World Weavers' Workshop

How do I sign up?

Just start writing. There is no pre-registration and no deadline for new starters. When your first exercises comes in, I'll start tracking your progress in the forum body.


Do I need to be a member of World Weavers ?

No. If you do want to join, send me an email.


Do I need a certain level of W.com membership?

So long as you are a W.com member of any level and can create items, you can participate. Unfortunately we cannot accept participants who are not members of the site.


But I only have a free membership and limited portfolio space.

You don't need to post items on WDC to participate. You can paste your text into the survey instead.


But I want to keep my notes private.

Your survey responses come to me as the owner of the survey. I only scan them to check the exercise has been completed.

If you really don't want to share your notes, create a private item and submit a link to the item instead. I won't be able to open the item, but I will be able to check whether you have edited it.


Can I just use one forum post and update it to submit all my exercises?

Exercises shouldn't be posted in the forum. You need to submit them via WW Workshop - Exercise Submission  to make sure I don't miss your updates.

But if you're looking for feedback from other participants on something, you can post in the forum as well.


Can I work on a world I already created?

Yes! You can use ideas and notes which already exist for a setting you have already prepared, to explore it and develop it further in a structured way.


How is this even going to work? What if I'm only working on a city scale? What if I'm not writing fantasy?

Don’t let the word ‘world’ mislead you. Your ‘world’ can be as small as a high school, as large as an empire, a single religious sect living within a larger whole, or a rebel colony of sentient reptiles on a star ship.

These exercises are designed to lead you through the layers of a culture as much as the physical make-up of your 'world'. In order for a place to exist, someone has to build it and use it. The workshop is intended to help you understand the implications of those truths.

If you're working with a contemporary setting, I still recommend giving the exercises a try. Often stories in those settings lack enough detail to bring in readers unfamiliar with a particular city or culture compared to fantasy and historical stories.