I loathe and despise social media. Of course, I'm a dinosaur when it comes to all that stuff. I am a novelist and nearly finished editing my fourth novel, "Black Lion with a Red Heart." I believe if you are on social media, you're not writing, and that's the whole purpose of our existence. The hypothesis I'll throw out there is those individuals who spend hours on social media have the attention span of chickens. Because of this visual overload with useless garbage, novelists are concerned we are pursuing a dying objective. We write for an ever shrinking audience that is being eroded by the dumbing down of America. I obtained my MFA in 2019. The data presented to us in a seminar is that over 70% of those who graduate with an MFA never write again. Why did they take the program? That's not why I took it. After completion, I was hired on the spot to teach English in the Community College System. The head of the English Department told me I was exactly what she wanted because I knew how to think and put thoughts on paper. Covid shut down the entire teaching program and it has yet to recover. One would think it would be the perfect opportunity to pick up a book and read, but as indicated by the increasing number of social media vehicles, that hasn't happened. Ah, the distractions. I think I will withdraw into my castle, lower the portcullis, and raise the drawbridge, then proceed to my room deep within the rock walls, light my candle, sharpen my goose quills, and begin work on my next novel, which I think I will title "Break My Heart of Glass." I'm striving for more misery, murder, and gore. My depression will be nourished by imaginary rivers of blood.
Screenwriting : Lamentations of a luddite by John Roane
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There is a paradox. People with short attention spans spending hours doing something.
I think the change is culture is people do not want to work for their entertainment. Streamers have proven that. In the era of event TV like friends. People had to do things in the life to make sure that hour was free. They had to work for that free time.
Books take work. We still have million selling books, Harry Potter comes to mind. But books, like rock music, are no longer the cool kids. They aren’t even in the same bus. They are following behind and sitting outside the party watching people have a great time.
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I'm not particularly active on social media, but I don't quite hold such a negative view of it. There are many active author communities on social media, including on platforms like Twitter, which engage in informal programmes like #WritersLift to help new authors network and gain exposure.
Globally, book sales soared during the COVID lockdowns. In some markets, including the US, sales increased by around 20% from the previous year, resulting in a supply issue for printed books. That supply issue, along with the closure of brick and mortar stores, may have been a catalyst for a sizeable uptick in eReader sales (such as Amazon's Kindle), along with a large number of new subscriptions to Amazon's Kindle Unlimited subscription service, and audiobook platforms such as Audible. E-book loans from online libraries jumped as much as 50%, and categories such as juvenile and YA fiction increased almost 100% from the previous year.
In 2022, e-book sales are declining, but print sales are up again - although one important caveat to that is Amazon doesn't provide Kindle store sales data to third parties.
Wattpad, which describes itself as a social-reading platform with the bulk of its audience under 40, claimed that at the peak of lockdowns, 90m monthly users spent 20bn minutes on the platform every month.
Personally, I think there is still a sizeable audience out there but like many forms of traditional media, the old ways of reaching that audience are no longer as effective. When traditional publishing houses effectively controlled what someone could read, it pushed many niche-market writers out of the market because the marketing bucks were spent on what publishers felt would top bestseller lists.
Nowadays, if you've got a manuscript ready, it can take all of thirty minutes to publish it to the world. Writing on social platforms such as Medium and Wattpad, and being active on social media, is how many of these self-published writers build and maintain audiences. I know somebody who, with a helping hand from social media, turned their erotica blog into a brand and a six-figure annual income. They've since written novels, but also made contacts on social media that have enabled them to get additional writing work from third-parties.
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Let me take a step back. I am not against social medica. I think it's this time devouring monster that must be controlled. I was told a back in 2006 at a writing conference by an agent that if I didn't have a "platform" she wouldn't represent me or anyone else. Since then, social media had become so cluttered that I am of the opinion it is worthless, except for communication with colleagues of like mind. I now receive over a hundred emails per day, most of it garbage. I don't have time to read them. That agent disappeared from the directory shortly thereafter. A Texas writer recently told me there are two requirement for being an agent, a desk and a phone. The desk is optional. Writing is hard, and if you are submerged in social media as many are. you're not perfecting your craft. I started late in my life and its been hard, lots of word. I enjoy it. But social media, for the most part, is useless and a P in the A. The only reason I'm on line now, is I've been editing my fourth novel this morning, starting to see double, and needed to vent. Ranting and raving is a great purgative exercise.
John hearing you load and clear on this social media platform (AKA: Stage 32 forum)
I think the Social media experience reinforces shorter attention spans in people. I also think this is acknowledged by many. At the end of the day though, it is up to the writer to re-invent himself and the novel, and to make the rewards of longer attention spans i.e. reading novels, far more "addictive" or "re-enforcing" than the "rewards" of short attention spans. How a writer does that is up for debate and investigation. I have a few ideas and I guess I will be working on them. You've identified a serious issue.