I thought I'd better get some consensus and semblence of discipline into this venture even before Miller says to me ' Ask me again when I'm drunk, you insect'. The point are so. Who is writing this? Do we limit this or risk anarchy? I realise that this might run contrary to the open policy of this website which makes it so successful? We do need a deciding voice. My vote goes to nascent as he already has it, but he may be setting himself up for a substantial amount of additional worrk. We do need to settle on a specific format.ie are we going for the world's first cyberspace soap? Or is this something we are going to get involved in to flog to someone else? Think carefully about this one. This is a creative first for all its logistical hurdles. The couple who set up Friends Reunited never dreamed that they were in the vanguard of ideas. It was an accident that they came good. Its a lesson to us all on the internet. If we are going to work together we will need a format to communicte swiftly. More to the point we will need a format that will enable us to communicate in private. As a professional writer believe me I cannot tell you how many times I have seen wonderful ideas--often from amatures--filched with no recompense. I have my own ideas so far. Here is what I am working on. STRAP LINE . 'The Village.........It's where bad things happen' We have the opportunity to take this beyond Southpark and Royston Vasey and explore the full unfetterd uncensored power of the internet. We can do anything we want. Here's my pitch CHARACTERS. Lord Nasent. Unseen and aloof Lord of Nascent Manor. Alegedlly an alien whose descendats have ruled the Village as long as anyone can remember. Feared. Miss Jean [ The Widow Day] Gossip and NARRATOR. Annoyingly always righrt. Miss Brook ' Two Sugars Please' Rivers. Fallen film idol, owner of the Village Tea Rooms, sensual siren whose has more knock offs than the postman. Farther Gerard. PC priest who loves everone, the younger the better . Hiding extreme views always triggered by the line 'Tell them, Reverence', which results in an explosive avalanche of violent, venomous vituperative vox against 21 century society. Segt Bagheera. Seedy policeman from Liverpool. Beat up car, village council house, dysfunctional past, possible link with Loyalists, advocate of Law and Disorder, expert on 'theivin' ' and general exponent of what style gurus call 'Toxteth Chic '. Chris. Roving role. Owns Village Post Office and General store. Entrpreneur who's lived abroad. Enemy of Lord Nascent. Any other takers? We still need a Village Idiot. I need your views Bedsit Boys and Girls. Particularly how we take this forward. There is still the distant possibility we could do this ourselves with a pay per hit. I suspect nascent knows what problems this would throw up. Though I am thinking in ten years time when the BBC annnunce ' The creators of The world's first Cybersoap have have sold their site to AOL FOR 100 MILLION!! They are all living in the Bahamas.... a long way from eachother! ' Slainte! |
A lot to think about
Written by brook_rivers (486 comments posted) 7th March 2006 | Right there is a lot to think about here!!
My opinions are that the village has been open to the website and those who are interested in it have already contributed, therefore I think that the writing of the village should now be limited to just those who have already involved themselves: Nascent, Givitsum, Brook, Bagheera, Jean and Gerrard,(i think thats everyone) providing of course that all these people want to be involved in taking the village that step furthur.
I agree that Nascent, as already a creator of the website, has the right to take the deciding voice and of course Gerrard who is setting this project up. Would just like to add though that I am willing to help out with the extra responsibilities ect.
As for communicating privately and swiftly we may aswell all exchange emails for that?
The subject of the cybersoap, as you probably have seen I have been mulling this idea over in the village discussion forum. I think we could of course do the lines and flog it to someone else, but the idea of doing a soap in cyber space I think is more original and would give the village more appeal. On saying this though dont have a great deal of knowledge of what would be involved in either so Im guessing Gerrard and Nascent would be able to shed more light on the more technical aspects? I would probably say try the cyber thing first and if it doesn't hit off we can always find someone gullible to make a mint from!!
On the idea of safeguarding our work I think something should be set down in which we all know where we stand in regards to our share of the gold!!lol.
As for the characters there are obviously more than those mentioned above that have already made an appearance in the village. Also I would'nt neccesarily describe the characters as above, givitsum and I did a character guide type thing in the village discussion forum, and I think the characters and plot line and where we are going with this whole thing needs more clarification anyway.
Will think a bit more on the characters, a few more plots and the cubersoap issue.
Think the Village is doing really well at the moment though, if we all tried to add another scene for Gerrard to take as sampls or whatever to his boss.
Brook x  | My thoughts
Written by givitsum (651 comments posted) 7th March 2006 | Well done gerrard, the subject needed raising. Presently, nobody knows when someone else is gonna post and update. You could spend hours writing something, only to find someone else already posted something that makes yours outdated.
Secondly, I agree that we stick to those that have been bothered to contibute so far. (as mentioned above)
Thirdly, It should be a seperate site to here, where we and we alone have 'log ins' in order to edit and post etc.
This way, I would imagine it could all be copyrighted to the site (us or this chap gerrard's due to meet) and avoid it being nicked. There must be an area we post our ideas for the others to review and comment, prior to being posted to the site proper for viewing by the paying masses.
Regularity? I think once a week to start off, we could increase that once we get the knack. I've never done owt like this before, but I would say before we even start, we should have each persons fate for the next few months mapped out in advance. Maybe nascent (the pro) could alot a storyline to a pair of us to work on between us?
I also reckon is has to be deliberately set in cyberspace, that way the scenario's open to us are infinitive, plus it makes it different to anything else out there. (I would imagine)
PS. I would also like to propose gwynn1970 as the resident idiot. Hello! Earth calling gwynn!!
I heard that, pardon?
X | Thanks
Written by gwynn1970 (109 comments posted) 7th March 2006 | Yes, thanks for writing me in, even if its as the idiot. Sorry Billy & Bob weren't cutting the mustard. I am sure all my doctors will be happy to learn I am recovering and have made a positive impact to society since my recent conviction for mass-murder, and subsequent incarceration here in the lunatic asylum.
Thanks again and good luck with the soap. | A girl after my own heart
Written by givitsum (651 comments posted) 7th March 2006 | | That is very interesting indeed. Any chance of going into a bit more detail, specifically regarding your murders? |
Written by nascent (106 comments posted) 8th March 2006 | Hi all,
First of all I'd like to make it clear that the idea of restricting input in any way on this site does not fit within the ethos of Great Writing. So as has been pointed out, The Village would have to be created somewhere other than Great Writing. You may find that any publisher would consider publication on an open site such as this constitutes previous publication anyway, and may not be interested because of this. So that is a serious matter to consider.
On more general notes:
I'm not sure everyone knows what is meant by the term 'cybersoap', or perhaps everyone has a different idea of what that means.
The idea of a group of people collaborating in writing anything - novel, soap opera isn't new - even the TV soaps are usually written by teams of writers, with different writers taking different storylines, and some published novels are written by two people (a larger group might be harder to manage  )
The idea of individuals or groups writing books or stories set in a common 'world' isn't new either. We've even featured the founder of one group on here: The Road to Okal Rel: An Interview with Lynda Williams
I think what is important (as Brook and others have pointed out in their posts) is that the characters and characterisations, setting and events remain consistent across all the stories.
So far most people have tried to do their own bit of scene setting and that's fine although as can be seen, there are discrepancies slipping in.
Gerard is right in that someone needs to be the 'editor' to pick up on and point out these discrepancies, although I'm not certain I have the time for that. And further to that, I think people need to be prepared to go back and edit their work to bring it into the agreed line.
A lot of where this goes depends on what Gerard has in mind to pitch it as. As I said above, many of these ideas in and of themselves are not new, so I'm not sure what angle you are proposing to get your editor's interest. Nice of you to think it's worth it though
My personal view is that perhaps the interested people should spend some time 'scene setting' and 'guideline setting' to get a consistent approach after which, like in any soap, we can all write short scenes. When you look at the structure of a soap opera, there are very few long dramatic scenes and lots of short scenes which weave in and out of each other following the various storylines. And there's a key point - 'storylines' plural.
So there's plenty of scope within the soap format for people to bring in more 'left field' ideas - eg Bagheera's more magical elements, as long as we know which characters are involved. then people can choose whether or not to use those characters in their storylines.
My 2 cents worth anyway : and if nascent appears, unless I'm to undergo a virtual sex change, it should be 'Lady Nascent' :D
cheers,
n |
Written by nascent (106 comments posted) 8th March 2006 | PS. Athough we don't want to lose your usual contributions to GW, if you want some technical help in setting up different, password-controlled location for the cybersoap (eg a blog or something similar), I'll try to find some time to help.
n |
Written by brook_rivers (486 comments posted) 8th March 2006 | Copyright and security is obviously an issue, as givitsum suggested
i
f gerrard could tell us more about where his boss comes into this, and what angle his propsal is going to take maybe that would help?
Consistency, as I have said before needs addressing and I also agree with nascent that we need to spend some time scene setting and sorting out the storylines, which as nascent said we need to have a few of running at the same time.
The term cybersoap also needs some clarification as everyone seems to have different ideas on what this actaully means!
If the editors job is going begging i would be pleased to fill it as fairly good at picking out the discrepancies, typos ect + have a fair bit of time on my hands at the mo
Thanks to nascent for his offer of helping to set up something and I for one will still carry on using GW!
brook x | Food for thought.
Written by gerardconnolly (1186 comments posted) 8th March 2006 | Thank you nascent for a comprehensive and helpful reply. As I anticipated in posting the above this is far form straightforward.
There have yet to be responses from Jean and Bags but I thought it worth putting my thoughts on the line as I intend mentioning this to Brian Miller on Friday and do not want anyone undre any illusions regarding the hurdles this project poses. Brian has two phrases in his vocabulary You're fired. And, You're fired, you bastard.
Firstly I want to make it clear this project does not belong to me. I am interested in persuing it because I think that it has genuine originality. Collaborations exist; but I am not aware of any internet Soap. Therein is the absolute kernal of any feature the project has. I take on board what nascent says about Lynda Williams. I had never heard of her or her books until now and without wishing to appear overreactive, having looked at her site, material, etc., I think I know why. Quite frankly my heart sank into my boots when I read it. Candidly the whole thing sounds a serious dog's breakfast and leaving aside that it's science fiction/ Lord of the Rings Mark750 along with 750,000 others, and therefore does by definition rules out a significant percentage of the population, this is not a road I am at all interested in travelling. I am however grateful to nascent for pointing out what is in fact a grim reality.
On the positive side I do think the writing team as constituted has real possibilities. Again I am aware as I suggested in my original posting that this website will not lend itself to restriction without becoming something that would rob it of its distinctive appeal. That said it is difficult to write a Soap without any formal discipline. I have workd on Coronation Street and I do know how disciplined professionals are. We all need to consider this and have our own say.
Slainte!
|
Written by jean.day (2387 comments posted) 8th March 2006 | | I've thought about it, and was flattered to be invited in, but I don't think this is my style. Good luck. | APPEAL
Written by brook_rivers (486 comments posted) 9th March 2006 | I agree with gerard that the appeal here is definately that it is proposed to be an INTERNET SOAP. I also think this idea has real possibilites and think we should make a go of it!
brook x | please!
Written by woody44 (777 comments posted) 6th April 2006 | I am one of the worlds foremost comedy writers and an inveterate liar. Could I join this motley crew or am I toooo late...
.. |
Only registered users can rate and write comments.
Please login or register. Powered by AkoComment 2.0! |
Previous item
