Updates for Scrittura Writers
The voice of the prose poem is getting louder
By now, unless you’ve been taking a complete holiday from Medium for the past three months, you’ve probably heard or read something about recent changes to Medium. Many articles are flying about, either directly lamenting the changes — with some big-name writers threatening (or actually) leaving the platform — or articles complaining about steep drops in views and earnings because of the changes.
The new updates have created significant differences to how stories are categorized, distributed and displayed on Medium — namely that the former 100 or so Topic Pages have now been replaced by millions (literally) of Tag Pages, and what’s displayed on these pages has also changed.
I’m currently writing a broader article discussing the changes — but this post focuses on changes relevant to Scrittura and our writers — and accordingly, some updates we’re making to submission processes.
Seated on my metaphorical meditation cushion, my new mantra is: Accept the change / Embrace the change. And as I telekinetically type this with the sheer power of my serenity and sagacity, I’ve decided to focus on the benefits, dear Scrittura writers. I’ve been researching and watching the Tag pages for months now, and will also be sharing some tips to increase visibility for your work — so pull out your sticky notes!
A Warm Welcome to New Writers
In October, we opened up applications to new writers — and have received a number of applications. JD is pretty particular, so congratulations if you made it through! We’re enjoying the fresh energy this has brought to Scrittura and we’d like to welcome the following new writers (apologies if we’ve missed any of you):Penny Grubb Aisha Manapova Eleanore Christine Alicia Lee Colasurdo and Cassandra Armstrong.
As some of you are new to Medium, please keep reading — I’ll be outlining some changes for submission processes and tips for tagging your stories.
Introducing the New Prose Poem Tag Page
For the many writers here who write prose poems, you may have previously noticed that curated prose poems were mostly absorbed into the Poetry Topics page — amongst the thousands of verse poems published daily across Medium. Medium didn’t recognize the prose poem as a separate (albeit related) genre.
Well now, the prose poem has its very own separate Prose Poem Tag Page — finally distinguishing it from other types of poetry. The voice of the prose poem on Medium just got louder.
You can now follow individual tag pages — and we strongly suggest that if you write prose poems and /or enjoy reading them, please follow the prose poem Tag Page. In addition to registering the prose poem as one of your interests, this will, over time, increase the genre’s visibility — and your work in the genre. Below is a screen shot I took when I began drafting this article — of the then-current Prose Poem Tag Page (as @ 15/11/21).
Of the Top 10 prose poem writers — we have our resident god of prose poems J.D. Harms at Number #1, Melissa Coffey at #3 (feels weird tagging myself here, but I digress), Danielle Loewen at # 4 and Jenine Bsharah Baines at #5 — all listed on the front page. (At the date of this post, the Top 4 positions are still the same.)
Click on the “see more” underneath and it opens the list of Top Ten Writers in the prose poem genre. The remaining 5 “Top Ten” positions are all currrently Scrittura writers — Paroma Sen(#6) Ann Marie Steele (#7 ) Terry Barr (#8) Jeff Langley(#9) and Dennett (#10).
That’s 9 out of the top 10 prose poem writers on Medium (currently at 1.6K writers if the figures are accurate) who are Scrittura writers and/or editors. Let that radiant glow of success sink in, folks.
We are officially rocking the prose-poem genre. Keep up the brilliant work everyone! I know some of you also have your own pubs and /or contribute prose poems to other pubs, so we can’t claim you all for ourselves — but thanks for contributing excellent work to Scrittura.
Features of The New Tag Pages
Like the former Topics Pages, the Top Writers list is updated daily. Thanks Medium, for letting none of us to rest on our laurels for even a day. The newsfeeds on the new Tag Pages are divided into three categories: “Trending”, “Latest” and “Best”. Of the top 15 in “Trending” on this day — 7 are prose poems in Scrittura. The first two categories change daily — so it’s interesting to watch it over a period of time.
We’re also rocking the “Best” List — featuring JD, myself, Paroma, Danielle, Anne Marie, Dennett and others — go check it out and support your fellow prose-poem enthusiasts. This list changes more slowly. I was shocked to see nine of mine in the “Best” List today. Numerous stellar examples of JD’s work are also always there.
One significant change is that these pages no longer solely feature curated work — this arguably levels out the playing field, giving potential exposure to all. Additionally, the Tagging system has become user-directed, rather than algorithm or system-centred. This points to the importance of savvy tagging for your stories — hence some changes we’re making to mandatory tags for Scrittura submissions.
Another difference is the newly created Tag Pages only list the Top Ten Writers and “Top Writers” on these new Tag Pages don’t yet come with “Top Writer” badges automatically awarded to your profile. So hey, if you’re a prose poem Top Writer — welcome to the secret club. Perhaps we should develop a secret handshake or greeting code-word …
For more information about finding the new Tag Pages, “secret” Top Writers, I’ve written a more detailed article here.
Updates to Scrittura’s Submission Processes
These changes led to a decision to review our mandatory tagging for submissions. I’m finding I often have to correct tags on submissions — so taking note of these changes will make processing submissions a little faster. Please review and bookmark this article for future reference.
- Prompt Responses: Regardless of genre, prompt responses MUST be tagged Prompt. The older tag system, which separated our Wednesday and Saturday prompt responses, is no longer applicable.
- Prose Poems: If you are submitting a prose poem (as a prompt response or otherwise), a new mandatory tag for Scrittura submissions is now: Prose Poem. This ensures it shows up on the relevant Tab Menu in Scrittura — Prose Poetry.
- Poetry: If you are submitting poetry of any kind, please tag it Poetry. Once again, this ensures it displays in Scrittura’s Poetry Tab.
- Prose: All articles and other stories that are neither poetry or prose poems must be Tagged Prose. This allows it to display under our Fiction & Articles Tab Menu in Scrittura.
In addition, the updated tagging system for your submissions ideally (please note we aren’t responsible for observed glitches in Medium’s system) directs your stories to to the relevant Tag Pages — Prose Poem, Poetry & Prose (yes , there’s a Tag Page for that now too). So, this should increase both visibility for your work and visibility for Scrittura as a pub — after all the more Followers we attract, the more eyes on your work!
Optional Tags
We understand the prose poem as a hybrid genre. So, if you feel you’ve written a particularly poetic prose poem, or one that has a strong narrative thread that leans into fiction, then by all means, please give your submission relevant extra tags. In the past, Medium has curated some of my prose poems into both Fiction and Poetry, for example.
Remember what I said earlier about tags now being user-directed? I’ve had this confirmed from Medium Support. So, other useful tags for your submissions could be subject or theme-related, such as: Family, Dreams, Feminism, or Grief. For example my recent prose poem Wild Imprints was displaying on the Nature, Mythology and Love Tag Pages — just as I had tagged. So (theoretically) the more pages your story shows up on, the more potential views.
All the Tags I mention here have official Tag Pages. So you can confidently use them on your stories.
In Other Prose Poem News …
JD and I have been plotting some exciting new events and features for Scrittura. I’m thrilled to announce I’m planning a series of monthly writing craft articles on the prose poem. I’m passionate about the how of creating, so each will feature a couple of Scrittura writers, snippets and an analysis of their work. Each writer will be asked to discuss some aspects of their creative processes. The intent is to really generate dialogue about creative process around writing in this genre between writers — to share ideas and learn from each other. I’ll be reaching out to regular, outstanding Scrittura contributors who are also engaged members of our writing community to feature — so watch this space.
An Exciting, Evolving Genre to be Writing In
All of our efforts together to highlight the prose-poem as a worthy literary and poetic genre have undoubtedly contributed to an official prose poem Tag Page being created. So, please follow it and drop by there occasionally for inspiration — perhaps outside the usual people you read.
Special acknowledgement must go to our endlessly inspired and inspiring pub owner & Prompt Creator J.D. Harms for consistently dreaming up hundreds of prompts and prose poems over the last two years.
Relevant Links
Medium article announcing the discussed changes
Follow the Prose Poem Tag Page
Follow the Poetry Tag Page
Follow the Prose Tag Page
Please ensure you are Following Scrittura & the editors — J.D. Harms Melissa Coffey & Zay Pareltheon—as you really don’t want to miss out on what’s happening here!
More Announcements, More Excitement:
More on the new Tag Pages & “secret” Top Writers:
