Out of every 100 online writers, according to industry insiders, about 90 don't make a penny as they offer the early chapters of books free in order to build an audience.

Of the remainder, only one can bring home an enviable salary, with three to five earning white-collar wages and the others making some pocket money.

Sollong was one of the worker ants whose fiction not only attracts hordes of paying readers but also provides story elements for more lucrative games, television or movie deals. The Internet has proven to be at once heaven and hell for wannabe wordsmiths bent on becoming the next Mo Yan or Louis Cha.

On one hand, the lowering of the bar means you do not need to overcome the pride of literary publications and the prejudice of editors. On the other hand, you have to maintain such a high output that writing has turned from a mental exercise into a purely physical one.

Successes can be enticing. Wu Xuelan, whose pen name is Liulianzi, uploaded her novel about an imperial harem onto her blog in 2006 and pretty soon developed it into what later became a best-selling multi-volume novel and, in recent years, one of China's highest-rated television dramas with a potential deal to be shown in the US.

She is one of a dozen young writers who started online and were recently admitted to the writers' association, a confirmation of their achievements.

In 2002, Murong Xuecun published his novel Please Forget Me Tonight, Chengdu online. It drew a large following and a television adaptation. He became famous and shifted battleground to investigative reporting and social commentary, where he has gained even more respectability.