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What advantages and disadvantages does social media present to the modern writer?

Social media is widely used worldwide, used by various people in a variety of ways. Some people use it for leisure, others use it to publicize their works. However, this may all sound fairly neutral, but there are advantages and disadvantages, especially to a modern-day writer – some of the main ones being Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Tumblr.

As a writer, social media offers a large audience. There is also a benefit to different platforms, allowing people to share your work and comment on what you’ve written.  This is beneficial for a writer, as work is reviewed by a range of people and a writer can alter their work to suit the audience preferences.

The disadvantage of this however, for all social media platforms, is that due to the freedom for an audience to comment on the post, some comments can be negative, thus getting you down about your work[1]. It needs to be kept in mind that this happens to everyone - there are always be negative comments. Some negative comments can be beneficial for improvement, but they shouldn’t get you down about your work.

Another problem with social media in general is the ability for the audience and public in general to spread rumors. The daily mail was sued for 150 million dollars for rumors being spread about Melania Trump. One of Trumps lawyers stated “Their many lies include, among others, that Mrs Trump supposedly was an ‘escort’ in the 1990s before she met her husband. Defendants’ actions are so egregious, malicious and harmful to Mrs Trump that her damages are estimated at $150m.” In addition, it was stated that “These defendants made several statements about Mrs Trump that are 100% false and tremendously damaging to her personal and professional reputation”. [2]

As a writer, you need to be careful what you write, and be sure what you’re writing is truth and not spread rumors about certain people as it can get you in trouble with the public and lose your popularity and potential career as a writer.

Twitter is a perfect platform for broadcasting your work and reaching out to a large audience. There are certain features within twitter which make it beneficial for a writer such as retweets, comments, likes and direct messages. All these features allow a writer to reach out to their audience and expand their works popularity. Direct messages in particular could allow for in depth reviews from the audience, helping you as a writer to improve.

The way writers use twitter is not always to promote their stories but is a personal place to express their views on news in the world or about certain topics from their stories. An example of this is J.K Rowling’s twitter[3], where she retweets a lot about the upcoming new Fantastic Beasts, but in addition she retweets about certain views on Brexit which is currently going on. J.K Rowling has 14.4 million followers due to her Harry Potter books, but people admire her openness and views on the world today.

The main disadvantage to Twitter as a platform is its lack of characters you can use – this used to be 140 characters, but recently it has been changed to 280, double the original amount[4]. This may be a positive, however, its still not the best if a writer wanted to write out a short story or write a large description as they are limited to how much they can say. However, you can share links to other websites and social medias via twitter, so your audience can also view your work on other social medias.

Instagram is another great platform for publishing and promoting your writing. It allows you to post a picture but unlike twitter, you can write as much as you want in the caption area. This is beneficial for promoting a book cover or poem as you can describe the picture you post and use as many hashtags as possible relating to your picture, gathering an audience interested in the writer’s work. However, many writer’s use it to post pictures of their personal life for their audience to see.

Neil Gaiman, a writer and producer, uses his Instagram as an open space to interact with his fans and allow them to get a peak into his personal life[5]. As a writer, it is beneficial to keep an open relationship with your audience as they can tell you’re a likeable person and enjoy getting that insight into your life. It makes the audience feel more comfortable and Neil Gaiman has achieved this, gaining 295,000 followers on Instagram.

Neil Gaiman, due to his popularity as a writer, uses this to his advantage to help promote charity. On his Instagram, he has a link to a donation site to donate or sign a petition for children and families in a Syrian refugee camp[6] – along with a picture of himself with the children there. His popularity serves as a good way to ensure more donations for the children.

The main disadvantage to Instagram is it is image based, and the audience is there to scroll through pictures and not read big bulks of text. As a writer, Instagram may not be beneficial for big texts and stories, but more so for promoting book covers with a brief description or short poems.

Facebook is the most used social media, with 2,230,000,000[7] active users per month. Due to the large number of users, it is the best social media for modern-day writers. There is an unlimited writing space, so there is space for writing such as short stories or simply a description of a varied lengths.  

Carrie Hope Fletcher, a personal inspiration of mine, is a singer-songwriter, author and actress. 110,239 people like her page on Facebook[8] and posts about whatever she is working on at the time. She creates songs and albums based on her books and shares this over several social media platforms, widening her audience. Her openness with her audience is a wonderful aspect to have and invites a wider audience to follow her.

There are many disadvantages to Facebook however. It is easy for a person to get lost scrolling through thus not really focusing on the work being published. This can be a problem if the writer relies on their work for income or in order to maintain a large audience. Furthermore, it can be emotionally draining being exposed to negative comments as well as constantly trying to upkeep an interested audience.[9]

Furthermore, Facebook has privacy settings which are detrimental to the user, as there is a risk of a writer’s personal life being shown, which may not be what they desired. Facebook had adopted a default to public setting making your information openly available to the public – that was unless you made your privacy settings more restrictive. The lack of privacy can put people in danger. The ‘top man’ of MI6 experienced this when photos of a holiday with his wife and multiple other personal and private things were exposed over the internet and seen by a large majority of people.[10]

Tumblr is a microblogging and image sharing platform, in which followers can re-blog and comment on the post. For a writer this is beneficial as there is a large audience, making up 115,000,000 people[11]. The use of hash-tagging on Tumblr is the main way in which a writer can gain a wider audience, and their ability to re-blog expands the audience majorly.

Neil Gaiman uses Tumblr to answer his fans questions[12], keeping a tight nick community with his audience. This shows that despite being a well-known writer he still shows how he cares for his audience and allowing them to engage with him more personally. As a writer this is a good aspect to have.

Overall, social media proves to be a positive strategy for modern writers to use and they are lucky to be part of a generation in which they can share their work online and have a large audience see it. Despite the negative aspects to social media, the majority of it is beneficial. A writer needs to be careful not to get too sucked into the social media aspect of promoting their work.

  Bibliography

[1] http://www.publishingtalk.eu/marketing/pros-and-cons-for-writers/ accessed 10 November 2018

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/sep/01/melania-trump-daily-mail-lawsuit accessed 11 November 2018

[3] https://twitter.com/jk_rowling/ accessed: 10 November 2018

[4] https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/twitter-280-characters-tweets-start-when-get-latest-a8042716.html accessed: 11 November 2018

[5] https://www.instagram.com/neilhimself/ accessed: 11 November 2018

[6] http://www.unhcr.org/neil-gaiman?utm_source=twitter-NeilV11&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=CelebNeil accessed 11 November 2018

[7] https://www.dreamgrow.com/top-15-most-popular-social-networking-sites/ accessed 11 November 2018

[8]https://www.facebook.com/ItsWayPastMyBedTime accessed 11 November 2018

[9] (http://www.publishingtalk.eu/marketing/pros-and-cons-for-writers/) accessed 11 November 2018

[10]D.E. Wittkower, Facebook and Philosophy: What’s on Your Mind? (Open Court Publishing, 2010) p. 215 accessed 11 November 2018

[11] https://www.dreamgrow.com/top-15-most-popular-social-networking-sites/ accessed 11 November 2018

[12] https://www.tumblr.com/search/neil%20gaiman accessed 11 November 2018

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Purgatory

My eyes opened.

For a moment I was blind, with just the burning rays obscuring my vision. Is this heaven? Slowly, my sight came back to me, but I was confused. Bright blue curtains swayed from the breeze outside, a small square television set sat gazing down at me. No…this isn’t heaven.

Swiftly, I sat up. Where am I? Trying to stand on my feet, I noticed the tubes and monitors attached to my arms. Ripping them off I attempted to make an exit, before stumbling to the floor. What happened to me? I didn’t have the answers…maybe somebody did. Maybe my best mate, Fred. Reaching towards my pockets I searched for my phone, only to be met by the pockets of ragged hospital pyjamas. Should have known.

As I stumbled towards the wardrobe neighbouring the television, my reflection froze me in my tracks. Staring back at me was someone else…but it was me at the same time. A scar buried deep into my forehead, a black eye and what appeared to be gashes along my chin and throat.

Opening the wardrobe I found my clothes folded in a neat pile. I pulled out my ACDC t-shirt and navy jeans, ripped at the edges. They were still the best pair I had. I noticed while dressing my face wasn’t the only thing that had seen the wars…my body was covered in bruises and cuts. What the fuck?

I opened the old cracked door. Outside it was dead…there was no one around. Fear struck me and I ran, not really sure where. A staircase, a carpeted bloody mess, engulfed my passage. One step, two steps, 3 steps. Slow, swift, subtle. Then suddenly, there were no more steps, but a wall. A force. Keeping me here. Trapped. Silently, a man walked out one of the rooms. He looked familiar…

“Hello Alan, welcome to purgatory.”

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“When you’re falling in a forest and there’s nobody around, did you ever really crash or even make a sound?

- Waving Through a Window ~ Dear Evan Hansen

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Birds

Chirp chirp, their singing their sweet lullaby. Chirp chirp, high in the trees. Chirp chirp, as the sun rises up. Squawk squawk, there's a knocking at the door.

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A waiting game

She left, and shortly after he announced his date of expiry. Have you no thought to the hearts you'd break, the souls you'd take, the life you could make? No. She hung on the edge, wondering if he would do it .

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Tell me what you think

When you think of death

And loss

The thought of someone gone forever

Who did they matter to?

Apart from family and close friends

Did they matter to you?

Either way

Life goes on without you

In the end

Did you even exist at all

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Social media and modern day writers (Twitter and Tumblr)

Twitter: Twitter is one main source used by a majority of people, such as writers, musicians and bloggers. There are a number of positives and negatives to this social platform, and for a writer mainly positives:

+ It’s public meaning that anyone can see what you post and anyone can comment, share, retweet and like it

+ Retweeting is very beneficial as it enables other twitter users to view what you’ve posted

-A negative is that it is very public and not filtered, so any abusive or harmful comments are going to be seen

 Tumblr is another good platform for blogging as it is also public.

+ Anyone can see what you post and leave comments and reblog, showing what you’ve posted to an even wider audience

-not many people use Tumblr and so it’s not the best place for you to advertise your blog

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My dream last night was scary... I thought I’d write it down and share it

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Scars

Crackling crisp vines Red like the autumn sun Heat. Burning. Scarred. Its permanence eternal

Like a shadow, they fade Like the wind, they cool Like a breeze, they dance Like the air, never gone

It steals the beauty Feeds the sights Each a memory Of sore delights

Time was short And not well spent Now emerging through the flames I'll fly, fly again

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Edge

Falling from my windowsill Beneath the world so dull and still For piercing gazes all to see My state of blatant ecstasy

Before my body hits the ground The world it pauses no more sound Before it turns all dark and still Why did I jump from my windowsill?

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Welcome to my blog!

I'm a 21 year old singer-songwriter and an aspiring writer for short stories and poetry (you've probably read that on my profile page already). I'm unlikely to be posting very much here but expect to see some poetry and lyrics that inspire me or ones I've created! I'll provide a link to my YouTube Channel at some point too so look out for that (disclaimer: it is less than satisfactory but I’d love to hear your advice and critiques). Oh, I also have a massive coffee addiction.