Help Codex Migrate to a New Website

Hi there! I'm Erin, and I'm the administrator of Codex , a website/forum/slack/encouragement club/contest site/critique group for neo-pro and pro genre authors.

 

If you're a genre author -- science fiction, fantasy, or horror, in short story or novel form -- you may have heard of us. If you're a reader you've probably read the work of some people who've gone through our electronic halls.

 

Currently, Codex is run as a labor of love -- I pay for hosting out of pocket, and everyone who participates in keeping the site running, me, the technical admins, and all the moderators, are all volunteers. I'm starting this gofundme because Codex is built on very old code. We want to update it to run on Discourse, while maintaining our current level of functionality, which is going to require some custom coding. I'm not entirely sure how much that will cost, so we're starting at $5,000 -- if we need more, I'll ask for more, if we don't, I'll put any excess toward paying for hosting. We're hoping to complete migration sometime in the next six months, but the sooner the better. 

 

It's hard to explain what Codex is to people who aren't on the inside -- and it's hard for people on the outside to take a peek, because we are membership only. We've never charged for membership, nor are we ever going to -- we just have a few simple minimum qualifications (much akin to the Science Fiction Writers of America, although a bit more broad) that we ask for people to meet before they request to join.

 

What Codex is to its members on the inside though, is a forum where people can talk about their writing goals, hopes, dreams, share submission stats, keep track of new markets and changing guidelines, have difficult conversations about their careers in a safe space, share success stories, crow about sales, and ask for help around a myriad of writing and writing-life topics. We have areas dedicated to writing lifestyle conversations, all sorts of book research topics (past, present and far, far future), keeping track of individual short story and novel markets, the business of writing (serials, the ins and outs of querying agents, how to break into game writing, etc), a contest section where Codexians host writing contests for each other, giving one another deadlines to write to and useful feedback on finished works and works in progress (many, many, so many of which you have seen published afterwards, some to critical acclaim), an active critique area, an area where we discuss attending upcoming conventions and workshops, and then some personal spaces that authors on Codex have chosen to make for themselves, to share more intimate portions of their writing journeys in a safe, password protected space. We also have a slack, which all members of Codex are welcome to participate in, and where people have lively conversations about things happening in the genre world (and the general world!), and we're currently preparing for an online convention for just for Codexians in early January 2022.

 

Both Codex the forum and Codex's slack are heavily moderated, and absolutely no racism or harassment is at all tolerated in either location. The forum has a 102 area for difficult research questions, to make sure that everyone participating in discussions there has a foundational knowledge of what they're asking about, to make sure that no one is hurt unintentionally, or if accidental harm is done, that it is quickly addressed. Codex also has a private BIPOC area of the board for members who self-identify.

 

Essentially, we endeavor to support neo-pro and pro writers with our communal knowledge and comradery at every stage of their careers.

 

I took over as Codex's admin roughly three years ago, with the goal of making it a non-profit at that time. I also, however, happen to be an ICU nurse, so just about the time I'd finished making bylaws and asking people if they wanted to be on the board is when covid hit. In a perfect world, this migration could wait until I'd managed to do so, so that people could write these donations off -- but in actuality, I'm not sure when I'm going to get the free time to do that, and our old code is getting creaky, I don't want to wait.

 

I'm hoping that Codexians past, present, and future will donate, and possibly people who want to support writers in general -- please trust that your money would be well spent.

 

I love Codex. I think I've been a member going for thirteen years now. Codexians are the ones who cheered the loudest when I finally sold a book -- because they knew exactly what it was like for me to hit that milestone, either they'd been there themselves, or they'd been walking alongside me, for every step along the way. They were also the people who were there to catch me when my publisher didn't want any more books in that series, and when a subsequently written book didn't sell. It's easy for people to cheer for other people's successes, but it's so hard (and feels oddly shameful, and dirty) when your career hits the rocks, because no one talks about that portion of the writing-career roller-coaster, even though so very many of us have lived it. But my friends there held me, brushed me off, and gave me reasons to keep writing to this day. Between that, and the fact that Codex provided me a safe space to talk about my experiences as an ICU nurse these past two years, keeping me sane, hell, possibly even keeping me alive, when things were dire and I felt so alone -- I will be forever indebted to the kindness of my friends there.

 

I can't guarantee that kind of long-term satisfaction and aide to everyone who makes it through Codex's doors -- but as Codex's admin, I will always, always, try to keep us on the path that lifts people up and makes room for more writers to come aboard. 

 

If you can pitch in, that's amazing, thank you so much -- if you can't, these times are tough, I totally get that, please don't feel bad. If you're able to help get the word out, that would be great, too.

 

Thanks for making it this far! If I already know you from Codex -- hi! -- if not and you're a genre writer, especially if you're just starting out in your career, I hope to someday see you there.

 

<3

Erin Cashier