Every day we use the internet to connect ourselves with people and information no matter the physical distance. It provides us with endless collaborative possibility.
Certain companies are beginning to take advantage of this notion of connectivity, one we often take for granted, and are creating platforms that allow people to come together and benefit from each other in open, creative forums.
The idea is not exactly a fresh one, as sites like Deviantart have been operating on a similar principal for years, though they are often geared more toward the sharing of a final product and less focused on critique and collaboration.
This is one of the ways that networks like “WriteOn,” an Amazon-created service that launched its private beta this week, will try to be different.
WriteOn is a crowd-sourced editing forum, designed to provide an organized space for writers to share and provide feedback on projects. Its pages hope to provide a space for creative minds across the globe to assist in each other’s processes, assisting artistic collaboration through digital means.
This isn’t the first such service Amazon has attempted to introduce. Kindle Worlds, a sharing and editing site geared toward fan-fiction writers, has failed to find much success since its launch in May of last year. But WriteOn’s more expansive policy on genre should help it succeed where Kindle Worlds flopped.
“It’s a community where readers and writers come together around the creative process to make good stories great and great stories better,” states the launch announcement, made on the Kindle Author forums, introducing their idea to help those seeking to “polish an original work, hone your feedback skills, or just find a group of other passionate readers and writers to connect with — we’re building a community that will support you.”
With the nearly limitless connective opportunity the internet provides, it’s surprising that we don’t see more services like WriteOn making an appearance. What if there were forums where students could edit and assist each other in the writing of essays and research papers? Where musicians and sound engineers could come together to complete projects? Where passionate people of all creative inclinations could share their skills with one another?
It may be a few years before the right model comes along, but WriteOn is a step toward a net that takes full advantage of the opportunities it can provide for artists.