I have addressed some of the drama surrounding NaNoWriMo in the past year to two years. But not really, because I have been a little confused about it while not knowing enough to hold some emotionally-charged opinion (which others seem willing to do). I have been a participant (and winner) of NaNoWriMo in the past, have used it to write hundreds of thousands of words. I have really enjoyed the graphs and accountability as much as the community (which I took part in almost exclusively locally). Last year there was no NaNo, and I was in a terrible moment of my schedule to take part, anyhow.

(You can find the articles I’ve written on NaNo over the years HERE.)

Now, they announce, they are shutting down. They could not recover from the scandal or whatever it was. They could not update their old ways of doing things to make things financially viable. And this is a bummer for the writing world and so many aspiring writers. My aunt retired like a month ago and was looking forward to her first NaNo in November, something she had wanted to do for decades. (They’ve been around 20 years and their community was approaching half a million at their peak.) So that is dumb.

Other sites have cropped up to replace NaNo, at least on a smaller scale. And NaNo signed off hoping that people would continue to put 50,000 words on the page in November. Their demise can’t stop people and they certainly don’t want it to.

Other options:

TrackBearPlotteratiShut Up & Write!Pathfinders Writing CollectiveFicFrenzymyWriteClubAutoCrit Novel Writing 90 ChallengeStory a DayNoQuA Round of Words in 80 Days

I will try some of these in November and letting you know what I think of them and where I land.

Also, if you have statistics or content on NaNoWriMo’s website that you want to keep, then you need to head there ASAP and gather it. Download it or take some screenshots or something. I went to the site and was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of graphs and history I will lose and just sighed and gave up. The words are still mine. The track record and graphics will go away. But the point is you need to head on over there if you want to check on your stuff and maybe save some things.

End of PSA.