Snippetsville: General Discussion

[Snippettsville Group]

General Discussion

A Snippettsville Group free for all here. A place to come and ask any questions, give any answers and basically chill out. This is were you can chit chat. Please keep all other threads free of off topic chat.

Thanks and welcome

wso

 

[wildsweetone]

What?

Nobody's been in here yet? Sorry I was out of circulation the last 24 hours or so. My isp has been having problems with national and international links or some such thing. I'm back now.

Where is everybody?

It looks like the map thread is almost settled. Soon I'll be opening a discussion about settings.

 

[Guest]

 

[gauchecritic]

Wildsweet,

Your Sig link for GENERAL DISCUSSION leads to a member page for some reason; JESS-ANYWHERE?

Question to kick us off. When I read the last added story to S/ville; Wishes by sailorm (oon?) when the couple head off to the bushes I began thinking what if one of my stories happened at the same time and at the same place, it would be an interesting linkage to add that they heard some kids doing more than 'splashing about' in the water.

Now I've led myself onto a voyeur character giving his/her/their view of spying on the many depraved goings on, using the written stories as basis.

I don't have any objections to anyone taking that particular plot bunny as a pet.

Gauche

 

[wildsweetone]

darn i can't figure what happened... working on it now gauche - thanks for noticing it.... brb

Okay, thread linkage fixed. Sorry for the mix - html scatters my braincells (which isn't difficult at the best of times).

sailorm I forgot to mention, please go to the 'Sign In Time' thread in the SDC and agree to the conditions for being in the Snippettsville Group. It's a mere formality for copyright thingeebobs. You'll find a link in my signature line at the bottom of this post.

I haven't had a chance to read over the last few stories as yet. Hoping to catch up with them by the end of this week *touching wood*.

Gauche, Quasi is doing something similar with his writing. I have to sort out my Georgie Pie story so that he can link his next piece into it (if he's still wanting to). It's awesome how the stories can be interlinked. And basically, it shouldn't take much effort to be able to do it. Keeping in touch with the original author, perhaps if necessary discussing with them a rewritten sentence or two... It all makes for a fun and interesting read at the end.

 

[jon.hayworth]

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

[wildsweetone]

I've just been catching up on some of the posted stories.

perdita, Your second story titled 'Olga Tsvetaeva Nevskaya' you say is 603 words. In order for it to meet the requirements of Snip Rules, please slice three words off... I really hate to have to ask you to do that... I know how difficult it can be to edit down tight work. I wonder which three you will choose to take out.

I like both your stories.

Wow we have some skilled authors in the SG!

 

[Wantonica]

In General...

Alex De Kok coaxed me into this wonderful situation, since he feels I have first-hand experience in a real-life Snippettsville, which I certainly do. When the bar is hopping, the walls of the bathroom shake with casual banging; the old man giggles and pees his pants; it is all here. I just need to know: if I write and it isn't pertinent to your guidelines, will you edit me? I'm not sure I have the time to pay close enough attention to characters, settings, details of western states, the specifics. I could, however, pump out some good shit.

Smiles,
Wantonica

 

[Guest]

perdita, Your second story titled 'Olga Tsvetaeva Nevskaya' you say is 603 words.]

No problem; I saw stories w/a few less words so thought there was a range. Will do soon.

Perdita

 

[wildsweetone]

Wantonica and others interested

I'm hoping that the stories posted will be discussed one at a time in the Accepted/Declined thread. If for any reason a story is declined, then I expect to see a good reason given for that. I also expect to give authors a chance to edit their stories or to rewrite if necessary.


perdita I'm looking to have a range of between 595-600 words. Sounds a small range I know, but that's where the skill comes in. Editing to a word limit is not easy for lots of authors, (I especially find the 600 limit difficult) but it's really good practise for wordiness. I haven't gone through each story with a fine tooth comb as yet... But it will happen at some point in the reasonably near future.

To anyone I have not yet had time to say Hi to, Welcome. I'm glad you've joined up with the SG and I'm sure we'll have a great time with the setting up of our own township and ultimately the end result of Literotica publication.

Reminder:
If you have not yet signed up on the Legal Sign In Time thread, please do so.

 

[Guest]

I'm hoping that the stories posted will be discussed one at a time in the Accepted/Declined thread. If for any reason a story is declined, then I expect to see a good reason given for that. I also expect to give authors a chance to edit their stories or to rewrite if necessary.

Do you mean declined for posting to the story index? or in the thread?

Who makes the final decision re. this?

No problem w/the range, I'm good at snipping; thanks for the clarity.

Perdita

Edited to add: I've looked through from p. 8 re. the progress of suggestions and decisions re. Snipps. I have nothing to add and think the way the ideas and decisions went were miraculously productive. My gratitude and congrats to all concerned.

 

[wildsweetone]

Do you mean declined for posting to the story index? or in the thread?

1. 600 word stories written by authors are posted first to the 600 word story thread.

2. The next step will be for each story to be discussed on the Accepted/Declined discussion thread. Two authors (any SG authors) need to say 'inclusion' in their 'well done' posting for the story to go the next step.

3. The next step is a formal look at 'acceptable' stories. Punctuation, grammar etc will be looked at, any suggested corrections/alterations will be passed back to the author. Once the story is 'finished', then it sits in the queue and awaits to be combined with four other stories for formal submission to Literotica under the next Snippettsville Group Issue number.

Who makes the final decision re. this?

I have lazily been trying to pass the buck on for this, as some authors will have seen. However as SG co-ordinator, I am willing to give the final go ahead for formal submission. Both Alex de Kok and I have the entrance into the SG profile and submission areas and either of us is therefore able to submit on SG behalf.

No problem w/the range, I'm good at snipping; thanks for the clarity.

You're welcome.

My aim is to make the authors' job of writing as smooth as possible. Once the set up of Snip is up and running, it should be a breeze to write and post stories. Keeping the Character Database (and Setting Database soon) up to date is a priority as other authors will be reliant on current information. Reading every story posted will help keep all the Snip basic facts and some partially hidden ones, straight.

I have been known to make mistakes. I hope that anyone who notices I've missed something will please speak up. I promise I'll try not to bite too hard. If anyone has any questions, please ask. I'll check in here frequently.

I want us all to enjoy what we're creating.

(sorry but i have to rush off now as one teen wants to go to hockey practise and the other needs a ball gown to be fitted at the dressmakers.)

 

[Alex De Kok]

I need to stick my oar in here...

...with an apology. Some of the stories - quite a few of the stories - already posted are based on the original Snippettsville description. In all honesty, this was dashed off too quickly. With the enlargement and relocation of Snippettsville and the change of Tom Holt's status, some stories will need amendment in generally minor ways.

WSO and I hope to have the revised description finalised "real soon now" so we'll all be able to see what needs changing. Hopefully, it will only be a title or a phrase or two. As the stories will need to be 'cut-and-pasted' anyway to be added to the multi-stories in the Snippettsville Group Issue I hereby offer to make those changes for anyone who hasn't the time. Obviously I can't touch your originals but I can tweak the copies.

Alex

 

[Guest]

Re: I need to stick my oar in here...

... I can tweak the copies.

Alex De Kok's oar *and* tweaking, my my (sigh...)

Purrdita

 

[gauchecritic]

Interesting. The two editors (all power to them) have the ability to stick 4 stories together for submission to Lit.

I think sticking the stories together is probably going to be one hell of a job if it's not just copying them up one after the other.

There will be a great and exhausing opportunity for comingling the stories in order to make them a coherent whole, especially with them all being linked not just by setting and characters but by authorship and co-operation. Good luck.

Gauche

 

[Guest]

There will be a great and exhausing opportunity for comingling the stories in order to make them a coherent whole, especially with them all being linked not just by setting and characters but by authorship and co-operation.

Re. Gauche's comments, what if the Snipp. authors were asked to note (in PMs to the eds. or in parens at the end of stories, or on another Snipp. thread) to indicate when other characters are included/involved? That would ease the task of the eds. reading for continuity.

I intend for my characters to interact w/themselves but also with other Snipp. citizens and would not mind making the above notes.

Perdita

 

[Wantonica]

I intend for my characters to interact w/themselves but also with other Snipp. citizens and would not mind making the above notes.

Perdita

Other characters can interact with mine anytime.

Happy day,
Wantonica

 

[Quasimodem]

I hate to throw more obstacles in the way of carrying this project forward, but to be fair, the following must be noted.

In the days of submitting for printed-word publications, one word equalled five characters, including the space.

At present, most people are using the word count feature on their word processor.

This brings up the problem of how different word processor's count words differently.

For example: Microsoft Word counts an asterisk "*" as a word. Corel's WordPerfect does not count an asterisk "*" as a word.

I don't know how other word processor's count it, or other items, but if we are going to count to within three words, we will need to agree upon some common word counting method.


Even going back to the old typists method of five characters (including spaces) equal one word leaves me with problems. Although all my stories average five characters per word, the character count comes out as the following:

1) - Stars Over Snippettsville - - 3,017 characters.

2) - The Ghost - - 2,934 characters

3) - Hopes for Green - - 3,129 characters

4) - Ker-Snap! - - 3,178 characters

5) - Evidentiary Proceedings - - 3,069 characters

6) - Hometown Hotshots - - 3,074 characters

7) - The Legendary Boater - - 2,913 characters


Now, before I start celebrating the passage of “The Ghost” and “The Legendary Boater,” I should check whether the “characters” counted include quotation marks, punctuation marks, line breaks and page breaks. Et fecking cetera, ad nauseam.

 

[wildsweetone]

Actually combining the excellent thoughts here...

What say, when a story is being posted by each author, that author makes simple 'To the Ed' notes on the bottom of the story...? Maybe indicating there, the characters that tie up with other stories, or settings, or any other pertinent notes the author might think 'helpful' to the Eds. I for one would be supremely greatful for that kind of help.

I suggest posting them with the story rather than PMing because frankly my PMing is beginning to take 3/4 hour of my morning, and my mornings are now having to be tightly scheduled in order to fit in my family, my work, Literotica (incidentally my family knows nothing about Litland) and other expectations on my time.



Gauche said: 'I think sticking the stories together is probably going to be one hell of a job if it's not just copying them up one after the other.'

You're right, it's going to be a hell of a job. Which is why I'd like to add a step in between posting and the Eds reading... I'd like authors to take the responsibility of spell checking and proofreading their own work. If it's feasible, it would be handy for each author to 'marry up' with one other author and you could swap stories for checking... Only if it's feasible and authors want to.

Another big help would be if all authors make sure they read all stories... This way, everyone will keep up to date with what's just happened in Snippettsville, and they'll be able to keep track of characters. Also, with all authors reading every story, you will all be helping by noticing any discrepancies within stories. Make particular note of your own invented characters and PM with authors where necessary. I doubt I have the capability of remembering every detail mentioned in every story and my computer system does not have the capacity to store a huge database, hence I plan on making good use of our Databases in the SDC.

It would be a reasonable idea to stick with a couple of existing characters each in the early stages... Keeping track is going to be a difficult task for all of us.

As you can tell by my fluffing around with links and html thingeebobs, I'm not great at that kind of thing. I find it time consuming when I'm under time limitations. So, if I scream for help at some point in the future, you'll know why.

We are all involved in the creation and writing of Snippettsville. It's not just me or Alex sitting pointing fingers. We're a team and our creation is going to look awesome. Heck, the setting up is looking fantastic already, so the finished product is certainly going to enhance each one of us in many different ways.


Anyhow, I need to go check out the threads, so I'll check in later.

 

[wildsweetone]

I hate to throw more obstacles in the way of carrying this project forward, but to be fair, the following must be noted.

In the days of submitting for printed-word publications, one word equalled five characters, including the space.

At present, most people are using the word count feature on their word processor.

This brings up the problem of how different word processor's count words differently.

For example: Microsoft Word counts an asterisk "*" as a word. Corel's WordPerfect does not count an asterisk "*" as a word.

I don't know how other word processor's count it, or other items, but if we are going to count to within three words, we will need to agree upon some common word counting method.

One of Couture's postings had *** in it and I only noticed it when I copied it across into my Word 97 program... You're right Quasi, and I have no answer for this, so please anyone who has ideas speak up I am so not sitting here counting characters!

 

[Guest]

 

[Quasimodem]

My initial reaction to the wordage problem is that everybody should make it a point of honour to try to hit as close to 600 words as possible, but that a one percent ( six word ) margin be permitted.

Second, for those individuals whose word processor counts asterisks, they should be sure to discount the amount of asterisks included.



Further Research by Word Users:

1 asterisk ( * ) = 1 word
2 asterisks ( * * ) = 2 words.
But, do 2 asterisks ( ** ) = 1 or 2 words?

 

[wildsweetone]

Quasi if there is a space between the astrisks, then they're counted as separate blocks of words with my Word 97.

 

[Weird Harold]

My initial reaction to the wordage problem is that everybody should make it a point of honour to try to hit as close to 600 words as possible, but that a one percent ( six word ) margin be permitted.

I think the practical solution to an "official" word count is to use MS Word 97's count for a target of 594 to 606 words with asterisks removed, since that is the word counting tool at WSO's hand.

I think that MS Word actually counts the spaces between "words" and doesn't actualy look at the nature of what's between the spaces. It's a very crude way of counting words and typos that add or miss spaces between words will screw it up, but that's the easiest way for WSO and ADK to count words consistently.

I did think about using the"check messge length" function in Lit's newreply form, but it counts characters instead of words and counts "white space characters" like trailing spaces and "carriage returns."

As long as WSO and ADK are aware of the quirks and the authors know what the standard is, there should be few quibles over word counts.

 

[Guest]

Re. word count

Long ago when I was in school and was required to write assigned length papers, several teachers used a so many words per line and so many lines per page so as not to have to count all the individual words per paper. Is that possible when viewing a story in 'preview reply' mode (using a 600 worder as a model)? Then it wouldn't matter what wp program an author uses. Half sentences and dangling phrases or words would be added to the total line/word count. Just a thought.

Perdita