Note: This is in response to the survey to improve WritingForums.Org. Because the survey is anonymous, please vote here (and leave comments or suggestions) if you're interested in volunteering (Question #54). This is to help gauge interest in volunteer positions and to highlight interested members. Are you interested in getting more involved with WritingForums.Org by volunteering? We are currently considering a few potential positions. Feel free to indicate which positions you're interested in. Feel free to offer suggestions on how each position can be improved, if implemented. Please keep discussion to this thread and avoid PMing me about it, as these are all tentative.
As a writing workshop Reviewer, what requirements would be needed for quantity? Would a reviewer be responsible for a certain number per week, or would he just be responsible for remaining active and staying helpful? I'm interested in the Development Team, but I have not had experience with a forum before. I have been a webmaster for five different sites before, using CSS and HTML, handwritten by me. Having mastered HTML, I'm learning PHP for a future project involving a forum, but I'm not up to the "helpful" stage with PHP quite yet. My question: would my volunteering still be helpful?
I could help with being a reviewer or part of the support team. And I could be a project volunteer if you ever needed me for anything.
I would love to help volunteer on the writing forums. I can help with miscelaneous stuff, answering questions, or reviewing other peoples work in the writing workshop. Anything to help the Writing Forums!
I already voted earlier, but forgot to comment. I would love to volunteer, it'd be great to contribute to this forum more.
Newsletter (see my post on the other thread), and also being part of a general support team, especially in the future.
What difference would there be between a Reviewer and your average forum member who just so happens to review some writing? For instance, are Reviewers more or less obligated to review everything or more frequently?
Contest Judges can Help Improve a Writer's writing Oops, I posted the wrong content. I apologize. I will find the original content I was looking for. Anyway, I found the original comment. I accidentally copied and paste a question I was asking in another thread. I love reading other people's stories and other piece they display on the board in the contest section. These stories are good at times and some may be able to be improved to make it better. I am interested more as a contest judge. These contestants may be encouraged to write better stories in upcoming contests if they received full evaluations (especially unbiased comments) as to why they do or do not deserve to win the week’s contest. I feel that contest judges would help people to improve on the quality of their writing, as the contestants may be serious enough to apply the comments to their stories to future stories. This may also minimize the need for members to post publishable pieces in the Writing Workshop for review. I do not think that the voting system is always a way to help improve the writer, because there are no comments to help support the vote. When they receive evaluations on their story, they can also apply this to the comments before they post another story in the Contest Section.
I agree that the Reviewer role needs redefinition. I believe the Reviewer role should be more of a mentor role, to guide members in HOW to critique. That requires a lot of patience, and the ability to point out flaws in critiques (or how the author responds to critique) in a non-confrontational manner. Not everyone will react appropriately to that kind of "meta-critique" no matter how diplomatic you are, so the Reviewer also needs a thick skin and the will to walk away rather than perpetuate an argument. A Reviewer is therefore a teacher, and yet must be eager to learn as well as teach. Also: Non-Reviewers should stick to critiquing the writing rather than other critiquers BECAUSE of the likelihood of it degenerating into an argument that detracts from the critiquing process.
I like this idea. It's true there are many excellent threads discussing and explaining reviews, but that's not the same thing as having reviewing mentors who can provide personal assistance to writers new to critiquing.
Missed out on the Olympics ballot and am I too late for this? Hopefully not! Spend too much time on bigger forums of far less interest to me than writing (fantasy gaming / poker etc.) but would love to get my hands dirty helping out (in any way) in a "smaller" forum. And I just love to write! Skills may be a little limited but would happily help wherever I can though. And great believer in the power of enthusiasm to overcame all obstacles. On other thread suggested that I was crap at art - which is still quite true - but must say have designed and attempted to run 2 forums in the past (a writing one - conveniently enough and an LFC fanzine thingy). Would happily employ Office 10 H+S to try to write up most "official" material kind of off-line. That way more likely to be fair / "nice" to more posters more often. Have laptop (+ 15G dongle), can work on the go. Type @ 40wpm+...
This is still something we will pursue - to one degree or another - once the software upgrade has been complete. Thank you all for your willingness to volunteer. The requirements for the Reviewer are still up the in air - I haven't even decided if we'll bring back the reviewer group. When we do, however, it'll probably be announced publicly and the requirements made pubic then. The development team could make use of people with web development skills, but could also include things like brainstorming for practical ways to better the website, creating and posting on other websites within our network (still writing related), designing banners in photoshop, or writing articles. Again, these things are still highly theoretical. This is a good point, which is why I'm considering this option. If top contest entries or winners could receive quality feedback from good judges, it potentially could improve their writing. Opponents, of course, would argue that judges would be biased. Right now I'm considering some sort of combined vote/judging system for the next contest. I agree with what you've said here, but I still like the idea of an independent Reviewer and a separate Mentor. I'd view the Mentor as more knowledgeable in guiding people how to critique, but ideally also someone who's had experience in the writing industry. For Reviewer's, they'd have to meet content quality guidelines, review amounts, etc. Unfortunately, this would require additional programming to be successful. As such, your suggestion seems more practical at this point in time.
My web development skills are pretty solid - php, sql, css etc. I used to do it full time but have moved onto other things. I've kept a few of my old clients on as a part time thing (partly for pocket money, but also as I actually enjoy it), and I'm more than happy to give away some of my free time helping out here. Anything to procrastinate against actually writing something, god forbid. I've customised other forums (although not vbulletin, they were mainly phpBB), and done plenty of templates for wordpress, so that might be useful too. However, to be honest, I find CSS to be the most frustrating and least fun tech of all web development.
I would be very willing to write reviews on a consistent basis. At the minute I don't take the time as I feel not enough people on the site are willing to take the time and do the same. A lot of people's work goes unread. That might be a tad cynical way of looking at it, but i'd say with this new initiative, things could drastically change for the better.
Fix'd, because what it sounds like you're saying is "Other people don't write reviews, so why should I?"
Ummm... no? Being a hypocrite means that you pretend to have values or beliefs that you don't have. That you condemn people for doing what you yourself won't do. That's not what he's saying, though I see how you could construe it that way. He meant cynical. The belief that people are motivated by self-interest. That he's doubtful something is worthwhile. And Fix'd = Fixed. Just so you know
I think i'm well able to choose the right word, Cruci, but thanks anyway. In the context of what I was saying, 'cynical' is the right word. I think i was perfectly honest by my comment, and that's not something a hypocrite does. So reserve your grammar policing for younger people on the site who need it. Thank you
