Hi guys,

I found an issue with the chat room earlier today.

hardware/software specifics:
Asus netbook Eee PC--iirc it's a 10" screen--running XP
browser: Chrome

When I attempted to open the chatroom by clicking on the blue person a list of chatrooms popped up, but only the last 10 or so showed and no way to scroll through them that I figure out. The list was also transparent so everything on the page I was using showed through. I could, however, scroll the background window up/down to make lines visible.

-------------------------------------------------------

I found a workaround to get into any of the chatrooms not shown for you if you have this problem.

Enter an unlocked chatroom from the popped up list
Click the 'pop window out' button on the right side of the top bar
In the small free-floating window that appears, copy the URL
Close the window and open a new tab/window in your browser
Paste the copied link in, edit the # at the end of the URL to 2 and hit enter
This will log you into the sprint chat room.
Now if you go back to your original savvy tab/window you should see the chatroom open as a small inline chat function. If so go back to the other tab/window you created and close it.
From here you can use the chatroom as normal.

If you need a different chatroom, just keep changing the # until you hit the correct one.

Hi I'm new on the site and really wanted to take Candace Haven's class tonight, but can't find it....

thanks,

Mina

Is there a way to have html in our sigs? ie the ability to add word counters, like this, that we've had in the past at on our other sites.

What happened to the Synopsis workshop that was supposed to start yesterday? I keep logging in looking for posts and have nothing...other than my registration email. And yes, I'm looking on the new site. Did it get cancelled or what? Curious.

Hi there,

I have a NaNo teammate who's as perplexed as I am about why her posts almost always quote posts before it? She can't seem to stop replying with quotes. Is it something in her settings? Any other ideas?

Hi,

I can't wait to take the Sweet Passion 101 class next week. I hope I figure out how to navigate before then.

Sandy

Hey there,

I've been lining up a team for the NaNo Boot Camp. One of our prolific author team mates is visually impaired and uses specialized equipment to view the site. Though she never was able to access the chatrooms, we managed to make the old site work, but haven't tried anything on the new site. If someone could provide some info as to how the new site should work for her, it'd be much appreciated as we try getting her set up.
Thanks!

RJ and June Faver are superheroines!!!! Anxiously awaiting Monday.....

Check out this sale -- 18 Authors joined together for this chance for people to buy books at inexpensive prices.

https://www.facebook.com/events/614162795392038/

Morning! I'm having trouble viewing the calendar and upcoming classes.

Hello - I'm in the How to Add Humor to Novels workshop. I know there was a gliche in getting up Lesson 1. I'm wondering if the same is happening with Lesson 2, because I don't see it there yet. I'm trying to get used to the new forum myself, so maybe I missed it? Thanks, Lori.

Leslie, I know you have oodles and oodles of time on your hands ( ), but is there a way to bookmark a thread or a particular post for future reference? It would make it easier to find a post we wanted to respond to.
Thanks.

Hi, I'm not sure my help request went through on the old website. I just renewed my premium membership on the old website and I would like to sign up for the characters workshop that started yesterday. But when I try to register only the basic member ship registration fee of 30 dollars pops up and I need the 25 dollar fee. I know it probably takes a while for everything to update with my membership, but is there a way I can register for this class and pay 25 fee now.

Thanks,
Tina
[email protected]

2 requests

#1

Can we have a spellchecker for our posts?

#2

I just took 2 courses concurrently. Except for the post titles, I couldn't tell which is which. I like to set up a separate folder for each class & I'm not able to. Can you set up classes with a [name] like YahooGroup does?

I'm curious:

Do you plan to publish traditionally with a Big 5/6 company or Indie Publisher?

or Self-Publish?

or do some combination?

This is a reprint from DeepMagik's site here.

5 Sites You Need to See If You Want to Self Publish
October 10, 2013
Nice video this week. An interview with Mette Ivie Harrison. You can watch it here. She goes over the publishing world. In this post I’m going to add some links and information about the other route…self-publishing.
Here are the 5 things you need to know about self publishing.
1. Here’s a bit of the first post, it’s from a site called copy blogger. This first article is “21 things you need to know about self publishing”. I liked this one and thought you might too.
1. Reality check
At the time of this writing, the amount of money households spend overall on reading materials is going down.
In 1994 (source: Bureau of Labor Statistics) the average household spent $165 on reading materials. In 2011, adjusted for inflation, the average US household spent $115. How come? Because there are many high-quality, free things we can read. So we spend our entertainment dollars elsewhere.
Meanwhile, the number of books being published each year rises at a steady 6% per year.
So we have less demand and more supply. Which means prices and incomes go down. You can use this to your advantage.
How? Publishers aren’t reducing the prices of their books. Actually, they tend to raise them with inflation to keep fueling their bloated machines.
So you can instantly gain an advantage by reducing prices, given the facts I’ve laid out above.
2. Audience first
If you have no readers, nobody will buy your book. Fortunately, that’s not a Catch-22. You build your audience by giving, giving, giving, giving, before you finally ask them to pay $4.99 for your book.
You write blog posts. You write tweets. You build a Facebook fan page. And on and on. The next several points are about building your platform. If you are not willing to do this, then your spouse will read your book and maybe your parents. Maybe. Your kids will not read your book.
That’s a taste of it. Read all of the 21 tips if you liked how this began. I personally think this site is awesome. I mean tip #3 is If it doesn’t bleed, it doesn’t lead. Funny way for them to give you a tip. Check it out.
2. The next post is on How to Blog a Book. It’s a great blog about the possibility of changing your book idea into a blog. But it also just gives great information about writing a blog. And Brandon strongly recommends having a blog so this one is one you dragons should take a look at.
My Critique of His First Post
You can imagine my critique.
You don’t have a plan for the blog or the book.
Your post had formatting errors.
Your post needed proofing before hitting “publish.”
You haven’t determined the focus of the book.
The post title doesn’t tell the reader what the post is about.
The title contains no keywords to help with discoverability.
The post contains no keywords to help with discoverability.
You haven’t used any subheads to help readers scan for content.
I don’t now what this story have to do with anything?
What is the focus of the blog itself? Does it have a long-term plan?
You can write.
He wasn’t too pleased.
Again, very amusing. And it has great information. Could be of some help. Read a lot of good content about writing at How to Blog a Book.
3. The Worlds Greatest Book. This is a site and guy that works on your work. Below is an example of his work.

Writing is Design: Avoid Bland Pronouns and Boring Verbs
October 3, 2013Dave Bricker 17

As a graphic designer, I see numerous parallels between the values that create engaging imagery and the values that create engaging prose. So many designs fail because the designer arranged elements on a page without questioning their purpose, hierarchy, or relationship to the intended message. Good writing is characterized by the same conscious application of order, balance, tension, tone, spirit, relevance, and clarity as good design. As a designer might scrutinize a page to evaluate margins, kerning, and font choice, a writer can search for style patterns that illuminate weak, lazy, or formulaic writing and missed opportunities to create stronger prose.
See his site here.
4. The Write’s Guide to E-Publishing. Cool site with lots of articles about all kinds of stuff centered around writing. Take a look at an example author.
I wouldn’t touch those readers with a 10 question poll
July 13, 2013 By Bufo Calvin
I wouldn’t touch those readers with a 10 question poll As the readers of WG2E know, the landscape has completely changed for independent authors since the release of the Kindle in late 2007. Prior to that, there were virtually no independently published books on Amazon’s bestseller lists. When I recently checked, 24% of the top [...]
You can see the rest of them at The Writer’s Guide.
And finally the last one, number five.
5. This one is one of my favorite sites. It’s called Write to Done. Here’s an example.
Top 10 Blogs for Writers 2012 – The Winners
Written byMary Jaksch

Email
When we asked you to nominate your favorite writing blog as one of the top 10 blogs for writers, we got a huge response! Great to see how passionate readers are about their favorite writing blog.
As you’ll see there are some previous winners, as well as some talented new bloggers in the top 10 of 2012.
This article in particular is a best of for sites like I’ve listed above. Lists and lists are great. They help, so get to reading them. They will improve every aspect of your writing, but also, they will improve the way you *think* about writing.
Thanks Dragons,
In the comments let me know any other great sites you guys and gals know of and also let us all know how great the interview was. We all look forward to hearing you.
-d

About DeepMagik
Fumbling through this Hitchhiker's Guide trying to get to Arrakis... aka Have Spice Will Travel Find my book and my blog at www.DeepMagik.org

I'm at about the 70% complete mark in my Urban Fantasy, and at no point did I intend to write in a sex scene. There is lots of heat between my leading lady and main man, but no hanky panky.

Only they changed things up on me yday.

I let the words flow in a scene where innuendo lead to a training session instead and now LL is kinda hot and bothered. Because I'm writing UF, I can see this going one of two ways: 1 - (the planned idea) was to get in the kiss, establish interest, but have LL's distrust pull her back from the brink OR 2 - the smexing will commence.

Online forums are divided on the subject - some readers want hints of sex only. No images of it on the pages (I interpret as "scene goes to black"). Others don't mind a page of hot and heavy as long as the majority of the story isn't dedicated to the romance. A minority will throw the book at a wall if a UF skews romantic.

If I had a CP or two I'd ask them their thoughts; instead I wonder if you lovely people would mind sharing yours?All opinions are welcome. As I said, I'm torn and open to any advice.

Thanks!
Hetal

Check out this article in The Atlantic about ghostwriting and books, such as The Hardy Boys, The Nancy Drew Mysteries, and other series written by ghostwriters. The "packagers" as they are called pull together the initial drafts of ghostwriters and funnel them through a system of editors and intermediaries with a short turn-around, so they can still produce 2-3 books a year under the pseudonyms, Dixon and Keene.

Right now, a pink box shows quotations, with a portion hidden e.g. Click to expand

Two issues surface.

After an instructor has posted a lesson (including the quotation in pink), a classmate reading the post requires additional clicking to read the whole post. There is no way to leave the 'quotation' as a full post. Instructors don't know that using the 'quote' feature, creates an additional effort on the classmate's part.

Why is this important? It doesn't show up fully in the emails. We have to access the site to read it. Once in the thread, it requires additional work to expand it.

I can understand why 'click to expand' works when someone has quoted the thread post several posts above, and most likely everyone has already read the full post, but it is different when the quotation is brand new and never seen before. Interrupting the reading of the posts to have to click to expand is an inconvenience for the participant.

In addition, moderators wishing to copy and paste are forced to copy the quotation separately. It will not copy the quotation in the full post without requiring a separate click, copy and paste (which requires finding the spot to add the additional quotation not included in the first copy and paste).

Solution: Is there a way to make quotations be included in their entirety and not diminished, when there is need to see the whole post as a single unit? Can this be made as a selection of the poster/instructor/moderator?

Thanks,
Lyn

Wondering about he jimmy morris class-- since Monday only 4 intros? Can't be right can it? Also I did the thing where I changed my password for the new site --and if I use the direct link the current one will work but if I go through google to savvy it wont--it requires that I change my password every time I go to the site. So once my class is done I might have a problem again. Otherwise its change every time I visit.
Dory

Hi,
Sorry, I need a bit of help. I would like to make up my own log-in password. The new site build required a new password and the ones sent to me are not ones I could ever remember. I'm not finding a way to generate my own password.
Thank you.

Hi!

I've already asked about this, but I haven't heard from you in a while. I can't get the system to load the upgrade account feature. I would like to become a member before I register for another class. I've tried it in both chrome and firefox, and the little loading symbol in the upper right-hand corner starts up but never loads anything. I mean, I walked out of the room, forgot about it, and came back 1/2 hour later and it still hadn't loaded.

From the same page, I've tried to enroll in the motivation course, and the same thing happens. I'm kind of bummed that because of this bug, I've missed the month of May. If you get this fixed, can I enroll at the beginning of any month, or only when it's advertised again? Or can I enroll mid-month and catch up? (because it isn't fair!)

Anyway, please let me know.

Thanks,

Marianne

This shows why English is so much more difficult to learn than other languages. If you can pronounce correctly every word in this poem, you will be speaking English better than 90% of the native English speakers in the world. After trying the verses, a Frenchman said he’d prefer six months of hard labour to reading six lines aloud.


Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I! Oh hear my prayer.
Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain .
(Mind the latter, how it’s written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.
Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.
Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation’s OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.
Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhyme with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does. Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.
Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.
Liberty , library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.
Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas .
Sea, idea, Korea , area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.
Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.
Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.
Pronunciation (think of Psyche!)
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won’t it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It’s a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight ,
Housewife, verdict and indict.
Finally, which rhymes with enough,
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is to give up!!!

English Pronunciation by G. Nolst Trenité

I am looking for a few tips to describe a situation in a way that it is not dragged on and on. But it is sweet and to the point. For instance, I want to describe a situation in a pub where boy meets girl. What should I do? Describe in a few short words what the scene looks like, the other persons and then concentrate on my main characters?

Hello. I have been a member of your forum for some time and I enjoy being a member of this community. I am also an amateur writer and I am taking a shot at my first real novel. But that is a story for another time

I have visited some other forums and there are a few things that I have been accustomed to which I do not see here. I think that they will improve the user experience here a great deal. Here it goes. 1) A recent threads box on a separate page showing x latest threads. That would be a good way to keep track of them. The New Post that you have here it makes posts disappear after you read them. 2) A Like and Dislike options for threads. For instance, there are a couple of threads that I like and I would like to be able to like them and then give a reason as to why I liked them. The same goes for threads that I dislike. I want to let that be known. And all threads that will be disliked most can be locked or moderated. These were what I can think for the moment. I do hope that you will take my request into consideration.

Best Regards,

Celeste