[Author's note: TWF voting impact & Google Wave]

THANK YOU to everyone who voted at Top Web Fiction for The Philosopher in Arms (and Eclipse Court). Your votes have made a real difference already.

As of this writing, Shirley and I are occupying 1/5 of the top ten overall with PA at #5 and EC at #10, which means we both got to post nifty banner ads. In the fantasy category, PA is at #3 and EC at #6. In the science fiction category, PA is at #1 and EC is not on the board because Shirley must not have included "science fiction" as one of her tags. (Update: fixed.) What we're writing here is as much sf as it is fantasy.

But the more important impact is invisible to you. Due to your votes and hence our presence high in the race, our hits are way up. We both had record days yesterday, and we didn't do anything else especially promotional, so there can't be any other reason. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, and did I mention, THANK YOU? We'll see whether that increase continues. Considering the popularity of Web Fiction Guide (3,000 unique hits per month, slowly increasing) and that the Top Web Fiction service is the newest and shiniest thing over there, I think there's cause for optimism.

Thank you, again. Your vote remains valid for seven days, so naturally I will want you to renew it. What I will do is post a "Top Fiction Tuesday" reminder on PA every Tuesday, since this past Tuesday is when the voting really started, and since voting takes only seconds and requires no registration, I hope you'll help keep me (and Shirley) high in the standings so as to let surfing readers searching for good weblit that there's some right over here.

†

So I heard about Google Wave from one Gabriel Gadfly over at Weblit.us . This is a tool that the scarily-brilliant Google people have come up with for online collaboration, and I immediately saw its potential as a role-playing tool for Shirley and me, and so immediately began scrabbling, begging and whoring for an invite. It's in beta at the moment so you can't just sign on; you have to get invited by somebody who already has it.

Shirley and I both got signed on two days ago, but it was yesterday that we tested it in an actual working context. Our impression: AMAZING. We are never going to go back to RPing by IM again. Not only can you textually role-play the scene, but the author can add the narrative at the same time. It is WONDERFUL.

So we did two scenes, one of which was incorporated into yesterday's EC post, and the other of which was incorporated in yesterday's PA post. For a more detailed recounting of the experience, see my post on WebLit.us.

Were we the first weblit authors ever to include Wave-generated material into our posted works? We like to think so.

If you think Google Wave might be useful to you -- it's great for any kind of collaborative material whether it be novels or corporate reports -- and would like an invite, let me know, as I have six invites left at the moment (and Shirley probably has some too, or will soon). Email me at hearth at xplornet dot com with the email address to which you'd like me to send the invite.





--