Tomorrow’s Pop-Ups will be the last in the present format. It’s been a surprisingly successful experiment in every way. Viewing number ranges (quite unpredictably) from a few hundred to a few thousand. More importantly, I’ve had very positive feedback from many writers, saying how useful they’ve found it. And from my own point of view, I’ve found the chatroom to be a wondrous resource: it’s actually helped me formulate opinions, work out positioning, and conduct realtime research that has often stunned me. Plus, they are a garden of scatological temptations 
Thank you, everyone, who has taken part.
The only drawbacks have been time – it can take 45 mins or more to talk through a submission, meaning that our early shows were running close to, sometimes exceeding, an exhausting three hours. And backlog. The most I can manage at this length is about six submissions per week, so the window is closed more often than it’s open.
As I’ve already outlined to chatroomers (Copacabanistas?) I think now is a good time to bifurcate. To refine the best elements we’ve discovered, while addressing the two issues mentioned above. Here’s my solution.
Our first show will run for three weeks in the month. Submissions will be open to all Litopians and the general public. But they will consist only of the title, the first page (500 words) and the blurb. We will aim to move quickly from one submission to the next, i.e. to cover a good number in each show. As a special feature, I’d like to invite a guest publisher to evaluate submissions along with me. Anything that catches the publisher's eye, or mine, will be called in for a full submission. It should be quite entertaining, but also a pretty good laboratory for writers.. just think - you could conceive a project, write the first few pages, and then get an early reaction to it! Could save you months of work. And if the reaction were positive, how motivational that would be for you to get the thing written!
The other show will be once a month, on the Sunday when the above one doesn’t run. It will be restricted just to Litopians, and will not be visible to outsiders. It will be more similar to what we’re doing at the moment, more in-depth, able to take more time, and give more consideration to a more mature piece of work.
How does that sounds, Litopians?
Now for the hard bit. I think we’ll keep the name POP-UP SUBMISSIONS for the first show. The second one, though – just for Litopians – doesn’t yet have a name. Some were suggested in the chatroom, and they appear above in the poll. Please vote accordingly… or make your own suggestion below...
Thank you, everyone, who has taken part.The only drawbacks have been time – it can take 45 mins or more to talk through a submission, meaning that our early shows were running close to, sometimes exceeding, an exhausting three hours. And backlog. The most I can manage at this length is about six submissions per week, so the window is closed more often than it’s open.
As I’ve already outlined to chatroomers (Copacabanistas?) I think now is a good time to bifurcate. To refine the best elements we’ve discovered, while addressing the two issues mentioned above. Here’s my solution.
Our first show will run for three weeks in the month. Submissions will be open to all Litopians and the general public. But they will consist only of the title, the first page (500 words) and the blurb. We will aim to move quickly from one submission to the next, i.e. to cover a good number in each show. As a special feature, I’d like to invite a guest publisher to evaluate submissions along with me. Anything that catches the publisher's eye, or mine, will be called in for a full submission. It should be quite entertaining, but also a pretty good laboratory for writers.. just think - you could conceive a project, write the first few pages, and then get an early reaction to it! Could save you months of work. And if the reaction were positive, how motivational that would be for you to get the thing written!
The other show will be once a month, on the Sunday when the above one doesn’t run. It will be restricted just to Litopians, and will not be visible to outsiders. It will be more similar to what we’re doing at the moment, more in-depth, able to take more time, and give more consideration to a more mature piece of work.
How does that sounds, Litopians?
Now for the hard bit. I think we’ll keep the name POP-UP SUBMISSIONS for the first show. The second one, though – just for Litopians – doesn’t yet have a name. Some were suggested in the chatroom, and they appear above in the poll. Please vote accordingly… or make your own suggestion below...
