Webnovel and a Humbling Lesson in Web Design

[Suzumiya]

Hmmm. So, I've heard Webnovel gets a lot of webtraffic, so I reposted my DIY there.

It seems like they've no place for authors to insert a Patreon, except for at the end of each chapter in an Author's note. The way they require a certain amount of bank information before authors are allowed to edit their profile in Inkspace is also kinda sketch. And then there's contracts for even small barely-monetary competitions?

Their forums are hard to look at. The website is difficult to navigate. Took me a whole five minutes and a google search to find that they even had forums!

What got me, though- what really got me was the absolute intolerance for formatting in their novel editor, "Inkspace." Like, not even basic stuff like bolded or italic text. Suddenly all these websites with absolutely terrifying machine translations make sense? What I don't get though is how they're successful, despite all that.

I guess that's why I'm not a Web Designer. From the looks of things, I'd be horrible at it.

 

[MasterHiatus]

I am once a webnovel writer so I know how it goes but I have to agree when it comes to the text thingy.
And about the forum, I never checked it out 'cause I am bored to do so.
Now I'm thinking, SH might really be the website for me.
======
Erase that, so I have a lot of questions, what is webtraffic? That is one question I wanna ask.

 

[Saileri]

They throw contracts at almost everyone, that's why there's that space for putting your personal info there. They offer exclusive and non-exclusive, where you lock your chapters so people have to use their site's currency to obtain them and you get a little from it.

Their editor is limited and some simple functions like bold or italics is (what I heard from other authors) locked for public and available for contracted authors. And yes, it lacks most of the basic functions, there aren't even simplest tables or text centering.

You can edit the profile without inputting the bank data though. The other thing is, Patreon is literally a censored word. It doesn't get censored in the synopsis, but in chapters it does. Also, links don't work anywhere. They aren't clickable, so anything you'd want to link has to be copy-written by people. Some of this stuff is ofc intentional, so that you only use their platform.

They are successful cause they got big and worldwide. And also, they literaly steal authors. They go to Wattpad and other sites and DM authors to come for a contract. The time I joined their Discord, there was a big wave of them and literally hundreds of ppl were asking what to do now since they got informed about the contract. They are luring people with them and "kidnapping" them under various contracts.

They are popular thanks to many reasons. Mostly due to a lot of marketing and poaching. And also the mobile app is "fine". Thanks to the limited editor they don't have to worry about much reformatting and just yeet chapters with Light or Dark Mode and everything is gucci for them. And naturally, a lot of people like to have a dedicated app to read stuff. Also, they encourage daily chapters or mass releases via "contests" and "quests" or "tasks" for authors, and of course people really like when a story is often updated, so that's a point too.

 

[Joyeuse]

Isn't webnovel part of you know what begins with Q?

Basically expect evil corp stuff there, contracts that force the writers to stay with them for long, holding many popular CN novels hostage, they don't try to web design properly because unlike other sites they don't need to do so to keep their writers there (and therefore keep the readers as well) heh...

 

[Suzumiya]

[The stuff of nightmares]

Oof.

I'm glad I got PM'ed to stay away from their contracts. *shivers*

 

[NotYourTypicalMan]

imagine writing LitRPG with no basic editor,meh... (but they got huge reader base tho)

 

[Suzumiya]

I am once a webnovel writer so I know how it goes but I have to agree when it comes to the text thingy.
And about the forum, I never checked it out 'cause I am bored to do so.
Now I'm thinking, SH might really be the website for me.
======
Erase that, so I have a lot of questions, what is webtraffic? That is one question I wanna ask.

Yeah, Scribble Hub seems to be the way to go for me, too. There's just something about the culture here.

Webtraffic is jargon turned slang and means different things in the business and out. If you're not in the business, it means frequency of views. Popularity, that sort of thing.

View attachment 3801

imagine writing LitRPG with no basic editor,meh... (but they got huge reader base tho)

I really can't imagine it. Well, I can, but all the things I'm imagining are plainly awful.

I'd rather release a high quality product and miss than release a shit product, hit, and be embarrassed about it for the rest of my life.

 

[kagurasenpai]

I've never heard webnovel. And as an ex- web designer, it seemed webnovel couldnt pay a better web designer? Lol

 

[Saileri]

imagine writing LitRPG with no basic editor,meh... (but they got huge reader base tho)

I really can't imagine it. Well, I can, but all the things I'm imagining are plainly awful.
I'd rather release a high quality product and miss than release a shit product, hit, and be embarrassed about it for the rest of my life.

It looks like this, where you can't even influence the spacing between lines and they are always forced to be single paragraphs.

Spoiler: Image

 

[Sii]

View attachment 3801

imagine writing LitRPG with no basic editor,meh... (but they got huge reader base tho)

I've read some LitRPG/System stuff on Webnovel and now it makes so much more sense why their layouts were so shitty. They really don't want anyone doing any editing or formatting. And it also makes sense why so many of their novels are super basic, especially the machine translated ones.

 

[Suzumiya]

It looks like this, where you can't even influence the spacing between lines and they are always forced to be single paragraphs.

Spoiler: Image

That gives me the frown. :(

 

[TRNRLogan]

Given they fully intend to do shady business stuff they really don't need good web design. Especially at this point when they're super successful.