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Ask Massively: Grand conspiracies
Earlier this week, Massively's Mike Foster penned a Soapbox editorial that argued against obsessing over the definition of MMO to the exclusion of debating good game design. If you liked it, awesome. If you hated it, then take heart; next week, Brendan Drain will be arguing the flip-side of Mike's article. That's what our Soapbox is all about: writers talking about game-related things they're interested in or passionate about. It's a soapbox mounted by a different author every week, not a notarized declaration of the site's purpose and intent. We've intentionally collected a team with diverse opinions, and we rarely all agree on every opinion published on the site, especially the Soapbox, and that's the whole point. If we all agreed, we'd be boring. Plus I'd never get to waste an afternoon debating video games with Eliot in chat, which is tremendous fun, incidentally, and I highly recommend it. This week in Ask Massively, I want to address the conspiracy theory proposed in the wake of that Soapbox as well as a few other bits and bobs from our comments.
Call for Posts: Write a Breakfast Topic!
Over the last few years, the number one thing people have submitted over our tip line is suggestions for Breakfast Topics. Everyone has questions they want to ask the community. There are people of all types and flavors playing WoW, each with their own views and opinions. It's always fun and interesting to see people debate your topic, and this is your chance. We are now taking Breakfast Topic submissions via Aol's Seed. You can find out more about the program in our announcement post about the Guest Writer program, and at our Contributing to WoW.com page. As mentioned, we're looking for all of you to write Breakfast Topics in our usual conversational style, asking the community for their thoughts and opinions on whatever WoW-related topic you'd like. Entries should ideally be between 200 and 500 words, though there is some wiggle room in either direction. Only the best submissions will be accepted. In order to get started read up about the program, sign up, and then submit your article (you can't see the article page unless you have a Seed account). Unfortunately, we are currently only able to take submissions from individuals living in the United States, but hopefully we'll be able to accept international submissions in the future. We are accepting submissions until 11:59 p.m. EST on Wednesday, March 24th. If this round goes well, we will take more contributions later. Good luck, and have fun!
Call for Posts: What I want to see at BlizzCon 2010
Last week we did a test run of our Guest Writer program asking our Twitter followers to write an article giving five tips to DPSers running random heroics. Our test run was a success (the winning article will be published later this week), and we're now ready to begin allowing everyone to have the chance to become a Guest Writer on WoW.com! WoW.com runs the program through Aol's Seed. You can find out more about the program in our announcement post about the Guest Writer program, and at our newly re-vamped Contributing to WoW.com page. This week we're looking for contributions from writers telling us what they want to see at BlizzCon 2010. We're looking for between 75 and 150 words, and we'll select 3 to 7 entries for publication on WoW.com. If your entry is selected, you'll be paid $10 through Seed. Last week we found out that BlizzCon could be returning to the Anaheim Convention Center and that Jay Mohr is hosting again. In order to get started read up about the program, sign up, and then submit your paragraph over on the article page (you can't see the article page unless you have a Seed account). We are accepting submissions until 11:59 p.m. EST on Sunday February 14th. Please follow all instructions exactly. US residents only right now, although we're told our international friends will be able to submit work through Seed soon. Good luck!
The new WoW.com Guest Writer program
You may be seeing some new names on the site soon, but don't be alarmed! In addition to the new columnists who have recently joined us, we also are starting a new Guest Writer program through Aol's Seed.com. Seed is new site designed to allow writers submit work for publication on many of the blogs Aol owns, in this case, WoW.com. (If you are interested in potentially writing for this or any other Aol site, I encourage you to set up your Seed.com account now. Seed only works for USA based writers and your real name will appear on our site.) We're going to be using Seed in a couple of different ways: We'll be tapping WoW writers around the internet to write specific posts for us. In fact, you will see two this week: one from Chris Dinwiddie (aka Graylo of Gray Matter) and another from Richard Powell (founder of the LoreCrafted blog). We'll occasionally call out for anyone to contribute on specific topics and pick the best for publication. You may have noticed us doing one of these already! Our recent call out for tips on running random heroics received dozens of submissions and we're going through them now. For any future opportunities, keep an eye on the site or our Twitter feed -- we're aiming to call out for your content once or twice a week. And in the meantime? Don't panic if you see unfamiliar names on the site -- after all, the next name could be yours! To be crystal clear: we now have two ways of hiring writers. We still have the old way where we can contract writers regardless of the where they live for regular, long term writing on the site and we have this new way which we use when we only want to use a writer once or irregularly. This new way, unfortunately, is limited to writers in the U.S. The geographical restrictions for Seed submissions are unfortunate, but out of our control. If it changes, we will let you know.
