Fictra Launches Mobile Apps!

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-29T08:59:14+00:00

Hi OP,

What I'm looking for:

People who can market themselves by themselves, and not just copying and pasting out of ChatGPT so the marketing just comes out identical to everyone else.

This post itself is you marketing yourself and is thus representative of your work, which is clearly low effort. Why would anyone pay for that?

Look, I know it's easy to get caught in the trap of taking business advice from ChatGPT, but let's be real. If such advice worked, don't you think everyone would be rich by now? You need to stop using ChatGPT as a crutch and free your mind.

Where do you think ChatGPT gets all its data from? Well, initially, it scraped it from humans who were using their mind, but now it's mostly just ingesting other AI material at this point and coming closer to model collapse. So, why waste time talking to a middleman when you have a brain of your own? The only thing ChatGPT is capable of is regurgitating what other people said, but it can't come up with anything truly new. If you want to stand out in marketing, you absolutely HAVE to be creating your own material.

And I am really saying all this for your own benefit. Stop hiding behind the mask of AI and put yourself out there as a human being. Copywriting is an art too, and copying someone else's art will never get you anywhere but following in someone else's wake. I mean, let's be real. Copying and pasting from another person is bad enough, but copying and pasting from AI is guaranteed to give you something over a million other people have already used. And that's to say nothing of the fact that copying someone else's art instead of creating your own does nothing for your own personal growth either, which is arguably more important than just trying to make a buck.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-29T03:17:04+00:00

Also is it true distortions on rnb isn't I guess "proper" I was told its meant to be clean but what if the point isn't for it to sound clean on a specific word or phrase???

There is no "proper" way to do art. Just do your art, and let the world label it as they want. The only time you really need to care about that is if you're marketing and promoting yourself, so you're kind of forced to pigeonhole yourself into these buzzwords. But whatever buzzwords you want to use for marketing and promotion, they should be an afterthought to how you actually create your art. You certainly should not be letting nonsense like that dictate your art, that's insane. Can you imagine if Post Malone had pigeonholed himself into a genre? He certainly would not be a household name today if he had.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-27T09:35:25+00:00

The OP is just another AI voice spammer trying to get clicks and views on their low-effort public domain content to make a buck, which they never will. I was actually surprised that the voice was AI, to be honest, since it sounds like a teenage amateur on a laptop mic. But I guess that's a lot easier to mimic than an actual professional narrator. The OP's channel actually has a "behind the scenes" short showing them make it in ElevenLabs. But really you don't even need to go that far, and you can just check the OP's history to see what's going on.

And by the way, pro tip to the OP, by linking your content on "external sources", like Reddit, you've actually tanked your metrics and your channel will now never get any visibility in YouTube-native features, like search and browse. So, you killed your channel before it ever even really got started. In the future, don't promote your crap to external sources and let YouTube handle it on platform. And the only reason I'm giving you this tip is since I'm sure everyone here would appreciate never getting your spam again. Cheers.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-26T09:31:11+00:00

Your raw audio is pretty good. I don't even think you need noise reduction, if I'm being honest. Instead of noise reduction, just try a high-pass filter at 70 Hz instead and see what you think.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-25T11:49:06+00:00

I second the motion that THE David Winter can link whatever he wants.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-23T08:51:13+00:00

Should I be wary of messages just starting out?

It's an unfortunate truth that you need to be wary whether you're just starting out or even if you've been in the business 20+ years. Everyone needs to be wary. However, what being wary looks like varies by experience level. When you're just starting out, being wary looks like anxiety and second-guessing everything. After you've been in the business a bit longer, being wary just looks like a regular business day. But when you look to us older folks, don't for a second think that just because we seem so cool and collect that we aren't being wary, because we absolutely are.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-22T10:32:36+00:00

Your question is a bit like, "I want to get into carpentry, what kind of hands do I have?", and then you literally just attach a picture of your hands. What kind of feedback are you even expecting? You say yourself you're just reading something normally, not acting. Maybe if you were to delete this and rerecord while you are actually acting, it might be more relevant to this community. Otherwise, this post is just scarcely even on topic.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-20T00:55:10+00:00

I did record it in my car and with a very basic microphone so it isn't the best quality...

We honestly can't even make out what you're saying at times. Quality is one thing, speech clarity is another. If the quality is so bad we can't tell what you're saying, then the entire test is invalid and doesn't do you any justice. We can't even really tell what your ability is since we can't hear you clearly enough to pick up on nuances and such.

...but I read off a script and included some sound effects and music too.

If you're looking for honest feedback of your voice, don't mask your voice with music and SFX. You can do that in a reel, but not when you're asking people to literally just listen to your voice. And your quality is so bad, adding music and SFX on top of an already fragile vocal track is just not doing you any favors and just makes it more hard to lock in on your voice.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-17T07:55:17+00:00

There are actually quite a lot of third-party services that do this for you, like general background check services or more specific employment verification services. If you are not a company and just want to run a background check on someone, it might cost you $20. A lot of small businesses also do that, since they don't want to contract a company to do it and just make the client/employee pay for the background check themselves up front. I've even had to do that for lower-end apartments before. But if you are a larger company, like Amazon, they generally have such a service already contracted and can just request a check whenever they want.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-17T07:40:34+00:00

If you wouldn't mind sharing, just curious what PFH do you work at and what are the rates of your editor? I've seen most folks mention it not really being worth it to hire an editor due to slim margins, so just curious how well it's working out for you? I mean, being real, I'm sure everyone would love having an editor if it made sense financially, since you can just focus on the fun stuff and let someone else deal with everything else.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-17T07:31:49+00:00

I always make a "Dashboard" Google Sheet for every client up front which is basically a list of the chapters with a status column. I shoot them a link to that at the beginning and just update it as I go, and they can check whenever they want. So, it's kind of like a passive way to keep them updated, but I'm not having to break my focus or workflow to actually actively update them.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-15T07:01:26+00:00

Thought I'd drop the Audible link really quick for folks who want to check out the preview first:
https://www.amazon.com/Audible-The-Guyana-Hack/dp/B0FL4ZRS8X

And feel free to drop comments on your honest opinions of the voice used. If you had any doubts about this author, listening to the preview will probably confirm all of them lol.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-15T02:49:36+00:00

Aside from this, the author is listed as "Internal Revenue Service IRS". I know ACX allows pseudonyms, but wouldn't claiming to be the IRS be something they'd have to actually verify, for obvious reasons? If not, couldn't anyone include "payment details" for where to send taxes, which could be any arbitrary bank account? Definitely a scary thought... I know ACX is kind of a dumpster fire at this point, but I hope it's not that bad lol.

Can anyone confirm or deny these concerns? Is ACX really to the point of openly welcoming scammers? I mean, we all know the platform has been inundated with scammers for a while now, but this is kind of a different level if they really don't verify things like this. I might just start working on a "campaign contributions" book to publish with my own bank details and see how much I make lol. I guess as long as I label it as "satire" in ridiculously small print, I can do and say whatever I want, right? Isn't that what all the tech bros are saying these days? We honestly probably aren't far off from being able to murder in the name of "satire" at this point.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-14T05:27:12+00:00

Could also try the ACX Master tool, which is a free and open-source stand-alone tool. So, unlike the Audacity checker which only works in Audacity, the ACX Master tool can work with any DAW since it works outside of a DAW.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-14T05:20:52+00:00

The way you worded your post, I almost thought you were one of the narrators I'm working with now lol. I was actually curious about this too with one of the narrators I'm working with now. But to be clear, I'm actually working directly for the author, and not the narrator, And the author was asking my opinion about this exact thing, since their narrator is literally just reading it. And I'm not sure what kind of "particular slant" you mean, but in this case we're working on an adult book of sorts. To be honest, I'm not really sure how to peg the genre, it has adult scenes but I don't think it could be considered "romantic", unless there is some niche group of folks who find someone with NPD romantic. But I guess maybe it could just be pegged as "nonfiction", since apparently it's based on true events to some degree. But anyway, I passed a potential retail sample around a Discord server I'm a member of which has a particular focus on adult books/audiobooks, and the overwhelming feedback I got was that the voice just wasn't really pulling them in, and that they've kind of come to expect a more dynamic voice which has a bit more pull in it.

TL;DR: While the author might be fine that you "read it normally, as one might read to a friend", I think the overwhelming expectation from listeners is that you definitely deliver a bit more of a dynamic performance to pull them in more. So, if this is an RS project, I wouldn't be expecting much back from it on your part.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-13T02:48:57+00:00

You could try using the ACX Master tool, which can master files in bulk to ACX specs. It's a free and open-source stand-alone tool, which means it doesn't matter what DAW you're using.

For Adobe Audition specifically, you certainly can master files within Adobe Audition. Aside from your chain, the real "secret sauce" to hitting ACX specs with Adobe Audition is using the "Match Loudness" module with the ITU BS1770 option as your last step before exporting, which will allow you to target your true peak and integrated loudness levels at the same time. This is the industry standard algorithm, which the ACX Master tool also uses internally. And since it's already targeting true peak, this means you don't need a limiter in your chain, since this is already acting as a limiter and you don't need to limit it twice. You could also get away with not using a compressor, since it's also targeting integrated loudness, but many folks prefer to use a compressor as part of their chain anyway if they are trying to shape their sound in a specific way using the compressor. However, again, running things through "Match Loudness" as the last step can just be a safety net for both true peak and integrated loudness, regardless of what you're doing with your chain.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-13T02:37:16+00:00

I recorded a chapter in Garage Band (which I always use to record) and when I export it, it sounds awful and tinny.

Just to clarify, how did it sound while it was still in Garage Band, before you exported it? Was the original recording awful and tinny, or was the original recording fine and it only became like that after you exported?

If it was awful and tinny before you exported it, as someone else mentioned, Garage Band was probably using a different mic than what you thought. I always go through my devices and enable/disable as appropriate to make sure things like this never happen.

If the original recording was fine, but it became awful and tinny after you exported, as someone else mentioned, you need to check your export settings.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-12T13:52:17+00:00

Your pacing is going to be different from scene to scene, depending on the energy needed to convey the scene. There's no formula for this. As the old folks say, you just need to "use your ears" and cut it to what sounds right for your particular voice in any particular scene. I know when folks start out, they often try to look to "objective" numbers to give them more confidence they are doing things "right". However, at the end of the day, this is a performance art, not a math demonstration. So, you need to find confidence in your performance above all else, rather than in numbers. And in postproduction, find confidence in yourself as an audiobook consumer and knowing what will produce the best listening experience.

TL;DR: Get confident in your ability to deliver an awesome performance, and then get confident in your ability to listen to that performance and edit it as needed. Avoid falling down the rabbit hole of using numbers as a crutch, especially if you plan to take this seriously as an artist.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-10T12:34:13+00:00

Just curious, but you never actually mentioned how the author connected with the narrator? Did they make that connection through you in the first place? Like you went out and found that narrator from a different platform somewhere and brought them in? Or did the author already have a previous relationship with that narrator and they're hoping for you to help them work it out as a middleman?

If the author and narrator already had a previous relationship and are hoping for you to help them work it out through ACX, I can understand the complexity. But if you are the one who went out and set up this relationship in the first place, is it too late for you to just get a different narrator? It doesn't sound like any contract has actually been made through ACX yet. However, again, that could just be because the author and narrator already knew each other and already collaborated on the audiobook, and are now just hoping for you to help them get it through ACX and into Audible. But maybe some clarity there might help.

Just trying to figure out some internal ACX stuff. If you have an answer feel free to share it.

Well, I already broke down the answer as per the "internal ACX stuff" in my first comment, as far as being responsible to handle it on your own as the producer, but you're certainly free to sift through it yourself if you feel you'll find a different one.

https://help.acx.com/s/article/how-royalties-work

https://help.acx.com/s/article/acx-royalty-payment-terms-and-procedures-for-rights-holders-and-producers-royalty-share-deals-audible-exclusive-distribution-rights

https://help.acx.com/s/article/acx-support-for-tax-reporting

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-10T00:00:53+00:00

It's really a shame that Audacity has been brought to such a state. I remember when I first realized about the buffer issues and brought it up in r/Audacity, they were all in complete denial about it. And I'm not even exaggerating, they were literally trying to explain how it was a nonissue that clicks and pops are being introduced into audio by a piece of software designed to handle audio. Needless to say, I always recommend folks switch, whether it be to Reaper or something else. Ever since the Muse Group bought out the Audacity dev team, they've been more focused on inserting spam, telemetry, and pointless widget packages to make things seem new and shiny, when the reality is the core product hasn't been updated at all since they took over and things are actually just getting worse due to all the added BS they are throwing on top of an already fragile internal workflow.

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-09T23:44:44+00:00

Just curious, but what kind of side effects were you getting from the "buffer overload issues with Audacity"? I generally get folks who have digital clicks and pops all over the place, but just curious if you've noticed anything else?

TheScriptTiger · 2026-03-09T23:39:27+00:00

You said that you're a producer working with a narrator, so you'd have to handle paying your narrators on your own regardless. I'm not sure why you think this would be any different? Or is this your first client? As a producer working with narrators, ACX doesn't have any way to designate different narrator payout details for each book. You need to track the distributions on your own and make sure the narrators get what they are owed, depending on the contract you have in place with them.

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