Plume has joined the zoom revolution– at least for now. You may have heard about the popularity of “zoom bombing” –the latest pastime for racist a-holes and perverts…. Plume recently hosted a book reading for our featured writer, Karin Zirk whose book Falling from the Moon was published earlier this year. There were 20+ attendees for this online event. Karin read a scene from her book and then talked a little about the importance of passion and persistence in completing her manuscript–and believe me she needed a heavy dose of both. A few minutes after we began the Q & A our meeting was interrupted by men who were more interested in blurting out racist commentary or sharing pictures of their genitals– or even offering a strip tease–than actually engaging in discussion of a novel or the act of creation. I was trying fast as I could to kick these disruptors out but they were joining at a fast rate, so I just said “OK then, thank you Karin and we’re ending the meeting.” Actually I don’t know what I said. I don’t know what the disruptors said, I was pretty flustered.
Anyway, we were able to get through 90% of the event. And several people messaged me and said I handled it well. While it may be true, and sadly I’ve seen enough perverts in my life, I won’t be doing that again.
Since then Zoom has made some changes, and added some capabilities for meeting hosts to be able to keep disgusting racist perverts out of meetings they don’t belong in. So for now we’ll stick with zoom as we research other options. We are hosting via zoom a group I used to host in my home called Monday Writers. This is pop-up writing session (now only popping up on the internet). Currently Monday Writers is free, and a great way to get story starts, bits of prose, and write in the company of others:
For this and other Plume events we have initiated some safeguards:
You must register ahead of time. Once you’re registered you will be given a password, and a link to join the meeting. Also there is a “waiting room” and you will be admitted to the meeting one at a time.
It’s a little clunky, but this way we can keep the creeps out.
We’re going to host a women who write check in–2nd and 4th Thursdays. These will be in the evenings, after kids go to bed. It will be a way to meet each other, do a check in, offer each other some support, and maybe a writing prompt or two. Plus we’d like to meet our Plume supporters .
It was a great event. Thanks to Jennifer and Plume for hosting it. Yup the ending was bad but we survived. I love the idea of a check in in the evenings!