Friday, July 2, 2010

15-Year-Old Writer Counts 6.5 Millions Reads

That is the title of a Galley Cat article published today. Needless to say, I had to read the article and I HAD to share. I saw it in an email I receive daily from mediabistro.com. Apparently there is a 15 year-old girl in London sharing her fiction work on a site called Wattpad who's logged 6.5 million reads. Her name is Abigail Gibbs and she has 4,638 fans as of a minute ago when I looked. It seems she is posting a chapter at a time and her fans are snapping it up.

I say, "You go girl!"

But, I have several questions, and here's where my newbie-ness (i.e. ignorance) is showing.

1) Does Abigail get paid for these reads? I clicked on her work and accessed it for free so I think that answer would be NO.

2) If not, can she ever make any money on this work now that she is self-published on a free site? I mean, would a publisher pick up a work like this?

It seems counter-intuitive. But that's just me. Can you guys enlighten me?

Thanks for helping a sister out! Olivia

8 comments:

Nicole said...

its a tricky situation. kind of in the same box as fan fiction. But Agents love it if you have a 'name' so she's doing that for herself :)

Olivia J. Herrell, writing as O.J. Barré said...

Thanks, Nicole. That's kinda what I thought. Sigh. Love your blog!

~Olivia

Jemi Fraser said...

I agree - she's sure going to have a name for herself when she does try to sell - agents & publishers will be excited about those numbers! :)

dolorah said...

Yeah; I would agree that if she has a fan base that large, as long as her "next thing" never shows on the blog, she'd probably be scooped up by an agent because she has proven marketability.

........dhole

VR Barkowski said...

Kudos to Abigail! Wish I'd had that kind of determination at fifteen. (Wish I'd had the Internet at fifteen. lol)

I agree with the consensus. She's building a brand and an audience, which is good. But publishing is a fickle business. Hope she intends to take advantage of all this attention now. It's unlikely by the time she finishes school agents will still be clamoring.

Olivia J. Herrell, writing as O.J. Barré said...

Am I write about her not being able to sell the one she is currently posting/self-publishing?

stu said...

Publishing it online counts as publishing it, so it would only be accepted by anyone doing reprints if she has really published the entire thing rather than the odd excerpt. I suppose there is a chance that someone might agree to put out a print version on the basis that a percentage of the existing audience would want the whole thing in one papery block, but the odds seem low. This strikes me as being more about the next book.

Olivia J. Herrell, writing as O.J. Barré said...

Thanks, Stu, for clarifying that for me!

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