NaNoWriMo lit their brand on fire years before they "embraced AI." Their demise says everything about the way they ran their organization, and specifically the way they failed their volunteers and their users (and especially the minors in their Young Writers program!) If you want all the gory details of how NaNoWriMo destroyed its reputation, this post from Jan 2024 (and its Part 2, linked at the bottom) has a good overview: https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/1ae3038/writing_discords_forums_and_a_decades_worth_of/
Their abyssmal behavior drove away their sponsors. I discovered 4thewords.com in 2016 in part because they sponsored NaNoWriMo. By 2024, 4thewords had literally scrubbed NaNoWriMo from their site. 4TW is a writing gamefication site that has events in April, July, and November specifically because those are the months NaNoWriMo held events. And even 4TW wanted nothing to do with NaNoWriMo by mid-2024. This went beyond "we won't sponsor them" to "we won't even mention their name."
Yes, technically, NaNoWriMo is closing because they can't get funds. But the reason they can't get funds is that they alienated virtually every organization and individual that cared about their mission. It's like a baby food company putting arsenic in their product and then wailing that they have to close because no one will buy it. THERE IS A REASON FOR THAT.
They were so toxic that by 2024 (and again, before the AI nonsense), I didn't know anyone who was writing in November and using the NaNoWriMo hashtag. Not just the site! No one even wanted to associate with the hashtag anymore. I don't think the AI thing was even a nail in the coffin. The community had already declared them dead and buried; they just hadn't admitted it yet.
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NaNoWriMo lit their brand on fire years before they "embraced AI." Their demise says everything about the way they ran their organization, and specifically the way they failed their volunteers and their users (and especially the minors in their Young Writers program!) If you want all the gory details of how NaNoWriMo destroyed its reputation, this post from Jan 2024 (and its Part 2, linked at the bottom) has a good overview: https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/1ae3038/writing_discords_forums_and_a_decades_worth_of/
Their abyssmal behavior drove away their sponsors. I discovered 4thewords.com in 2016 in part because they sponsored NaNoWriMo. By 2024, 4thewords had literally scrubbed NaNoWriMo from their site. 4TW is a writing gamefication site that has events in April, July, and November specifically because those are the months NaNoWriMo held events. And even 4TW wanted nothing to do with NaNoWriMo by mid-2024. This went beyond "we won't sponsor them" to "we won't even mention their name."
Yes, technically, NaNoWriMo is closing because they can't get funds. But the reason they can't get funds is that they alienated virtually every organization and individual that cared about their mission. It's like a baby food company putting arsenic in their product and then wailing that they have to close because no one will buy it. THERE IS A REASON FOR THAT.
They were so toxic that by 2024 (and again, before the AI nonsense), I didn't know anyone who was writing in November and using the NaNoWriMo hashtag. Not just the site! No one even wanted to associate with the hashtag anymore. I don't think the AI thing was even a nail in the coffin. The community had already declared them dead and buried; they just hadn't admitted it yet.