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!

New Contributors’ Resource Page

We’ve put together a one-stop link to all the resources available for History Commons contributors. The page includes the “Entries for ‘Dummies’,” a Content and Copy Editing guide, walkthroughs, style manuals, links to writing resources, and more.

If you have suggestions as to what should be added to this list, post them below. Thanks!

Writing Entries for ‘Dummies’

With the prospect of several new contributors coming on board in the next few days or weeks, I’m thinking we need to write a more user-friendly supplement to our style manual. What do you guys think? I’d like to hear what the users think, and hopefully someone who is already a veteran contributor will step up and help me put this together.

Edit: The official page for this guide is here:

Contributors’ Guide

The unofficial but more currently updated page for this guide is here:

Unofficial Version

and has just been updated again.

It will be a week or so before the official page catches up with the unofficial version. Until then, you should visit and comment on the unofficial version. Thanks.

Recent Contributors

We’d like to welcome NewMex and JFTracy to the Commons. NewMex likes to remain anonymous, so we won’t pry, but he does say he will be contributing primarily to the 9/11 group. JFTracy is a professor of media studies at Florida Atlantic who has contributed to the 9/11 group and is, so far, part of the Neoliberalism, False Flag Attacks, Domestic Propaganda, and Neoconservative groups. We’re glad to have you both on board.

We’re looking for new contributors as well: Volunteer at the Commons.