Should today’s creators go it alone, or try cross-disciplinary collaboration?Utsudo believes the era when you could succeed just by keeping your head down is over. Every skill takes a lot of time to build, and it’s hard for one person to do it all. For ordinary creators, the most feasible way is to bring together partners from different fields — scriptwriting, programming, visuals, music, voice acting and so on — though that also requires communication and coordination skills.

Translated from Utsudo’s original Chinese column.

The era of just keeping your head down is over

　　Today, it’s no longer an era where keeping your head down and working hard brings success — except for geniuses, the truly lucky, and people with more resources. What I’m discussing here is “ordinary people.”

　　In the past, mastering one skill was basically enough. But in this era of extremely rapid change,new technologies keep emerging, and of course many old jobs are gradually disappearing and being replaced.

　　In this fast-changing modern world, to avoid being swallowed by the times, we must stay alert at all times and learn more skills to adapt to this ever-changing era.

　　We have far more information and resources than people before us, but this has created another phenomenon: more information splits our attention, and we busily chase more material things. Our living conditions have improved and life is more abundant, yet our hearts often fall ill.

　　Besides, Earth’s resources are ultimately limited. If we keep overconsuming them like this, what will become of the next generation?

　　Ahem, I seem to have drifted off topic — back on track.

The situation of pure-text creators

　　Creators today have more resources than ever, and can even improve their skills and broaden their horizons quickly through exchange. The art scene is a great example — today’s prodigies keep getting younger (scary). I once worked on a commercial publication with a kid who was only in high school at the time.

　　But pure-text creators are at a relative disadvantage, though they still retain a certain audience.

　　Drawing and writing use completely different parts of the brain. A few people can do both, but they’re the rare among the rare — and the same goes for other fields.Reaching a professional level is very hard (so please respect professionals).

　　Besides talent, every skill takes a great deal of time to hone, yet a person only has twenty-four hours a day and limited energy. In an era flooded with information, the way to grab attention at once,besides gimmicks, is probably a work of extremely high completeness or quality.

　　Of course, some creators have talent and put in hard work across many fields, able to complete high-quality works on their own. But the time and energy it takes is unimaginably daunting — only the rarest of the rare, capable people with no financial worries, can do it.

Cross-disciplinary collaboration is the most workable path

　　So for the vast majority of people, the most feasible way is, after all, collaboration.

　　Take games as an example: bringing together talent in scriptwriting, programming, visuals, promotion, music and sound effects, voice acting and so on — doesn’t that save time and energy compared to going it alone, with a higher chance of producing a great result (generally speaking, as long as you don’t run into a dud teammate XD)?

Communication and coordination are skills too

　　Of course, the example above assumes everyone gets along and shares the same goal. Working with people comes with some troublesome interpersonal risks, so now you also need to develop another skill — communication and coordination. But that’s another story.

　　There’s plenty of talent out there; whether you click is another matter. Getting along and coordinating with people is a skill too — and yes, so is riding on someone’s coattails. But doing it in a way that pleases others, without being looked down on or demeaning your own dignity, is a modern art.

　　All in all, once you’ve achieved something in your own field, the next step is to gather like-minded partners from different fields and chase your dreams together!

　　Fighting together and creating something from nothing feels wonderful >w<

FAQ

Further reading (in Chinese)

• Previous: #71 (in Chinese)
• Next: #73 (in Chinese)
• Start from the beginning: #01 — Utsudo’s debut
• Column introduction
• Utsudo’s books

About the author

Utsudo is a Taiwanese light novelist and novelist VTuber with more than ten years in the industry and 40 commercially published print books. Her novel 《遺失的情書》 received a 2022 Ministry of Culture youth creative award. The 《嘿！聽說妳在鬼島當作家》 series records her experiences as a novelist in Taiwan.

📚 More on this topic: The Publishing Industry Today & Trends: Ghost Island Column Guide