Link Sharing Guidelines

[NoCa]

Hello everyone,

I am a freelance author and narrative designer currently working on a number of visual novels and interactive games. As part of my creative process, I often write fully developed stories that serve as the foundation for these games. I would very much like to begin sharing some of my best written work here on Literotica—both to reach a wider audience and to benefit from the feedback and engagement this platform is known for.

Naturally, I wish to do so in full accordance with Literotica’s community rules and guidelines. I understand that content promotion and external linking are sensitive matters, and I want to ensure I proceed appropriately and respectfully.

I have browsed the FAQ but, being not particularly tech-savvy, I was not able to find conclusive information on my doubts.
Specifically, I would like to know:

1. Is it permissible to include links to related projects (e.g., Steam store pages, Patreon/SubscribeStar accounts) in the story description, author’s note, or comments, provided they are relevant to the story and not intrusive? (My idea was originally to post this at the end of a story, as a authors note and a call to action.)
2. If so, what is the best practice or format for doing so in a way that complies with site policies?
3. Are there any additional steps or approvals I should seek before including such references?

My intent is to contribute meaningfully to the community, not to advertise inappropriately. I am more than happy to limit external links to forum posts or author profile pages if that is preferred.

Thank you upfront

 

[Erozetta]

1. No. More specifically - if it's off-site, definitely no. On site, to another story posted on Lit or a forum thread or the like? Yes. But links to outside sites aren't allowed in forum posts outside of signatures, either.


But you can include them in your profile and might get away with a "See my profile for more about me and my work" note. Maybe.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

But you can include them in your profile and might get away with a "See my profile for more about me and my work" note. Maybe.

Risky.

Doing so might be construed as an attempt to "tease" readers here into reading something that they would have to follow an external link to read the rest of, or get more related content.

Laurel watches for this.

 

[Erozetta]

Risky.

Doing so might be construed as an attempt to "tease" readers here into reading something that they would have to follow an external link to read the rest of, or get more related content.

Laurel watches for this.

Hence the "Might get away with" and "Maybe" parts.

 

[NoCa]

1. No. More specifically - if it's off-site, definitely no. On site, to another story posted on Lit or a forum thread or the like? Yes. But links to outside sites aren't allowed in forum posts outside of signatures, either.


But you can include them in your profile and might get away with a "See my profile for more about me and my work" note. Maybe.

Well, it was not really my intention to "get away" with anything. Then again, I do this for a living and would at least like to be able to direct some readers to a Patreon page.

 

[Erozetta]

Well, it was not really my intention to "get away" with anything. Then again, I do this for a living and would at least like to be able to direct some readers to a Patreon page.

You can link to Patreon through your profile under the "support author" option. But you can't post the link directly in a story.

 

[Bamagan]

Hello everyone,

I am a freelance author and narrative designer currently working on a number of visual novels and interactive games. As part of my creative process, I often write fully developed stories that serve as the foundation for these games. I would very much like to begin sharing some of my best written work here on Literotica—both to reach a wider audience and to benefit from the feedback and engagement this platform is known for.

Naturally, I wish to do so in full accordance with Literotica’s community rules and guidelines. I understand that content promotion and external linking are sensitive matters, and I want to ensure I proceed appropriately and respectfully.

I have browsed the FAQ but, being not particularly tech-savvy, I was not able to find conclusive information on my doubts.
Specifically, I would like to know:

1. Is it permissible to include links to related projects (e.g., Steam store pages, Patreon/SubscribeStar accounts) in the story description, author’s note, or comments, provided they are relevant to the story and not intrusive? (My idea was originally to post this at the end of a story, as a authors note and a call to action.)
2. If so, what is the best practice or format for doing so in a way that complies with site policies?
3. Are there any additional steps or approvals I should seek before including such references?

My intent is to contribute meaningfully to the community, not to advertise inappropriately. I am more than happy to limit external links to forum posts or author profile pages if that is preferred.

Thank you upfront

You can put nearly anything you want on your biography page... anything that wouldn't be illegal in a general context, anyway. The site doesn't allow promotional content inside the stories, and as others mentioned above, anything that might be construed as a teaser for paywalled material may be rejected, or pulled down if it got through the publication process. That's particularly true for anything that's not a complete story, since they don't want authors trying to hook folks with 7/8ths of a tale and then charging for the finale. But the site obviously doesn't expect or demand that one's entire body of work be available, so it's generally fine to mention in your bio that you have other stuff for sale elsewhere.
Given that Lit doesn't really have much support for visual arts, you might be okay mentioning in an author's note that the story is the text portion of a multimedia version; that might even be prudent from a copyright perspective. Off the top of my head, I don't know of any examples of such here, although it's quite possibly happened before. Again, they probably won't allow anything in the story pages that points the reader in a specific direction, but anyone interested in seeing more would probably check your author page regardless of whether or not you tell them to in your note.

 

[NoCa]

You can put nearly anything you want on your biography page... anything that wouldn't be illegal in a general context, anyway. The site doesn't allow promotional content inside the stories, and as others mentioned above, anything that might be construed as a teaser for paywalled material may be rejected, or pulled down if it got through the publication process. That's particularly true for anything that's not a complete story, since they don't want authors trying to hook folks with 7/8ths of a tale and then charging for the finale. But the site obviously doesn't expect or demand that one's entire body of work be available, so it's generally fine to mention in your bio that you have other stuff for sale elsewhere.
Given that Lit doesn't really have much support for visual arts, you might be okay mentioning in an author's note that the story is the text portion of a multimedia version; that might even be prudent from a copyright perspective. Off the top of my head, I don't know of any examples of such here, although it's quite possibly happened before. Again, they probably won't allow anything in the story pages that points the reader in a specific direction, but anyone interested in seeing more would probably check your author page regardless of whether or not you tell them to in your note.

Thanks, I believe that this is what I am going to do

 

[THBGato]

This was interesting. At the end of my most recent story I put the following note:

Thanks heaps to Cagivagurl for beta-reading; go read her stories! Any remaining errors were entirely my fault. This story was partly inspired by Tiaara Golden's "Red" on Wattpad, "The actress" by Salander and "Side by side" by Sugarstorm. If you enjoyed this, maybe go read those... but vote and leave a comment first, eh? That'd be choice!

Now, when it was published, the words "on Wattpad" had been deleted. I hadn't included a hyperlink, but it just shows that you can't even refer to other sites by name.

 

[HeyAll]

You can put a link in your bio and the comments