ghosted by prospective editor: what next?

[etiennesurlaplage]

hi, I'm relatively new to the publishing side of Literotica, wondering whether there are established protocols for this situation.

I sent a draft of a story to someone who had posted their availability for editing in this forum. they had said they would be happy to edit my story for me. it's been a couple of months now and I've heard nothing back. I've reached out - politely - to find out what's up, a couple of times, and have had no response.

is this something that I would reach out to the Literotica folks for? or does this forum have a mod, or an uber-editor?

I'm worried now about 2 things, 1. the fate of my modest story being 'out there' in the world somewhere; and 2. how to find an editor actually interested/able/willing to put the work in.

any advice? do people have more success posting a request for an editor, describing the piece to be edited, rather than reaching out to people who post their availability?

 

[alohadave]

If the person isn't responding, it's safe to assume that they either don't want to, or can't do the edit.

Your only recourse is to try to find another editor. The site only facilitates matching authors with editors. Once you connect, it's between you and them.

You can look through the list of current active editors here: https://www.literotica.com/my/#/editors/editors This is all the currently registered editors. It's sorted by how recently they've updated their profile. You can message any that look good to you.

 

[KeithD]

I'd name them here. There may be a reason there's a disconnect, which could get cleared up. Otherwise, maintaining communications is a basic need in an author-editor relationship. Others should be called off even starting with this one if they aren't communicating. I assume you sent your story file to them? Without responses from them, it's reasonable to believe they are just stealing your story. There's no reason they should be protected unless they have a very good reason for ghosting you.

 

[neuroparenthetical]

If their name/entry is still up on the 2023 "Available to Edit" thread, then it might be worth contacting the site's owners (much like the FAQ recommends if an editor on the Volunteer Editor board fails to respond,) or the person who started that thread if it's not actually a site owner. Maybe somebody will remove their post. That would be helpful to all the site's authors.

If nothing comes of that, though, then maybe it'd be more helpful than harmful overall to call them out more publicly. It could start a shitstorm, too, but that's an ever-present risk.

After all that... well, start the hunt again. It sucks, but what else can you do?

 

[etiennesurlaplage]

hey, thanks for the feedback!

yeah, I just checked and the profile is gone, from both 'sides' of Literotica. guess I was naive, moved too fast.

but still what an asshole move, eh? I don't know what they've achieved, honestly. Not to knock me'self but it was no work of art. And the interweb time-stamped every step of our interaction, right? so...

I'm not going to dwell on it. Anyone fancy beta-reading a story...?! c. 4300wds - just kidding! - and yet...?

 

[Todger65]

Nobody monitors the volunteer editor list. It is purely up to the individual to update or remove their entry.

The best option is to post a request in this section of the forum. Still no guarantees that there will be interest, or availability.

 

[neuroparenthetical]

Just look me up on the VE board, etienne. I know its interface and limitations peg it at a million years old, but it sends emails directly to me. I don't spend much time on these forums, ironically, so I can't promise I'll see a DM in any kind of timely fashion.

I have enough personal experience to tell you that kenjisato and I will at least reply to your requests, even if we have to say 'no' sometimes due to overstuffed queues. I'm sure there are a couple more people on there who are reliable, too, but I haven't used them often enough to feel confident boosting them.

I'd actually recommend kenjisato over myself if you're looking for proofreading with a minimum of meddling and commentary. If you want somebody to get up in there and go hard, that's more my default mode.

 

[RoperTrace]

hey, thanks for the feedback!

yeah, I just checked and the profile is gone, from both 'sides' of Literotica. guess I was naive, moved too fast.

but still what an asshole move, eh? I don't know what they've achieved, honestly. Not to knock me'self but it was no work of art. And the interweb time-stamped every step of our interaction, right? so...

I'm not going to dwell on it. Anyone fancy beta-reading a story...?! c. 4300wds - just kidding! - and yet...?

Don't rule out the editor getting sick, unexpectedly. A close friend in IRL and a Lit writer, ghosted me when she moved about two hours away. No response to phone calls, texts, emails. I later found out, she had an aggressive case of dementia from her DIL. My very capable editor from the UK, stopped editing when she got engaged to a very traditional man, and she didn't want to share that side of life with her fiance. In her case, she gave me notice prior and then nothing. She also took down one or two stories.

 

[etiennesurlaplage]

Don't rule out the editor getting sick, unexpectedly. A close friend in IRL and a Lit writer, ghosted me when she moved about two hours away. No response to phone calls, texts, emails. I later found out, she had an aggressive case of dementia from her DIL. My very capable editor from the UK, stopped editing when she got engaged to a very traditional man, and she didn't want to share that side of life with her fiance. In her case, she gave me notice prior and then nothing. She also took down one or two stories.

hey, couldn't resist pointing out that this short paragraph of yours contains several germs for potential lit stories... go to it Roper!

 

[PastMaster]

hey, thanks for the feedback!

yeah, I just checked and the profile is gone, from both 'sides' of Literotica. guess I was naive, moved too fast.

but still what an asshole move, eh? I don't know what they've achieved, honestly. Not to knock me'self but it was no work of art. And the interweb time-stamped every step of our interaction, right? so...

I'm not going to dwell on it. Anyone fancy beta-reading a story...?! c. 4300wds - just kidding! - and yet...?

I can heartily reccommend @neuroparenthetical - he's a really good editor. I worked with him on one of my stories and learned so much from him.

I'd definately look him up.

 

[2soon2no]

I'd name them here. There may be a reason there's a disconnect, which could get cleared up. Otherwise, maintaining communications is a basic need in an author-editor relationship. Others should be called off even starting with this one if they aren't communicating. I assume you sent your story file to them? Without responses from them, it's reasonable to believe they are just stealing your story. There's no reason they should be protected unless they have a very good reason for ghosting you.

I wonder, how many Editors read this thread and think that it couldn't be them, but maybe it is me! I lose track of my mail sometimes, especially when they send it from a different account name or a different device, I don't know. My computer lag also can send a message to trash 'oops' if I catch it; bye bye if I don't.

 

[KeithD]

Beats me, but part of the deal in being someone's editor is to have communications set up and to use them.

 

[neuroparenthetical]

I wonder, how many Editors read this thread and think that it couldn't be them, but maybe it is me! I lose track of my mail sometimes, especially when they send it from a different account name or a different device, I don't know. My computer lag also can send a message to trash 'oops' if I catch it; bye bye if I don't.

I'm beginning to suspect that a lot of my response emails are getting flagged as spam. I actually made a post about it.

Once Literotica.com sends its automated, no-reply message to the editor's listed email address, that editor is supposed to send an email from their own address to the email listed in the request form. That's where the problem arises. From the perspective of the writer's listed email address, it's getting a completely unsolicited email from some rando address - and probably from one of the major free email services. That has a decent possibility of being flagged as spam.

I've got 4-5 responses out right now with no reply. It would be pretty bad for my reputation if all of those people thought I flat-out never responded.

 

[alohadave]

From the perspective of the writer's listed email address, it's getting a completely unsolicited email from some rando address - and probably from one of the major free email services.

Messages sent to editors through the system come from Literotica using this email address: Literotica Editor Program <noreply@literotica.com>

The replyto: address is the email of the author as listed in their Literotica account. So the editor's email system may flag Literotica as spam and they never see the initial email, or the editor's response to the author may get flagged as spam by the author's email.

There are multiple places for things to break down.

I've got 4-5 responses out right now with no reply.

Being ghosted by an author after replying is pretty common, even when they initiate the conversation.

 

[2soon2no]

Beats me, but part of the deal in being someone's editor is to have communications set up and to use them.

True dat.

 

[neuroparenthetical]

Messages sent to editors through the system come from Literotica using this email address: Literotica Editor Program <noreply@literotica.com>

The replyto: address is the email of the author as listed in their Literotica account. So the editor's email system may flag Literotica as spam and they never see the initial email, or the editor's response to the author may get flagged as spam by the author's email.

There are multiple places for things to break down.

Well, yes, that is theoretically true, but I'm speaking as an editor who's got everything set up on my end to not flag Lit's emails as spam coming into my dedicated editing email account. That's something that's fairly easy for any editor to do, because it's a single email address that can be whitelisted.

It's a lot harder for the author, in turn. They have no idea what email address the editor is going to use to contact them.

 

[Jay626]

I sent out a dozen requests for the volunteer editors' board. Only 3 people replied and then rest sent nothing. It is extremely hard to find an editor and to those who reply and edit, you keep this site running.

 

[RoperTrace]

I sent out a dozen requests for the volunteer editors' board. Only 3 people replied and then rest sent nothing. It is extremely hard to find an editor and to those who reply and edit, you keep this site running.

I'm curious if you give them an idea of story type, est. number of words, just proofreading, or grammar and sentence structure needed? I've only edited roughly three stories and it's a ton of work depending on the writer's ability. I'm sure my old editor thought the same with me, as she suggested several rewrites of some of my sentences.

 

[Jay626]

Simple Grammer and spelling was all i needed. I had a couple say they were unable and that was fine as they at least responded. Some have it listed to the amount of words and I didn't bother them. It's the ones that had the preferences match mine that I contacted. There are too many editors I did see that only wanted 1-3 types of stories they wanted to edit.