Because of organisation. In Scrivener I split up all my scenes into different documents sorted into folders (chapters). It makes it easy to get an overview of what I have so far and how everything fits together (the corkboard and outliner help a lot with this as well). On top of that I can also apply tags/meta-tags like "WIP", "First draft", "Finished", etc. to each scene in order to get a better view of how far I've come through the entire writing process (writing + editing + polishing). With Word I would either have to keep one folder for each chapter to store separate documents in if I was to achieve the same level of organisation.
I can write in Word, and I did so for years, but it isn't really a pleasurable experience. It's actually rather annoying. I always had to have several instances going at once - my main text, another document for notes, another for another chapter I might need to refer to, etc. And there was no convenient feature that would link my notes to specific scenes! I'd also need yet another document for research, and possibly (usually, in fact) a web browser open so I can google things conveniently. Scrivener does all this for me, very conveniently, in one project file. It also backs up my work automatically if I stop typing for two seconds. It has a great "snapshot" feature so I can save a version of a scene, make a bunch of edits, and return to the original version easily if it turns out I like it better. Probably best of all, though, is it lets me type in Times New Roman, which I like to look at better than Courier New, but it will automatically compile to Courier New (actually, the full Shunn standard manuscript format) for submitting! Easy peasy! Word is, as I said, annoying for me. Scrivener is slick and fun to use. I look forward to my writing sessions with Scrivener much more than I ever did with Word. Scrivener is a joy; Word is a pain in the ass.
I knew there was something that I forgot to mention! Scrivener lets you work in whatever way you want, be it with a thousand documents of text and research material or one huge file containing the entire manuscript, in whatever format you want (purple text, lucinda console, A3-size pages) and then compile it to a tailored format ready for submission. ETA: And you don't have a gazillion worthless features in the way.
I'll ditto both minstrel and Komposten. I've used WORD since it first appeared using those horrid line commands on my AT. It only ever got more confusing, never did it get user friendly. I think it's fine for letter writing or printing labels but falls apart with long documents. With Scrivener, as was mentioned, its just fun to write in. You can drag adn drop whole scenes to other projects. You can create collections, so that you might try a story idea out that is abridged by removing scenes, in as many ways as you like and if you change the scene, it changes in all collections, and the master layout stays as you started. It handles images smoothly. And it's pretty cheap. It exports to current epub formats.
Scrivener is easily worth the money. And if you watch, you can find good deals for it. Also, if you use Linux, there is a free beta version of Scrivener in their forums.
Also, if you happen to be on a Mac, Scrivener runs the way you expect a Mac app to run. Smoothly, quickly, never showing you that rainbow twirly (Mac version of the spinning hourglass) that comes up so infrequently on a Mac that its presence is always a mild cause for worry, unless, of course, you're using anything from the Microsoft Office world where the rainbow swirly is ever present and deeply frustrating. The Office port to Mac is just abysmal.
BayView - You are so right with what you say of course ... I am just expressing how my own head works after all, and not inferring any criticism whatsoever. After all I am a new writer and not being that successful I wish I had the brain to remember more but I don't. Maybe this is why I find Scrivener so helpful, which is an interesting thing by itself because I wonder how many people like me may have abandoned writing out of frustration on that side.
Something worth saying here - because I am not an evangelist and have no connection with Scrivener ... is that writing in Scrivener for a person coming from a WP is very straight forward. You can just stick to writing scene after scene after scene and not use all of the bells and whistles. But they are there when needed. Also some great tutorials on the site and on youtube.
I don't want to insult people who use Word either. It's just that it seems to me they're trying to use chopsticks to eat soup. Scrivener is the spoon, people!
Getting more sold on Scrivener. Does it load DOC formats (with passwords) or do you have to export/import?
Scrivener has a suite of importing converter filters, including ones that will split a document based on special characters such as # into separate docs. Visit the L&L web site and check the forum. It is a very supporting and not too busy one. It also has several video tutorials, as does Youtube.
I might just try it out. I noticed it has a try-and-buy option. Once I get my computer replaced (I'm on a work one right now, so I can't install anything without an admin password) I'm gonna give Scrivener a shot.
I tend to use wordrpress or evernote, i primarily write poetry and i like using the apps on my phone and tablet cause i write better on the go as opposed to sitting at home.
Just wondering if you all use anything specific when you start writing. I've just been typing in google docs thus far. I like it because I can pull it up at work, at home, or even on my phone if I'm out and an idea suddenly strikes. I've been told there will be specific formats I should have later on. Just curious what more experienced people are using.
This thread has lot of info. https://www.writingforums.org/threads/what-word-processor-do-you-use.7480/page-20#post-1287549
Glad somebody showed me this thread. Interesting. Can scrivener be downloaded on my android device as well?
No, you can't run it on android. At least, not easily. People have had some luck running WINE on android, and it might work through that.
Ah, well then for now I think I will stick to my google docs. I suppose if necessary I could always copy and paste it into something else.
I found Google Docs tended to bog down and get laggy with bigger documents, the last time I used it (a few years ago). Are people writing full novels on it, all in one part, or just shorter stuff?