the main page approximates the 50,000 words as 175 pages; my makebelieve abacus tells me we need 1666.666667 words / 5.833333 pages a day

so far "we" seem to be 8, possibly 10. If this is correct [or on the low side] we might be able to get by with 1/2pg+or- per day each...

we need recruits.

, is 50000 words the limit, or the requirement?

req

about to try friending: applesnpears, Acelessthan3, el8_br, facecrook, wriver

assuming I didn't scare anyone away, that makes us 8.

thinking about mechanisms to ensure that everyone can have a part in everything...

I was considering a structure wherein we all come up with a chaptertitle/character/ideapool, but then are forced to work w/ someone elses...

so everyone submits some kind of input/outline about what they want to see happen, then everyone [except that person] fills in the outline

ultimately this structure would allow the finished quantity of a section to return to its originator for final polishing

the idea of an agreed upon metanovel b/c then the blending between sections can be factored in to the writing process. on the other hand,

we could try just frantically doing whatever our agreed upon task is and THEN come together to carve all the lines into ONE work...

If we wrote it all independently, we would need to be done long before the deadline. It would take at least a few weeks to get it all linked

Maybe we should decide on a few places and events that all or several of the characters end up at.

Then set the time period and the order and basic description of events.

For instance, "during a 3 week period, A then B then C happens in order and the characters experience them"

That way ti would actually make sense to have the same event happen several times over the course of the novel (from different perspectives)

if we can agree on an outline for the whole thing, it'd probably be easier, though it wd require alot for us to pre-write the whole thing &

then actually write it...

True. I think we should agree on a starting and ending date for the story, then write in events that take place in that time frame.

The way the characters interact would then be based on the events of the time period of the story.

curious if we could make the "write-pass-write-pass" mechanism work. If we do active author switching, we might end up with more brilliance

since the constraint wd be to fit the context of the last writer & to provide for the next

though, nano's "waiting room" didn't seem to go

True. We should still agree on a framework though, otherwise it'll just wander around.

I'd be down to start in on that, we just hadn't done any prewriting yet. No characters/names/genres/settings/etc.

the write-pass-write method would cut down on alternate storylines though, unless there were several concurrent threads...

still stuck on the metanovel idea-- the beauty wd be that we'd only need agreement on the metastory...

though I'm sure it wd still need blending at the end

We could do both. A metastory within which we'd write-pass-write.

So we would know where we wanted to start and end up at and several checkpoints along the way, and let the rest fall where it may.

if it doesn't wind up working out in one month, we should keep going, polish it up and maybe publish...

we need a way to get the full group talking- 50,000/8= 6250 words each in NOV. to finish by the 25th we'd need 250 words a day each

Tony wasn't even intending to officially enter, so I'm down to set our goal as "finish" rather than "on time"

to finish as hivemind rather than cell though

Yeah, I agree. Otherwise it would be 8 novels with the same setting.

Sorry to jump into this conversation late, but I like both the idea of a metanovel and the write-pass system.

My only question with write-pass is where we would share the information (unless that's covered in a different update I haven't read yet).

*goes to check

Yeah, we still need to iron that one out. Am I correct in assuming that we were originally planning on doing it via plurk?

guesses that to be the case

140 word segments would only work if everyone was on for a few hours at the same time.

if we weren't, it would take us a long ass time to get anything done.

Not even 140 word. 140 characters, which is like 15-20 words max.

are you only dividing tasks along the lines of words per day.. how about functions? directors? critique? idea mills?

that after we have some quantity or if we do write-pass, I'd prefer blog/email

Oh yeah, that's what I meant.

so far me n' kilroy have just been brainstormin'

Yeah, where the fuck have you guys been?

Mkay.

I'm enjoying the view.

the idea of getting some stuff ironed out (setting, time frame, beginning/end, characters) and then writing it chronologically.

so in that case we'd need a way to blend all our ideas into the meta-outline

ideapool plurks, voting, assigning duties?

if this goes completely to hell, we could always start by just assigning a writing order, then do the handoffs by wrd count or something

this last idea. Let's take this bad boy to Nebraska.

liked the last idea too, at least in terms of actual writing. I work best when I have deadlines. Or rather I work when I have deadlines...