with reading fiction at work if it's published on a blog rather than carrying around and reading a book.

11. I still want an iPhone

12. Eleven is too weird of a number to end on

How to Save Your Spot When Reading Fiction Online

Posting around here has been a little light for the last few days. The reason is that I've been reading a rather large and difficult to read blog fiction. I'll be writing all about soon. There's something else I wanted to talk about in this post. How does one "bookmark" his\her progress when reading a blog fiction?

Here's what I mean: Say you're reading through the archives of a blog fiction, but the archives are much too large to read through in one sitting. How do you mark off where you left off? You could just use the "bookmark" feature of your web browser. Although, if you do that you have to remember to delete the old one after creating a second one. The second problem is that if you aren't viewing the content one post per page, instead using something like the date ranges to display multiple posts per page, you'll still have to remember which individual post on that page you last read.

If you're reading a blog fiction that has multiple characters, it could get even more complex. If you're reading one character at a time you have to keep track which ones you've read. If the posts are stored on different blogs, now you gotta have a bookmark for each blog. If you're reading in chronological order, that means you have to delete and create multiple bookmarks every time you have to answer the phone, or yell at the kids because they don't know how to share their wii.

All of this is just a long winded way to point out another way that reading a book is easier than reading a blog fiction. "Saving your spot" isn't always as easy as sticking in a bookmark or folding over the corner of the page.

This may seem like thing to complain about, but I assure you I'm not above complaining about the little things in life. If I'm taking a 15-20 minute break from something (say my day job or honey-do list), I don't want to spend 5 of those minutes trying to figure out where I left off. That's like a quarter or third of my break. If I was reading a book or magazine instead, I could've spent that extra time reading the end of a long article or one of those tiny little chapters in The Da Vinci Code.

I don't suppose any one has a simple way to solve this problem that I didn't think of?

Interview with a Zombie Lawmen

A couple weeks ago in my post, Zombie Lawmen? Where the heck did this come from!?, I wrote about a weird ad that brought me to the site zombielawmen.com. With a only a little effort and a kind webmaster I was able to get in contact with the creative director of Zombie Lawmen. His name was David Gregory and was gracious enough to take some time and answer some questions about the project:

What was the idea behind Zombie Lawmen?
Gregory David: Zombie Lawmen was first conceived of in 1997 by John Lucas and myself. At the time we were both working at Media Station, a company that developed CD-ROM games for children. The theme of Zombie Lawmen was decidedly more adult. The original concept came from a drawing John Lucas did of famous gun-slingers from the old west brought back to life as zombies. I developed the first back-story.

The project stayed on the back-burner for nearly ten years when I came up with the idea of using the story to create a blog fiction. The idea was that there would be three separate bloggers each telling the same story but from a different perspective. Readers would need to read each of the blogs to get all of the details. Each blog was to have a drawing that depicted the dramatic action of each entry. The goal was to create a serial story like Jules Verne's or graphic novels.

Who was your target audience?
GD: The target audience was adults who were interested in horror/fantasy/scifi.

How would you summarize the story?
GD: The story is about a fictional future where lawlessness rivals that of the old west. It is an alternate reality where Tombstone has become a major metropolis that is run by the Clanton gang with high tech weapons and designer drugs. Scenes revolve around the zombies who have been brought back to life by a relation of Doc Holliday, and their conflicts with being alive, remembering the past, having zombie characteristics (like eating brains), yet being cast as the good guys against the evil Clanton empire.

How many people worked on the project?
GD: Three writers, one artist, one web master, and one project manager.

Who came up with the idea?
GD: I did.

On the site I saw links to 3 different blogs. How was the work divided? Did one person work on each blog? Or did everyone work on each blog?
GD: Each writer assumed the role of one of the characters doing the blogging. They all lived in Tombstone and had varying levels of interaction with the zombies.

In what ways do you think was writing online different from writing in a book or magazine?
GD: The writing was geared towards being on-line as blog entries were kept relatively short so as not to be too tiring on the eyes. Writing a book would have been very different because that would require much more descriptive writing and detail. Zombie Lawmen was very action oriented.

How long did the project last?
GD: The project was about 4 months in production and ran for six weeks on-line with new blog entries from each character Monday through Friday.

Are there any plans to bring the story to a different medium, such as a comic book?
GD: That is under consideration. There is also the possibility of doing it as a podcast drama. We recorded character actors reading the blogs and I added foley effects and scored musical themes.

Why was the project abandoned?
GD: The readership did not develop as we had hoped. This could be for a variety of reasons but we have no data to indicate exactly why it didn't take off. It could be the sheer volume of stuff on the internet that makes it hard to find. It could be that people who like horror/fantasy/scifi are more into games and movies than reading. It may be that people just didn't find it that compelling but judging by the small number of hits we got, it seems more likely that it just didn't get seen. It could be and probably was a combination of many things.

I found out about your site through an online ad. Were you aware that google adsense was still running ads for your site?
GD: No.

Besides online ads, how else did you promote the site?
GD: We ran targeted ads on Facebook at select Universities around the country and one or two overseas. Those didn't net us many viewers.

Do you, or GMobileMedia have any plans for future blog fiction?
GD: Probably not. Zombie Lawmen was a tremendous effort that we paid for out of our own pockets. We did all of the work in the evenings when we weren't doing our day jobs. It was exhausting.

What's next for you and\or GMobileMedia?
GD: Not sure. There is still a lot of work to do to create the podcasts. That would be the next step.

Do you have any advice for someone trying to start their own blog fiction or online story?
GD: Think small. Zombie Lawmen was probably over ambitious. If I were to continue, I would stick with one writer and one artist. Better yet, be a writer who can also draw. Another idea is instead of original content, use something familiar to people that would draw them in. It is too expensive to license content so use the Disney trick of stories in the public domain.

That's a real shame about the project not doing well. Hearing more about it I wish I could've seen it in it's prime. Let's all hope those podcasts get finished.

Rant on (lack of) Copyright Law Changes

This isn't, nor is it meant to be, a blog that discusses politics. Unfortunately, as long as politicians are writing our laws, we can't talk law without talking politics. I don't know what it's like for my friends across the pond or around the world, but copyright laws here in the USA are as outdated as they are draconian.

Faced with the new openness of the internet, the idiots running this country did little to clarify many of the new questions of copyright that the internet brought. Instead they extended how long a person or corporation could hold a copyright. Then, in the name of preserving intellectual property made it illegal for me to make a backup copy of my cds(if they have useless anti-piracy methods built in).

Further proving that my country's "leaders" don't have a clue what's going in the market are some of the idiotic things done since then. From introducing market stifling induce act to failure to pass net neutrality, they have shown that they are not interested in making our laws reflect the realities of the 21st century. Instead they are more interested in harsher and harsher penalties for infringement.

Meanwhile, the rest of us are still facing questions such as, "who has the copyright on blog comments?" Are you serious? Our laws are so outmoded, that it's not clear that a commenter on a blogpost gives up most rights to his words when posted on an open forum? Until I read about this, I hadn't realized how bad things had really gotten. It's crap like this that a law called "Digital Millennium Copyright Act" should have resolved.

I guess let that be a lesson for us all. Make your copyright policy on your website obvious. I'll start.

Any comment you leave on this blog you are giving me and blogspot the right to display that comment for *forever*.

I can't believe I have to say that...

Introducing the "catch up" button

In a recent post I put forth one of the challenges of attracting readers with a blog fiction site.

You could read a blog fiction just like any other. Subscribe to the feed and when there's a new entry go read it. One entry by itself is easy to read once in a while. The problem is that once we've written a lot of posts, people will want to read our fictional blogs from the start. That can be a lot of on screen text to read "for fun".

The assumption I'm currently working on is that, once a reader is caught up with a story and likes it, they'll subscribe to a feed and read it when updated. So the question is, how do we get readers up to speed on our blog fictions?

Well, one way of dealing with this problem is the way that Tom Evans does it in his blog Fate's Acquittal. He uses a tag (or "label" in blogspot speak) called "Catchup". Each post that has a something important that you need to know about the story is labeled "CatchUp". Of the total 32 posts, I read only the 9 with the "CatchUp" label. It reminds me of those short clip compilations that begin episodes of 24.

So the question is, how well does it work. Well, based only on the one example I've seen so far, pretty well. As you might expect, a lot of the earliest posts are labeled "CatchUp". As the story went on, the posts labeled "CatchUp" became more spread out. After reading only the CatchUp posts, I then read the most recent 2 posts and was able to follow them both pretty darn well. Although, don't take my word for it, go try it yourself. (One thing to note though, if you do read it yourself, use the Catchup Link in the label list, not the one in his welcome message. His link in the welcome message is broken\uses the wrong case.)

So here's a hat tip to Tom Evans for using a common blogging tool to solve a common problem. I think each blog fiction author may want to consider if it would help the readers of their own blog. I'm not saying it'll work for every blog fiction I've read -or even needed-, but I'm willing to bet it could help attract new readers for some.

Blog Fiction Formats

Blog fiction is still a very new fiction format. The number of English examples of it I don't think has even hit a hundred. But despite the low number, I am already noticing that Blog Fiction tends to follow only a few different formats. I'm going to describe what I've found here. Also, without any humbleness whatsoever, I'm going to try to give a name to the different formats.

Standard Blog Fiction
A blog fiction that is written using a single blog\url that's written by only one character. I call this the "standard" because it's the most common. As far as why it's the most common, I can only theorize. It might be because it's the simplest type to read. It might be because that's the most popular non-fiction blog type. Examples of this can be seen throughout my feed list and the entire list of blog fiction. For instance: Anonymous Lawyer, The Professional Pet, Wilf's World

Many to One Format
This I would say is the next most popular format. This is where there are many character's writing, but they are all kept within the same blog. Each entry somehow indicates which character is writing the blog. The indication might be a label, category setting, or may even be contained within the post itself. Active examples of this format would be Yanni's Block and Fate's Acquittal

Many to Many Format
This type of blog fiction not only has multiple character's, but each character has their own blog. If you're going for as much realism as possible, this format makes the most sense. Most people like to have their own blog and don't share it with others. In spite of that, it's the least used format I've seen. I think there is two reasons for this. It's the hardest format to set up(think 5 different blogger accounts). Also, it's the hardest for a reader to follow - trying to read them in chronological order means you have to have 5 different windows\tabs open. Examples of this format would be the Super-Hero Blogs and Ten-Sided. (even linking to them is difficult because i don't know which blog I should link to!)

Other
I wanted to have a category to cover sites that I haven't seen yet. I've found a couple "quirky" sites that might fit the description of "blog fiction", and they don't fit the description of any of the other formats. See them here: Renal Failure, The Writer's Stand

I think it's important to have words or simple phrases for common occurrences. It makes talking about them a heck of a lot easier. Looking into the future I plan on using these terms a lot. That's why I wanted to define them here so that I could just say [X] blog has a "Many to One" format, instead of always taking a paragraph to define the format. I just hope you all will forgive my audacity in thinking that I can invent new phrases.

Horton's Folly is Back

I wasn't planning on doing a post today, but I found a reason to put up a quick note. I noticed that Horton's Folly is back from his trip to the mental institute that he went to last August. Actually, he's been back for more than a month and a half. I just haven't been keeping up. I'm going to be adding his feed.

I'd also like to take a moment to ask for your help. I've asked before that if you write, read, or find a blog fiction that I don't have listed to let me know about it. I'd also ask that if you know of an inactive blog fiction that becomes active to let me know too. Whether or not you're the writer or just a fan of it doesn't matter. The list of fictional blogs is beginning to get large enough that it's hard for me to keep all of it up to date. Just like finding a new one, to let me know either put it in the forum list, leave a comment, or send me an email. I'd appreciate it.

Lazy Sunday Afternoon Meta

On this lazy sunday afternoon I wanted to make a personal note. When I first started this blog, I just wanted to separate talking about blog fiction from talking about my blog fiction specifically. Since starting this blog I've been having a lot of fun reading other fictional blogs, reviewing them, and seeing what advice other writers have.

I have since set out several goals for my blog here:
Offering objective reviews of some of the blog fiction that I've found.
Search out and find new blog fiction
Observe new and innovative forms of Blog Fiction
Find new ways for writer's to promote their blog fiction.

To that end I've decided to take some time off from my own blog fiction to concentrate on this one. Hopefully, the break will lead to better content on this blog. The first consequence of my decision can already be seen here. I've been able to do more frequent (and hopefully, higher quality) articles.

My shut down is only temporary. Even if I wanted to shut down my own blog fiction permanently to only do this site, I couldn't. I think anyone who writes about a subject should do it or have done a lot of it. Besides, the story of Alex Chou has been bouncing around in my head for way too long to never finish it.

Will we ever read fiction online?

Over the last 10 years we have seen the internet transform or obsolete industries that haven't had any major changes in decades. We've watched magazines and newspapers lose circulation as readers abandoned their dead tree publishing for their online edition. We've watched the RIAA get dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century. Movie rentals can finally happen online. Youtube like sites could be the replacement for "channel surfing". We can make phone call over the internet. However, inspite of all of this, there is almost no market for reading fiction online.

This fact has lead many to suggest that we'll never read fiction online. Others will claim that we will, but it'll be limited to short stories or flash fiction. Based on the continued failure of electronic book devices to bring us constantly failing ebooks, it's not surprising that many want to throw in the towel on long form online fiction. I, however, am still optimistic about blog fiction someday going mainstream. I think it's only a matter of time until something evolves to the point where we're reading fiction online.

As Novelr points out, it would appear that blog fiction is perfect for short stories and short serials. At least we can all agree on that. You could read a blog fiction just like any other. Subscribe to the feed and when there's a new entry go read it. One entry by itself is easy to read once in a while. The problem is that once we've written a lot of posts, people will want to read our fictional blogs from the start. That can be a lot of on screen text to read "for fun".

It's that last point I think is the only thing holding back online fiction. It is just hard to read a lot of text on the computer - it can strain the eyes. It's a lot easier to read a book in bed than a laptop screen. It's more relaxing to sit in your recliner than your computer chair. So, to get more people to read our fictional blogs we have to ask this question:

How do we easily beam our online content to a device that's affordable, portable, and pleasurable to read?

I think that once that question is answered, online fiction will explode. Think of all the possibilities:

• When we find a new fictional blog that we like, we can just enter the url into our bookreader and go to the beach and read its archives.
• Free ad-supported eBooks. Where the ads are imbedded in the text. Or you can buy the ad-free version.
• ebooks that have a 2.0 version instead of 2nd publishing
• Dozens of other innovations no one has dreamed up yet

As far as "a device that's affordable, portable, and pleasurable to read" I can't really help with that. However, I am a programmer so maybe I can help with "easily beam our online content" part. Another goal I've set for myself is to look up and maybe develop tools that can format our blogs so that they can be read by existing (and crappy) eReaders and other mobile devices. That way, once someone engineers the fictional device described above, we can be ready to fill it with our awesome fictional blogs. Also, maybe, we can help beam content to the existing crap we have today.

Any pointers or suggestions of where to start looking would be more than helpful.

9 tips for a better blog fiction website

I've been reading a lot of blog fiction for the last couple months. Some have been easier to read than others and not because of what words they used. I'm talking about easier because of how the website has been laid out. I've compile a list of things that all fictional bloggers would do so that it's easier on my eyes and my mouse-clicking-finger. I know now that I made a couple of these very mistakes on my own blog fiction. When I relaunch I'll fix them.

1.) Next and Previous links for individual posts.
When I'm reading through the archives of a blog fiction, I like to click through one at a time. That way, when reading I get into a groove. Read the post, read the comments if any, click next. If there's no next button I have to look over or click over to the archives and slows down my reading time.

2.) Let a headline be clickable
Going off of the first point. Most blogs let you click the headline to look at an individual post. There are still some that don't. Please, don't make me scroll to the end of your post and click some small '#' or the word 'Permalink' just to read your comments or to get back into the groove I was talking about in number 1.

3.) Readable font
Make your writing large and easy to read. I hate having to tell my webbrowser to enlarge all text. It might make the content more readable, but will often break the margins of your sidebar and other formatting. Besides font size, be sure to pick a font type that's easy to read on the screen. One time I was reading a blog and I had firefox increase the font size. I quickly realized that no matter how big the font was, it was still hard to read. Novelr has tips on which font types to use.

4.) Double space Paragraphs
Always have a space in between paragraphs. Dead tree publishers can get away with cramming as much text together as possible. As a digital writer, you cannot. There are few thing harder on the eyes than a whole bunch of text crammed together with no spacing to help break it up. Especially if they are short paragraphs.

5.) Easy to navigate to first page and archives.
So let's say I find a new fictional blog(woohoo!). Now I want to read the story from the beginning. Now what do I do? Until someone catches up with reading your entire archive, they are going to come to your homepage and then click directly to the archives. Please make the archives link easy to find.

6.) Link back to old references
One of the few advantages that us digital publishers have over our dead tree counterparts is that it's sooooooo easy to reference past events. Not all readers can remember everything in a long work of fiction, especially one delivered in instalments. A novel could be ruined if everytime a minor character is mentioned it says next to their name(pg 41), but for a blog fiction writer you can just create a link back to when that character was first introduced. It may be extra work for you, but your infrequent readers will thank you. And who knows, maybe it'll turn your infrequent reader into a regular.

7) Make RSS feed readily available
This is tip not just for fictional bloggers, but for all bloggers. Lots of people use rss aggregators to read their favorite blogs. No reason to believe that a reader of a fictional blog wouldn't do the same.

8) Don't overwhelm your readers with widgets and gizmos
Another tip that's for all bloggers not just the fictional ones. Sometimes, less is more. I hate having to sift through 14 gadgets, 83 directory links, and 34 "cool links" just to find your archives link.

9.) Don't make it hard or impossible to find the publishing dates.
Alright, so maybe this one isn't a hard and fast rule so much as a pet peeve of mine. I hate it when I can't readily find out the date an item was published. I use that too gage how often a blog is updated or if it's currently active. Also I don't like it when the date isn't listed for each post. For instance it's laid out where it lists the date and then just shows all the posts from that date. So, if I want hte date on a post I have to scroll through 2, 3, or 4 other posts... grr! Like I said - pet peeve.

Follow these 9 rules 8 rules and 1 pet peeve and I bet your readers will thank you for it. I know of at least one reader that will. Do you have tips for writers to make their blogs more readable?

Better search results for your fictional blog

My last post about search engines and blog fiction said not to rely on them if your entire website is a fictional blog. I had an idea that, if we all work together, could help blog fiction writers get some search engine traffic.

Before we get to my idea, let's get some background on how search engines work. When you do a search in yahoo or google for the phrase "cats", yahoo and google will give you about 30 billion results. The order that those results come is not random. They will try to give you the most relevant results possible. Most search engines do this based on a combination of the number of times the word "cats" appears on your website, and the number of other websites about "cats" links to your site.

It's that last point that's important. The words someone uses to link to your website is remembered by google (and, other search engines). So if a few hundred people link to your website using the word "cats", then google will think that your website is about "cats" even though the word may never appear on your website.

As I explained in my last post about search engines, the problem is that the words people use to find your fictional blog, may never appear on your website. They certainly never did on mine. No one ever found my fictional blog when doing a search for the words, "fictional blog". To solve this, we should exploit the part of google that takes note of our linking words. If you have a list of fictional blogs, don't link to them by name. Link to them using the words: "fiction", "blog fiction", or "fictional blog" etc...

Let's look at an example. I'll use Fluffy's blogroll, from The Professional Pet Blog Fiction as an example. (Not trying to pick on him, just the website I was reading when I got the idea)
Her Blogroll currently reads:

• (Un)Dead Man Blogging
• Atyllah the Hen
• Horton's Folly
• Peep This Diary
• The Squeaky Boot
• Undead Flowers
• Wilf's World

Linking to those websites using those words doesn't help them at all in the game of search engines. If you do a search for "Atyllah the Hen" or "Wilfs World" their websites already come out on top. However, if someone never heard of "Wilf's World" they wouldn't know to search for it. They would, instead, search for "Blog Fiction" or "Fictional Blog". Here is how I would propose Fluffy should change her blogroll:

• Blog Fiction: (Un)Dead Man Blogging
  
• Blog Fiction: Atyllah the Hen
• Blog Fiction: Horton's Folly
• Blog Fiction: Peep This Diary
• Blog Fiction: The Squeaky Boot
• Blog Fiction: Undead Flowers
• Blog Fiction: Wilf's World

Now, the next time google looks at fluffy's blog, it will note that "Blog Fiction" is used to link to all those other sites. Now, the next time somebody searches on "Blog Fiction" those sites will appear higher on the list. If we all do this for each other, it will be easier for new fans to find our Blog Fiction. I will soon be changing my feed titles to reflect this change.

If you have a fictional blog that I link to, Let me know in the comments if there's a different phrase you'd like me to use when I link to your site.

Review of Starts: Anonymous Lawyer; Lord Likely

[This is part of my series of reviews of blog fiction beginnings. Click here to read more about the importance of the beginning of story or about the criteria I use. This review is not a review of the entire blog fiction story or site, just the first post or two.]

For my first review, I would like to take a look at the beginning of The Astonishing Adventures of Lord Likely. The first post, titled An Amusing Incident, does not spend it's time explaining why he's taking up blogging, instead, it gets right to it. Here's the first paragraph:

Being a hard-working member of the aristocracy is tiresome fare indeed. When not deciding which hat to wear, or attending private functions, or stabbing a beggar, there's countless other tasks which all vie for my finite attention.

The post continues for another 10 paragraphs, but I think the first should already have you hooked as a reader. First to jump out at you should be the ironic statement of Lord Likely being "a hard-working member of the aristocracy". This sets the tone of Lord Likely's other "observations" in life as well as his condescending attitude. The next sentence sets the tone for Lord Likely's irreverence. The idea that "stabbing a beggar" is as common as "deciding which hat to wear" also reveals Likely's callousness. Overall this is a great beginning to a great Blog Fiction.

Now let's look at the first and second posts of Anonymous Lawyer. The first short post was like so many real blogs. A test message combined with why it's starting.

Just testing. I spend enough time reading what other people are writing that I may as well start my own page.

Kind of a gruff unfriendly start. Just like the character. The second post tells a story that ends with the character saying:

This is power. Making law students vomit. This is why I like being a lawyer.

The story definitely reveals something of the character writing the blog. It also sets the tone of "Anonymous Lawyer" constantly trying to make himself feel better by making others miserable. Another appropriate start to a great Blog Fiction.

If you're looking for good online fiction, check out both of these blogs. As you can see, you'll enjoy both of these right from the beginning. Let me know in the comments your own review of these two fictional blogs.

New Blog Fiction Definition

When I first started this blog I posted what the best definition of blog fiction I could come up with. It wasn't a very elegant definition. It was long and complicated and fit a new story telling medium into a rather small box.

I think I may have come up with a better definition.

A story published using blog software that uses common blogging tools to create the story in a way that would be difficult for other medium to replicate.

The new definition has two advantages. The first advantage is that it's shorter and could be put into a dictionary. The second advantage it encompasses current blog fiction without precluding future innovation. I also think it's a little more flattering of a definition than the one Wikipedia gives:

a form of fiction writing that uses weblogs to reach its readership. It is a small-scale fringe activity in the world of blogging, and although it has generated some literary critical interest, it remains isolated. It is presented in many forms, from a pretend diary or posted novel to a serialblog.

Going forward my new definition is the one I will use when looking for new Blog Fiction. Hopefully the rest of you who find my blog will use this new definition when adding your own blog fiction to the list.

Compared to my last attempt at defining a blog fiction, I think it includes some of the categories I explicitly excluded last time. This was a conscious decision. Rereading my old definition and looking at more closely of the stuff that's out there, I decided that it was too narrow. That's why this one is a bit more broad.

Please let me know in the comments what you think of my new definition.

Beginning a Blog Fiction

Call me Ishmael
It was the best of times, It was the worst of times.
A long time ago, in a galaxy far far away...

What do all three of these phrases have in common? They are the first line to timeless story telling. In one line the tone of a story or character is placed in the mind of the reader: The Character is a cast-away, It's a time of contradictions, An epic fairy tale. The first line of a story can also draw in the reader by making them ask questions that they want to know the answer too. "Why is telling me to call him Ishmael? Is that his real name? Is it a biblical reference? How can it be the best and worst of times?"

Blog Fiction is no different than any other fiction in that it needs to draw the reader into the story. Much of the blog fiction that I've found starts off with a justification of why the character is starting to blog or a diary. The first post follows the formula, "I'm starting this because of [x]". Some other's go for authenticity by making the first post something along the line: "I hope this shows up when I hit publish!" As if the character is testing the blog software. Some may not have a real beginning and just start writing.

I don't know which way is best. Actually, I don't think there is a 'best' way. As long as it's interesting I think a writer can start a Blog Fiction however (s)he wants.

A regularly occurring series here will be me reviewing the first (and second and third, when appropriate) post of the blog fictions that I've found. I'll be basing it on 3 criteria: Does the tone it set in sync with the character or story? Does it draw in the reader? Is it Original or Clever?

I will review more than a couple per post as warranted. If I give a bad review I will do my best to contact the Author and see if they would like to either comment or rebut. If there is a rebut, I'll post it on the front and include a comment in the original review that contains a link to the rebuttal.

There'll be no particular order in which blog fiction I review first other than I'll give some sort of preference to blog fiction that is currently active.

Look for the first reviews in the next day or two.

Zombie Lawmen? Where the heck did this come from!?

Well that's weird. I've been doing searches of the term blog fiction for months now and I have never seen any "Blog Fiction" ads from google. However, when I did a recent search, I found this:

Click picture for full size image.

An ad for something called, "Zombie Lawmen". The description read, "Where Justice is Dead! The very best in Blog Fiction". Naturally, I couldn't resist checking out the site.

What I found was, "disappointing", to say the least. All it was was a weird graphic, a parental advisory warning, and 3 links useless links leading to websites that were just scum-sucking domain squatters. At this point, I was completely confused.

After doing a quick google search of "Zombie Lawmen", I found a copule websites that shed some light on the subject. Apparently, this (now defunct) Blog Fiction effort was launched by a company called GMobile Media. They have a description of it on their main page.

Zombie Lawmen™ is a Blogworld set in an anarchic future where the heroes of the Amercian Old West are raised from the dead to bring law and order back to Tombstone, Arizona: "The Town Too Tough To Die.”

I also found a blog post about it from last year. You can read the summary of Zombie Lawmen here. The whole concept sounded really interesting, if a little far fetched.

So what happened to it?
Why are ads still appearing for it when it's obviously an abandoned project?
When it was still around, was it any good?

When I have some time, I will try and find the answer to these questions.

The "Fake" Blog Explosion

For a year and a half, the blog Fake Steve Jobs was a runaway hit. One, because it was a entertaining parody and, two, because of the mystery surrounding the blog trying to determine who the "real" Fake Steve Jobs was. It was so popular that, once the identity was revealed last August, that even the New York Times announced that the mystery of the wrote an article about it.

That article must have introduced the blog to a lot of people because shortly after the article(and probably many many others) were printed, a whole slew of copy cats flooded the internet. Almost all of these hard working copy cats lasted only a few months until the blog ended or was abandoned. Now come on, If you're going to be a copy cat, at least put some work into it. If you want somebody to spend time reading your writing, you should be either original or spend a lot of time working on. Most of these copycats did neither.

The Secret Diary of Jonathan Schwartz:
This was a darn near exact copy of the Fake Steve Jobs blog. The title was the same, The Blogger template that was used was the same, only the widgets were slightly different. It started in August - right after the New York Times Article was printed. It limped all the way to November before being abandoned.

The Secret Diary of Brad Stone:
This hard working mocker of the guy who outed Fake Steve Jobs, lasted only 4 days past a month and only 13 posts.

The Secret Diary of Hillary Clinton:
It's amazing how politics can bring the best out of people... Luckily it doesn't bring out hard work so we don't have to endure them for long. Like so many of these "Fake" blogs, it came in with a lot of posts at first and then limped on until it was abandoned a few months later.

The Secret Diary of D.A. Carson:
It's amazing how religion can bring out the best in people... This very original blog copied the title and template of Fake Steve Jobs. It started right after the New York Times article. This hard working sinner only lasted 2 months.

The Secret Diary of Greg Swann:
Here's an esoteric diary that only our Australian friends would probably get the jokes. Thankfully for the rest of us, we aren't missing much. This fickle Aussie blogged for a grand total of 7 days.

As you can tell, I really don't like unoriginal, lazy, copy cats. To get a glowing review from me you don't need to do much. You only need to do one of two things. Be original\different, or show some work ethic. I will never mock anyone who works his\her butt off, or for trying something new.

As far as "Fake" blogs go, I will continue to link to ones that are active. Also, if you're thinking of doing one yourself, please, don't make it exactly like Fake Steve Jobs right down to the template and description. There is plenty of ways to be original in your "Fake" blog. Also, if you're shooting for the same popularity as Fake Steve Jobs, take note that he had over 1700 posts in 2007. In other words, you're probably going to have to type your fingers to the bone.

Did Blog Fiction peak in 2005?

Lots of new things in popular culture follows a certain pattern. Somebody does something new and/or different. It becomes popular. Everyone talks about it. The genre is then copied repeatedly until every hack is trying to do the new thing. The novelty then peaks. People quit watching the crappy copies and only the best survives. People quit talking about it because it's no longer new and just becomes part of the culture.

Examples of this were variety shows on TV Variety shows gained popularity in the 60s, especially the Ed Sullivan show. Then in the 70s it really peaked. Any idiot that was famous got a variety show. Now, the closest thing to variety shows that we have are late night talk shows and SNL.

The same thing happened in the 80s with standup comedy. Every bar owner thought they could be the next Improv and every office "funny guy" thought he could be a comic. Well, the number of stand up clubs eventually declined, but stand up is still done in clubs that know how to run a comedy club.

With that in mind. It seems like interest in Blog Fiction peaked back in 2005. Considering that they only started in 2003 that's pretty quick. I know things go fast on the internet, but this is ridiculous.

I keep find articles and websites circa 2005(or earlier) about Blog Fiction and very little since. Don't get me wrong, people are still writing Blog Fiction, but nobody is really writing about it. Here's some of what I mean:
FictionBlogs is a list of Blog Fiction that hasn't been updated since January 2005.
Over on BloggersBlog all of their posts about Blog Fiction were in 2005 with one January 2006 exception.
Blog-fic.com used to be a gathering place for Blog Fiction writer's, but now the site is gone and has been replaced with a scum-sucking domain squatter. (Link not included so as to discourage people going to these sites.
Over at Grand Text Auto, an active blog "about computer narrative, games, poetry, and art", hasn't had an post about Blog Fiction since 2005 as well.
The yahoo group fictionalbloggers started and peaked in 2006. It hobbled along until the middle of 2007 and died (right about the time I found it, of course)
The most recently active site that was dedicated to Blog Fiction was Betsy's Phony Bologna blog. Unfortunately, shortly after finishing her thesis she had to stop writing about them to concentrate on her job.

I think you're starting to see the point. Based on all the searching I've done, Novelr and I are the only ones left still writing about Blog Fiction. And Novelr writes about the more broad topic, Blooks. Or, at least, we're the only English websites still talking about it. I don't think that's a good thing. If more people writing about them, I think it could help to increase the blog fiction audience. I think it's healthy to have multiple views and angles about a subject. I hope more people will pick up the subject.

If I do find a site, or a section of a site, that is dedicated to blog fiction I will link to it. So far though, there are none that I know of that are still active.

Blog Fiction and Blogrush

The concept of BlogRush is simple enough. Every time someone loads up a page on your blog, BlogRush will show 5 random blogposts from other bloggers. In exchange, someone looking at a different blog will see the title of your latest post. The more visitors to your blog, the more your posts show up on other's. There's other factors to determine how often your blog's posts are shown, but I won't get into that. You can read about it yourself.

As for driving traffic to your site it's decent. On this blog I get one or two visitors every other day. For Terran Resistance it's less. More like 1 or 2 a week. I have to assume I'll get more once the blogs themselves get more traffic. Considering the low traffic of this blog and even less for Terran Resistance it's worth my while considering it's a free service.

I'm still experimenting with it to see if I can get more or better traffic. And by "better", I mean letting people know what to expect when they click a post title. For instance, if I a post title is called "Engine Test" people might think it's about cars or search engines. When I have some time I'd like to see if I can somehow slip the word "story" or "blog fiction" into my blogrush feeds so that people know what they're clicking on. Right now the only targetting is that I put the Blog under the "writing and literature" category so it'll only show up on other "writing and literature" blog sites.

The best part of the service is if you're just starting out you'll get "bonus" credits which means that even though your blog is new with no traffic you'll get "free" views. Bottom Line: There's probably no downside to picking up this widget and putting on your Blog Fiction site.

Is Blogger Favored among Blog Fiction writers?

Wordpress, Blogger, TypePad, Nucleus. These are just a few of the many many different ways that you can blog. All of them are popular and have a lot of users. However, which of them is most favored by us Blog Fiction writers? Of all the Blog Fiction that I've found, here's the breakdown of the software that is used:

Blogger:
Anonymous Lawyer
Captain Picard's Journal
Ten-Sided
(Un)Dead Man Blogging
The Darth Side
Wilf's World
Atyllah the Hen - Chicken with Attitude
The Professional Pet
Confessions of a Blogger
Transplanted Life
Modern Vampire
The Astonishing Adventures of Lord Likely
Horton's Folly
Secret Blog of a TV Controller
Fleet Commander
The New Year's Resolution
Diary of a Killer
Fictional Blogs of Original Super Heros

WordPress:
The diary of dastardly deeds, space cowboy
Yanni's Block
Confessions of a CEO
Life in Bear Country
The Mexican Year
Up and Onward (Confessions of a Super Hero)

NucluesCMS:
Action Figure Diary
Unknown Ship, Unknown Planet
Terran Resistance

Square Space:
The User Pool

TypePad:
Peep This Diary

As you can see Blogger is the far and away favorite amongst blog fiction writers. WordPress is a distant second. Or is it? As I've documented (twice), google tends to favor blogs hosted on Blogger. So, I had the thought that the reason so much of the blog fiction I've found is hosted on Blogger is because that's what comes up in my google searches.

Therefore, I started trying to tailor my searches to find blog fiction not on Blogger. In my first try, I succeeded. After doing a search on typepad "blog fiction", I found a blog fiction called The Cranky Product Manager. I've added it to the Blog Fiction List, and, since it's active, I've added it to my feed.

Over the next few days I'll be trying to find some non-Blogger blog fiction to see if Blogger really is favored, or if it only seems favored because it's easier to find.

Site Changes

I've made some changes to my site that I want to mention.

I'll start with the most superficial. I changed the style of my headers on the side bars to make it more apparent that they are clickable links. I've also rearranged some information on the right to put the more relevant information towards the top. That is, the link to a list of all of the blog fiction that I've found so far.

Second, it saddens me, but I'm removing Random People, Random Ship from the feed list. It's been nearly 3 months since a new post on that blog so I have to declare it inactive. This will probably be temporary since the author says that he'll be back soon.

Finally, due to the overwhelming response of my reader(s). I've decided to include a list of "Fake" Blogs that I've found. I have a feeling that I'm going to continue to find a lot of them and their feeds would overflow my sidebar feed list. Therefore, I won't include their feeds on my site. However, they will be listed with a link to their respective homepages on the right.

Grammar Check!

Bad grammar or bad spelling can ruin even the best story. No matter how compelling the characters or how witty the writing style, no one is going to enjoy it if they have to take out the teacher's pen before they know that hell you're trying to say. If your writing has someone "sitting at the table and eating desert" or have a driver "cames to an complete stop", it's going to jar your reader out of the story. You don't want that to happen, and neither does your reader. That's why it's important to edit your writing before publishing.

Grammar rules apply for blog fiction as well. Last night I was reading the archives of a blog fiction and kept finding myself having to reread sentences because of bad spelling or grammar. It was really distracting. It slowed down my reading and I couldn't get through the posts as quickly as I'd like.

Now, in the world of dead-tree publishing, fixing a grammar or spelling error is not a cheap thing. It requires printing a second edition and configuring a new press and distributing the new copies. In the digital world that blog fiction lives, it takes about 5 seconds to fix. (30 if you're using dial-up and god help you if you are!) That's why I think Blog fiction writer's should occasionally reread their older posts. If you see a grammar error, fix it. It won't change the story, just make it easier to read for new visitors. Don't abandon those old posts until you've reread them at least 2 or 3 times.

I once read a counter argument about editing a blog fiction post after hitting the "publish" button. It said that it lent "authenticity" because people make errors when posting to real blogs or diaries. That is total BS. When speaking in everyday conversation people will say "um...", "uh...", stammer, pause, etc... but it doesn't mean you should include those in your character's dialog.

In fact, dialog is a good analogy. When writing a novel authors only have their character's speak poorly to convey something. Like a 5 year old might mispronounce a word. The author does that to remind the reader that she's only 5. Another example might be someone stutters in their dialog because that person is nervous.

The same principle can be applied to Blog Fiction writing. The only reason to have bad grammar is if you're doing it on purpose for a plot point or character development. Maybe it's a joke that your character always misspells the same word and it gets him in trouble at work - or something. Otherwise, don't do it.

So, there. I'll quite channeling my 11th grade English teacher now.

Are "Fake" Blogs, Blog Fiction?

I've been wondering for a while if I should include "fake" blogs in my list of blog fiction. First though, some definitions on what I'm talking about.

First of all, I don't mean a hoax blog. That is a blog where it tries to fool you into thinking it's real. Something where somebody makes up a person and tries to make everything think it's real. Nor do I mean a fake blog or 'flog' that a multi-national company's marketing team creates to force fake stories and information.

What I am talking about is a fake blog of a famous person. Where somebody pretends to be a famous person, but is obviously a parody. Examples abound:
The Secret Diaries of Janice Combs
The Secret Diary of Steve Ballmer
and of course the most famous, The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs

I don't even know what to call these fake blogs. They aren't really a fake or a hoax because you know they're fake. "Parody Blog" seems to broad. I'd like a good name for them because you can't say "fake" when talking about them.

I'm thinking of including them because the blogs are funny and popular; however, they don't really tell a story and are used exclusively for parody. If these blogs continue to explode in number and popularity, I may create a separate list for these "fake" blogs that's separate from the Grand List of Blog Fiction.

Anonymous Lawyer is BACK!

Anonymous Lawyer has always been somewhat of a light poster. Usually averaging only one a month; however, without explanation there hadn't been a post there for more than 2 months. I was getting ready to move it to "inactive", but today it sprung to life with an in-story explanation of his absence. Kudos to the author for that.

And yes, Anonymous Lawyer is important enough that this deserves it's own post!!!

SuperHero Blogs

Here is an awesome find for blog fiction readers. I found 5 fiction blogs written by "Super Heroes". They are written by original characters who have superpowers. It follows their struggle to get by in life.

The characters all exist in the same "world". Each of the blogs references the other 4. Sometimes the characters will even comment on each other's blog. All of the 5 characters have their own Blogger account. So I don't know if it's 5 people on each blog or if it's 1 person writing all of it on 5 accounts. I will say this, if it is just one person writing all 5 of the blogs that person is one busy person! The blogs all started a couple months ago and have a lot of posts already.

I'll be reading these. I'll be interested how entangled the lives of the characters get with each other. There's a lot of backlog for me to catch up on. Their lives may already be entangled and I just don't know it yet. Here's the links to each of the blogs:

Leroy J. Power
Terra Stone aka Elemental
Ean Iago
The Enigma Known As Brice
Mr. E. aka weird Wellington "Edwin" Mallard

One more thing. Just to give credit to originality, It looks like Up and Away served as the inspiration for these 5 blogs. Up and Away was the blog fiction that I found yesterday.

2 More Fictional Blogs

*[wipes forhead] Whew...
Trying to keep my list of known fictional blogs up-to-date is a tough job. I found 2 more today and posted them. Unfortunately, neither of them are active anymore. They've both been abandoned. For the next few days, I'm going to be concentrating on finding new fictional blogs. As I find them I'll post in the Grand List. If I find anything of note during my search, I'll be sure to let everyone here know.

I'd also like to take this moment again to ask you guys to help me out. If you run a blog fiction, or know of one that I haven't listed yet, please let me know. Either post it in the forum yourself, or put it in my comments and I'll get the info needed.