Looking to the Future

I write stuff and am fortunate enough to be able to post it to LSF. It is my only publisher.
I am 70 years old and am beginning to consider my “legacy”. Put simply, I would like to think that after I am dead there will still be readers exciting themselves with my words. As it stands at present that will only happen while LSF survives me in something like its present form, because readers can’t download copies of my work from LSF, so, unlike the real books of old, there won’t be copies turning up in antiquarian bookshops for keen collectors to find. If readers could download stories they might, just might, preserve them or post them elsewhere.
I am not the oldest contributor to LSF and I suspect that others also wish for a link into the future.
If someone said to me that eg www.redbum.com (made up URL) was asking writers to upload their stories to it so that they could be made available for free download by anyone, I would be very interested. By the way-- Redbum.com is available for purchase, not from me, at $4,630!
Does anyone know any repository like that or have any better idea of how to project our words into the future?

Geoffrey Stirling

Geoffrey,

You raise an interesting point. One never knows how one will be remembered. However, your issue is not necessarily confined to our particular genre. In my career, I published my share of articles and three books. Most of these have already turned to dust. People forgot my name ten minutes after I retired. Unless you achieve great fame, that's the way the world works. I just know some day I'm going to browse the shelves of a second-hand bookstore and see one of my books on sale for fifty cents (or less). Bottom line: Don't worry about your legacy - it will take care of itself - just enjoy what you're doing while you can still do it.

What is really amazing is that some books have survived for several thousand years.

I found this post intriguing because it raises the question: Who exactly are you writing for? Are you writing for your audience or for yourself? It is not clear to me which is more important. For me, whether my stories are good or bad from the audience's perspective, I REALLY enjoy the writing process and pour my heart and soul into each story as I write. But I am also pleased when the audience appreciates the result, feeling a self-satisfied glow that I have done a good job according to my peers.

As for a legacy for when I am gone, I am not sure I care that much. After all, I'll be dead!

My daughter is an archivist and her profession is struggles with this all the time, particularly in the realm of digital archives. The problem is, as Often has hinted at is that paper, despite its apparent fragility can last a very long time (modern acidic paperback book paper stock notwithstanding).

It's probably easier to read the Magna Carta than a floppy disc nowadays.

My thought exactly - at least half of the time. In addition to posting on the LSF, I also put my stories out where people can steal them. And hope they do.

Forty years ago I wanted to know about writing a 'booklet' and it might be funny but back then one copy of each print on paper regardless of content went to a federal German archive.

No idea how it is nowadays and neither for English.

What I found funny back then was that they went to all the trouble to archive German language novels etc. but they didn't think that German had any point in EU correspondence. I guess we got 100 million native German speakers. The number of native Spanish, French, Italian and English speakers for sure is smaller. After the Brexit the only native English speakers in the EU are the Irish. Native Spanish in the EU not sure, but I guess no other language exceeds 60 million people. But German is lucky to make it into the small print.

Well about electronic archives, there are archives that archive old sites. If its published somewhere on the internet, there is a good chance that there is a copy somewhere. Since the library is only open to members the chances that there is a copy somewhere are slim though. Since spanking is a niche and considered kinky and some people consider even it forbidden chances don't improve.

* * *

Are we trying the Microsoft approach?

I once read an article saying when the made DOS or the first Windows they couldn't get a stand at an important fair.

Bad luck.

In response they rented all the pillows of the hotels. Nobody saw Microsoft but everyone slept with Microsoft. ;)

Talk about marketing.

I just used spell check, it gave me the option to replace the unknown(?) word LSF with the worrd LSD. Do I have to assume we are all drug addicts now?

Once again I went off topic, I meant their Office approach:

Don't fight students copying and using it. They will later make important decisions. In other words they will influence their companies to buy MS Office to be used in the company.

This is a very interesting topic. Over the years I couldn't begin to tell you how many times that I have said to myself "I wish I had saved that story before it disappeared"

I just looked at my data and all of my stories over the last 16 years have amassed just shy of a million views combined. But this thread has made me think, what if something happens to me? Everything will disappear and unless someone has cut and pasted my work then it is gone for good. I can't speak for anyone else, but I write stories for people to read them whenever they want.

This has made me reevaluate things a little bit. Perhaps I should make all stories into PDF's so that people can download them all and keep them.

I had (and still have) a PDF that I uploaded to a site for people with similar interests. The site closed after a year or two.

My computer's hard drive packed up and had to be replaced. All the half-written stories, ideas for stories, and related things (such as lists of reasons for spanking/accepting a spanking and alternate terms for bottom) were lost, and I no longer have copies of the stories I posted to the Library.

It's frustrating when I think of looking something up, and realise that it now only exists in my memory!

I'd like to think my stories were still out there, being enjoyed in years or decades to come, even if no-one knew they were mine!