Use Wikipedia to promote yourself? Don't Bother

I was checking out twitter and found this tweet about Wikipedia from Muse's Success.

Added our link to the Blog Fiction article on Wikipedia. Let's hope it doesn't get removed!

The link did not last more than a day before being removed as "spam". Compared to how quickly most links get removed from Wikipedia articles that's practically a record. Wikipedia is meant to be used as a research tool, not a promotion tool. The editors have a lot of rules in place to keep the site from being used for promotion.

Wikipedia has a "bot" (computer controlled editor) that looks through all articles and removes the most obvious self-promotion updates. What criteria does it use? I'll let the XLinkBot article answer that:

XLinkBot is primarily intended to deal with domains which may have a legit use on-wiki, but are frequently misused by new and anonymous users (or have a history of being misused). The bot allows established users to add links, while reverting links added by others. IP's and new users can still edit a page that contains links on the bot's revert list, they won't be reverted unless they add or change a link themselves.

So if you add an external link, and you aren't a frequent editor, it will remove your link by reverting the article. So, if you're a blog fiction writer, don't bother trying to promote yourself on the wikipedia page. All that will happen is that you'll add an external link to your site and seconds later it will be gone.

Even if you somehow manage to defeat the XLinkBot's logic, you'll still have to deal with human editors. If they think that your link was either self-serving or irrelevant, guess what? It's gone.

It's not worth trying to get your link on the site. This blog was around for nearly a year and a half before someone finally decided to add me to the external links portion of the Blog Fiction article. Now that I'm listed I get about 1 hit every other day from it. So getting listed on that page is hardly worth the time. Rather than trying to defeat the bot and other wikipedia editors, might I suggest something more constructive, entrecard, Web Fiction Guide, or Muse's Success.

Chaos Reigns in World of Online Fiction

I really hope that I'm over reacting, but where the heck is everybody?! I'm not just talking about the dearth of activity on the Blog Fiction Forums. I'm also talking about the lack of forum activity everywhere in the online fiction world. I had a different post planned for today, but I can't ignore something really eerie going on right now. It affects not just Blog Fiction, but all online fiction.

As you know, Pages Unbound closed... and then reopened. Even after reopening though, I haven't seen any new activity on their forums. I don't know if people have started reviewing again (no dates on reviews or any way to list reviews by date published). Over at the Web Fiction Guide forums the only activity for the last 5 days has been a thread for new people to introduce themselves. The editors are still editing, but the visible users seem to be gone. Over at the Novelr forums, the only activity there in 2 weeks has been the mention that Pages Unbound has reopened.

So, I come back to my original question. Where the heck is everybody? I had a couple theories. My first thought was that the holiday weekend distracted everyone(Labor day in U.S.). That theory didn't hold, not every writer is from the United States after all - I would still be seeing participants from the rest of the world. My next theory was that maybe the chaos of people and their kids going back to school was to blame. Again, this theory doesn't hold up. Every school in the world doesn't start their school year around the 1st of September. I then formed a third theory that scared me. "Omigod, did we lose critical mass?" - That hard to define, but easy to recognize property that allows online communities to thrive.

Here's how the theory goes. When pages unbound closed, Web Fiction Guide became the immediate beneficiary. It allowed community reviewing and rating in addition to editor reviews. They added a forum. All of it was easier to use than Pages Unbound too. Pages Unbound even gave a banner ad advertising Web Fiction Guide. With all the activity at Web Fiction Guide I noticed that my forum activity grinded to a halt (Presumably, going to the more active and just as easy to use Web Fiction Guide). As far as I can tell, the same thing might have happened to the NovLounge. Then, web fiction guide forums slowed down a little. Why, I don't know. Maybe it did slow down because of theories 1 and 2. Then, something strange happened. Pages Unbound came back. Now, people don't know where they want their home to be. Now people have to choose which great review site they want to participate in. Internet traffic being the finicky beast it is, chooses neither. Now, the longer both forums remain inactive, the more people that are going to give up and not participate in either. Where as "critical mass" describes a virtuous circle of people creating content, which attracts more users, who create more forum content, which attracts more users... etc. What I'm describing is a vicious circle. People who would be willing to participate are leaving due to inactivity, which leads to more inactivity...

Alexandra Erin used Pages Unbound to create a critical mass of online writers and readers. She created a hub for the 2 groups to connect to each other. I hope that my theory is wrong and there is another explanation for the disappearance of forum traffic - that the critical mass held together during the chaos of the last month. It would be a devastating blow to online fiction to have to try and rebuild that critical mass.

In the end, only time will tell. Maybe everyone went to a different site that I don't know about and is having a hell of a good time. That would be good. If not and the forum traffic doesn't come roaring back, and is instead sparse, then my "chaos reigns" theory would be proven correct, and all will mourn our loss...

August News Roundup

Some Interesting News Bits happening in the Blog Fiction World. Some old, some recent, all of it was news to me in the last month.

Novelr taking a semi-break
Eli James has let us know of a planned "study break" until December. Unfortunately, that means a lot fewer posts. The online fiction community never seems quite right when we're deprived of Eli's insight.

Pages Unbound is closing down.
In a sad move, Pages Unbound is shutting down. Alexandra Erin didn't have enough time to run the review site and forums. Pages Unbound was a busy, well frequented site, and a great resource for finding quality fiction online. It's absence will leave a huge gap and need. Fortunately, another site has risen to fill that need. Which brings us to the next news bit...

Web Fiction Guide now has forums
In response to the loss of Pages Unbound, the editors at Web Fiction Guide installed a forum. The forum isn't Blog Fiction centric, but covers all online fiction which include Blog Fiction.

Seeing Blog Fiction published
This is really old news, but Undead Man Blogging is working on getting published. Still waiting to hear about Star Islanders being published.

New Blog Fiction
I found 2 new blog fiction sites: Death's Blog which is still active, and BlogPaige which is not.

Unknown Ship, Unknown Planet gone.
Unknown Ship, Unknown Planet has done a disappearing act. One that would make "Life in Bear Country" jealous.

Unannounced Leaves
Unfortunately, there are a lot of blog fiction sites that seem to be taking unannounced leaves.
A while ago, Fleet Commander teased us with a possible comeback. Unfortunately it didn't materialize.
The three Super Hero blogs, of Leroy and Enigma have not had a post since July 8th. Hopefully they weren't defeated by a super villain. Terra is still blogging sporadically.
Peep this Diary also teased us with a comeback. With only 2 posts back in early July and none since, it may have been premature to call it a comeback.

What was news to you this past month?