Young Writers Society

I like your honesty on your feeling about YWS, and the way you get right to the point.
Before I go on to the nitpick section, I'll just mention that I'm not saying this to be mean at all, I'm saying it to give advice, and/or call your attention to something you may have missed. Not that I'm a super experienced writer, or anything like that.

There are some grammar and sentence structure mistakes which, with just a bit of polishing, could be easily fixed.
I don't understand why you made certain words (for example: "teacher", "continue" and "talk) into hyperlinks.

While I can't account for every member of YWS, I genuinely think that those members who leave seemingly harsh reviews are just trying to help the writer improve.
If you only received reviews that said, "OMG! You were so awesome!" it would flatter you, but it wouldn't really help with anything.
So, while I can't agree with you on the point of reviews, I'm glad that you expressed your honest feelings.

I hope you keep writing!

OMG PINKIE HEY! It's Mr. Powers here, for another fun and exciting...review? I don't want to call it a review, because you so clearly stated that you don't like reviews. I don't blame you, I hate reviews too, they all seem to be negative. And I see some people being negative here, so I'll be nothing but positive here for you.

Why will I be so nice to you? Because everything you said here is 100% true. The storybooks are fun, because you get to collaborate with other people, who can in turn inspire you. The "shy moments" you have are something that you personally will have to get over.

People can be mean. In fact, most of the reviewers do seem mean, because they're tearing up something you put your heart and soul into. But, seeing as though you've reviewed 138 works, you know that already.

I, too, hate that you've got to use "points" to submit work. But hey, what can you do?

I'm so glad you seem to be enjoying yourself here.

Hey Pinkie! Thewriter13 here!
This work looks like it belongs in the blog section, because it's not a story or a poem, or anything. It's just you explaining why you like YWS and how you found it. That belongs in a blog post
Overall, I like it! You're honest and you give good reasons as to how you feel about this website.

People loved my stories and always told me that I am a great writer.

They always enjoyed my stories that I wrote for them online. They sometimes wrote stories on there which they were very good as mines. I really loved those sites very much, but I wanted to go somewhere else to write my stories.

It is true that some people can leave harsh reviews, but the important thing to remember about this site is that, while we write for fun, we're here to improve our skills, as well. Someone saying "Omg, this is so good, keep writing" is nice for the self-esteem, but if you don't find out what isn't working then how can you ever get better, right?

That's why I try to leave reviews that point out something that was well-done as well as some things that need improvement (or, the YWS Review Sandwich). I find it helps young writers improve without smashing their sense of worth or their dreams of being a writer. Yes, your story or poem may have some serious flaws, but every writer had to start small. It's hard to remember sometimes, when you see how famous they are now, or when you read a book and it's so good that it makes you feel like a worthless piece of crap in comparison...but that writer started out by sucking, too, and was rejected by agent after agent after agent and publisher after publisher after publisher before they became who they are today.

Some reviewers just don't like the critique sandwich because they think pointing out good things isn't helpful--good things don't need improvement! While they're right about the latter point, I disagree with the former. Pointing out good things is helpful because it's just as important to know what does work in a story as it is to know what doesn't work. They mean well, though. There are very few people on the site who review something with malice and make it a personal attack against the author--and if you ever come across one, you can report them to a moderator, and we'll take care of it.

As for the point system, I love it! I tried other sites too, a few years back, but it was hard to get reviews unless you were site-famous. (How do you even become site-famous? I had no idea then, and I have no idea now. Bad at social media because I'm bad at "social.")

Here, because you have to write reviews to get points to post your own works, people actually read each other's works and give them feedback. It's fantastic. It gives you first-hand interaction with a potential audience. Oh, I love it. Friends, mentors, mentees, and readers, all in one place--often, all in one person.

Not to mention all the cool activities and forums around the site. I've never done Storybooks, myself, but I'm glad to see you enjoy them so much.

Just have fun, and if you ever feel like someone's attacking you in a review, go ahead and contact one of the mods!

Blue

I totally understand where you're coming from with all of this, even though I don't agree with some of it. I, for one, was delighted to find a site that had active reviewers. On my music website, I consider myself lucky to get a few favorites on my pieces, much less a comment. The review system was a little annoying to me at first, but it's grown on me now.

I love to hear that you love writing. I am astounded at all the ideas that you brew up in that head of yours. Just look to the right of this comment. That's a mighty big list of works. You have so many stories, so many thoughts that you put down on paper that it's amazing. I'm just over here struggling to come up with an ending for my short story! You're so creative, I have to say I'm kinda jealous.

On a different note, have you ever considered using your blog for things like this? They're very difficult to review (I can't exactly tell you that your characterization or plotting or whatnot is off, it's your thoughts, they aren't wrong), and they end up being in the Green Room for a while until someone decides to mark their comment as a review to get it out. Also, putting it in a blog would save points for other things.

Never stop writing! <3

I can kind of agree with some of things that you've said. I remember one of my first comments basically said that in order for it to be a good poem you have to change everything about it. It said that in a way that could seem kind and helpful, but in the end it seemed more useful to give up on the poem. Though, it's nice to get some critic on work, and also for people to say why the like it. Even on another site that I am on, I ask people to say what they like about what I write. I still get responses like, "it's good. I like it."