Free CC-licensed kids' fantasy short story every week

Jonathan sez, "As an aspiring author of fantasy for young adults, there is only one to get better [and get published] that I can think of: write. Then write more. And write better. So in order to do that I have set myself the target of putting a free short story online every week, and to keep doing just that for a year. I'm at the third week, and I have a couple in reserve to cover busy weeks. But more than that, I am making these stories available under a Creative Commons Share-alike Licence, hoping that others will take the stories to places that even I can't imagine. And on top of that, I'm willing to let commercial licences go for 1 euro. Just to get the ball rolling."

I love to see projects like this that display work ethic and talent. Good luck, Jonathan!

free reads

[#1 posted by gijoel, June 14, 2009 10:43 PM]

Unfortunately his site hates Mozilla.

But I admire the ideals. Hope he can keep up the pace.

[#2 posted by Kennric, June 15, 2009 12:09 AM]

Dang it! I just started such a writing project myself, I was just waiting til I got 10 or so done before seeking BoingBoing fame for it.

Though my challenge is a bit different, as I intend to write the entire story in only 7 days every week, no reserves, every word written within that week. You can clearly see the impact of time constraints on the 7 stories up so far (I work full time and have a comprehensive array of social and hobby commitments already). My hope is that by number 52, I'll have figured out how to do time management.

I think there is a significant benefit to the "one every week" or "one every day" creative project - I have watched friends greatly improve their photography skills in Flickr's 365 day projects, and I can already feel the effect of the exercise on my writing muscles. I may not produce gold every week, but I'll be much more capable of it by the time I am done.

I wish Jonathan the best of luck, it's not an easy task. One of the biggest motivators, I have found, is an audience and feedback - it's much harder to slack off when you are letting someone else down, not just yourself. I intend to read his stuff, and comment, I hope you will too. Just knowing someone out there is actually reading is a huge incentive to work.

(oh, and if you are interested, my stories are at http://www.hypothetical.net/kennric/blog )

[#3 posted by shadowfirebird, June 15, 2009 6:32 AM]

Yeah, well, good luck with the project. It would be nice if you would let me read these supposedly CCSA stories, though, instead of just showing me a message "Spam is not appreciated".

Since you clearly don't consider it worth your while to share those stories with me, forgive me if I don't bother telling anyone if they are any good or not.

Yours, not a spammer, actually.

[#4 posted by artefatica, June 15, 2009 7:15 AM]

@shadowfirebird. Try this URL instead http://thepowerfactory.com/reads.php

[#5 posted by shadowfirebird, June 15, 2009 7:53 AM]

@Artefatica:

Thanks for the thought, but, exactly the same thing. A short message accusing me of being a potential spammer because I'm using Firefox.

And frankly, I'm not minded to bother reading stories written by someone who is obviously trying so hard to keep me from them.

I can't help but wonder why this made a BoingBoing post. What percentage of Happy Mutants are IE users, do you think?

[#6 posted by dodi, June 15, 2009 8:11 AM]

Try just http://thepowerfactory.com/ and follow the link in the Short Story section. I got the same spam message in Firefox and IE.

[#7 posted by j_adams, June 15, 2009 8:11 AM]

I'm seeing the same thing. No stories, just an accusation about being a spammer.

[#8 posted by shadowfirebird, June 15, 2009 8:15 AM]

I get no spam message in IE (but, damned if I'm actually *using* it).

And, yes, if I go to the top level, I can click on stories and then scroll to the bottom of the screen and click on a story name.

Even so, I'm nonplussed. I think I'll leave a message on the site.

[#9 posted by shadowfirebird, June 15, 2009 8:16 AM]

Whatever link I follow from this site I get the spammer message. I guess the guy doesn't want referrals.

[#10 posted by NickPheas, June 15, 2009 9:09 AM]

IE6 produces the same error.

[#11 posted by Antinous / Moderator, June 15, 2009 9:30 AM]

I have no problem with it in Firefox. Maybe it's IP related.

[#12 posted by thepowerfactory, June 15, 2009 12:24 PM]

hi everyone, jonathan here and -- involuntarily -- red-faced.

please be assured that I have not, did not, will not block anyone from coming to read my stories. if you were inconvenienced, then i am most abjectly sorry.

this morning i was delighted when i saw the link, and the first visitors. this evening, my mail box was full of mails just like the comments above, and i nearly wanted to cry...

i use firefox, i have no intention of blocking it, i did not create the message.

after i put my toddler to bed, i went through the source code of the blog platform i use [thanks whatver for the GPL!] and found an overzealous spam filter -- that I didn't even know was there -- had tripped on the word 'free'.

why this worked for some people but not me, i do not know. anyway, i have killed it.

the only other thing i can say is sorry [again], and thanks to all the wonderful boingboingers who did find a way through.

//jonathan

[#13 posted by mjd, June 15, 2009 3:02 PM]

Please be more specific when talking about the license you use. Yes, Attribution Non-Commercial Share-Alike (BY-NC-SA) is technically "_a_ Creative Commons Share-alike License", but mentioning the share-alike requirement alone strongly implies that you are using the most permissive share-alike license, Attribution Share-Alike (BY-SA).

This is an important distinction since BY-SA is a Free Culture License (http://freedomdefined.org/Definition), while BY-NC-SA is not.