Hi Ted, I'm glad you did decide to come over and engage in the discussion.
I haven't spent enough time on your site to get into much of a talk about it yet. What I think you'll find here is this:
-We're in favor of critique groups. Nearly all the writers here will agree that it's valuable to give and get critiques. I used to be very active on Zoetrope.com, where I went for screenwriting critiques. It was a superb learning experience, and very humbling. (I had no idea how many talented screenwriters were lurking about.) If that were the only purpose of your site, I don't think a single person here would say anything but, "You go, Ted."
-We don't think POD is a dirty word, but we think it's generally a bad idea for writers who want to sell books to strangers. It's a fine idea for writers who genuinely just want to see a book in print and have something to give to their friends and family, or perhaps for writers who have their own built-in audiences (because they do speaking engagements or the like). What I did see on your site seemed to encourage self-publishing and vanity publishing. Many, MANY writers get into this without having any idea how many obstacles are against them. In general, bookstores WILL NOT STOCK self-published/vanity-published books because (a) there's no market for them, (b) they're overpriced, (c) there's no returns policy, (d) there's no quality control, (e) the covers are not professional, (f) there's no publisher backing them with a publicity campaign, etc.
People who see headings like "YouWriteOn Bestseller to Bookshop" and lines like "your book will be available to order through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, W.H.Smith, Waterstones and over 25,000 other booksellers in the U.S. and UK" can easily get stars in their eyes and not realize what that ACTUALLY means is that someone can walk up to a desk and place a special order for the book and come back 2 weeks later and pick it up, but that the book will *not* be on bookstore shelves, no matter how well-written it is. The only people who do place special orders of POD books are generally the writer's Aunt Gertrude and best friend from high school.
Which is all fine-- IF that's what the writer understands and expects. It just feels to me like the last thing the writing world needs is another vanity POD press.
And it seems to run counter to the whole idea of critiquing and getting reviewed by agents; presumably, it's the goal of most writers on your site to get better and whip their work into publishable shape so they can get picked up by a real publisher. Encouraging them to self-publish is like telling them to settle before they've reached their goals.
I know that there are rumors floated about that it's harder than ever for newbies to break into publishing. I suspect that rumor has been around since the printing press was invented. But it was only five years ago that I broke in. We see success stories here frequently. I don't feel like it helps new writers to make it sound like the walls are any higher than they actually are, because that only encourages them to give in and self-publish-- a move that many of them regret once they realize they've just consigned their hard work to a sad fate. Writers want readers. You're helping them with the first step toward that goal-- getting feedback so they can improve their work-- but I hope you'll consider that it seems a waste of effort to have them work to be publishable, only to sell the same 75 copies they would have sold if they'd sent their first draft to Xlibris, iUniverse, Lulu, etc.
