Writing.com

Writing.com is a massive website dedicated to providing a encouraging environment for aspiring writers and hosts everything from short stories, to poetry, to interactive fiction. Needless to say, it is one of the best places on the web to find something to read, or if you feel up to it, someplace to write.


 * Author Existence Failure: If this somehow happens, the author's portfolio is turned white with a 'picture' of a feather in honor of their memory.
 * Doorstopper: Many interactive stories goes on for hundreds or thousands of chapters in less than a few months, some other stories aren't so lucky...
 * Bragging Rights Reward: Awards that cost huge amounts of gift points.
 * Bribing Your Way to Victory: GP (Gift points, which are like currency.) are easy to gain by doing reviews, adding to certain stories, logging in daily and, of course, being given them as a gift. However, you'll rarely get more than 100-1000 at a time this way. For $10 you can buy 100,000 GP at the store which will allow you to do a lot more a lot quicker than by simply participating with a free account.
 * Also noteworthy is the ten item limit for free users. Once you hit ten you can't add any more work until you delete or transfer your old stuff to someone else (at the cost of 1000 GP). Of course, people who pay for a membership get much more room for their items.
 * Color Coded for Your Convenience: Gray portfolio icons for non-authors, black for authors, yellow for preferred authors, blue for moderators, purple for senior moderators, red for staff, and white for members who have passed away.
 * Content Warnings: The website mentions that even though the site uses a 'rating system', it's up to the authors themselves to decide the rating of their works. Needless to say, not everyone thinks a violent pornographic story is only for grown ups and give their own story an 'all-ages' (E) rating.
 * Cosmetic Award: Merit badges, awardicons, and trophies.
 * Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Is there any writing on this site? Why yes, yes there is!
 * Also, several of the pornographic interactives are, eh, quite... blunt with what the viewer will be reading about...
 * Orphaned Series: Whether it's due to Author Existence Failure- or the writer in question simply 'losing interest' in writing, this sadly happens often- if the story has only a 'few chapters' it's also a factor.
 * Product Placement: In addition to the various ads that appear for people without a paid membership there are several people who do this with their own stories. There are even interactives that are based around Walmart and McDonald's that have been around for years and have hundreds of chapters.
 * Rule 34: Oh yes. Though it's properly labeled (and rated) "Erotica."
 * Shout-Out: Countless authors include these... sometimes way too many.
 * Shameless Self Promotion: A lot of authors do this to their stories, causing a backlog of old stories popping out of nowhere.
 * This is actively encourage to an extent by the website itself. Every time you make a contribution to something an icon leading to your own portfolio is included. The more you add to other people's stuff the more people will check out what you've got.
 * Wall of Text: This happens a lot, but most authors (thankfully) know how to properly space out paragraphs.
 * Zombie Apocalypse: A popular theme in the interactive stories section. The are dozens of these (maybe hundreds or even thousands) of varying quality. Some authors put a lot of effort into the story and establish a coherent universe while others put the reader into the role of a mindless zombie slaying action hero. There are also a ton of fanfiction interactives that center around zombie games like Left 4 Dead or Dead Rising.