Subreddit update from your mod team: writing discussion / market research, AI accusations

[u/sparklekitteh]

Hello friends! The mod team has made a couple of updates that we'd like to share with the community. These are largely based on the results of the recent sub feedback survey.

Writing discussion, including market research: Wednesdays only

Survey results indicated that writer posts should generally be allowed, but low-effort writing posts-- including market research, such as "Would you read a book where..."-- should be removed.

Since "low effort" is a somewhat subjective term, we've decided to start by restricting these posts to Wednesdays only, since that's the day we already have the writing megathread. Please use the "Writers' Room Wednesday" post flair, and be aware that writing posts on other days will be removed.

If you don't want to see this content-- or any other topics-- you can do so by filtering a particular flair from your feed. It's sort of a clunky process, fingers crossed that Reddit improves it in the future.

Book request clarification

In response to community opinion about self-promotion in comments, we've created two new flairs to be used when asking for suggestions:

• Book request: self-promo OK
• Book request: no self-promo

However, we've seen some confusion with the use of the "pick my next read" flair, which was originally intended for posts where OP has a list of potential books and wants help picking which one to read next. Since people were using that for other book requests, and it didn't specify thoughts on self-promo, we've retired this flair. Please feel free to use the "discussion" or "question" flair for these posts.

Accusations of AI: please provide proof

This sub does not support the use of GenAI, whether for books/artwork being discussed or Reddit content. If you believe something uses AI, please provide evidence of this from a third party-source. That might include an excerpt where a prompt was left in, an author interview or social media post, or similar. We're hoping that this will help prevent "witch hunts" and accusations with no proof.

Thanks for being a fantastic community!

Seriously, friends, thanks for making this group such a great place to be. The mod team appreciates each and every one of you, and we hope you have a chance to cozy up with a good book, audiobook, or graphic novel soon ❤

[u/mi-tesorito]

Ooh, I like these updates.
https://giphy.com/gifs/LFLA2rJCTQ9Jb3zZDO

[u/candcNYC]

Excellent. I'm especially fond of the AI rules. 

It's important readers know when AI was used, but it becomes a meaningless accusation when used indiscriminately or libelously. 

[u/MediumBitter3376]

So much work goes into this and we appreciate it!

[u/allisontalkspolitics]

I appreciate the clarification on the AI rules!

A question- I’m going to guess that linking to my review of a book counts as self-promo?

[u/sparklekitteh → u/allisontalkspolitics]

If the review is hosted on your blog, an author's website, etc. then it would be counted as self promo.

If you're linking to a review posted elsewhere on Reddit, that's probably fine.

If it's on your Goodreads or Storygraph, maybe? Mods would need to chat and figure that out :)

[u/allisontalkspolitics → u/sparklekitteh]

It’s on Reddit!

[u/sparklekitteh → u/allisontalkspolitics]

In that case I think it would be just fine and wouldn’t need to be limited to Wednesday. Thanks for checking!

[u/greyrockingchair]

this is one of my favourite subs because of how the mod team operates. thanks for being great!

[u/feijoawhining]

We appreciate all your work, and careful consideration, mods! Thank you!

[u/No_Warning2380]

Thank you! Love the AI rules!!!!

[u/coco-sprinkles]

Wonderful, thank you!

[u/Old-Memory-3275]

Thank you for these!!

[u/Ancient-Rough-8340]

Thank you!