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[Deleted member 89995]

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[Deleted member 54065]

I guess you need to reassess why you write. What's your goal in writing? What keeps you in picking up that pen, that mouse, the keyboard again and again even though you keep on suffering 'failures'.

And last, you need to redefine your meaning of success.

For example, I know my writing won't reach the levels of the 'popular' writers here, on RR, on HoneyFeed and other writing sites, let alone reach the levels of my 'idol' writers, Rowling, Tolkien, Lewis and Yamaguchi. But I continue because I love what I do, and I love telling stories my readers enjoy.

For me, one, two or three readers enjoying my work is success already. Yes, I'm aware it's monetarily impossible and it's too idealistic, but then again, money and popularity isn't my motivation why I write. I mean, it was...before, but not nowadays.

Then again, it's not shameful to back down if you think it isn't worth it. Nevertheless, think it over well before dropping the pen.

 

[Le_ther]

i dont want to be that one guy who goes hard about "survivor bias" or "hard work does not pay off" but I think im starting to grow pessimistic each day

we always hear the 1% who succeeded and never hear about the 99% who failed

there is this one guy that created this term "literary masturbation" and it basically means you're writing a story that will never benefit you financially

i want to be optimistic, but i cant help but be gripped by the reality that "not all authors will succeed"

not. all. authors. will. succeed.

not. all. entrepreneurs. will. succeed.

failure is failure, and i don't like it when people try to see the "silver lining" of it; perhaps life is so cruel that it literally doesn't care whether you persevere or not

literally everything is luck and we just copium every time we don't meet our standards

"yeah, this will work out and i will keep doing it no matter what"

but will it really work out?

sometimes, i wish i was born passionate in programming, not in writing (and lucky you if you're passionate in both)

writing makes me overly happy and overly depressed

writing fucking sucks.

That's that and this is this.


Yes in life there would be hardship or the so called ordeals we must face. You can either continue your passion or end it. It's much better to face your mistakes than run away from it... this is just from someone who also run away from his problems. The feeling of not taking the responsibility of your actions and being afraid of it is something we can overcome with hope and positivity.

Although I don't know any of your current circumstance. Remember that someone near you will always be with you. There is no such thing as genius or talent but only comprehension and potential. You might take too long to being a good writer but it's better to start now than never. Just let all your worries go and if you really are frustated just calm down from somewhere and relax.

 

[Paul_Tromba]

I'm sorry to hear that man. Though I think you're focusing too much on the monetary gains of writing. Writing isn't fun when all you want to come out of it is money. Most people who do make a good amount of money on their works are people who have been writing for a long time and got lucky with maybe one or two books. Some even a whole series. Though most of them wrote because they enjoyed it. Some of them did care about money but a good chunk of well known authors only wanted to write because they wanted to. I would highly recommend revaluating your reason for writing and try not to focus on becoming a huge success. If you do become a successful author then it may take one story or it may take years of writing, who knows? Try to find joy in what you do by taking pride in the fact that you wrote something rather than seeing it as a failure just because it wasn't enjoyed by the masses.

 

[ForestDweller]

there is this one guy that created this term "literary masturbation" and it basically means you're writing a story that will never benefit you financially

What a twat.

 

[AliceShiki]

Well, part of it is definitely luck, but a lot of it is hard work and determination.

Like... I dunno how it works nowadays, but I remember hearing about how in wattpad there was very little in terms of visibility for new stories... But if a popular author checked out your story perchance and made a comment about it, then your viewership might explode.

Obviously, you need to be writing a good story for that to have a chance of happening, but it actually happening seemed to mostly be luck-dependent from what I heard.

OTOH, on a site like Scribblehub, due to the way the homepage works... I think luck ends up being less of a factor due to how much exposure the site naturally gives to everyone?

If you write a good story on a popular genre, and your writing style appeals to the readers, your viewerbase here should grow with time... Probably.

 

[RavenRunes]

I've seen it happen where one influencer will book tok will rave about the books and the author's then swamped with authors. It's luck, I mean sure there's hard work involved in writing anyway but you can plug away for years trying to get someone to read, and never hit that one person with 1000s of followers who can blow it up for you.

 

[TheEldritchGod]

not. all. authors. will. succeed.

OH. MY. SELF.

Look. If you want to make money at this, you can. I don't care how bad you are, if you want to make money, you can make money. If you work at this for a few years, you can even do more than grunt work and become a ghost writer.

No no no... you are lamenting that you aren't a POPULAR WRITER.

Making money? Dear god, anyone can. Are you gonna make more than $1.12/hour? Not until you put in the YEARS that you need to actually have skill at this job. But you look at Steven King and go, "That's a success". I'm a middle of the road, passible, nobody. I have stopped Ghost writing years ago, and I STILL occationally get calls because, "I TYPE WHAT I AM COMMISIONED FOR AND I FINISH ON TIME."

Most "professional" writers are people you never hear about. Most writers who make money are like the guy at McDonalds flipping your burgers. They are just grinding it out for a paycheck.

You want fans? You want praise? You want people to like your work? That's a whole other situation.

There is little luck in this field. No. Really.

365 Days, Twilight, EMPRESS THERESA, fer fuck sake.

GRIND. GRIND. GRIND. GRIND. GRIND. GRIND. GRIND. GRIND. GRIND.

You do not see the posting 3k word chapters TWICE A WEEK FOR A YEAR.

Steven king writes about 8k a DAY.

So, how about this? GET GUD. I got little sympathy. I took four years to write an ENCYCLOPDEDIA of 112 books, for the fun of it, with NO COMPENSATION, because I enjoyed the topic, but also because I wanted to do it. I learned more in that 4 years then I learned any other time or place. I learned, because I DID IT. Every day I did some more. At least 1 hour a day, usually 4 hours a day, grind grind grind grind grind.

That is how you become a writer who is successful in this business. You work your ass off, like becoming a doctor. It takes YEARS to get good at this.

After 12 years of doing this one hour a day, rain or shine, no matter what, then you can tell the rest of us, "YEW WERE JUST LUCKY."

Fuck. YOU. I am Not Lucky. I AM FUCKIN' AWESOME.
Take your insults and shove them up your ass.

 

[AuntieMaysLittleCousin]

i dont want to be that one guy who goes hard about "survivor bias" or "hard work does not pay off" but I think im starting to grow pessimistic each day

we always hear the 1% who succeeded and never hear about the 99% who failed

there is this one guy that created this term "literary masturbation" and it basically means you're writing a story that will never benefit you financially

i want to be optimistic, but i cant help but be gripped by the reality that "not all authors will succeed"

not. all. authors. will. succeed.

not. all. entrepreneurs. will. succeed.

failure is failure, and i don't like it when people try to see the "silver lining" of it; perhaps life is so cruel that it literally doesn't care whether you persevere or not

literally everything is luck and we just copium every time we don't meet our standards

"yeah, this will work out and i will keep doing it no matter what"

but will it really work out?

sometimes, i wish i was born passionate in programming, not in writing (and lucky you if you're passionate in both)

writing makes me overly happy and overly depressed

writing fucking sucks.

Set up a ko-fi page and just shove your link at the end of your chapters. You can also try Draft2Digital.

And these are the words of someone who's had terrible luck his entire life:
If luck is against you, just push forward till you break it.
Might sound like a motivational speech or whatever you want, but trust me, it's all about willpower and perseverance. And, improvement. So to fuck with luck.

 

[Oreo]

There is no luck, only probability.

Just keep writing and your probability to succeed will rise.

 

[LilRora]

My father has a saying that a pesimist is a former optimist who learned the truth.
Another saying I've heard is that if you shoot for the stars, you might reach the moon.
Both of those can be applied to writing.

But honestly, in my opinion the luck factor is there in the same way that Edgerunners were a hit. That show was advertised well, had a huge number of fans already waiting for it, and happened to match the expectations of audience in themes and a lot of small details. But tell me, would it be such a popular show if it was a standalone production, without Cuberpunk 2077, and not advertised? I very much doubt it. It might have, but it certainly would not have reached as high numbers as it did. That's the luck you're talking about.

If you put a lot of effort into advertising a story that many of people want to read, then even a subpar story can earn you a massive amount of money. On the other hand, if you just post a niche story somewhere like Scribble Hub without much effort put into distribution and all, only focusing on writing, then you'd be really lucky earning $500 a month.

The success (or what I think is success) you're talking about is more about the effort put into things other than writing, that make your stories reach more people and consequently make you earn more.

Like... I dunno how it works nowadays, but I remember hearing about how in wattpad there was very little in terms of visibility for new stories... But if a popular author checked out your story perchance and made a comment about it, then your viewership might explode.

I don't remember what story it was, but I've seen one which number of readers spiked from 200 to 400 in a single day because someone mentioned it on Azarinth Healer discord. And that wasn't even the author, just some random person making a comment.

 

[Anon2024]

In general there are two types of successful writers.

1. Luck writers - people writing what they are passionate about and getting lucky.

2. People researching what is popular and catering to them and making a decent living (not famous).

In general, you write because you enjoy it or because you want to put a story out there that hasn’t been told. Your story.

 

[Tsuru]

i dont want to be that one guy who goes hard about "survivor bias" or "hard work does not pay off" but I think im starting to grow pessimistic each day

we always hear the 1% who succeeded and never hear about the 99% who failed

there is this one guy that created this term "literary masturbation" and it basically means you're writing a story that will never benefit you financially

i want to be optimistic, but i cant help but be gripped by the reality that "not all authors will succeed"

not. all. authors. will. succeed.

not. all. entrepreneurs. will. succeed.

failure is failure, and i don't like it when people try to see the "silver lining" of it; perhaps life is so cruel that it literally doesn't care whether you persevere or not

literally everything is luck and we just copium every time we don't meet our standards

"yeah, this will work out and i will keep doing it no matter what"

but will it really work out?

sometimes, i wish i was born passionate in programming, not in writing (and lucky you if you're passionate in both)

writing makes me overly happy and overly depressed

writing fucking sucks.

....................You know, in chinese urban novels, since 8+ years ago, they began to show MCs that know that the idiom "hard works is rewarded" is bullshit.
See this idioms of "chicken soup" like "never give up", "there is always a rainbow after the rain" etc ?
Well, since long while ago the chinese authors (and probably their side of internet that was closed-bubble) directly expose it's a lie. For example they had this Jack Ma of Tencent saying "I don't care about money" or "they are just numbers" that was often used in novels by the MCs. But now? You see MC sneering at this words and telling this dude wouldn't say that if didn't have enough money to eat for the day.
People simply stopped being fooled and know how bad reality is. Especially in china where despotism is crazy rampant, and seniority is horribly harsh.

Also, one big idiom of china was "Good wine is not afraid of deep valleys". Now it's "Even good wine is afraid of deep valleys" because nowadays publicity is fundamental for any work unlike before where quality can shine.

^In relation to this idiom, there is too much stuff on internet now. And even a author said "SOME masterpieces of the past would fail if they appeared now". If before you had like only 10+ novels and 0 manga translation to read and crappy games, NOW you got dozens of F2P games ; hundred of mangas/hua/hwas translated where you get at least 1 chap decent to read every 3hours ; novels now people directly go to MTL machine translation where you got THOUSANDS OF CHAPTERS for 1 chinese novel.

Last.
Unlike JP and china, english authors suffer far worse. Because west population is not fundamentally knowing about WEB NOVELS. In china, because not having good manga culture most teens focused on WNs, and companies had paid websites for WNs.
JAPAN, despite high manga culture, early on they had LNs where people bought physical books just like western. BUT unlike us, WN was also attractive and developed itself that later surpass LNs.

 

[Erys]

In general there are two types of successful writers.

1. Luck writers - people writing what they are passionate about and getting lucky.

2. People researching what is popular and catering to them and making a decent living (not famous).

Three, actually.

3. People rating @K5Rakitan stories with *1 stars.

 

[BearlyAlive]

Sounds like a serious cas of "Oh, woe is me". Now you just need ti channel your inner complexes into your writing and you've attained nirvana. At least in your playlist. If you've got taste.

 

[SailusGebel]

Three, actually.

3. People rating @K5Rakitan stories with *1 stars.

People who *5 rated @K5Rakitan stories.

 

[Anon2024]

Three, actually.

3. People rating @K5Rakitan stories with *1 stars.

People who *5 rated @K5Rakitan stories.

Neither of those are successful.

 

[Tsuru]

In general there are two types of successful writers.

1. Luck writers - people writing what they are passionate about and getting lucky.

2. People researching what is popular and catering to them and making a decent living (not famous).

In general, you write because you enjoy it or because you want to put a story out there that hasn’t been told. Your story.

Anon said the truth.
--------------------------------------------
1)
Luck writers are often the early ones. The "early birds". Because the themes werent done before.
Look at my favorite SH author : https://www.scribblehub.com/series/444464/heaven-earth-me/
He was the first to do a very good quality AND WHOLESOME futanari.
Not to say he didn't deserve the popularity but to show that "being the first one" is one factor that makes easy to succeed.

"The true endgame" is kinda both. Not lot of VRMMO english wn, and smut content that cater to public.

The famous 177013, beside it's content, was immensely popular because it was the first jp R18 doujin to be that much depressing and detailed.

Reverend Insanity. High quality but also helped it was the first chinese novel that showed a true evil MC. Breaking the rules of censoring and later banned.
Harry Potter can be said to be lucky too. Lucky that a publishing company finally took it after it's author kept trying hard to find one.
Naruto is lucky too because editor stopped the author to do naruto-kun as the son of kyuubi.
----------------------
2)

There are even now chinese authors that have great writing skills, but they prefer continuing writing "faceslaps" of low quality novels. Why ? Because they still get lot of stupid readers that like that ! Because the youths often are dumb for any country.

There is "Carn", a jp ero artist. Despite he could do VANILLA doujins, there are only more NTR doujins popping up ! WHY ? It's because NTR is simply more attractive that cater to public compared to vanilla. AND because when "carn" did a vanilla work, it flopped.

"Asanagi" a very VERY famous ero artist. Recent doujins of his have lot of big breasts and going the dark route of "pleasure fallen" tag despite early on having some "small breasts" girls. Why ? Because in an author note, asanagi said that public like that ! And just like "carn", doing dark doujins is more attractive to public !

"baalbuddy" a current popular ENGLISH ARTIST
It's main focus was ERO. But his "comedy" images became so popular that people prefered paying requests for more compared to his ero art ! Where even recently when he did a new ero bundle comic on danbooru, there was a joke about forgetting he was ero artist.

 

[Zakuro]

Neither of those are successful.

Doing neither isn't enough. You need to do both carefully.

 

[Anon2024]

Doing neither isn't enough. You need to do both carefully.

No, you do it bashfully.