Opening my LinkedIn account, I was surprised to receive an invitation from a Chinese-based publishing platform called Webnovel owned by a publishing firm called Qidian Yuewen. “You are finally here!” it says in the first paragraph. “You are who we want, passionate about writing and reading stories, eager to write and change the world!”

Wow. The opening of the message sounded like I’m a catalyst they seek that will bring about social change. Receiving invitations from headhunters and companies to apply for available jobs suitable to my qualifications were nothing new. This is what’s great about having a LinkedIn profile. Companies and professionals seek other professionals for the possibility of forging a working relationship. This is the first time, however, that I received an invitation to write a novel and potentially earn from it, and I found it intriguing. I’ve heard of serial novels published online before, but I never gave it much thought until now.

A closer reading of the somewhat detailed message further piqued my interest. Webnovel, as the invitation explains, is a global online reading and writing platform. It gathers people from over two hundred countries across six different languages with a cumulative visitorship of 52 million, and it boasts that more than 52,000 authors have created their works on their platform.

The invitation explains that every word that comes out of an author is worth its weight in gold, as Webnovel provides the most competitive monetary rewards in the industry. Should I decide to accept the invitation, I will become a contracted author who will stand to receive a guaranteed payment of US$1,600 for four months of writing a serial novel upon reaching a specified word count for publication.

I’m assuming that I’m not the only one who received such an invitation. I understand that they’re pooling fiction writers for their latest ten million pesos project (US$200,000) that they claim is “up for grabs” for local authors.

Upon clicking a link to their website, I was taken to their landing page claiming that many outstanding authors in Webnovel have been earning a considerable amount of money for their serial fiction. Some authors are said to earn more than US$10,000 a month. They said that experienced writers will find it easy to create and publish stories on their platform, and for those who aren’t, they have professional content editors who are ready to assist beginners on the readability of their manuscripts.

I learned that Webnovel has 10 million viewership a month and further digging led me to an online report of CNN Philippines about local writers earning from their fiction with China’s literary app, “Webnovel.” This further triggered my interest to dig deeper. I am very ecstatic about the idea of earning from my fiction, but I don’t jump in without doing a little research. Given that the Internet is filled with publishing and writing opportunities, it has also become a haven for con artists and scammers who are out there to take away your work without just compensation.

According to the CNN report, one Filipino fantasy writer says that next month, he is going to be paid twice as much as he actually earns in his day job. He has been writing for Webnovel for quite some time now and has accumulated a considerable following. Another local writer who goes by the pseudonym of Anjeeriku claims that Webnovel has given her the opportunity to make new friends and create an audience for her romance stories.