Crowdfunding: Connecting Creators and Patrons

Torn World has been updating regularly since the beginning of 2010, which makes for quite an incredible collection of fiction, poetry, artwork and metafiction. It has, however, been a little on the haphazard side, making it difficult to jump into and get started.

2013 has already seen some refinements - not only in our site, but also in our story. In January, the three year Rails project finally wrapped up - this series is a romance/intrigue, with blackmail, murder and betrayal. Lalya and Dini continue their adventure through the tangled social and bureaucratic hurdles of changing gender for love. Jrilii and her age-mates discover new land and wild snow-unicorns as Wild Snowy Chase begins its exciting conclusion. ysabetwordsmith is releasing Sqiggles: Excerpts from Nleimen's Journal once a week.

And perhaps most momentously, we're beginning a steady release of the Big Storyline of the world - the introduction of the isolated Northern culture to the sprawling, steampunk-flavored Empire to the south. Watch our Livejournal community for weekly installments every Monday - plus bonus Friday episodes when we receive 20 or more comments at the site (on any artwork, fiction or poetry)! Additionally, we have a Tuesday spotlight on something from the archives, a Wednesday Handbook article on some metafiction topic, and a Thursday character spotlight.

It's a great time to get started as a reader, or as a contributor!

And if you're looking for a way to dip your toes in, join us this weekend for the February Muse Fusion! http://torn-world.livejournal.com/140245.html

Bring title or phrase prompts, questions, characters you want to see more of, topics of interest... and see what our creators come up with.

2012 was a year of big personal changes for me. I had a baby at the end of February, which put a very significant dent in my project time. Things still happened at EMG, in large part due to marvelous volunteers who kept things steaming while I was otherwise occupied.

Torn World

In 2012 we posted 36 stories, 65 poems, 59 pieces of artwork and more than 20 metafiction articles, or a total of more than 175 new items. We ran several contests (thank you to wyld_dandelyon!) and approved dozens of new characters (thank you to ysabetwordsmith!). Weekly spotlights from our archives were thanks to padparadscha, and we had Muse Fusions most months. Most of the work was individual self-standing pieces from all over our world and timeline, but there were a few storylines that were continued - the wilderness adventure of Jrilii on her Wild Snowy Chase in the North, and the romance and intrigue of Rails in the South.

The webpage saw a lot of improvements this year, as well - most notably, the collections and the reference material (which is even more impressive if you are logged in as a creative contributor!).

2013 will see the conclusion of Rails (the final 8 installments will be released in January!) and more in the Wild Snowy Chase, but most importantly, we will be pushing forward the big core plot of the setting - the culture clash of the isolated Northerners with the sprawling Empire of the south. We will be highlighting some of the stories that have set up this meeting in our LJ community this month as we prepare to start releasing new material.

Our next Muse Fusion is next weekend, January 11-14, and our current contest ends January 15th!


EMG-Zine

In June, Head Editor puffbird and I decided to end EMG-Zine with the calendar rather than push to fund it further. (You can read more about why in my interview and this article.) I ran a retrospective in my blog through the month of December that looked back over our seven year run. The site will remain up as a valuable archive for artists and writers, and you may nominate your favorite pieces (which will be more prominently featured in the final incarnation of the site) until January 15th. (Email your selections to editor AT emg-zine DOT com!) A particular thank you to Jenny Heidewald, for her help in writing features nearly every month for the last several years and for getting artists to submit work when we needed it most, as well as to our columnists: Melissa Acker, ursulav, marrael, nixjim13, Annie Rodrigue, Amy Waller, Constanza Ehrenhaus, and marina_bonomi, as well as Deborah Grieves, redokapi and quickreaver, plus all the artists and writers who submitted non-fiction features, fiction and artwork and the readers who helped keep us going! We couldn't have done what we did without any of you...


Sketch Fest

Sketch Fest continues to blossom. In January, we trialled a 48 hour creative jam - and it was so popular that we've kept it at 48 hours ever since. Tags were added as an option for artists who wanted to find prompts again but not actually claim them, and claims were changed so that it's the only way to upload work after Sketch Fest is over. (Though you are only supposed to upload work done during Sketch Fest, this gives artists time to scan or photograph the work they did.) The administration tools for selling work were made MUCH more efficient, and now allow artists to sell multiple products, not just a single original. Work for sale could be set with a variable prompter hold, a special prompter price, and it would track limited editions and remove them from sale when they ran out! Customers got a 'bought' page that would show them what they bought with credits, and pending credit card purchases if they were logged in when they bought them. My own sales approval tools were refined, cutting down my workload significantly. The gallery got a new look, with pagination and a neat table. (Some of the pages still need to be updated for the new sales functions!) The prompts page was re-written twice or three times, trying to cut down on the load time as the site became more popular, and should be much speedier now, with a new method of counting claims, artwork and tags. Sales each Sketch Fest are brisk and exciting - customers can get awesome deals or snag rare work from some amazing artists, and the sales (along with donations!) help all the awesome site improvements. But what really keeps folks coming back in the creative inspiration and energy - it really is addictive!

In 2013, look for more site improvements - categorization for the artwork and some search features, updates to the browsing pages, an option for auctions on items for sale... and a laundry list of other things.

Our next Sketch Fest is January 18-20.


Portrait Adoption

Portrait Adoption languished this year - I didn't have the extra energy to push for new work or provide any of my own, so it hit a bit of a lull. I have received some donations bookmarked towards improvements in the site, and have plans to make some user-end improvements over the next several months... including a few changes I think will be very exciting for artists. I was able to code a 'watch' feature in, early in the year! If you are registered and logged in, you can 'watch' an artist and receive an email when new portraits become available. I've also got some funds earmarked for advertising, and am considering other ways to push to get the word out more.



...and that should keep me pretty busy for the year, considering the (soon-to-be) toddler, and all the artwork and writing I want to do for personal projects. A big thank you to everyone who has gotten involved - leaving prompts, joining in as a creative participant, volunteering, or just sharing your enthusiasm.