<p>Ah, awesome! Where are you going? :)</p>
<p>NYU 
so excited!!!</p>
<p>Cool thread :)</p>
<p>I’m also an aspiring author… Junior in HS (it’s almost over!!!)</p>
<p>However, I have this dilemma between writing as much as I can (after reading Stephen King’s On Writing) or not writing much and putting a lot of effort into getting into my dream college (which takes a lot of my time and my energy and stresses me a lot 
).</p>
<p>It’s so cool to see there are other people writing :D</p>
<p>Crfcaio, I know it gets stressful…been there I promise! But it’s sooooo worth it! You can do it Maybe while trying in school, you can write to relieve stress! Put it in a journal…that’s what I’ve done!</p>
<p>I’m so excited to meet people that like writing and reading also!!! That’s my thing!</p>
<p>Congrats guys!! :)</p>
<p>Hey, bigwill! You go to UVA? I might be going to school in Virginia next year. ^_^</p>
<p>@ Eiffel: Cherry, congrats on Emerson! It seems like a very interesting and underrated school.</p>
<p>Thanks. I also received the Next Step Scholarship, but sadly, it doesn’t pay for full tuition, and 1) my family can’t afford the rest; 2) there’s no way I can live in Boston as of yet (and commuting 50 miles to and fro won’t be feasible). <em>sigh</em> There’s always grad school, I guess.</p>
<p>“But I don’t understand what you find so irredeemable about authors setting up websites, events, et cetera to promote their work. I’m sure many writers still do use agents if they really have some kind of communication impediments or the like, but since when do social networking sites and other websites have anything to do with overcoming shyness?”</p>
<p>Well, to each his/her own. IMHO, 1) There’s no point in having a Facebook account if one has no “real life” friends to add to the list. 2) I understand the difference between a business account or “fan page” versus a personal page for one’s friends (or lack thereof), but if people are reading your Facebook they’re not reading your real book. 3) Internet marketing is nothing more than a popularity contest that operates along the lines of the “Peter Principle,” in which the most incompetent (untalented, unintelligent, etc.) receive the most number of accolades in the form of “page views.” And as anti-social as “social networking” can often be, there is still (at least right now) a need for face-to-face networking and promotion in addition to the email, website, Twitbook/BoobTube/EveryoneSpace account(s). I know I’d be exhausted enough to warrant a semi-permanent “shutdown” of the emotional/physiological “system.”</p>
<p>“And for those many other authors that are not painfully introverted, what’s wrong with them putting themselves out there for their own work?”</p>
<p>Again, to each his/her own. But I think it takes away from time one could actually be writing. Blogging, site maintenance, social networking, etc. all require a tremendous amount of time, commitment, and energy – all of which could be put forth into writing a book. Once you’re at the economic level of Stephen King, James Patterson, John Grisham, Janet Evanovich, etc., then you can afford to hire someone to do this stuff for you. The difference is, of course, that those authors achieved success in the pre-Internet era and got their online presence after a string of bestsellers. Even those who emerged around Y2K have now had roughly a decade to cultivate their presence. But for those of us whose works won’t receive any attention at all without an accompanying set of “Web 2.0” amenities in this day and age, it’s sadly become a necessity in order to sell books – that is, if “Web 3.0” (whatever that is) doesn’t usher in a tragic death knell for the written word in which few people if anyone will be reading “books” at all.</p>
<p>The Internet also opens a veritable Pandora’s box of “fan fiction” aka juvenile-quality copyright infringement (written, of course, by juveniles, for juveniles). Don’t get me wrong; I’m all for fostering creativity, but instead of breeding copycats who mash-up The Hangover, alien-abduction tales, and the Hogwarts series and call it Harry Pothead and the Flying Saucer-er Get Stoned, they should be encouraged to try their hand at doing something original. Although that one sounds more like a parody work in the same vein of *Pride and Prejudice and Zombies<a href=“by%20Seth%20Grahame-Smith,%20an%20Emerson%20alum%20himself!”>/i</a>, which, despite the absurdist, “B movie”-style title, is very smart, funny, and intelligently written.</p>
<p>Numerous studies have also confirmed that Internet writing is very different from the type of writing one does in fiction, academic research, or journalism. It’s very broken-up, elementary, and requires a modicum of marketing knowledge to insert “relevant keywords” that will attract visitors to the site. Unless one is an already established writer and the site is merely an announcement of upcoming projects/appearances, like a bulletin board. But the new entrants into the field (who can actually write) would have to dumb down the quality of their writing to such a basic level as to be understood by the “e-mind” and/or picked up by the major search engines. Read books on the emerging topic of 21st-century cognitive neuroscience (such as by Nicholas Carr and Steven Pinker), for more on why “TL;DR” (“too long; didn’t read”) is all too quickly becoming the rallying cry of the Bieber/Cullen/Markzilla Suckerbird era.</p>
<p>Speaking of writers who “suck,” Twilight is an anomaly in that the author, Stephenie Meyer, apparently spent close to zero time crafting a quality work while she was fiddling about on Project Playlist and Facebook indulging her ludicrous fantasies of being the next Amazon Idol. And who’s made Twilight so popular? The Facebook crowd, of course. Her kids are in, I think, upper-level grade school or junior high, exactly the demographic that’s salivating for this crap. Meyer is a savvy marketer, a statistical genius, and a prodigy in the world of media and advertising. But is she a good writer? Not unless one likes run-on sentences, bad grammar, and incoherent narratives that “sparkle.” Chances are, if one reads at barely above a fourth-grade level – or thinks in 140 characters or less – they won’t really care. Therefore, I award her, FanFiction.net, and all of Team Toothless Regression, no points, and may the literary gods have mercy on their souls.</p>
<p>Eiffel - Hey!!! Yes, I do go to UVA And that’s cool. Do you know what school you’ll be attending?</p>
<p>Not that I’m late to this party or anything… um… But it’s nice to “meet” you all! XD</p>
<p>I’m not sure how much I’ll focus on Creative Writing in college. I haven’t done as much in the latter half of HS as I did in the beginning; I’m not entirely sure why but it makes me sad. So I would like to sort of “get back into it,” as it were. I just find my stuff often comes out pretty autobiographical. When I do write I’m pretty happy with what I’ve done, but I write pretty sporadically and wish I could do it more regularly, I guess.</p>
<p>This thread is cool… I hope we can keep it going…!</p>
<p>You can count me in as an aspiring author. In fact, I’m gradually writing a book right now. It’s difficult to describe what it is exactly at this point, but I will say that movies, especially noir, drama, westerns, and action/adventure films are my primary influences.</p>
<p>Congrats on Emerson, Cherry! </p>
<p>@Quomodo- Pretty much the same has happened to me. I’m not sure if it’s just the stress, lack of interest… or what. All I know is I’m in the same boat- I still love writing but haven’t done it as much recently. 
I’m pretty sporadic too, and tend to be incredibly negative towards my writing as the time leads on… </p>
<p>@The Good- Glad to hear that! How far along are you?</p>