Introducing Scriptorum

A place to create and find writing prompts.

I know I’ve been quiet for a few weeks. I didn’t stop writing. I simply changed the type of writing I’ve been doing. And hopefully, it’ll solve a huge problem I’ve noticed in the fiction community here on Substack.

The truth is, it’s hard to find writing opportunities on Substack. Most of the time, it’s through notes, or maybe someone you subscribe to mentions something. Prompts live in posts that get buried. Writing opportunities are often stumbled upon.

Submissions scatter across comments, links, Google forms, and inboxes.

Organizers end up juggling spreadsheets, replies, and manual tracking just to keep things coherent. And as a participant, you’re always a little unsure if you’ve missed something.

It works. But it sucks — as both a writer and an organizer.

I kept thinking there should be a better way. Not something that replaces Substack, but something that supports it. Something that gives structure to events without pulling them away from the places they already live.

So I built it. It’s called Scriptorum.

Scriptorum is a platform for running and participating in writing events. At its core, it gives organizers a way to create structured prompts, track submissions, and keep everything in one place. On the participant side, it provides a place to discover and participate in writing prompts. I also hope that one day people will see it as a way to discover fiction as well.

It’s not a social platform. It’s also not something that replaces the writing platform. In fact, one of the things I care about most is that this doesn’t pull people off Substack or whatever writing platform they use now. I don’t want to host the writing, I want to make it easier to find. Simple as that.

Submissions link from the platform back to Substack. Prompts can, too. Scriptorum doesn’t host the stories, it provides a link back to it. It will make events easier to run, easier to follow, and easier to discover without changing where you write and promote the event.

You might be wondering about the logo. Glad you asked.

There’s two types of events currently supported in Scriptorum. Series events are the traditional prompt and response. We’ve all seen these. Someone drops a prompt and people respond.

The second type is a competitive mode that supports scraping engagement from Substack (and possibly other platforms in the future), divisions based on subscriber count, and a few other features that make the event feel like a competition. This mode is called “Arena” and is the first of several scored/judged event modes that are planned.

So where are we now? The first real test will be Bradley Ramsey’s Halls of Pandemonium event, which he has graciously agreed to run through Scriptorum. After all, this all started because I wanted to make things easier for him.

But that’s where we’ll see what works, what breaks, and what needs to change. I can test until my fingers bleed, but anyone in software development knows “users gunna use.” I expect some minor problems, things like this always have a few bugs.

After that, assuming it doesn’t melt down, I’ll start opening it up more broadly—likely in limited slots at first while I scale things.

There’s a second phase I’m planning that expands Scriptorum beyond events into submission workflows for small journals and micro-imprints. User accounts will be implemented around this time. Users will be able to track their submissions, follow events, and even maintain a small public-facing profile (if they so choose). Participating in a writing event will never require an account, but an account will open up convenient features to make the process even easier.

But that comes later. One piece at a time.

I’ll be sharing more soon, along with screenshots and a closer look at how it actually works. For now, I just wanted to explain where I’ve been, and what I’ve been building.

And hey, you can visit the site here.