Image source: kalle2709 on Pexels
First, a word of appreciation for all in the community who have been posting stories, providing feedback on one another's posts, and helping our community to grow and thrive! Thank you!
Okay, onto the news. Here are the topics in this newsletter:
- Announcement about Delegations and Rewards!
- Important Reminders to All Writers in The Ink Well
- Winners from the April Contest!
- May 2023 Contest — 10-Hive Prize + 2nd and 3rd Place Prizes
- Find Us on Discord
- Creative Inspiration
- Delegate to The Ink Well / Follow Our Curation Trail
Announcement about Delegations and Rewards!
We appreciate all the delegations we have received from our supporters up until this day, these delegations help the community grow, and they enable us to support the writers in The Ink Well.
To show our appreciation, and to encourage more support through delegations, we've decided to distribute most of the curation rewards back to our delegators!
Starting today, The Ink Well will start paying out curation rewards for your delegations!
Not only will you be supporting the writers and the community as a whole, but you'll also be earning daily rewards by delegating any amount of your Hive Power to @theinkwell account.
These rewards will be paid out on a daily basis, proportional to the amount of HP you delegate. This is similar to other big curation projects, but you'll be directly supporting fellow writers and The Ink Well community — one of the creative epicenters of Hive!
Our hope is that this initiative will encourage more delegations to support growth and curation in The Ink Well, and ultimately enable us to further encourage community engagement by rewarding quality comments in addition to posts.
Want to delegate to The Ink Well? See the last section of this newsletter for some handy HiveSigner links! Or do it on your own by delegating any amount to @theinkwell account, from your favorite frontend or wallet.
Questions? Visit the ask-theinkwell channel in our Discord server.
Important Reminders to all Writers in The Ink Well
There are a few things that we'd like to provide as reminders, as these are common issues.
Do not use AI to generate content in our community
As we mentioned in the March 2023 newsletter, we do not allow AI-generated content in the community. All stories must be completely original, and written from your own personal experiences and imagination.
Avoid morals, lessons and author intrusion
When we read stories, whether they are fictional or creative nonfiction stories, we do NOT read to be taught something. We do NOT read to find out what the author has to say about the story at the end. We do not read to learn lessons about kindness, thoughtfulness, God, politics, or anything else.
We read to be entertained, and to experience something outside of our own daily lives — just as we do when we watch a movie or a TV show. And, we want to draw our own conclusions at the end of the story.
When the author provides a summary of the lesson to be learned from the story at the end, this is called author intrusion. You can read our article on author intrusion in our catalog of fiction writing tips.
So — please do not add a lesson or moral, or write a story or creative nonfiction piece for the purpose of instructing, teaching or preaching. Thank you!
Please be sure to use the appropriate tags:
- #fiction for fictional stories
- #creativenonfiction for non-fiction stories
- #inkwellprompt for all stories written for prompts in The Ink Well
This is important because a) it's not always easy to tell the difference between fiction and nonfiction (and readers consider its merit accordingly), and b) it makes it possible to search for those tags when we review stories for winning entries.
Remember to add your story link to a comment on the prompt post
If you are entering a story into one of our fiction or nonfiction contests, you must add a link to your story in the comments.
We try to catch all entries as we list the participants and winners, but it is extra work for us to find those who have not added their link to a comment on the prompt post and we do not always find them. If you miss this step, you may miss out on being considered for contest prizes.
Please follow these important image rules
We have three important rules around images:
- All images must come from license-free or creative commons sites, such as Pixabay, Unsplash, Pexels, or Wikimedia Commons. Or they can be your own images. (You may not use images you find on Google, Pinterest or a website. Those are copyright protected.)
- You must provide attribution for ALL images — even if they are your own.
- For any image that is not your own, you must link to the image. For example, if you find an image on Pixabay, the source link you provide must be the URL of the page on which that image appears.
A note on quality and rewards
The Ink Well team curates content based on quality; the higher the quality, the higher the curation. (And note that we do not curate very low quality posts.)
What does this mean for our writing community? It means you have an opportunity to earn rewards for your creative writing efforts in The Ink Well. To get the best possible rewards, and to be considered for contest prizes, we recommend:
- Include more details in your fiction and creative nonfiction stories. Describe the setting. (Is it day or night? Are the birds singing? Is there a smell of coffee or the sound of the sea?) Give the characters interesting characteristics.
- Take a little extra time to read your stories and check for errors.
- Another recommendation is to read the winning stories. These are selected because they have literary merit, are well-written, compelling, have interesting characters, settings, dialogue, etc. — all the things we often comment on.
All of these steps can make a difference in your wallet!
We are here to help you on your writing journey with writing tips and feedback. Thank you to all community members who take that feedback to heart and continually work on improving your writing. It's wonderful to see!
Winners from the April Contest!
Image source: Askar Abayev on Pexels
Thank you to everyone who participated in our April fiction contest, with stories and comments. As always, we received some great stories!
The contest rules involved writing one story in The Ink Well during the month of April inspired by the prompt Reunion.
Winners!
Here are our three winners for the April, 2023 contest.
We have selected @katleya's story, The Last Party as the prize winner! Congratulations! You will receive 10 Hive.
In second place, we have selected @dianelson's story, A Reunion to Remember. Congratulations! You will receive 5 Hive.
In third place, we have selected @smc.arike.oba's story, Back to Wyoming. Congratulations! You will receive 4 HBI.
Well done, @katleya, @dianelson and @smc.arike.oba!
Honorable mentions:
- @george-dee: The Deceased Unfulfilled Dream
- @kemmyb My Last Day at Rotesway Academy
- @ricardo992: Your Efficient AI Network
- @wrestlingdesires: An Easter Story
Thank you, all!
May Contest!
Image source: kalle2709 on Pexels
Get ready to put your creativity to work! For May we will award a first place price of 10 Hive, second place of 5 Hive, and third place of 4 HBI for the monthly contest.
For the month of May, 2023, the fiction prompt is race!
What can you do with this prompt? Here are a few ideas:
- Tell the story of a character in a race against time to find an antidote or a cure to save a relative.
- Write about someone with a disability who wants more than anything to compete in an upcoming race.
- Tell the story of two friends who are competing against one another to become Student Body President. Can they somehow remain friends?
Those are just a few ideas to get your creativity flowing! People race on horses, skis, sailboats, bicycles, motocross bikes, bobsleds, dogsleds... the list goes on!
Remember to include the important elements of good fiction, including character building, conflict, a story arc, and the important storytelling skill of integrating action, dialogue and narrative.
Contest Rules
Write one story this month in The Ink Well inspired by the word "race." (Note: Please do not submit the same story to more than one contest.)
Post a link to your story in a comment on this post.
Use the #inkwellprompt and #fiction tags on your post.
At the end of the month, we will choose three winners.
Hint: We are looking for a high-quality story. Don't rush. Be sure to use the skills we highlight in our weekly fiction prompts — great settings, good character building, strong dialog, and a good story arc that resolves well in the end.
And finally, we recommend using our tips in the article Help for the Grammatically Challenged to identify errors in your story before posting.
Good luck!
Find Us on Discord
Our Discord server is a great place to chat with other community members about the craft of writing.
Please pop into our Welcome channel, read our guidelines for conduct, and then feel free to interact with other community members or ask The Ink Well Team a question in the #ask-theinkwell channel.
Discord invitation link: https://discord.gg/Bng7mMsaQj
Creative Inspiration and Skill Building
Source: Myriams_fotos on Pixabay
In The Ink Well, we're not just about posting content and getting rewards. We are about building skills that help you earn the best possible rewards because your readers love to read your stuff!
We are here to nudge you to strive for greatness. You know how it feels when someone says, "Wow, just wow! I loved your story!" That's what it's all about. And the good news is that the rewards follow. If people love your work, they give you great upvotes. They seek you out. They want more of your creative content. And curation accounts like Curie, which we utilize and support, will give you the best possible upvotes too.
So what are you waiting for? Use our resources to build your skills and improve your writing. Here are some of the resources we provide:
- Creative inspiration
We encourage and support ideas and creativity by publishing a weekly fiction contest prompt on Monday nights, and a weekly creative nonfiction contest prompt on Saturdays. Additionally, we have a nearly inexhaustible list of ideas to spur your writing. And these resources are included in every weekly prompt for reference: 50 Loglines, 50 Story Ideas, and 50 Imagination Ticklers - Skill building opportunities
We have a great catalog of fiction writing tips that can help any writer learn and grow. You can learn about characters, conflict, scene building, dialog and more. We hope you take advantage of it. And here are some important tips that can help you improve your writing craft:
-- Draft your content in Google docs, or use Google docs for spell checking and syntax checking. It is very easy to do and it is explained in the post Help for the Grammatically Challenged.
-- Make sure your story has the key elements of a story, including character development, scene setting, dialog, action, a conflict, and a resolution. (A story arc is especially important for fiction, of course.) We provide resources to help you with all of these important fiction elements in our catalog of fiction writing tips.
-- Review your work before posting. You will most likely find a missing word, a grammatical error, a misspelling or a sentence that does not start with a capital letter, etc.
Thank you for reading our newsletter! We are here to encourage you and help you on your writing journey.
Delegate to The Ink Well / Follow Our Curation Trail
Want to support our community, our contests, and our rewards for great quality content? See the table below. We have made it super easy. Thank you, thank you, thank you! We have a goal to continue increasing the support we give to our wonderful, hardworking and dedicated authors!
You can follow our curation trail by going to our hive.vote curation trail page and clicking the follow button.
We welcome delegations! These support our community in many ways, including helping us to provide support to quality content creators through curation and contests.
@jayna, @felt.buzz, @zeurich, @marcybetancourt, @agmoore, @marlyncabrera, @stormcharmer, @itsostylish, @iamraincrystal, @preparedwombat, @gracielaacevedo, @chocolatescorpi, @samsmith1971, @grindan, @jackdeathblack, @josemalavem, @riverflows, @generikat, @morey-lezama, @evagavilan2, @popurri, @mrenglish, @stuartcturnbull and @timix648.
We invite lovers of creative writing to visit The Ink Well, a Hive community started by @raj808 and @stormlight24 and run by @jayna, @gracielaacevedo, @yaziris, @itsostylish, @millycf1976 and @grindan.
Click banner to visit our community page
Find us on twitter by clicking the banner above.