Nov 09 Newsletter Campaign!!

[Dalgaroth]

Hello everyone!

As many of us know, Newsletters are an endangered species. Sapphire has mentioned how busy she is, but she's making time to update next week. This is our chance! n_n

And guess what?

We don't need to have access to the Update pages, neither do we need Sapphire to upload everything manually. We're all busy bees here, with school or work or whatever, but Newsletters are really a compilation of work already done (hopefully, lol) with some editing. xD

I propose a week-long campaign to get a November '09 Newsletter up and running for Sapphire next week and here's how we're gonna do it!

1.) Compile everything that's going to be the Newsletter. (discussed below)
2.) Edit it all to be grammatically correct but no changing anything anybody said. Just making sure spelling's good and that it will all fit into pages and whatever.
3.) Make an image of the Newsletter in Photoshop. This will be THE Newsletter! Sapphire can simply upload them to their Newsletter page and voila! (I'll be doing the image...)
4.) Clap! ...And start compiling for the next Newsletter! Woot!

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So, things I've seen in the Newsletter arrrrre:

BWInt Newsletter, What is this all about? Announcement Section = Personal intro from Sapphire to readers.

BWInt News = Stuff going on around the site, Youtubes. Botcon, etc.

Bother a Beast Warrior = We have Waspinator's Answers!

An Advice Column = (Silver's Advice Column?) We might not have material for that or maybe we do and I dun see it here on the Forums.

Next Week's Bother a Beast Warrior = Who's up next? n_n

Toy Review - self explanatory.

Fan Discussion

Fanfiction Serial - Um..I have no idea what it's about, lol, sorry, but that's another section.

Featured Fan Art --> For this one, how do we do it? List the latest fan art? Or do people submit their art? And do we critique it?

Fanfiction Review/ Featured Fanfiction --> We got a volunteer for a Fic! Whirlaway!

Featured Youtubes - I can't link youtube vids in a pic, so we might have to ind a way to link, or maybe skip it, or break the pic up into separate piece so that the link can be added somewhere or something. Suggestions welcome!

Tiny blurb at the bottom about copyright and contact info and whatev.

----> It would be awesome if various contributors posted their stuff here or new contributors signed up. New ideas could be put in too! I mean, if we don't have reviews, or a chosen fanfic or fan art or something, then our Newsletter this month is rather small. Which is fine, but maybe new material or new featured sections or something would bulk it up. Suggestion, comments, concerns, whatev, please say! We gotta get this done in a week! xD As we gather material, I'll put a green apple next to each Section listed above until we got materials.

Oh! Note: Not everything has to be in this Newsletter! We've got a week to do it, some people might be busy, others are completely unavailable, others aren't around anymore, voting on a featured work of some kind might be difficult or something, reviews take time to write, etc, and this is a new thing, we gotta work out the kinks of using an image over text/coding, so if we can keep material interesting and varied, but also concise, that'd be great. All suggestions welcome, but new trial run, I guess, to see how this plays out. For example, the youtube video thing. ._.

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Here's a sample of the Newsletter image, in case you haven't seen the other Topic I made ( Found here! ) :



Soooo.... Whatcha got? ;D

[una]

I love to contribute to this! I miss this!

I can probably contribute to Fan Discussions.

[Dalgaroth]

Sweet!

How do the Fan Discussion run, do you know? I think I saw a topic in this forum dedicated to two questions I think Tor meant to feature in the next Newsletter but I'm not sure if we should use them or if they were going to be used for something else or....in other words, they're not mine and I wasn't in charge of those questions, so I'm not going to touch them. xD (Some direction from those of yall who did Newsletters before would be great, lol!)

Otherwise, what are you gonna submit? I know you like to start interesting topics that get people talking! xD Maybe we could use one of them?

[una]

Sweet!

How do the Fan Discussion run, do you know? I think I saw a topic in this forum dedicated to two questions I think Tor meant to feature in the next Newsletter but I'm not sure if we should use them or if they were going to be used for something else or....in other words, they're not mine and I wasn't in charge of those questions, so I'm not going to touch them. xD (Some direction from those of yall who did Newsletters before would be great, lol!)

Otherwise, what are you gonna submit? I know you like to start interesting topics that get people talking! xD Maybe we could use one of them?

I was part of the Fan Discussion for awhile. We usually find a question like are the Vok evil. Questions that some times are kinda of philsophical. Some that gets the wheels turning.

Hey, we could use both the topics of Are the Predacons all evil and Gender Debate discussion (both are very vaired and interesting to hear)

Even we could make a separate topic for Rampage. We could also discuss morality in the show. So many possiblities....

[Dalgaroth]

Ooh, yes we could! But such deep discussions sound like a great Debate thing we could cal lthe Acropolis or some such and feature philosophical discussions or unanswerable things or something *_* that could be featured separately. o-o Not sure how or when, but sometimes, a small Newsletter section is just too tiny for deep discussion! Or maybe we present a question, a couple viewpoints, and hope peeps 'call in' with their opinions?

Those sound like great ideas! I'm just thinking about how to fit discussion into the image.

Or maybe we can start a whole new discussion specifically for the Newsletter? Like....

Hmm... what idea do you think would have a clear, concise question with clearly defined debated positions?

For the layout, maybe something along the lines of:
---

Title: Fan Discussion

- Question

-Position 1
-Position 2
-Supporting Position 1
-Supporting position 2
-Completely different Position

-Closing statement inviting members to think about and submit their thoughts over here on the Forum? Or submit them to Sapphire or someone to keep track of them or feature their responses somewhere...

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Or take an existing discussion and use that, but then if people want to continue the discussion, the topic might be dead or the same old arguments would be given or something. I dunno, I might be overthinking it. x_x

[una]

Actually, that's how we did it.

We had maybe about 5 or more people part of the debate and each person put their views on. They just put what they think and that's it.

[Blazemane]

And we have a debate still in this very forum:

viewtopic.php?t=2050

I'm sure if people wanted to continuing talking on there, it would be relevant, not thread-cromancy.

Originally we did have a specific team assembled for debating, but considering our current time constraints, having anybody jump in doesn't seem terrible.

We could continue that very debate if you want.

About the fan fiction reviews- maybe you should contact Wonko the Sane. She was originally going to review some fictions, but I don't know what is or is not going on with that.

[Dalgaroth]

Oh that's where it was! Yesh. Do we use that?

Yes, if the team is no loner assembled, perhaps an open debate would be fine, then we can edit?

Hmm, okay, I'll PM Wonko then, see what's up.

[Tor]

Excellent mock-up Dalgroth, yesss.

I'm pleased to see the activity in this sector, but now, to business.

The Fan Discussion that Blazemane pointed out is in fact the one we were going to use, but due to its time rotting in inactivity, I was going to steal a thread from the Beast Wars section of the board and slap on the title 'Fan Discussion'. The idea that we just pick a thread at random appealed to me simply due to the fact that I wouldn't be forcing a question on to the Newsletter, but making a more natural selection from the wonderful minds on the Board. However, if you want to make another Fan Discussion Thread, go for it.

Since Razor One was in charge of the Aurora Serial, I'll drop him a line about it, though I'm doubting he has another installment ready since he has just escaped from the Pit of Despair and still has some things to attend to.

For Silver's Advice Column, I had wanted SilverfromOz to start a thread or have people PM or email him so we could have content for the next Newsletter, but as we all know, he recently just got away from his busy life.

Of course there will always be fics for the Fanfiction review section, and I believe that we can get a fic from the console part of the Board or if we can still have Nyx review something new. But we really do need more people to volunteer for reviewing.

No critique is necessary for the Fan Art, though Sapphire usually adds in a sweet comment about the works. Something recent is the norm, but if you want to hunt through the works of some artists, feel free.

Don't forget to add the Beast Wars Fifty Theme challenge in the mix somewhere. You may put up my email for the participants to send in their work or you may put yours.

I offer my services in helping review and provide the thread for Fan Discussion and the work for Fan Art.

[Blazemane]

We... could take a debate from the Beast wars section.

But if it's the "Are all Predacons evil" one, give me a heads up. I hadn't commented in that because we're already having a variant of that in the "What's next?" section, so I didn't want to do arguing overload, but I certainly have things to say about things that were said in the thread in the Beast Wars section.

[Dalgaroth]

Ooh Hi Tor! Thank you!

About the sections for Advice and the Serial, I understand. I read their come back posts and they certainly are busy peeps! If those sections can't be in it, that's fine, they could totally be done next issue!

For the Fanfic review, I dun mind reviewing, but if someone else volunteers that'd be awesome! If someone does, then I guess the fanfic is up to them?

Oh I think I solved the Youtube (and other links that can't be linked in the image) problem - We could just add a Links section at the bottom of the Newsletter webpage for each thingy mentioned int he Newsletter.

Links to Check Out:
"Title of Fanfic" by "Name of Author" - "link"
"Title of Video" by "Name" - "link"

like that. That way, I don't have to cut up the images and upload remains simple.

:'D Yeah! Littlbe blurbs for each art piece. That sounds fine.

OH! lol the Challenge! xD I almost forgot! xD Thank you! I'll do that! :3


our help would be awesome Tor! Yay!

Blazemane, lol! Yes, big discussions those topics! xD Hmm....I'm not sure if we should go with those though. It's a really deep discussion with really long replies... Then again, that's what editing is for...umm... Dunno, whatev. As long as the responses chosen and stuff capture the spirit of a debate without making anyone furious should be fine!

[Blazemane]

I don't know. Cutting out stuff seems dangerous to me.

Would the debates simply fill up too many pages?

[Dalgaroth]

Yeah that's what I'm getting at. a really deep discussion without any editing (no editing would be ideal) could mean several pages of nothing but discussion. Such a thing could be a cool new section to the site, but I don't think something so long should be in a Newsletter. x_x In the past, it seems the discussions were pretty short. So maybe something like that.. o-o

That's why I'm thinkin' what if we started a new topic and had people contribute until all sides were said and no more....not sure though..

[Sapphire]

You know, as you are trying really hard to get this off the ground, you need not rush. If the newsletter is not ready by the time I update, it's fine. As you're doing all the work for it it is simply a question of uploading it and making mention of it on the Latest Update page, for me, so I can do that as a separate, mini-update after the big one at any time this month. If it IS ready in time for next week's update, then yay, if not, no worries. I will put it up when it's ready. This is the beauty of having other people manage it! lol

Also, Dalgorath, Waspinator emailed me his 'responsez' to the Bother a Beast Warrior Thread of a few months back, and I will forward them on to you when I get back from University today. I will also mail you any additional content I might have.

I can't speak for him, but I think Silver was interested in doing the advice column again, but I will have to ask him (later, though, as he's sick with flu right now). Razor's off to LA tomorrow to go to the Farscape convention, so I doubt he will have a serial ready by next week, but I will drop him a line too.

[Dalgaroth]

lol yeah... You're right. But I work way better with a deadline or things don't get done so I see it like omg get it done so Sapphire can uploooad! lol I can ease up on it, but I'd really like to get a prototype or something for you too try though. Is that okay? ._.

lol, Okay! I'll keep an eye out for the responsez. xD

Awww! D: Poor Silver. Man everybody's gettin' the flu. -_-' Alright!

:off to class!: