Metafilter Writer's Group on Vox

October 13, 2006 12:29 PM

The Metafilter Writer's Group: the Vox edition. (more inside).
posted by empath to MetaFilter gatherings at 12:29 PM (15 comments total)

As the last attempt at this kind of died out, I thought I'd make a second attempt that will be a bit more open and not require the attention of any one person to admin it.

Step 1: Open a vox account. Metafilter invites here.

Step 2: When creating your profile, add 'mefiwrigro' as one of your interests.

Step 3: Create a new post, introducing yourself, perhaps talk about what you want out of the group or what your writing interests are. Tag it with 'mefiwrigro'

Step 4: After you view the post, mouse-over the 'mefiwrigro' tag and then click 'add to reader'.

Step 5: View your Reader page. Under your subscribed tags page, you will (hopefully) see everyone elses introduction to the group.

Step 6: Start submitting stories and commenting on each others. If you really like someone's work, tag it with 'this is good' and see if the vox folks front page it.


Optional:

If you prefer to keep your stories private, you can do the following:

Step 7: Click here (or click the 'mefiwrigro' tag in your profile) to see everyone else in the group. Add all of them (that you want to add) to your 'friends' list.

Step 8: Make sure you mark all of your mefiwrigro posts as being only viewable by friends. Don't worry, friending is one way, so you don't have to depend on any of them to friend you back for them to be able to see your posts (as long as they are searching for mefiwrigro tags, of course)


That's it. Should take 5 minutes start to finish to get going.

The only disadvantage to this is that it will be difficult to enforce specific themes, but there's nothing preventing people with an interested in themes or exercises from suggesting them with the 'mefiwrigro' tag.
posted by empath at 12:29 PM on October 13, 2006

Worth a try.

*goes to vox.com*

Corporate filter blocks vox! Gah!

*uses back door*
posted by cortex at 12:41 PM on October 13, 2006

Oh, also, if you don't want to be on 'the latest posts' page on the front page of Vox, make sure you check the 'this post may be offensive', etc box when you submit it.
posted by empath at 12:41 PM on October 13, 2006

Perhaps this would be a good time to ask: What is Vox?
posted by knave at 3:27 PM on October 13, 2006

What is this back door of which you speak, cortex? My corporate filter blocks everything (except Metafilter!).
posted by echo0720 at 3:32 PM on October 13, 2006

ssh via proxy out to a unix shell, w3m at the console. YMMV.

Ironically, the graphical captcha stopped me dead. I'll do it from home.
posted by cortex at 3:34 PM on October 13, 2006

Cool, I'll stick a post on the dead version directing folk over here. It's a shame Vox doesn't have a 'groups' feature, like on Flickr - you'd think there'd be lots of people wanting to club together and do stuff like this.

What is Vox?

The dream we all dream of, LiveJournal versus MySpace in the World Series of love.
posted by jack_mo at 4:32 PM on October 13, 2006

Hunh, haven't tried fiddling with Vox since I signed up. Kind of confusing at first, but it doesn't seem so bad now.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 7:42 PM on October 13, 2006

So, is there a central mefiwrigro blog where themes will be posted?
posted by taz at 11:56 PM on October 13, 2006

If anyone wants to start one, go ahead. Just add the proper tags, and people should find it. I just didn't want to make it mandatory. If people just want to post a random short story they're working on every month or so, and just comment and browse other people's stories the rest of the time, I have no problem with that.
posted by empath at 7:58 AM on October 14, 2006

Yeah, I like the loose feel at the moment. If there's eventually enough groundswell for a sort of administrative central place, someone could certainly registers "mefiwrigro" and run things out of that.
posted by cortex at 8:10 AM on October 14, 2006

ah... so the group isn't doing the theme thing anymore? I kind of liked that little impetus to come up with something - but I have no room to speak since I only did one round before I got distracted and forgot to go back. Bad me.
posted by taz at 8:26 AM on October 14, 2006

Heh. I propose, taz, that you announce an optional theme.
posted by cortex at 8:38 AM on October 14, 2006

hmmm...
posted by taz at 1:00 AM on October 15, 2006

Hey just wanted to post an update in case anyone is checking back here. I've just started a collaborative project on Vox - it's open to anyone to participate; read about it here.
posted by Mister_A at 11:27 AM on November 6, 2006