With just minutes to go before Super Bowl kickoff, we're pleased to release the results for the On the Water writing contest. The results can be seen here:
https://www.thenextbigwriter.com/contes … Contest-23
Congratulations!
We'll be in touch with the winners this week about their prizes.
Hi all,
Sorry for the delay in announcing the winner of the On the Water Short Story Contest. We'll be announcing them this weekend, most likely Sunday.
Sol
The help documentation still refers users to support@thenextbigwriter.com rather than contact@thenextbigwriter.com. Also, last I checked, the site references the support email address when new users are trying to sign up and have to verify their email address. If they have an issue at that point, they won't be able to sign up, and we'll never know it.
At a minimum, is it possible for you to set up a simple forward of support emails to the contact email address, so that it's at least being monitored? The latter approach seems like it would involve less work.
However, the help documentation also still references the obsolete phone number, which should simply be deleted.
Thanks
Dirk
Hi Dirk,
Thanks for the reminder. I'm going to make that change.
I'm going to delete the phone number. I'd prefer to use email support.
Sol
Hi all,
Happy New Year!
I'll look again at the points ratio. It should have been changed but clearly not.
I'll also take a look at Whatta's account. I remember him from the old days.
Sol
Hi Marilyn,
Can you send me a private message. Just so I understand, if you download your content using the ebook feature, you get text that looks like this? Can you email it to me?
Sol
Hey Sol, I'd love to try this out!
Do you have an account on Booksie? Let me know the pen name and I'll upgrade it to premium.
ound it. You actually have to open one of your posted works to see it.
My user id is Dirk B. same as on TNBW.
Your account should be all set.
You should see a link to BOB in your portfolio. It says: Get AI Assistance. Message me your pen name and I'll check your premium.
Booksie has an AI powered reviewer for any type of written content. It's working pretty well. TNBW users are eligible to use it. Let me know if you want an upgraded account.
Sol:
I just spent two weeks trying to renew my premium membership. Each time I introduced my credit card data and hit "OK" or whatever the button says, the system would take me back to the page where it says my membership has expired, without performing any charge at all or sending any error message.
Two weeks like that!
Enough to scare away newbies. It finally worked yesterday, but I was about to stop trying.
Thanks for looking into it.
Kiss
Gacela
I'll have to test and see if I can recreate the problem. I did see your attempts on the backend so I have some data to work with. Thanks!
Sol, you never responded to the bugs I reported on this page (seven and counting; eight if you include Jack's issue). Some of them are new, others seem not to have been fixed. I just want to make sure you don't accidentally overlook these.
I suggested a priority for each of them in red: 2 very high, 2 high, 3 medium. I would also suggest high priority for Jack's reported issue about some forum posts disappearing too soon from the home page. One of the other high priority issues - getting the user support contact info right across the site - should be easy to do before digging into Jack's reported issue.
By the way, I'm pretty sure I've seen the same problem as Jack for years, but I never tried to reproduce it.
Thanks, this is helpful. We'll look into them.
PRIORITY: High. Until this is fixed, we have the same big hurdle in place when trial members are trying to get a feel for the site. This ratio doesn't affect most long-term members since we've accumulated more points than God.
Hmm. I'll have to look into why the ratio is still like that. We did make an adjustment. Okay, more to come.
Hi Dagny, what is your account name on Booksie? Virginia Wolfe? Dagny? Let me know and I'll upgrade your account to premium.
Sol
Hi all,
We didn't have any entries so I have updated the contest and opened it to all site members, new and old. Go ahead and post your entries!
Sol
Case in point! I commented on how some posts disappear like a puff of smoke, while others stay highlighted for days on end. My above post only lasted less than two hours, but the one above it, to which I referenced, was on the notifications for over two days. Splain me that, Sol.
It's a bit of a mystery to me, tbh. I'll have to dig into the forum software we are using to understand it.
Yes, I'll do that to the welcome email and the welcome sequence.
This is a test as I try to see if I can duplicate the timeout issue on forum posts.
I did a delay and am now trying again. Let's see if this session was mantained.
I wrote a short series of posts exactly on this subject. You might find it helpful.
Right now you have a 14 day trial period where you give posting a try. Once that expires, you can decide on whether or not to upgrade to premium to continue posting your writing and receiving feedback.
We may change this in the future to eliminate the trial period so get it while you can!
If I take too long to write a forum post, the system will log me out. Seems to happen when I leave my browser (Chrome) pointing too long at a specific forum post or forum. For example, I currently have my text cursor in the Post Reply field of this thread (Reviving TNBW). If I were to walk away, it logs me out pretty quickly. It also logs me out pretty quickly if I take too long writing a post like this reply to you. Usually, that's merely a nuisance (if I attempt to post my reply to this thread and the system has already logged me out, it will still post it, after which I have to log back in). This happens a lot.
The problem is greatest if I try to post a new topic and I take too long. Not only won't it save what I wrote, even the browser's back button won't get me back to what I wrote. This bug hits those who write long forum posts hardest since everything you wrote is gone. It happened to at least one new user some months ago that I know of. It also happened to me several times. Naturally, a new user who loses an hour's worth of typing isn't going to be happy.
These days, I usually (though not always) remember to copy the content of my forum post to the clipboard in case I run into this bug.
Okay. I think we have fixed most of the other bugs on the list. I'll check with the developers on this one.
Users would not be able to post until they becoming a paying member. I actually don't think the trial works that well. I'd rather have people explore the site a a free member (who cannot post) and then when they are ready, upgrade and publish their work. That was the old site model and it seemed to work better.
Hi all,
I wanted to get your opinion on something. The old site only allowed members to post once they had become premium members. There was no trial. Users were able to get a feel for the site by logging in as a free reviewer. I'm thinking of reverting to that model. Why? Because many new members come to kick the tires, get a bunch of reviews as a trial member, and then take off. I don't feel like this is fair to all of you and the community. Plus, I happen to believe that once people pay money, they are more motivated to put the time and effort into becoming part of the site.
Thoughts?
Thanks,
Sol
Hi all,
I launched the new contest for newbies as you requested. Let's see how it goes. It requires three reviews.
Sol
Thanks, Sol. Will you include a requirement on one or both contests for entrants to do some reviewing on the site within the contest window?
I'm debating that one. It would get them more involved, but it also has the potential to turn them off before they're even started. Thoughts?
I'm going to launch two contests this weekend. As Dirk suggested, one of them will be a new member contest. I'm thinking a New Member Short Story Contest. That way, the member doesn't have to write anything new and they can post any short story they have already written.
I also have a contest in mind for all members.
More to come!
