Part of my thesis project was to understand NaNoWriMo as a community of practice. The first part of looking at that was determining what makes NaNo different from regular creative writing classes. The way students interact in a class is completely different than the way WriMos interact on the forums. What was different? Why did it develop this way?
Well, it came down to the emphasis. Creative writing courses are trying to teach you fundamentals. NaNo? Not so much. By focusing solely on getting words on the page (and turning off one's evil Inner Editor), NaNoWriMo brought together a community of people defined by their love of writing, no matter how good, bad, or indifferent the quality of that work.
But there is more to this question than that. You see, NaNoWriMo provides a perfect intersection between the Internet and Academia. NaNoWriMo is very different from Academia, but it is also very different from the Internet. This series, lovingly shortened to NiIL, will look into that difference. How are the NaNo forums different? Why don't we see stereotypical "regs" vs "newbs"? Why are the forums structured the way they are? What amount of control do the users have on the actual infrastructure of the site? These questions and more, coming up in...
ADVENTURES IN INTERNET LAND
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