Making the Submission Process Easier

If you’ve ever tried to write entries for the History Commons, you’ve come up against the submission app. It’s not pretty. Even with the guideline we wrote about how to make a submission, it’s no picnic.

In fact, a lot of people have tried to wrestle with it and decided it’s just too much. The screenshot below makes MY head hurt, and I’ve used this app for years.

Yeesh! It IS very difficult, and a lot of people feel that way. There’s no shame. A lot of people have looked at it, or even tried to submit entries, and finally decided to just walk away before they broke something in frustration. It’s not the user that’s the problem. It’s the app!

So, until we finally get the money and the chops to redesign the app to meet reasonable usability standards, we’ve come up with a workaround.

If you want to submit entries to the History Commons but don’t want to fight the app to do it, here’s how. Just write an entry and e-mail it to this address:

mtuck@historycommons.org

It will come to me, Michael Tuck (“blackmax”). I’ll then submit it for you in the app, or one of the other admins will submit it. We can even submit it using your account if you prefer, so it will show up under your name and not one of ours.

More information, including guidelines and a sample entry, are available on this page:

Contributors Can Submit Entries to History Commons by E-Mail

Thanks! I look forward to being inundated with submissions!

Presentations w/Elevate’s Daniel Erlacher

Just finished a Skype presentation with Daniel Erlacher in Graz, Austria. Daniel runs the annual Elevate Festival in that lovely town, and is a huge HC supporter. I spoke for about 15 minutes on HC in general and our 9/11 coverage in specific. Kevin Fenton also did a presentation a bit earlier. I’ll let him discuss that.

What I’d really like to see is a more “international” presence for HC. We are very US-oriented, with the vast majority of our coverage focusing on events that primarily impact the US in one sense or another. (Two exceptions that come to mind are the Kosovar Albanian and European Football projects.)

We need more international coverage. I’d also like to see a version of HC in, say, German, either using our information in a translated form, and/or a version incorporating German-language original research.

Cross-posted at the History Commons blog.

History Commons Is Changing its Updates….

Hi, Commons community,

You haven’t seen an email update from us in a while. That’s because there haven’t been any. I won’t go into they whys, except they center mostly around personal and family issues that have precluded the admins (i.e. me) from getting them done. And they’re not coming back! (Okay, yes they are, but not in the way they have been. Keep reading to find out more.)

Instead, we’re using Twitter, Facebook, and our History Commons Groups blog to inform you of new updates, initiatives, and outreach. We’ll post irregular, but frequent, updates as to what new material is being posted, what new things are coming up, and how you can get involved.

I can tell you that something potentially big is brewing with HC. I can’t tell you what, because that would a) spoil the fun and more importantly, b) nothing’s firm yet. I don’t want to jump the gun and tell you all about something that may not, in fact, take place. As with all new and exciting changes, they cost resources. If you can, please donate to the cause. We are entirely user-supported, and everything you donate goes directly into keeping History Commons up, running, and expanding its knowledge base.

Here are some very important, and semi-permanent, links for you. They’ve all been shortened, so tweet, Facebook, Stumble, Digg, what have you, at will to spread the word.

History Commons Groups Blog: http://is.gd/AYjCzX
History Commons on Twitter: @historycommons and http://is.gd/VOWKG1
Supporters of History Commons at Facebook: http://is.gd/ZXeN6I
How to Volunteer at HC: http://is.gd/D33rOc
How to Donate to HC: http://is.gd/K9drCP

Email updates are not entirely a thing of the past. On an irregular basis, specific updates will come via email, particularly from the 9/11 Timeline admins. So if you’re used to getting emails on that topic, don’t smack your monitor in frustration, they are still going to hit your inbox. But not as often! So make a point of bookmarking the blog, following HC on Twitter and Facebook, and most important, get involved! Write for HC. Donate. Share the site with friends, journalists, scholars, professors, your family, anyone. We pride ourselves on having a factually accurate, expansive and ever-growing repository of information on subjects that we all care about. (And if you don’t see HC covering a topic you’re interested in, that’s where you come in — you can cover it, and we will help!)

We value your involvement, and we appreciate your support, whether you’re sending a donation, writing an entry, sending a link to someone, or reading and using HC material. Thank you, and make sure you drop us a note via Twitter, Facebook, the blog, or, yes, an email, to let us know what you think.

Max

New Posts This Week

Hm, I thought “biweekly” meant twice a week, not once every two weeks. Sorry about that.

Many more entries in the Plame-Niger timeline.

1 new entry in the Complete 9/11 Timeline; look for more in this project coming soon.

Tons more in the Domestic Terrorism timeline, one of my personal pet projects at the moment.

Many more entries in the Domestic Propaganda timeline.

After a hiatus, the Kosovar Albanian Self-Determination timeline is active again.

And finally, lots of entries related to football (soccer to the Yanks out there) and football-related economics in the Miscellaneous timeline. These will form the basis of a new, standalone project soon.

Let us know what you think, what you’d like to see, and most importantly, if you’d like to step up and start contributing.

New Posts This Week

Second in a biweekly series of updates. Like last week, we’ve posted lots of new material on WikiLeaks, domestic terrorism, the Plame-Niger and the finances behind European football.

We’ve added half a dozen or so WikiLeaks entries in the Domestic Propaganda project, with one crossposted in Iraq under US Occupation.

Several new entries are now in the Iraq-Uranium subproject.

Lots of new entries are in the Domestic Terrorism project, including material on US militias, environmental and animal-rights activists, and early entries in the Branch Davidian subproject.

And we’ve done a fistful of entries on the finances behind European football (soccer for the Americans) in the Miscellaneous project. Still pondering over the best permanent home for these.

If you’re not writing for the History Commons, give it a spin, we’d love to have you. And we are always financially strapped, so anything you can donate will be very welcome.

This Weekend’s Postings

First in a new and hopefully daily (or at least biweekly) series. This weekend, we’ve posted a good bit of new material. Lots of material on WikiLeaks, domestic terrorism, and the finances behind European football.

Almost a dozen new WikiLeaks entries in the Domestic Propaganda project, with one crossposted in Iraq under US Occupation.

Two new entries in the Iraq-Uranium subproject.

Lots of new entries in the Domestic Terrorism project, including material on US militias, environmental and animal-rights activists, and early entries in the Branch Davidian subproject.

Finally, a fistful of entries on the finances behind European football (soccer for the Americans) in the Miscellaneous project. We’re still pondering over the best permanent home for these.

If you’re not writing for the History Commons, give it a spin, we’d love to have you. And we are always financially strapped, so anything you can donate will be very welcome.

Open Thread

We’ve had some interest lately with new contributors (cheers!), so I’m creating this thread for comments, questions, and the like. Fire away!

Category Added to Inslaw and PROMIS Timeline

As the Inslaw and PROMIS Timeline continues to grow, I have added another category. It is Internal DoJ Investigations/Internal Investigations by the Justice Department of Allegations Related to PROMIS. As you can probably guess by the title, it will cover how the Justice Department investigated itself over the allegations made against it by Inslaw and others, or rather how it kicked them into touch. Altogether, there were probably at least five or six different internal investigations, in addition to the myriad of court cases.

At the moment there are only a couple of entries in the category, although I am adding relevant material now that will hopefully be published in the not-too-distant future. Overall, there are 82 entries published in the timeline, and another twenty plus making there way through the system.

As anyone familiar with the issue can see, there is still lots of material uncovered. I figure that if I keep adding something every month I should get somewhere eventually.

All hell’s breaking loose…

in the news. Economic meltdowns, Blagojevich going psycho in Illinois, torture revelations coming thick and fast, Bush sneaking new regulations in under the wire, and more. And I read that after Obama takes office in January, former Bush officials and confidantes are preparing to let loose with a mudslide of revelations that will bury us all. Are we ready to handle this? Aside from everything else on our plates, how are we going to try to keep up with some of this info? Contributors, users, just plain folks, your thoughts are very welcome.

I’m sticking this to the front page to keep it going.

New Categories Being Implemented

Okay, you talked me into it. If we’re going to discuss the projects, we need categories to organize the discussion. Otherwise the whole thing becomes a big mess. The categories are in the system. I’m cheating and adding all the categories to this single post. They will display in the sidebar. You won’t be able to miss it: it will be by far the single biggest menu over there.

There is also a “Books We Read” and a “Miscellaneous” category. The first one gives us a chance to talk about the books we’re reading. The second one is, well, miscellaneous. Think off-topic chats over coffee.

Put it to use, folks!