Help! How do you track Litopia submissions you have commented upon?

[Peyton Stafford]

I am new to Litopia, so the answer to my question may be obvious to everyone but me. Apologies in advance. I like the people on Litopia and want to do my best to help them with their writing, but I am spectacularly bad at organizing anything. This brings to mind questions about the process of submitting, critiquing and commenting, and responding. Any help will be gratefully welcomed.

1. Is it necessary to follow and track submissions in which I have shown an interest? Do I need to save them on my computer or in the cloud? How do I organize them?
2. If not, then why not?
3. If so, then how?

 

[CageSage]

Um, I can only say what I do, from both directions.
A - creating a 'for critique' thread:
1. when I submit a piece for critique, I collate the responses and thank or converse with the responders. I assume they have no great interest in keeping my draft docs, and delete them after a while.
2. when I've redrafted the piece, I [most often] delete the thread. Saves space in the colony.
3. if I haven't deleted it, and someone comments, I'll respond to the comment, wait a few days, and then delete the thread. I still welcome the comment, though, because every fresh set of eyes sees the the story from their unique perspective, and it may be just that one I want to use.

B - commenting on a submission by someone else
1. open, save to my downloads folder. If it's a long piece, I may convert it to read on an eReader to make it easy on myself.
2. I make comments, if I feel I can offer something.
3. I delete all the docs [easy to find, they're on the download directory, which gets cleaned each week [automatically], files [if I've converted the doc], and eReader copies [permanent delete, or I'll run out of space and won't have room for other books].

That's what I do - does anyone do different?

 

[izi 出久]

@cagepretty much the same, except I have a designated folder that I regularly delete completed critiques from, which I created when I was doing a beta read and didn't want to search for a document further down in the downloads folder.

I also have a designated folder for the feedback people give me.

 

[RK Wallis]

1. Is it necessary to follow and track submissions in which I have shown an interest? Do I need to save them on my computer or in the cloud? How do I organize them?

When I offer to read for someone, I download their work to a folder on my computer I've created called "Not my writing" which I work from.
Because I've commented on their thread in the colony, Litopian settings automatically follow their thread for me. If I feel I can't contribute anything helpful, at any stage, up top right is the "unwatch" button.

Does that answer your next 2 questions too?

 

[Hannah F]

I do pretty much the same. Once I've used or ditched other people's feedback on my work, I ditch the files so I just have my own drafts. When critiquing someone else's work, I delete it from my computer as soon as I've sent it to them. It is very important not to keep anyone else's unpublished intellectual property.

 

[MattScho]

Um, I can only say what I do, from both directions.
A - creating a 'for critique' thread:

IMO, in either way, this is an essential step. Labeling matter. A lot of us will post a first chapter that on our computer is called Chapter 1. we all have this file, in some form. When Litopians post something with what they've been using, Chapter One and we download it, it gets lost in all the Chapter One files we have (it's a lot on my desktop, and yes, desktop because I'm not as organized as Rachel). If they have done this, I try to add something specific to identify what it is, Chapter One, writer's name, my initials, and the word comments or edit or beta, whatever it is.
If they've labled it as a for critique file (which is really excellent) I always try to remember to add my initials before returning it because they're going to get the same file name back several times, so it's different.
Hannah makes an excellent point on getting rid of the intellectual property of others. I'm off to make sure I've done that.

 

[Peyton Stafford]

When I offer to read for someone, I download their work to a folder on my computer I've created called "Not my writing" which I work from.
Because I've commented on their thread in the colony, Litopian settings automatically follow their thread for me. If I feel I can't contribute anything helpful, at any stage, up top right is the "unwatch" button.

Does that answer your next 2 questions too?

Yes, and thank you. Hoping you and your family are feeling better.