There are hundreds, if not thousands of writing forums on the Internet. Some charge for membership, others don't.
It's the ones that charge I'd like to warn people about. Whilst there have been some good writing forums that charge for membership, such as Write Words, there are also a lot of shysters out there. Be very careful when parting with your money. What exactly are you getting for you annual fee?
Is the person running it a recognised expert in the writing field? Or just someone who thought 'hey, I'll run a writing site and make money from gullible writers?' Before you part with money, google them. Check their credentials. Check what other sites they've owned. Check if others have heard of them, and what's been said.
Be careful of sites that lead to sites that lead to sites. What I mean is a labyrinth of defunct forums and websites that lead to each other, all ending in the one that's now asking you to pay a fee to join. Google the owner of the site. If the google search turns up a dozen people on the first page who are nothing to do with the person you're googling, ask yourself why. Because that writing expert charging you for services should be near the top of that list, and most importantly listed as a writer. You should be able to find their work or details of it online (and not just on sites they've owned, by the way, but independent sites not connected with them). The Who Is database is an excellent resource for finding out who really owns a website.
If the owner of the site doesn't have a list of writing credits as long as your arm, or haven't appeared on other forums etc, then ask yourself why. Where have they come from? What do they hope to achieve by charging for writing services? What qualifications do they have for offering writing services? Are they published themselves? Does their name turn up in magazines, either as fiction or article writers? Or as novelists published by recognised publishers? Are their only contributions to the writing world books on writing that they sell for inflated prices? If they tick one or more of those boxes, then beware before you part with any money. Anyone charging for advice on writing fiction, articles or novels should be heavily involved in those activities, with credits to their name.
If what they offer on their forums is 'exclusive' access to news about writing markets and comps etc, ask yourself whether you can just as easily find these for free elsewhere on the net. The answer is invariably yes, you can. My writing calendar is completely free to use. You don't have to sign up to anything, and you don't even have to have anything to do with me if you don't want to. I also try to be very careful what comps I list on there, having my own selection criteria for those I post. I get it wrong sometimes, and rely on you good people to alert me to the bad comps, which happens occasionally. But for the most part, the comps I list are kosher. There are also other free writing comp listings out there, most of which I link to from my website.
As for markets, there are loads of free to use places you can find for writing markets. Womagwriter is devoted to ... well ... womag writing. http://www.duotrope.com/ lists lots of ezine and print markets for free. Ralan.com does the same for speculative fiction markets. The Writers & Artists Yearbook whilst costing money, is another good resource for market listings which you can then google for more up to date news.
But other, free to join, writing forums are good too. Writers, for the most part, are very generous about sharing market news for free, which begs the question of why anyone would need to pay for the same information. So there's never any need to pay for any 'exclusive' content. In the writing world there is no such thing as exclusive content relating to comps, markets, publishers. It's all out there in the public domain.
As for writing advice, good God, the Internet is full of it. Admittedly a lot of it is absolute tosh and too obsessed with the 'rules', but there are some helpful bits amongst the dross. You won't find anything about, for example, show not tell, on a paid for writing forum that you won't find on any number of other forums, blogs and writing sites.
If the idea of charging is just to keep the forum private and free from trolls, then you could easily do that yourself with some trusted friends and simply don't give out the address to anyone other than the people whom you invite to join you. There are free forums all over the place, and they cost nothing to run. Even if someone buys a domain name for it, it's not expensive. The domain name for this blog costs me about £7 every two years. Certainly not enough to justify charging you all £20 odd pounds per month/quarter/year to read it.
Be savvy folks. When you're a writer money is supposed to flow in your direction, not away from it. There's nothing wrong with paying for decent writing courses, such as the OU and places like Arvon and Caearleon provide. There's nothing wrong in paying to attend a workshop run by someone like Della Galton or Kate Walker. What is unwise is to pay to join a forum run by someone whose own writing credentials are murky to say the least. What's more, whilst paying for a course or workshop will help your writing, paying to join a writing forum won't. Not when you can get the same support and information for free in so many other places.
All you have to ask yourself when faced with a forum or site that asks for a membership fee is: Can I get all this for free elsewhere? The answer is nearly always yes.
It's the ones that charge I'd like to warn people about. Whilst there have been some good writing forums that charge for membership, such as Write Words, there are also a lot of shysters out there. Be very careful when parting with your money. What exactly are you getting for you annual fee?
Is the person running it a recognised expert in the writing field? Or just someone who thought 'hey, I'll run a writing site and make money from gullible writers?' Before you part with money, google them. Check their credentials. Check what other sites they've owned. Check if others have heard of them, and what's been said.
Be careful of sites that lead to sites that lead to sites. What I mean is a labyrinth of defunct forums and websites that lead to each other, all ending in the one that's now asking you to pay a fee to join. Google the owner of the site. If the google search turns up a dozen people on the first page who are nothing to do with the person you're googling, ask yourself why. Because that writing expert charging you for services should be near the top of that list, and most importantly listed as a writer. You should be able to find their work or details of it online (and not just on sites they've owned, by the way, but independent sites not connected with them). The Who Is database is an excellent resource for finding out who really owns a website.
If the owner of the site doesn't have a list of writing credits as long as your arm, or haven't appeared on other forums etc, then ask yourself why. Where have they come from? What do they hope to achieve by charging for writing services? What qualifications do they have for offering writing services? Are they published themselves? Does their name turn up in magazines, either as fiction or article writers? Or as novelists published by recognised publishers? Are their only contributions to the writing world books on writing that they sell for inflated prices? If they tick one or more of those boxes, then beware before you part with any money. Anyone charging for advice on writing fiction, articles or novels should be heavily involved in those activities, with credits to their name.
If what they offer on their forums is 'exclusive' access to news about writing markets and comps etc, ask yourself whether you can just as easily find these for free elsewhere on the net. The answer is invariably yes, you can. My writing calendar is completely free to use. You don't have to sign up to anything, and you don't even have to have anything to do with me if you don't want to. I also try to be very careful what comps I list on there, having my own selection criteria for those I post. I get it wrong sometimes, and rely on you good people to alert me to the bad comps, which happens occasionally. But for the most part, the comps I list are kosher. There are also other free writing comp listings out there, most of which I link to from my website.
As for markets, there are loads of free to use places you can find for writing markets. Womagwriter is devoted to ... well ... womag writing. http://www.duotrope.com/ lists lots of ezine and print markets for free. Ralan.com does the same for speculative fiction markets. The Writers & Artists Yearbook whilst costing money, is another good resource for market listings which you can then google for more up to date news.
But other, free to join, writing forums are good too. Writers, for the most part, are very generous about sharing market news for free, which begs the question of why anyone would need to pay for the same information. So there's never any need to pay for any 'exclusive' content. In the writing world there is no such thing as exclusive content relating to comps, markets, publishers. It's all out there in the public domain.
As for writing advice, good God, the Internet is full of it. Admittedly a lot of it is absolute tosh and too obsessed with the 'rules', but there are some helpful bits amongst the dross. You won't find anything about, for example, show not tell, on a paid for writing forum that you won't find on any number of other forums, blogs and writing sites.
If the idea of charging is just to keep the forum private and free from trolls, then you could easily do that yourself with some trusted friends and simply don't give out the address to anyone other than the people whom you invite to join you. There are free forums all over the place, and they cost nothing to run. Even if someone buys a domain name for it, it's not expensive. The domain name for this blog costs me about £7 every two years. Certainly not enough to justify charging you all £20 odd pounds per month/quarter/year to read it.
Be savvy folks. When you're a writer money is supposed to flow in your direction, not away from it. There's nothing wrong with paying for decent writing courses, such as the OU and places like Arvon and Caearleon provide. There's nothing wrong in paying to attend a workshop run by someone like Della Galton or Kate Walker. What is unwise is to pay to join a forum run by someone whose own writing credentials are murky to say the least. What's more, whilst paying for a course or workshop will help your writing, paying to join a writing forum won't. Not when you can get the same support and information for free in so many other places.
All you have to ask yourself when faced with a forum or site that asks for a membership fee is: Can I get all this for free elsewhere? The answer is nearly always yes.