Bronycon Panel Videos Posted

As I've mentioned in the other blogs I've posted on the subject of this year's Bronycon, I was on a pair of writing panels. Videos just went up on the Bronycon YouTube account, so obviously check there for all the others (or D's nice little compilation post for most/all of the fic ones), but here are the two panels of mine as well as a little bit of blathering about how they were.

Warning: I haven't watched the entirety of either of these videos yet, so for all I know, they're messed up like last year's.

Editors, Pre-Readers, Reviewers: Pillars of Support

(a.k.a. the panel with the name that was literally at the character limit)

Description: "No author is an island! From editors, pre-readers, and reviewers, the fanfiction community offers lots of support to its fellow members. Our panel will discuss the benefits that these roles provide for authors and readers, and how you can get involved when you're just starting out."

Compared to the only other panel I've ever been on and many of the ones I've attended, this was a more focused, small-scale affair. You can't tell from the angle the video's taken from, but attendance was low–middling (which we were expecting, this being a new panel about a sub-community's sub-community), though the room was actually the largest possible of the three we could have wound up in. It went well in most every other regard, though (good audience involvement, no technical problems, no notable slip-ups with the material, etc.), and Pav was an excellent host.

The Do's and Don'ts of Fanfiction

(a.k.a. the panel where I always feel like the minnow in the sea of popularity)

Description: "This panel explores the all-important question: what makes a good story? Get straight talk from pony fiction veterans about how tropes can work for you, how to polish a story for release, what to look for when editing, and even how to avoid the temptations of the alicorn OC."

This has historically been the most popular, well-attended fanfic panel of the con, and that was true again. In spite of that, it seems to get simpler to set up each year (he says, with a sample size of only two years of having helped set it up)—this year, we just listed out a bunch of dos and don'ts, and then right before the panel we each selected a do and a don't to talk about for a little while, after which the remaining time was for Q&A. It's a very fun experience for all parties, though, and any wrinkles tend to be smoothed over with the comparative informality.

I'll close out by mentioning where I'm at with my writing. Good news, actually: the next chapter of To Glimpse a Wider World is only a scene or two and some pre-reading away from being released, and it's pretty long as far as my stuff tends to go. On the topic of the newly released Together in Spirit, I've got most of it planned out and have out-of-order bits of it written, but I haven't quite decided on the release structure past the prologue, so I can't say for certain how much of that writing is from the next chapter (definitely not none, though).

PS: I wish you Good Spooktimes.