Questions February 25 *** About and FAQ *** Older Questions *** Resources ***

February 2025

Intro Questions

Today begins a two-week introductory period for #ScribesAndMakers. I was inspired by a friend who started a monthly group where we met up at a local café for drinks, baked goods, and conversation about our creative work. We talked about our progress, asked for help if needed, and offered encouragement. I wanted to create something in a similar spirit for an online community, with goals, check in days, and daily questions. Please feel free to suggest any questions you would like to see.

• 15. Welcome to #ScribesAndMakers. Tell us about yourself and your creative work. (Unless specified, work refers to all your creative projects.)
• 16. We're considering a monthly featured creator day. We would develop a few questions for you and encourage the community to do the same. Anyone interested in being featured would contact us and we would schedule a day for you and let you know which month it would fall in. This could give people more engagement and an opportunity to self-promote separate from our monthly “boost away day.” Would this be of interest to you?
• 17. Do you create for income? As a professional or as a hobby? Or for fun/ for yourself?
• 18. Do you have multiple creative outlets? Are they distractions, or do they work synergistically?
• 19. Do you find creative work therapeutic? If so, do you do it for that reason, or is it more of a side benefit?
  
• 20. Do you measure progress with something quantifiable, like word count, or something more abstract, like resolving an issue?
• 21. Do friends/family give you gifts for your activities, or do you buy all your own supplies?
• 22. Which creative activity gives you the greatest satisfaction, and why?
• 23. I do my best work in ___ ?
• 24. Time management. How do you manage to fit one or more creative activities into your day/week?
• 25. Do you buy your supplies online, at discounters, or in specialty shops?
• 26. In writing and with other activities, do you stick to one genre/category (e.g. historical, portraits, sweaters, architecture)?
• 27. Have you ever written to a writer/creator to tell them you liked their work? Did they respond?
• 28. Shameless self-promotion day. Let's boost away.

Please feel free to suggest any questions you would like to see. You can either pm or mention them to @saposcat@indieauthors.social, to @willelm@indieauthors.social, or to @gahlearner@writing.exchange, or just post them under the monthly question posts.

About and FAQ *** Monthly Questions *** Resources ***

About and FAQ

#ScribesAndMakers is a hashtag game on Mastodon for writers and other creatives. I was inspired by a friend who started a monthly group where we met up at a local café for drinks, baked goods, and conversation about our creative work. We talked about our progress, asked for help if needed, and offered encouragement. I wanted to create something in a similar spirit for an online community, with goals, check in days, and daily questions. Please feel free to suggest any questions you would like to see. You can either pm or mention them to us (see below)

How do I contact you when I have questions for the hashtag game, or when I want to be featured?

Either pm us, or or just post them under the monthly question posts. “We” are Walter Thinman (@saposcat), Will Elm @Willelm, and @gahlearner

What is the Talk To Me Day?

It is one or two days in the month where we feature one specific creative person. We give the names of the featured creators at the beginning of the month so people have enough time to look at profiles and posts, and think about what they would want to ask. Getting more engagement is the name of the game. We ask one starter question each to get the conversation going and then it's your turn. When you post your questions, please tag the featured person and add the hashtags #ScribesAndMakers and #TTMD

Tell us if you want to be featured too. You don't have to have a product available. We're interested in hearing from all kinds of creative people and what you do. Absolutely feel free to use it as a marketing opportunity if you've got things out there, but also don't feel like you have to. We want it to be an opportunity to talk about what you're into.

Please be kind. We will post the 'dos' and 'don'ts' we get from creators regarding personal questions, or things they don't want to discuss. Thank you for respecting their wishes.

This isn't a 'live chat' event. You post your questions if and whenever you want to, and the featured people will answer them, but people won't always be able to answer right away.

I don't know where to start with TTMD, where do I get information about the featured people?

If you want to ask questions on Talk To Me Day, and don't know where to start, there's a hashtag #SAMInfo – that gets you to my replies to all the people who introduced their activities on February 15. There's a lot of info there. This, people's profiles, their webpages, and maybe their posts should give you a good idea about their creative activities. And if you can't come up with your own questions, you can always join other conversations.

What is Shameless Self-Promotion Day? Do I need to have a published book to answer that?

This is a day, once a month, where you can promote yourself. You can tell us about your published books, or about your art exhibitions, about the socks you've just knitted, a prize you just won, or anything else creative you want to share with us. It can be a marketing event for you, but it doesn't have to be. And you get boosted. We support each other.

*** Monthly Questions ***