NEW USERS! INTRODUCE YOURSELVES!

[madison]

Glad you found your way in, madison!

Thanks, Kyle. I'll poke around in here a bit today during work breaks. Looks like a fun and interesting forum.

[Jennifer Hicks]

Hello, everyone. I've been lurking around this forum for years and finally registered today. I don't know why I didn't do it before. Anyway, I know a few of you from other forums and look forward to getting to know the rest. I've been entering the contest every quarter for about three years (Q4 will by my 12th consecutive entry), and I plan to keep at it until I either win or pro out.

[kyle]

Welcome, Jennifer Hicks! Glad you decided to de-lurk!

[Brad R. Torgersen]

Ah yes, Jennifer, I know your name from the quarterly lists. Glad you decided to de-lurk. Good work, making sure to have something entered every quarter! As Brennan Harvey can tell you, persistence WINS! Welcome, welcome.

[soulmirror]

De-cloaking is always welcome -- as are you! Hello and welcome, Jennifer!

[Lolaasaurus]

Hi, I'm Lola. I submitted back in May for the first time, but I'm only now getting around to introducing myself.

[Martin L. Shoemaker]

Welcome aboard, Lola!

(Now I have to keep telling myself: Stop thinking about the Kinks song, she's heard that one a zillion times... Stop thinking about the Kinks song, she's heard that one a zillion times... Stop thinking about the Kinks song...

[kyle]

Hi, Lola! Glad you decided to speak up, and good luck in the contest!

(Now I have to keep telling myself: Stop thinking about the Kinks song, she's heard that one a zillion times... Stop thinking about the Kinks song, she's heard that one a zillion times... Stop thinking about the Kinks song...

Must be a generational thing. I went immediately to Barry Manilow.

[Martin L. Shoemaker]

Must be a generational thing. I went immediately to Barry Manilow.

OK, true confession time: I first went with Yoda, Weird Al Yankovics Star Wars satire sung to the tune of the Kinks' Lola. I know more of the words to the parody than the original!

I met him in a swamp down in Dagoba
Where it bubbles all the time like a giant carbonated soda
S O D A soda
I saw the little runt sitting there on a log
I asked him his name and in a raspy voice he said Yoda
Y O D A Yoda
Yo-yo-yo-yoda!

[Lolaasaurus]

I've heard that a few times. I mostly get "Hola Lola" though, because it rhymes, I guess.

[MJNL]

Well, it's a very pretty name. Welcome!

[foxanthony]

WOTF has a forum? Whoa, cool.

You can call me Tony. Anthony if you're a fed. And, A.C. Fox if you're a fan

I'm looking to get published and WOTF seems like the best opportunity for a first-timer. I'm writing a fantasy series and I have an excerpt that I believe works as flash fiction. I have some ideas about marketing and self-publishing I want to try out; and, if I can get my story into the WOTF anthology, I'm hoping I'll be able to put a plug in for my website and novel.

I've been looking around at author's who are self-publishing and there are some things I want to do differently: 1. Have an aesthetically pleasing website 2. Get email addresses! 3. Social media, and 4. Get email addresses!

If you go to my site at http://tigerlore.com you'll see it's not an unattractive site and if you click on YES! I WANT MY FREE DOWNLOAD! [CLICK HERE] you will be asked for your email address. If you put in your name and email address you will be sent a link to a members only website http://tribe.tigerlore.com where (one day) you will be able to download the first novel, and you will find a forum where you can talk to me personally.

And, as far as pub- What? Oh. I was just supposed to say hello?

Hi, everybody!

[Martin L. Shoemaker]

If you go to my site at http://tigerlore.com you'll see it's not an unattractive site...

Welcome aboard, Tony! But respectfully: at least on my machine, it's an unattractive site. Or to be more accurate, an unusable site. Most of the header and sidebar text is unreadable against the background.

[kyle]

Hi, Tony! Welcome aboard and good luck in all your endeavors!

[M.O.Muriel]

Hi Jennifer, Tony, and Lola! Welcome to the mothership .

Wow, Jennifer, what a collection! I think you might be right up there with Izanobu and Gwen for 'massive pile.'

Tony, with skill, hard work, persistence, and in many cases patience, patience, patience, you have an excellent shot of making it into the WotF anthology. It features the best new and rising talent. And of course, if you make it in, it's a whirlwind experience that you'll never forget. And yes . . . you can put in plugs into your bio, lol .

[s_c_baker]

Welcome, Tony! I tend to agree with Martin--that background makes me go

I hear you on the "attractive website" thing, though. I've visited some professional author's sites and been amazed at how awful they are. (The fact that part of my job is web design probably does it.)

[Strycher]

Welcome, Tony! I tend to agree with Martin--that background makes me go

I hear you on the "attractive website" thing, though. I've visited some professional author's sites and been amazed at how awful they are. (The fact that part of my job is web design probably does it.)

The starting templates available on WordPress might be overused, but at least I can read the text. I always cringe when I come across a professional author's website that looks like it was designed ten years ago, in the forgotten time of CTR monitors and Pentium IV processors. It's like, come on guys! You write cutting edge science fiction! You incorporate the newest theories in physics into captivating prose - update your website template!

[soulmirror]

The text on the right could probably use a lighter-colour column background, so it's not dark grey text against mottled dark greys and black etc ... did you have that but lose it somehow on display? Otherwise, it's sort of a personal aesthetic ... it hit me as retro-looking, yeah. But then Q. Tarantino has made a career mining the basement-grunge retro-'70's movie aesthetic. "Your tiger-kungfu is powerful!"

[foxanthony]

Ugh. I can't believe I'm defending my webdesign skills. Three weeks ago I only had a vague idea of what CSS was and my photoshop (Gimp + Inkscape, actually) skills were limited to cropping photos.

But, that's not my defense. People going to my site will be going there to get a free fantasy novel and it is very clear how to do that. The subdomain doesn't have an image for a background and so the text is quite readable.

My attention is on marketing and writing, and my budget is next to nothing. When I can afford professional webdesign you can bet I'm going to get it. And marketing too, if I think the ROI will be worth it. Hell, I'd hire a better writer if I thought I could get away with it. I enjoy writing, but honestly I'd rather be composing and recording jazz-fusion.

And the book isn't done yet, so neither is the website. But, I'm doing it. What are you doing? I ask because I'm always looking for ideas I can steal, er, I mean use.

[Martin L. Shoemaker]

No need to defend anything. People are trying to help. You want a great-looking web site, but you can't know how it looks on every machine and every browser. So people are letting you know what's not working for them. This isn't something to defend over; just consider it, and then decide what works best for you.

[Jess]

Ugh. I can't believe I'm defending my webdesign skills. Three weeks ago I only had a vague idea of what CSS was and my photoshop (Gimp + Inkscape, actually) skills were limited to cropping photos.

But, that's not my defense. People going to my site will be going there to get a free fantasy novel and it is very clear how to do that. The subdomain doesn't have an image for a background and so the text is quite readable.

My attention is on marketing and writing, and my budget is next to nothing. When I can afford professional webdesign you can bet I'm going to get it. And marketing too, if I think the ROI will be worth it. Hell, I'd hire a better writer if I thought I could get away with it. I enjoy writing, but honestly I'd rather be composing and recording jazz-fusion.

And the book isn't done yet, so neither is the website. But, I'm doing it. What are you doing? I ask because I'm always looking for ideas I can steal, er, I mean use.

Pfft, I don't even have a website. And I've had either Photoshop or GIMP installed on my machine for well over ten years now, and my graphics design skills are still limited to cropping photos (well, and maybe filling in a border color to match my wallpaper background, if necessary). Not to worry.

They're not attacking you, though. It's more friendly feedback and criticism (something most of us here, as up-and-coming writers, are quite familiar with).

My take on your website? Your background doesn't bother me. I think it's largely personal preference for that sort of thing. I will say, however, that I found it very hard to make out the text on the sidebar column. If it's something you want people to read, you might consider a more visible color in relation to the background.

But I digress. Welcome aboard, and good luck in all your creative endeavors!

[soulmirror]

Well, myself I said

basement-grunge retro-'70's movie aesthetic.

with a nod to Q.T. -- whom I luv but many luv to hate. (lotta good it does them, whiners)

The real issue might be:

Do YOU like your website's vibe, or not?
If you like it, it's as much your artist's choice as the stories you choose to write: you can wisely hear what feedback others share, but you reap what you sow and you're the one who lives with the fruits of it.
No one else.

On the other hand, if you're unhappy with it, and just haven't caught up to your own vision of how you'd rather it be (story of my life, my bruthah) then we each are captains of our own fate enough to study and learn some moves and create the dance or website or story or illustration we are happy with!

Folks share what they feel. Feel the way you feel. It's all good.

[E.CaimanSands]

Ugh. I can't believe I'm defending my webdesign skills. Three weeks ago I only had a vague idea of what CSS was and my photoshop (Gimp + Inkscape, actually) skills were limited to cropping photos.

But, that's not my defense. People going to my site will be going there to get a free fantasy novel and it is very clear how to do that. The subdomain doesn't have an image for a background and so the text is quite readable.

My attention is on marketing and writing, and my budget is next to nothing. When I can afford professional webdesign you can bet I'm going to get it. And marketing too, if I think the ROI will be worth it. Hell, I'd hire a better writer if I thought I could get away with it. I enjoy writing, but honestly I'd rather be composing and recording jazz-fusion.

And the book isn't done yet, so neither is the website. But, I'm doing it. What are you doing? I ask because I'm always looking for ideas I can steal, er, I mean use.

yeah, I'm not keen on the website either, it hurts even my nocturnally inclined slit pupil eyes...
as for what I'm doing, as you can see below I have a minimal web presence. I'm wary of trying to do too much too soon or at least before I've sold anything, personally I think that's a dangerous strategy.

My blog is really just a vehicle for my CV. I just thought it's possible that if an editor was seriously considering buying one of my stories they might Google me or something. So I wanted something up there to brag about how annoyingly smart I am.

[Strycher]

Ugh. I can't believe I'm defending my webdesign skills.

I was talking about other professionally published authors who will go unnamed. Though, rereading my post it does look like I took a shot at you. For the record, I didn't have a hard time reading the text on your site.

[kyle]

For the record, I didn't have a hard time reading the text on your site.

And this is the first and most important lesson of web design: How it looks on your monitor is not a predictor of how it looks on someone else's. If you don't have an intimate knowledge of render engines, color gamuts, monitor gamma, standard platform resolutions, and browser support, all you can do is either stick to the 1991-era "web safe colors" or have everyone you know look at the site and report back on readability issues.

[Strycher]

For the record, I didn't have a hard time reading the text on your site.

And this is the first and most important lesson of web design: How it looks on your monitor is not a predictor of how it looks on someone else's. If you don't have an intimate knowledge of render engines, color gamuts, monitor gamma, standard platform resolutions, and browser support, all you can do is either stick to the 1991-era "web safe colors" or have everyone you know look at the site and report back on readability issues.

This is going to make me sound tech-illiterate but, just buy a template. If you don't like the free ones shell out the $15-30 for a pro-made one. It's so much easier. Consider how much time it would take to do it yourself, translate that into currency based on your hourly pay-rate and more than likely it costs less to pay someone else to do it.

Plus you can spend all the time you save writing. Which is what really matters.

[Martin L. Shoemaker]

This is going to make me sound tech-illiterate but, just buy a template. If you don't like the free ones shell out the $15-30 for a pro-made one. It's so much easier. Consider how much time it would take to do it yourself, translate that into currency based on your hourly pay-rate and more than likely it costs less to pay someone else to do it.

Plus you can spend all the time you save writing. Which is what really matters.

That's not tech-illiterate, it's smart advice.

[AMcCarter]

Wow! Lots of new faces, so to speak. Welcome all! Sorry I'm a bit behind. I don't post as much as I used to. I'm trying to focus more on my writing (no really, I am, I swear...*stares at knitting*).

Madison, another Arkansan? Awesome. I used to live there before I made the great trek west to Tulsa. NWA is the prettiest part of the state and there are days when I really miss the Ozarks. Even the snow days. Good luck! I would love to see more Arkansans win.

[kyle]

This is going to make me sound tech-illiterate but, just buy a template. If you don't like the free ones shell out the $15-30 for a pro-made one.

That's not tech-illiterate, it's smart advice.

I concur, but be sure to look at the template you're considering on every platform you can think of. Anyone can hang out a shingle that says "professional web designer." In my experience, only a small fraction of them actually know more than a typical teenager with an Adobe plug-in.

[s_c_baker]

So I wanted something up there to brag about how annoyingly smart I am.

Isn't that the only reason anyone has a blog?