I've always thought it was tacky to ask for boosts to get visibility, and yet here I am. If this post doesn’t apply to you, please boost so it can get in front of the right people.
Writers of Mastodon (who use a Mac), I am looking for a handful of people who can join the closed beta for my new creative writing app, WordFlow next week.
Details about the app in the thread.
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WordFlow is a creative writing app meant to assist in writing any kind of story, and the world building usually involved. It can be for anything narrative, a short story, a novel, a TTRPG campaign, fanfic, whatever. It is starting as a Mac app, but I’m hoping to have iPhone and iPad versions available shortly into the beta cycle. From there if the interest exists, I’ll be happy to port it to Android and Linux, and I guess Windows. I guess.
Here are some quick bullet points about the app:
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1. WordFlow is free. It’s free to test, it will be free on launch, it will be free after launch, it will be free if three people use it, it will be free if three million people use it. I will add a little tip jar because I do enjoy spending money on food for my family, but my goal is to help writers get their thoughts down without friction or feeling like they may be using a tool or app “wrong.”
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2. WordFlow is private. I do not collect logs or data in the app, not for the beta, not for the release. There is no scenario where story content from the app can make its way to me without the user sending it directly. I think privacy both locally and against anonymized data harvesting is an absolute right. On that note…
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3. WordFlow isn’t an AI app. There are no AI features at all, there never will be. The point of the app is to make the user feel like they can add ideas and story content at any given moment without it feeling like a chore, and all the “smart” features of the app are good old fashioned parser engines written by hand, like god intended.
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4. My hope with this app is to enable writers to work how they want, when they want without having to pay for services like Scrivener or Campfire, or without having to sacrifice their data and stories to harvesting machines like Google Docs.
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5. Why a closed beta? I want to make sure I have a bit of a relationship and communication stream with the first set of people who test it before I launch it into the wide world for open testing, and then release. That’s not to say I’m picky about who you are or what kind of writing you do, just that you’re up for chatting about the app and giving your thoughts in a more one-on-one fashion than I’d be able to oversee during an open beta.
So, if this interests you, please send me a DM!
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@TheEjj Thank you for removing those unrelated hashtags, while I am still suspicious of the project itself...At least hashtags aren't being misused or being spammed unnecessarily.
Being on the internet for so long has made me overly cautious (since bad actors promoting stuff is far to common these days).
@WanderingInDigitalWorlds My apologies for breaking etiquette, my goal is to reach writers and so I just picked any hashtag related to writing I was familiar with. I’ve removed all but “writers” and “beta”.
Aside from the misuse of hashtags, is there any other reason my post would cause suspicion for you?
The app is a personal project motivated by a novelist friend of mine, and I’m trying to reach others like them specifically to give people an enabling and safe tool to use.
@TheEjj The initial opening post felt really off...It activated my feelings of doubt. As co-opting unrelated hashtags is one of the common behaviors I see malicious actors use to broadcast their bait for users.
While you might have good intentions, the vibes were off and it will take time for me to get over this visceral feeling.
Sadly, I can't really offer anything more concrete to work with (not without a lot of thinking). Don't know if I have the spoons for that today.
However, I do hope that your project does get off the ground and become a great thing for writers to use.
@SusanneDoering I’m hoping to get it to other platforms in the future. I don’t want to gate keep by having it be Apple only.
Thanks for the support!
@TheEjj Not actively writing now, so the closed beta isn’t for me. But I’d be interested in the open one. Do I follow you or do you have a software focused Mastodon account?
Have Scrivener - but it just started updating when I started it, to show I haen’t used it for some time…
I’m willing to give it a spin. I have written a similar tool in the distant past, so I know a few things I can test (performance was an issue in my tool).
I will add that that I can’t guarantee any type of commitment besides the first two hours due to prior commitment. 😉
@DevWouter Oh my god tell me about it. I spent a shocking amount of time trying to get my text engine to be performant, and the smarter I tried to be about it, the worse I feel like I made things.
If you can DM me your Apple ID email, or send it through the wordflow.page site, I’ll add you to the beta. Any feedback is welcome!
I send you my apple ID.
As for the performance I can already respect the time you spend on it.
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