Hey Folks,

Welcome to the Tales community! I believe in the goodness of people and was skeptical that I had to write down these thoughts but it’s better to be safe than sorry. I was told I should have lawyers write this doc, but I’ll level with you: the lawyers would turn it into an unreadable mess of legalese and I’d rather keep this simple. If at any time you decide this letter is tldr, just remember the mantra: Don’t Be An Asshole. 

We want to the Tales community to be a safe place to try out new ideas and find the ones worth working on. When working in a creative medium, writers are putting their heart and soul into their work. It’s daunting to put your work out there in unpolished form for folks to critique. It’s no wonder that the first Harry Potter book took 7 years to write. That’s one of the processes we’re trying to change at Tales. We want creatives to put out their ideas as soon as possible and receive both metrics and qualitative feedback to help shape their introductions, character development, plot lines, etc. Many of our writers have tons of ideas but they don’t know which ones are worth spending the time on. You’re here to vote with your taps and feedback to help guide their way.

Nothing kills creativity like an argumentative or hostile fan base. We appreciate feedback but please be respectful at all times and understand that a writer does not create a memorable story through democratic vote. They are be open to ideas but ultimately it’s their call to make.

We have a zero tolerance policy towards harassment. Assume that every message you send, public or private, is auditable by Tales when investigating claims of harassment. Always err on the careful side. Ask yourself if you would you be embarrassed if your messages were made public. If you’re a fan, do not message authors directly unless they consent in a public channel. You can understand with thousands of players, they simply can’t deal with inbound messages.  If you’re a writer, understand that we’re going to hold you to a higher standard. As we are selective about the writers we are providing early access to, your conduct is a reflection of our choices so make us proud!

If you have concerns or questions about the way we do business, talk to us, don’t disrespect the hardworking people of Tales. I promise you all they want to do is see authors succeed and players happy.

Lastly, we do not operate an open platform like Twitter/Reddit/Facebook/Telegram with difficult to enforce policies. We’re a small but growing community of good people that think interactive fiction can do better than 95% of what studios are putting out. We genuinely hope that you’d like to be a part of that either as a creator or a fan. But if we think you are not making our community a better place, we have no qualms about removing you.

If you’re a target of harassment, send us a line at: info@talescreator.com with the subject “Code of Conduct”.

Best,
Thomas Wu
Founder & CEO