The beginning of a new beginning

6 Months Ago

Alright, the time for a new beginning has come. Me and Patrick have started working on ideas to improve the site (we've got lots of them), but we're also asking you all to help us out with suggestions. The first thing we need your help with is how the hell do we make this place friendly again?

You've all noticed that tensions have risen on this site. Arguments seem to dominate every conversation. Most of the messages I receive concern some malicious or otherwise unruly act. I handle them the best I can, but not as well as I should. I will admit such daily evidence of humanities faults wears me out and is part of the reason I have not been as present on this site as I should.

There are a few bad apples, a few people too quick to throw punches. The vast majority of you, I know, are kind and good and you're just looking to get feedback on your writing (and let me take this opportunity to thank you for that, it makes me happier than you could ever know). We must, however, find a way to make this community more accepting and more friendly.

So, I'm asking for your suggestions.

Offer Your Suggestions

Me and Patrick have a few ideas (The return of blogs for example. These will be where 'opinion' writing is allowed. We welcome dissent and opinions, but the 'Writing' section should be for posting and reviewing creative writing.), but we'd like to hear what you have to say.

No, on to more exciting stuff. Here's what we have planned for the site in the near future:

• Return of 'Subscriptions' - Allows you to subscribe to writers so you will see their latest writing and (optionally) receive notifications when the publish


• Improved Facebook & MySpace Apps - I know, the Facebook one doesn't work very well. It will be fixed and we'll introduce a MySpace App.


• Writing Courses - I'm excited about these. User created writing courses of any focus (poetry, sci-fi, or whatever). Share your knowledge, discuss techniques, improve your writing


• Fancier Reviews - We've got some weird ideas for this which may or may not work out, but some things you will definitely see: Inline Notes (better than the old method), Reply to a Review, and . . . well, I won't tell you anymore


• Return of Agent / Publisher / Magazine listings. Let's get some of you published.


• A new forum . . . maybe (I'm hesitant about this because people argue in forums way too much).


• A whole bunch of backend stuff you'll never see, but which is awesome to us nerdy coders.

Of course, we want to hear what you have to say as well.

Offer Your Suggestions

Now, it's going to take some time for this all to happen (I work 60 hours a week and Patrick got hit by a car and has to lay in bed for a few weeks), but we've already begun converting the old site into our new code base (nerdy stuff). Get us your suggestions straight away though so we can work them in.

-Charlie

P.S. If you have kids you should check out hiSprout.com, a new site I just finished which lets you easily share your kids photos & videos with your friends and family.

Use Google's Cache to Recover Your Old Writing

2 Years Ago

Google cache's all the web pages it spiders. What does that mean for you? Well, you may be able to recover some of your older work (more than a week or two old).

My Google Cache

How to Restore

Locate your writing amongst the results, click the 'cache' link which appears below each search listing, and you'll be able to copy and paste your old writing and either restore it or add it as new writing.

- Charlie

Restore Your Writing

2 Years Ago

In an effort to help get WritersCafe.org back on track, we've set up a Restore Writing section.

What does that mean, you ask. Well, if you have a saved version of your writing and that piece of writing got reviews, you may be able to restore the text.

Head over to your Restore page

Identify your writing from it's reviews

Re-add the writing text

Restore Your Writing

Of course, if you'd rather just post a new version of the writing, you can always do that to:

Add New Writing

-Charlie

With Our Sinserist Apologies

2 Years Ago

It was a snowy night in Wisconsin and Charlie was just finishing up a long day of optimizing WritersCafe.org so it would run nice and quick for you. Then it was a slip of the mouse, an errant click, and catastrophe.

I'm afraid to say that all the previously published writing on WritersCafe.org has been lost. I, Charlie, accidentally emptied the wrong table in our database and deleted all of your writing.

I could say this is a chance to start fresh, a chance to push yourself to write more, and I think that's true, but I also know that you all put a great amount of work and heart into your writing, and I know it is an irreplaceable loss. There's nothing I can say or do to make up for this catastrophe, but I will say with as much sincerity as one boy can muster that I am truly sorry. I am very sorry.

The Good News
Besides your writing, everything else is safe. Your friends list, private messages, reviews, and overall rating are all still intact. Indeed, if you head over to WritersCafe.org right now you'll see it's pretty much the same. All you really have to do is add new writing and everything will run just as it did before.

Add Writing

However, there are a few small differences besides the missing writing.

As a result of the missing writing, all the Contest Submissions have also been deleted. Every contest is still running, but if you want to be considered you'll have to resubmit.

If you're a group moderator, you'll also find that your 'Writing' section is now empty.

The Future
First. We have now backed up the entire website. It will also be backed up every evening so that if something of this nature were to occur again, it would be easily fixed.

Second, for every piece of writing you add to WritersCafe.org this week, you'll recieve an extra 10 points. We call these Loyalty points because it really shows your quality.

We're also throwing a contest with prizes worth $300. You can submit any kind of writing in any genre and you have until March 1st to enter the contest.

Check Out Our Contest


The Conclusion
Again, I am terribly sorry for any heartache I may have caused you. I tried everything to recover your writing, but it proved impossible. Yet, I dare to hope that you may decide to continue using WritersCafe to share and improve your writing. We love having all of you and we want to continue, and improve, this community.

Lastly. With death there comes new life. There is no better time than now for us to introduce improvements to WritersCafe.org so if you have any suggestions for new features, please let us know.








-Charlie

Share Your Writing on Facebook with our new Facebook Application

2 Years Ago

For all you Facebookers we've got a brand spanking new WritersCafe.org Facebook Application.

Head on over to our Facebook page, add the application, and you'll be able to easily share your writing with all you Facebook friends.

Newsfeed

Adding the newsfeed feature means everytime you publish a new piece of writing on WritersCafe.org a notice will be published in your Facebook Newsfeed.

Profile

Add the profile feature and your 30 most recent writings will automatically be displayed on your Facebook profile

-Charlie

Welcome New Writers and Get Double Points - Win, Win!

2 Years Ago

In an attempt to get more and more new writers involved in the WritersCafe.org community, we're giving you, the established writers, some perks.

Every time you review a new writer (a writer who has registered in the last week), you'll get double the points for that review. As well, if you're the first to review any piece of writing (by new or old writers), you'll receive double points. If you're lucky enough to be the first to review a new writer, then, you could earn triple the points.

10 points for review
10 points for reviewing new writer
10 points for reviewing first
————
30 points

We also have a new badge for you all. If you review 10 pieces of writing by new writers, you'll get the "I Welcome New Writers" badge.



So review new writers and new writing, and you'll get double points. I think that's the definition of Win, Win, is it not?

-Charlie

'Tis The Season For Giving

2 Years Ago

So you've been on WritersCafe.org awhile and you've collected all these points. You're in the thousands now and you've finally begun to wonder, "What the hell do all these points even do for me?"

Sure, they put me higher on the Writer's Search and the Writer's Rankings. And I look cool, obviously. But what's the point? I mean I'm already cool, everyone knows that, so why do I need all these points?

Well, we've got you covered old buddy. Now you can spend your points on Gifts. What are gifts you ask? Well, gifts are icons of things (animals, TV characters, Christmas crap) which appear on the gift reciever's profile.






Simply pick out the gift you like, choose a person to send it to from your friends list, include them a nice little message, and send the gift. You'll automatically be deducted the points (anywhere from 10 to 100 points depending on the gift), but don't worry, your Total Earned Points won't change (which is what we use in the Writers Search and Writers Ranking systems).

See All 126 Gifts

In the future we hope to give you even more things to spend your points on. Things which should be more useful. But for now you'll have to enjoy spending them on Gifts. It is the holidays after all.

-Charlie

Badges . . . Not Just For Boyscouts

2 Years Ago

We at WritersCafe.org decided we wanted to show our support for those writers who have had a special impact on WritersCafe.org. So, in that light, we are proud to introduce Badges.

There are currently 6 different types of badges, each of which has different requirements. When you've met the requirements for a badge, it will automatically appear on your profile, your listing on the Writers Search, and a few other places.

Full List of Badges

And what do Badges do, you ask. Nothing. They're just a way for us to recognize your contribution. So thank you.

-Charlie

Share Your Writing with Your MySpace, Facebook, and Friendster Friends

2 Years Ago

You can now share all your writing with everyone of your MySpace, Facebook, Friendster, Orkut, and hi5 Friends.

Check out the 'Share' section on each piece of writing. Go ahead, check it out . . . see all those little links. Click them, sign in to your MySpace/Facebook/etc. account, and you'll be able to instantly send messages, post bulletins, and post shoutouts about each piece of writing.

Or if you want to tell them about all your writing you can click the Promote tab on your profile and use the Share links.

So go on, start sharing your writing. I'm sure your friends would like to read it. No, now don't be shy. They'll be kind and they'll help you improve your writing.

**Update**

You can now share your writing on Wordsy as well. Wordsy is a social community for readers. Users share interesting writing they find on the internet. The more people who share the writing, the more popular it becomes on Wordsy, and the more readers it gets.

You can share your writing or your friends writing on Wordsy by clicking the Wordsy link which appears in the 'Share' section of every piece of writing.

-Charlie

Send Your Writing to 100's of Friends in just a few seconds

2 Years Ago

Would you like to share your writing with all your friends? Then you should start using our 'Email to Friends' feature.

On every piece of writing you should see a Share section (to the right of the writing). In that section there's a link entitled 'Email to Friends' which allows you to easily email your writing to all your Gmail, Yahoo, and MSN friends at once. It take only a few seconds to import all your contacts (don't worry, you don't have to send your writing to everyone of them), then it's just a matter of clicking the 'Send' button and a shiny email is sent to all your friends telling them about your writing.

You should be proud to be a writer, and you shouldn't be afraid to tell your friends about your writing. So get to sharing.

-Charlie