How to publish on Waidrn

Publishing is free, and it stays free to read. This page covers the mechanics so your first chapter goes up without a detour.

Before you publish

1. Create an account and verify your email. You can browse and draft without verification, but publishing needs a verified address (it keeps spam and impersonation down). If the message does not arrive, use resend, check spam, then contact support.
2. Read the Rules and the Content Policy. In short: publish what you have the right to publish; label what needs labelling; keep hosted work free to read.
3. Decide on metadata before you write the summary — rating, content warnings, category, language and at least one fandom. You can edit them later, but starting right saves a second pass.

Creating a work

Open Publish a work. The editor asks for:

• Title and summary — the summary is what readers see on cards; a specific one gets clicks.
• Rating — General, Teen, Mature, Explicit or Not Rated. Mature and Explicit works require the 18+ gate and correct labelling.
• Content warnings — Graphic Violence, Major Character Death, Non-Consensual Content, Underage, "Chose Not To Warn" or "No Warnings Apply". Choose honestly; warnings are metadata, not judgement.
• Category — FF, FM, Gen, MM, Multi or Other.
• Language — the language the work is written in.
• Fandoms — at least one. Use "Original Work" for wholly original stories, or the fandom whose world the fanwork belongs to.
• Optional — characters, relationships (A/B for romantic, A&B for platonic), freeform tags, series, notes and a discussion thread.
• Rights attestation — the checkbox that says the work is yours to publish or is a transformative fanwork published free. It is stored so the record is clear.
• Visibility — public, signed-in readers only, or private to you.

Chapters and drafting

• A work needs at least one chapter before it can be published. Save it as a draft until you are ready, or publish straight away.
• Each chapter has a title, optional notes and a body in Markdown. Word counts are computed for you.
• Import pastes an existing work from Markdown, plain text or HTML, or uploads an EPUB, then previews the chapters before you commit. You can edit every chapter afterwards.
• You can add chapters later, mark a work complete when it is finished, or take it back to incomplete if a sequel of chapters is coming.

Power, gifts and the author share

Every published chapter carries power — at least 0.10 WAID staked to it at publication, paid from your loaned balance first and then your spendable balance. Power pays the small rent for storage and decays; readers can gift or top up a chapter to keep it alive. Each post has an author share (0–100%, default 50%): that is the fraction of each gift that goes straight to you, with the rest becoming power. The split is shown publicly and can be changed for future gifts.

You can keep a chapter alive without spending more by letting it be gifted, or by topping it up from your wallet. Pruned work leaves a tombstone; the receipts and records that reference it remain.

After you publish

• Comments and kudos are how readers answer; there is no algorithmic gate. Comments are public and moderated by the community's report flow.
• Subscribe readers get in-app notifications; email notifications follow the preferences each reader sets.
• A work can be linked to a discussion thread, either one you started or the one already attached to your work.
• Series group related works in reading order.
• Downloads: readers can read online, download HTML/EPUB or print your work. That is the free-access promise in practice.

What we ask of you

• Tag and warn honestly. Label adult content so the gate can do its job.
• Keep hosted work free to read; you may link your own external support page from your profile, but not a paywalled copy of the same hosted work.
• Be decent to readers and other authors. The Rules apply to authors too.
• If you delete a work, a tombstone remains and the record stays truthful; if you need hosted text removed entirely, contact us.

When in doubt, publish the first chapter as a draft, read it once more, and press publish. The archive is better with your work in it.