Question Fanfic we really should have had by now? But...

The list of potential subjects we have is the list of STORIES we are willing to give people a shot at writing. It is not a list of people who we're willing to consider. We haven't completely worked out the details of how we want the process to work which is why we haven't opened the doors to the floodgate of applicants and have just dealt with one or two people who were are looking at as candidates for canon anyway.

In general though, the idea is that WE provide the story concept. The protagonist is already chosen, the scope of the story and maybe even the framework... by the canon team. The G0 author writes the story within our parameters, has a mentor from the group assigned to work with them to answer any cabal detail questions and to give technical, style, and concept feedback. Scenes and sections of the piece are presented to the team for feedback and approval at a number of stages and will pass a couple go/no-go tests which will tell you if you've actually got something that is what we asked for... or if you've gone off the rails and are in fan fiction land somewhere.

Why this format? Well, generally, we find that the people who want to write in the WU are creative authors. There are lots of great character ideas, for power set and personality, for how to plug a character into a niche, and how to introduce them. But there are far fewer people among this group who are looking at telling full stories, of working within an ongoing plot and both closing out and introducing new aspects that may or may not come to fruition in the near future, and of completing projects that stretch beyond the original gimmick.

We're also looking at the AUTHOR as much if not more than their work. An author who has a character or an idea that they refuse to adapt or let go of for the good of the group/universe, makes everyone's work harder and less fun. Especially if they refuse to recognize that the character isn't really within the scope of the universe and they're trying to shoehorn something in that doesn't work. There are lots of great superhero stories possible that can't be Whateley canon. And there's a limit to how many new characters you can write origins on before the school year is in motion and you need to go further with the character AND long term plots.

Finally... we want stable reliable authors. The last thing we want to do is introduce more authors who leave after copying in their one or two stories into canon. Or who need regular guidance and emotional support to get a story done and out the door. We're often tough on each other and when everyone's off working on their own things, getting feedback on YOUR story doesn't happen without prodding and may be blunt, short, and harsh when you do get it. If you let that stop you from handling refinements or continuing... you'll never have stories released.


Mostly, to this point people have been throwing ideas for a story THEY want to do as a Gen 0 story... and that's not how we want to work it at all. When we're ready to move forward on this, we'll bring in a couple people who we have authors to pair up with, and we'll give them the list of story concepts to choose from. And we expect that story and process to take 3-6 months, with regular updates and scene reviews every other week. And we expect the end result to range from 40-80k words in length. A few of the concepts might be able to be written really tightly into a 25k word single release, but most will have two to three parts. It will be a LOT like a commissioned work, and your only 'guaranteed' payment is the feedback and guidance you get along the way. If it turns out, you might get an invite to the canon team. But even a good story, that is posted as canon, isn't a guarantee that we'll add you to the group.


And I do have a list of a couple people who have expressed interest in doing a G0 story, but I've been holding off until we finalize how we want to work it. For example, Elrod has been doing a lot of G2 support and guidance and mentoring for author candidates... and its taking away time from his writing. So we need to spread out the commitment to mentoring a bit more, but doing so will obviously take time away from writing for anyone who does it... once we decide on a solution, we'll make more announcements about it.