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Over the past few weeks, I’ve made extensive improvements to YWS after being mostly absent for far too long. I allowed parts of the site to fall into disrepair while all of you kept the community alive, and I knew I needed to demonstrate a renewed commitment to the site before asking you to consider a major change.
That change is renaming Young Writers Society to WriterFeed.
I want to make one thing clear from the beginning: the future of the site does not depend on this vote. Whether the name changes or not, I intend to continue maintaining and improving the community.
The vote
Voting will be open from August 1 through August 31. Every member who has either logged in within the past year or completed at least 10 reviews will receive a unique voting link by email and private message.
The vote will offer two choices:
- Keep the name Young Writers Society
- Change the name to WriterFeed
Members will be able to see who participated, but individual votes will remain private. The result will be announced on September 1.
Why change the name?
When I created YWS, I was 21, and most members were around 15. The name accurately represented the community we were building at the time.
That is no longer the community we have today. The average YWSer is now 24, and many active members are in their 30s or 40s. “Young Writers Society” gives the impression that the site is primarily for teenagers, even though its membership has grown well beyond that. Some valued members have left because they felt they had aged out of a community they still cared about.
The name also makes it harder to attract new adult writers. Someone encountering YWS for the first time may reasonably assume that it is not intended for them. I believe we need a name that reflects who we are now and gives the community room to keep growing.
The changing legal and regulatory environment surrounding social platforms for users under 16 also makes it increasingly difficult to build the site’s future around a youth-focused identity. YWS will always remain welcoming to younger writers, but laws we must comply with, and which I broadly agree with, make it challenging.
Why WriterFeed?
WriterFeed is age-neutral without being generic. It describes what the site actually is: a living feed of writing, reviews, conversations, challenges, games, and activity from a community of writers.
The name also already has a connection to YWS through Writer Feed Pad. It is short, memorable, and easy to type, while giving us room to welcome writers of every age and experience level.
I considered other names, particularly “The Writers Society,” but its domain is already owned by someone else. Of the realistic options, I believe WriterFeed is the strongest fit for the community YWS has become.
How would the site change?
The community itself would not change. Everything you know and love about YWS will remain intact.
The change would affect the site’s name, logo, and domain. It would not be a replacement for YWS -- it would be a new name for the same community.
When would the change happen?
If the proposal passes, the transition would begin after the result is announced on September 1. I would complete it as quickly as possible while ensuring existing links and accounts continue to work properly.
What happens if the proposal fails?
If members vote to keep Young Writers Society, the site will remain YWS. I will continue running, maintaining, and improving it, and I have no plans to shut it down or sell it.
However, I believe the current name will continue to make long-term viability more difficult because it no longer represents the age or identity of the broader community, and because of a changing regulatory environment. That is why I am asking you to consider WriterFeed -- not as a rejection of YWS or its history, but as a name that can carry that history forward.
Questions, concerns, comments
As always, please feel free to ask questions or say your concerns.
