None Of Your Old Writing Was A Waste Of Time

Very Brief Guide to [tumblr], for Reddit refugees

Shit You Must Do Right Fucking Now:

Change your profile picture, blog header, and title to something other than the defaults. Do it right now. You will be mistaken for a bot otherwise, and blocked.

Go into Settings -> Dashboard, scroll down to Preferences, and turn off the options in the picture. This will get rid of most of the algorithmic stuff.

Turn off Tumblr Live. You have to snooze it once every 7 days for some stupid reason. It's hosted through another company and will steal your data if you use it.

Go to your blog settings (under the little person menu) and turn off these two settings:

Turn off infinite scroll (lags the site) and turn on timestamps on posts, in the same menu as Preferences.

Basic Features of the Site:

Reblogs drive the entire site. If you'd upvote something on Reddit, you'd reblog it on Tumblr. You can add text, images, or tags to a reblog, but you're not required to.

The dashboard is the equivalent to your Reddit feed, and contains the posts of all the people you follow, with the newest at the top

You can send an ask to someone, and it'll appear in their askbox for them to answer. You can receive them too, or turn off the settings if you don't want.

Tags aren't actually used for finding stuff (search function is dogshit), but are more for categorizing. People also talk in tags. Because Tumblr is weird, you can't use quotation marks (") or commas in them without fucking it up

You can filter both tags and phrases under Account Settings; doing this will put a filter over a post that contains them, which you'll have to click through to see the post itself. Useful for avoiding hate speech or blocking out annoying stuff

You can make polls in posts. Here's one now.

Likes are useless. They literally do fuck-all except send a notification to the OP.

Stuff Tumblr Does That Other Sites Don't:

Very old posts (I'm talking from like 2012) often circulate on this site. There's no such thing as a post being "too old" to reblog

Blocking is highly encouraged; you can block someone for any reason. Even for just being annoying.

If you and someone else are following each other, you are mutuals. Mutuals are fucking awesome and are treasured like friends. Mutuals are a thing on other sites but Tumblr treats em differently.

You can screenshot someone's tags if you like them and add them to a reblog. This is called "peer review"

Sometimes someone will find a blog and go through it and like/reblog a bunch of posts. This is totally fine and not "creepy" like it is seen as on other sites.

Tumblr jokes often rely on Continuing The Bit and a "yes, and?" attitude. Goncharov is probably the best example of this.

We are fucking infested with bots. They will either have totally blank profiles or be filled with porn. Block and report on sight.

Censorship is pretty lax here. I can say "I want to brutally stab Elon Musk to death and watch him bleed out in front of a crowd" and nobody gives a shit.

General Etiquette:

Don't try to do epic clapbacks here, you'll probably just get laughed at or blocked. If someone is bugging you or spouting bigoted bullshit, block them.

Reblog art!!! Artists often struggle to gain traction on here; reblogging will give them a boost.

Not every reblog needs a comment or tag in it

You can go all out with tagging your stuff to organize it, or you can just leave it all blank. Someone might ask "hey, can you tag these posts as [x]?" and you can decide if you want to do that or not. It's generally polite to oblige, but "no" is still reasonable.

Avoid discourse like the plague. Filter it, block people who start it, scroll past it when you see it. Just don't get involved in it. Ever.

Don't put fandom tags or jokes on someone's posts about serious matters or personal shit

You're responsible for curating your own dashboard; if you complain about constantly seeing stuff you don't like, that's probably on you. Don't be afraid to unfollow.

Follower count doesn't matter much here and you don't have to make yours known if you don't want to.

Reblog, don't repost. Reblogging keeps the credit and doesn't "steal" engagement like Twitter retweets.

If someone likes something a LOT, they might reblog it like 30 times in a row. This is normal

Having a post blow up is actually kinda a bad thing, since it floods your notifications. There's a sort of in-joke about how having a big post is awful and people jokingly try to stop their own posts from blowing up, often in vain.

Tips:

Get XKit Rewritten if you're on desktop, it's a really helpful extension

In the little drop-down menu next to the 'Post now' button you can either save a draft, schedule a post, or add it to your queue. The queue lets you post things in order at a certain interval, which you can change. It's good for spreading stuff out over time.

You can use Shift+R to quickly reblog stuff and Shift+Q to queue!

Filter your notifications under Activity - you can also see some neat graphs

Find each other! If you want your old Reddit communities to stick together, seek out other refugees and follow them.

Have fun on [tumblr], everyone!

Rewards

“I refuse.”

Tobirama frowned at the instant rebuff. Madara hardly ever refused him these days, but this was something that Madara absolutely refused to do no matter what.

“Madara, you are being unreasonable,” Tobirama pointed out, crossing his arms and readying himself for a change of tactics.

“Unreasonable? I’m being unreasonable?” Madara said, turning around where he was skimming through a mission scroll and pinning Tobirama with an impressive scowl. “I refuse to be your guinea pig any longer! You turned my Sharingan neon pink for a week! I was laughed at by my enemies before I burned them alive for laughing at me!”

“It was an unfortunate side effect,” Tobirama agreed solemnly.

“And then you left me nearly blind after messing with my Mangekyō Sharingan! I couldn’t see for three days! I walked into a damned tree!” Madara ranted hotly, pointing to his eyes to emphasize his point.

“You were hardly blind. Your eyes were just more sensitive to light,” Tobirama dismissed the accusation calmly.

“You only care about my eyes!” Madara hissed. “I refuse to participate in any more of your experiments!”

“That is untrue,” Tobirama denied.

“You haven’t slept with me for two damned weeks because all you want to do is experiment on me!” Madara accused, now pointing at Tobirama to emphasize that particular point.

Tobirama paused, thinking back and realizing that, yes, indeed, that particular accusation was true. It wasn’t as if Tobirama could get in the mood when there was so much to learn with an available specimen — or rather, volunteer was readily available.

“I’ll let you do anything you want tonight if you let me continue my research,” Tobirama offered.

Madara paused, looking like he was seriously considering it for a minute before he shook himself and scowled. “That’s unfair. You can’t do that!”

Tobirama locked onto the lapse of Madara’s indignation with the precision of a predator and ruthlessly exploited it. He slinked over to his displeased lover and got right into Madara’s space, causing the man to tense in wary suspicion. Tobirama placed a lingering hand on Madara’s chest, trailing one finger lightly over it. Tobirama certainly wasn’t above more…persuasive options if the need called for it.

“You’re the only one I want to do it with,” Tobirama murmured, gazing at Madara through his lashes.

Madara swallowed at the suggestive wording. “You mean with your experiments, right?”

Tobirama tilted his head, aware that he had the entirety of Madara’s reluctant enraptured attention. “Can’t it be either? Besides…”

He pressed a little closer, their lips mere millimeters apart, breath warm and enticing between them. Madara sucked in a shuddering inhalation, eyelids lowering in anticipation.

“…The rewards you’ll reap will be entirely worth it,” Tobirama promised in a silky purr before abruptly drawing back and shrugging nonchalantly. “However, since you’re that opposed, Kagami and Izuna have been quite eager to volunteer. I suppose I’ll go and request their assistance after all.”

Madara blinked rapidly, looking half dazed when Tobirama was suddenly a few feet away before the words sank in. Before Tobirama could take two steps, Madara swiftly reached out and snatched his wrist, pulling him back.

“Wait,” Madara said before grudgingly grinding out, “Fine. I’ll do it, damn you. But I want my reward first.”

Tobirama raised a brow and allowed the curl of satisfaction to settle in his being before he nodded. “Let’s get started right away then, shall we?”

“You guys,” a voice came from their right where a hapless witness had watched the entire thing with an increasingly embarrassed blush. “Can you not do this in my office every single time?”

Hashirama, unfortunately for him, was entirely ignored while Madara hastily whisked Tobirama away to the Uchiha compound with all of the intentions to reap his well-deserved reward.

This is so helpful when designing characters with wings

This week: Form follows function! You can tell a lot about a bird by its wings.

A note on fanfic writing.

I feel like times have changed drastically. We went from ‘you write just for yourself’ to ‘likes are bad, reblogs are good, and the metrics by which your worth is measured’. 

Here, I will be using my own experience as a frame of reference - but again, it’s different for everyone. [The rest under the cut]

Weiterlesen

So I was just wondering, in happy AU where Izuna lives and Konoha is formed and Madatobi happens and everything is sunshine and roses, how would the Shinobi Wars have been influenced? Konoha was the most powerful of the villages in the original universe, but add to that the power of Madara and the dozens of Uchiha and Senju that would not have died if the fighting had stopped earlier, they would be ridiculously stronger than the other villages. Also, would the Daimyo of Fire Country take advantage of having such an overpoweringly strong ninja village to expand his borders? 

On another note: in the books they mentioned that the Senju and the Uchiha were always hired to oppose each other, what happened when people could no longer do that? Would there be people willing to pay Konoha not to take a job, or secondary parties willing to pay Konoha extra to take certain jobs?

@hiruma-musouka , @blackkatmagic, @redhothollyberries, and @elenathehun what are your thoughts?

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I got Uriel.

And I do admire and appreciate her loyalty ☺️

WHOOPS. Deleted that last post, sorry. 

Okay, here is the angel quiz. Reblog with your result and say whether you agree or not!

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Useful Writing Resources

This is an extensive list of resources for every problem you could come across while writing/planning/editing your novel. Use it well;)

{ *** } Indicate a Highly Reccommended Resource

Planning/outlining Your Work

How To Outline ***

Zigzag Method : Creating Plots

How to Plot a Romance Novel 

Seven Great Sources of Conflict for Romances 

Let’s talk about brainstorming

Writing Something With Meaning ***

Past Or Present Tense? : How To Decide

Writing Your Work

How To Write A Fabulous Chapter #1 ***

How to Build a Romance Thread in Your Story 

The Big Book Of Writing Sex ***

6 Ways to Get Your Readers Shipping Like Crazy 

Romance Writing Tips ***

20 Tips for Writing Lovable Romance Novel Heroes

7 Ways To Speed Up Your Writing *** 

80+ Barriers to Love: A List of Ideas to Keep Romantic Tension High 

9 Romance Writing Mistakes to Avoid 

Removing the Creeps From Romance

19 Ways to Write Better Dialogue ***

50 Things Your Characters Can Do WHILE They Talk ***

How To Write Action And Fight Scenes

10 Steps To Write Arguments

9 Ways To Write Body Language

Writing Good Kissing Scenes

Writing Murders

Create And Control Tone ***

Tips for Writing Ghost Stories

Incorporating Flashbacks

12 Tips To Avoid Overwriting ***

Characters

Behind the Name

Top Baby Names

Looking for a name that means a certain thing? ***

7 Rules of Picking Names

Most Common Surnames ***

Minor Character Development

Writing Antagonists, Antiheroes and Villains

Characters With Enhanced Senses

5 Tips to Help You Introduce Characters

How Do You Describe a Character?

How To Write Child Characters

36 Core Values For Building Character

Questions To Answer When Creating Characters ***

4 Ways to Make Readers Instantly Loathe Your Character Descriptions

5 Ways to Keep Characters Consistent

Character Archetypes

25 Ways To Fuck With Your Characters

Building Platonic Relationships Between Female Characters

9 Simple and Powerful Ways to Write Body Language 

33 Ways To Write Stronger Characters

Conveying Character Emotion 

How to Make Readers Love an Unlikable Character…  

How to Create Powerful Character Combos

How To Describe A Character’s Voice ***

Describing Clothing And Appearance ***

Career Masterpost ***

Creating Your Character’s Personality ***

Character Flaws ***

Editing

DON’T EDIT>>> REWRITE THE WHOLE THING FIRST

Ultimate Guide To Editing Each Aspect Of Your Work ***

Why You Would Read Your Novel Out Loud ***

Grammar and Punctuation ***

How To Write A Captivating First Sentence

10 Things Your Opening Chapter Should Do: A Check-List for Self-Editing ***

Saving Your Story: Finding Where It Went Wrong

How To Condense Without Losing Anything

The Stages Of Editing

Dialogue/Description Balance

3 Proofreading Tips

The Short Story Form

Chapter & Novel Lengths

Anatomy Of A Novel : Chapters and Parts ***

How To Write Chapter After Chapter Until You Have A Book ***

Where Chapter #2 Should Start

Step By Step Guide To Editing Your Draft

Writing Tool: CTRL-F (How And Why You Should Use It) ***

How To Kill A Character

25 Steps To Edit The Unmerciful Suck Out Of Your Story

5 Ways To Make Your Novel Helplessly Addictive ***

Setting

{Setting} How To Describe Setting In Your Stories ***

20 Questions To Enhance Setting

How To Bring Your Setting To Life

Miscellaneous Resources You Can Use In Between

How to Write from a Guy’s POV 

The Emotional Wounds Thesaurus

Text To Speech Reader

Compare Character Heights 

A Visual Dictionary of Tops

Writers Helping Writers

7 Tricks To Imrove Your Writing Overnight

Work Out/ Word Count : Exercise Between Writing ***

Most Important Writing Tips ***

Let’s talk about diversity in novels

Letting Go Of Your Story

Keeping A Healthy Writing Schedule And Avoiding Procrastination ***

How To Create A Good Book Cover

Write or Die

Tip of my Tongue

Character Traits Form

Online Thesaurus

Writing Sketchy/Medical/Law

Coma: Types, Causes, etc

Tips for writing blood loss

Gunshot Wound Care

Examples of Hospital Forms

Common Legal Questions

The Writer’s Forensics Blog

Brain Injury Legal Guide

Types of Surgical Operations

Types of Mental Health Problems

A Day in the Life of a Mental Hospital Patient

Global Black Market Information ***

Crime Scene Science

Examining Mob Mentality

How Street Gangs Work

Writers’ Block Help/ Productivity

Story Plot Generator

@aveeragemusings ‘ Cure To Writers’ Block ***

50 Romance Plot Ideas

Reading Like A Writer ***

Defeat Writers’ Block

Writing In A Bad Mood ***

Writers Block

When You’ve Lost Motivation To Write A Novel ***

What To Do When The Words Won’t Flow ***

9 Ways To Be A More Productive Writer

“I Cannot Write A Good Sentence Today” (How To Get Over It) ***

Real Writing Advice ***

Info You Need To Know & Words You Didn’t Think Of

A Writer’s Thesaurus ***

Words To Describe… ***

Words & Phrases To Use In Your Sex Scenes ***

Colors (An Extensive List Of Colors)

List Of Kinks & Fetishes ***

List Of Elemental Abilities

inkarnate.com : World Creator And Map Maker For Your Imaginary Setting

Body Language Phrases

List Of Legendary Creatures

How To Write Magic

Hairstyle References

Hemingway : Writing Checker

Body Types: Words To Describe Bodies and How They Move Around

Poisonous Herbs and Plants ***

The Psychology of Color

The Meaning behind Rose color

Types of Swords

Color Symbolism

How a handgun works

How to Write a Eulogy

Types of Crying

Avoiding LGBTQ Stereotypes ***

Superstitions and More

The 12 Common Archetypes

Language of Flowers

12 Realistic Woman Body Shapes

Using Feedback And Reviews

Turning Negative Reviews Into Positive Ones ***

Proofreading Marks : Easy Symbols To Make Reviewing/Feedback Easier ***

Authonomy Teen Ink Figment Fiction Press ReviewFuse

These Are Trusted Critique Sites ;)

Fanfiction Authors: HEADS UP

(Non-authors, please RB to signal boost to your author friends!)

An astute reader informed me this morning that one of my fics (Children of the Future Age) had been pirated and was being sold as a novel on Amazon:

(And they weren't even creative with their cover design. If you're going to pirate something that I spent a full year of my life writing, at least give me a pretty screenshot to brag about later. Seriously.)

I promptly filed a DMCA complaint to have it removed, but I checked out the company that put it up -- Plush Books -- and it looks like A LOT of their books are pirated fic. They are by no means the only ones doing this, either -- the fact that """publishers""" can download stories from AO3 in ebook format and then reupload them to Amazon in just a few clicks makes fic piracy a common problem. There are a whole host of reasons why letting this continue is bad -- including actual legal risk to fanfiction archives -- but basically:

IF YOU ARE A FANFIC AUTHOR WITH LONG AND/OR POPULAR WORKS, PLEASE CHECK AMAZON TO SEE IF YOUR STORIES HAVE BEEN PIRATED.

You can search for your fics by title, or by text from the description (which is often just copied wholesale from AO3 as well). If you find that someone has stolen your work and is selling it as their own, you can lodge a DMCA complaint (Amazon.com/USA site; other countries have different systems). If you haven't done this before, it's easy! Here's a tutorial:

HOW TO FILE A COPYRIGHT COMPLAINT FOR STOLEN WORK ON AMAZON.COM:

First, go to this form. You'll need to be signed into your Amazon account.

Select the radio buttons/dropdown options (shown below) to indicate that you are the legal Rights Owner, you have a copyright concern, and it is about a pirated product.

Enter the name of your story in the Name of Brand field.

In the Link to the Copyrighted Work box, enter a link to the story on AO3 or whatever site your work is posted on.

In the Additional Information box, explain that you are the author of the work and it is being sold without your permission. That's all you really need. If you want, you can include additional information that might be helpful in establishing the validity of your claim, but you don't have to go into great detail. You can simply write something like this:

I am the author of this work, which is being sold by [publisher] without my permission. I originally published this story in [date/year] on [name of site], and have provided a link to the original above. On request, I can provide documentation proving that I am the owner of the account that originally posted this story.

In the ASIN/ISBN-10 field, copy and paste the ID number from the pirated copy's URL. You'll find this ten-digit number in the Amazon URL after the word "product," as in the screenshot below. (If the URL extends beyond this number, you can ignore everything from the question mark on.) Once this number has been added, Amazon will pull the product information automatically and add it to the complaint form, so you can check the listing title and make sure it's correct.

Finally, add your contact information to the relevant fields, check the "I have read and accept the statements" box, and then click Submit. You should receive an email confirmation that Amazon has received the form.

Please share this information with your writer friends, keep an eye out for/report pirated works, and help us keep fanfiction free and legally protected!

NOTE: All of the above also applies to Amazon products featuring stolen artwork, etc., so fan artists should check too!

Here comes my Bleeding Out Project! Part one.

Finally

Angst galore, beware!

So, instead of Hashirama, Madara met Tobirama at the river. They became friends, eventually they became lovers. And yet, despite that, Tobirama kills Izuna by mistake, and Madara never forgives him.

Konoha is builts, but Madara’s sanity keeps on slipping, torn between the grief for his brother and how he loves Izuna’s murderer. Eventually, Madara refuses to accept it as reality, and decides to destroy Konoha and break the illusion.

Tobirama has no choice but to put down his lover.

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