Maybe it's still happening. But maybe writers, you have to love them, appreciate the ease of a prepackaged network that they could slip into, like the back of a class without being noticed until they decide to participate.
They don't want to build the classroom and the desks themselves.
I complain a lot about how #literarytwitter never migrated to Mastodon, but if you actually look back, you can find a lot of people who did create accounts in the November 2022 event—they just didn't stay. Probably because the literary community as a network didn't exist.
So that raises the question: at what point did the literary community develop on Twitter? It didn't exist ab initio, it developed over time. But that didn't happen here. Why?
How can I grassroots build an indie lit community on Mastodon? I have a few ideas but I can use some help (open to everybody ofc):
1. More specific hashtags. Some of the general ones are spammy.
2. Dedicate my account to promoting the community 24/7. Somewhat unappealing to me, I'm lazy and I don't want to sacrifice myself especially if it never materializes.
3. Just do better about finding people. Maybe new text search will help?
The writing community on Mastodon really spams all the related hashtags.
Even if a community similar to the one on Twitter could coalesce around a specific hashtag, that would get spammed too. So this platform is never going to be an effective way to share work and connect with like-minded people.
Sometimes the algorithm did good work.
I never did an #introduction back in November, let's go:
Hi, I'm Anthony Michael Morena. I'm a freelance editor, writer, and author of THE VOYAGER RECORD: A TRANSMISSION.
I moved back to NYC last year after 13 years in Tel Aviv. I post about living in #Queens, trying not to die while I #BikeNYC, and #litworldproblems, a big one being the lack of literary community here to talk about #litmags #CNF #hybridwriting #submissions.
I'm also an avid #MagicTheGathering player but see my alt @MTG3K.
Wake me up if literary Twitter gets here.
Should I submit the new version of my book to the publisher that has already form rejected two previous versions of it?
Remember the time I wrote to the famous poetess and asked her to talk publicly about her filing system?
I did not hear back.
Anthony Michael Morena