A slew of authors are distancing themselves from NaNoWriMo after the most recent NaNoWriMo controversy.
What happened now?
NaNoWriMo issued a statement that appeared to endorse the use of bots to write novels.
This is certainly not the first NaNoWriMo controversy, nor, we’re sure, will it be the last. But this is a big one, and it’s strongly affecting the writing community.
Read on to learn more about the previous and current controversies the company is facing.
What is NaNoWriMo?
What is NaNoWriMo? NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month. It is actually a nonprofit organization that encourages creative writing through a variety of events.
The most famous event is its titular program where participants attempt to write a complete novel (or at least 50,000 words of one) in the month of November.
This is no easy feat!
Most people don’t sit and write a whole book in one month (although at selfpublishing.com we can easily teach you how to write one in 90 days!). The good thing about NaNoWriMo is that lots of people do it and you have a whole network of other creatives as accountability buddies.
There are all sorts of NaNoWriMo tips on how to prepare for and complete the month successfully. But it always seems like there is some sort of NaNoWriMo controversy going on.
In 2022, there was a NaNoWriMo controversy where the company paired up with Inkitt, a known scammer in the writing community. Inkitt is a vanity publisher who preys on writers who are desperate to be published.
The people at NaNoWriMo ended up realizing their error and parted ways with Inkitt. They also paired up with SFWA’s Writers Beware to ensure this issue never happened again.
Unfortunately, there was an even bigger NaNoWriMo controversy the following year.
The 2023 NaNoWriMo controversy
In 2023, a group of teenagers in the Young Writers’ Program stated that one of the main moderators of NaNoWriMo had been grooming children. They also notified the FBI about their experience.
The teens claimed that this moderator was sending them to an adult website to interact with pedophiles, and allowing other pedophiles into the Young Writers’ Program Forums to groom and abuse teens.
The teens had reported these events many times over a period of years and were always told there was no proof that the moderator was doing anything wrong. This was despite screen shots that did show proof!
The moderator was allowed to continue with his job which gave him access to minors. Because of the inaction, the teens in the Young Writers’ Program decided to start their own website for victims to speak out on.
Finally, the NaNoWriMo Board became involved. They begrudgingly admitted that they had received hundreds of pages of proof that nefarious things were going on and they had done little about it.
Because of this NaNoWriMo controversy, many people assumed it was the end of the writing competition for good. But surprisingly enough, the 2024 writing competition was still on.
This then ushered in a whole new NaNoWriMo controversy…
The 2024 NaNoWriMo controversy explained
In September of 2024, NaNoWriMo issued a statement on the use of generative AI in writing. They initially said that AI could be a useful tool for disabled or marginalized communities who would otherwise not have access to the publishing industry.
This NaNoWriMo AI statement received immediate backlash, so the company amended their statement multiple times to try to clarify their position. They said that while there are bad actors in the AI space, they find “the categorical condemnation for AI to be problematic.”
This caused a massive NaNoWriMo controversy – first on their stance about AI, and second on how they were using disabled and marginalized people as their excuse.
Several authors, including Daniel José Older, Maureen Johnson, and Rebecca Kim Wells decided to step down from NaNoWriMo’s board.
Maureen Johnson even posted on several social media platforms about the NaNoWriMo controversy, warning people that their writing might be used to train AI.
Where did this claim come from?
While the official NaNoWriMo challenge doesn’t require any text input from writers, the organization’s Young Writers Program DOES. It uses an online writing space which stores the writers’ work. There is concern that the company would use this writing to train AI – ultimately stealing the hard work and creativity of those teens.
As stated above, the other part of this NaNoWriMo controversy has to do with their claim about disabled and marginalized people.
Author Cass Morris said that the access issues cited in their statement can’t simply be fixed with AI. “It’s pretty insulting to imply that the only way members of marginalized communities can get their foot in the door is through the use of a plagiarism machine,” Morris said in a statement.
Other writers in the disabled community also took offense at the statement. On X, Sarah Salcedo said: “Disabled writers may use accommodating tools in our work, but it’s not the same as technology that steals other’s work & destroys the climate.”
Even if you don’t consider it offensive, at the very least, the NaNoWriMo AI stance is concerning. They aren’t supporting the creatives that they claim to have been fostering all these years, and many writers are publicly denouncing them because of it.
Our stance on the use of AI in writing
The NaNoWriMo AI stance is quite different from our own at selfpublishing.com.
We think there is no debate that AI steals creativity, and should never be used to replace the talent of writers. In fact, AI can easily spread misinformation, so it should be used with extreme caution.
That being said, we don’t believe in demonizing AI either. It’s a useful tool that shouldn’t be ignored, lest we fall behind on the times.
Generative AI can be a fabulous tool for brainstorming or editing. That’s why we have an AI book title generator and other free AI tools on our website. AI can be tremendously helpful for a brainstorming session, or even with help for outlining your book.
But actual writing? That’s best left to the writers.
Regardless of your stance on the NaNoWriMo controversy, we believe that AI should never be used to replace creativity.
So is this the end for the company? What happens after NaNoWriMo?
Luckily there are still lots of writers’ communities and resources out there. At selfpublishing.com, we host writers’ rooms and Hackathons and have a large community of professionals to fall back on – as well as one-on-one coaching.
If NaNoWriMo no longer seems like an option for you, perhaps you would let our team help you write, market, and publish the book of your dreams.