Journal mcgrew's Journal: Nobots Chapter Twenty Nine 2
"So," Rority said, "Want to go play that silly game?"
"Nah," I replied. "I'm burned out on Quake. Lets go somewhen else. Maybe back to when K5 still was a vibrant, living site rather than the zombie on life support it is now."
"OK," he said, "But Saturday we're playing Quake!"
How to get your story posted to kuro5hin
By mcgrew in Meta
Sat Feb 12, 2005 at 09:36:40 AM EST
Some people have whined that it's just too darned hard to get a story posted, particularly to the front page.
Well, your troubles are over. There is no need for "administrative action" to get your story posted. Indeed, K5's present membership base is far more lenient about what they allow to be published than some of the dearly departed K5 losers who have committed suicide.
Here are ten guidelines to getting enough votes to get your story posted to section, if not the front page. Well, at least to get my vote.
Some of these are guidelines, and some are hard and fast rules. With any creative endeavor, rules can be broken. However, before you break any of them, be sure you thoroughly understand the rules and their reason for existence.
1. Have something to say
Face it, we can't all be localroger. Some of us have been cursed with creativity, and the luckier of you can simply sit back and enjoy our madness. If you have nothing to say, then stop right there, unless you are a very, very good writer.
Do you have a hobby? An area of expertise? If you can make your hobby interesting to us, we'll vote it up. If you make it really, really interesting we'll vote it Front Page.
2. Have a three digit IQ
K5's readership has been traditionally more intelligent than most sites on the web, although there are, of course, exceptions. If you are among the lower 50 percentile mark in reasoning ability (i.e., I.Q.<100), then see guideline #3
3. Be funny
If you can make me laugh, you'll get my vote. And lots of other votes, too.
You don't have to be smart to be funny. In fact, considering the limited reasoning abilities of some clowns, intelligence seems to be a hindrance to humor.
Remember, boys, girls, and spambots, the one thing that makes us different than the other pathetic animals on this planet is our sense of humor. Except you spambots, of course.
4. Read something besides the internet and People Magazine.
I believe you'll find that the most published Kurobots are also the ones who have read the most books. Books - you know, those funny looking square things made out of dead trees. These are always edited, usually by editors who actually know the language.
It's hard to get a story posted when you're only semiliterate. The way to becoming more literate is to read more literature. And I'm not talking about crap on the internet, either.
The more you read, the better you'll write. The better you write the more people will vote for your dumb story.
5. Be controversial
Although I personally voted against this story, it is a good example of how to be controversial by being completely "over the top." If you get a lot of discussion while your story is in the edit que, you'll have some folks voting it up just to preserve the comments.
6. Know what you're talking about
Don't write an article about guitars unless you're a luthier or a guitarist. If you're the co-founder of Wikipedia you would be foolish to write a story about your goldfish. Unless, of course, your goldfish is funny or controversial. Or unless you have a story about how to keep your goldfish alive. Or unless you can write like Stephen King.
You're going to get flak from K5ers if you get posted, and most of this flak will be from people who think they understand, but really have no clue.
7. Don't just slop down the first thing that comes to mind
There are two possible bad consequences to sitting down, rattling off some ill-concieved piece of crap and submitting it. The first is that your story will be dumped unceremoniously in about thirty minutes time. Even worse, they might vote your bad story up, and you'll have to live with the damned thing.
You will find that some of K5's better contributors think about a story for weeks or months, then write.
8. Proofread! And never, ever send a story to vote without the edit queue
You will make typos, unless you're incredibly lucky or you're Isaac Asimov reincarnated. After you've written your article, read it! Ask yourself, if someone else had written it, would I enjoy it? If not, then it is certain to be dumped. Figure out what you don't like about your story and change it.
The edit queue is there for a very good reason. People will point out typos, misspellings, factual errors, non-erroneous facts they think are errors, plus of course they will add some trolling, flaming, bashing, and crapflooding. After all, this is K5.
9. Have a thick skin
Because, you know, you're going to get voted down. Because, well, YOU FAIL IT!
10. Have 80 nullo dup accounts
How do you think rmg gets posted FP?
Poll
Which rule did mcgrew shatter in this story?
o None of them 2%
o #1 1%
o #2 4%
o #3 8%
o #4 2%
o #5 7%
o #6 2%
o #7 1%
o #8 4%
o #9 0%
o #10 7%
o all of them 18%
o screw this, -1, resection to trash can 37%
Votes: 69
k5 (Score:2)
I think I first read you over on K5 way back in the day. I forgot that place even existed for years until you mentioned it a few weeks back. I was surprised to find it still up, and in the deplorable state I found it, I was even more surprised to find it still up. Who would be crazy enough to pay to host that POS now?
Re: (Score:2)
Agreed, it is surprising. I guess Rusty's making lots of cash at that other site, or there's so little traffic now he can host it from a desktop computer in his basement.