Suddenly, they’re everywhere. Websites with big, bold home pages. Big headlines. Big, colorful backgrounds that evoke posters. No sidebars, ever. Want more information? Start scrolling, scrolling, scrolling.
Suddenly, they’re everywhere.
Websites with big, bold home pages. Big headlines. Big, colorful backgrounds that evoke posters. No sidebars, ever. Want more information? Start scrolling, scrolling, scrolling.
This isn’t news to designers. But it may be news to lots of folks in Marketing and Communications who are working with the current industry standard template — a top nav; a photo slideshow; three “boxes” filled with teaser information linking to pages deeper in the site; and secondary pages with complex sidebars.
What’s driving the change
Blame the trend toward scrolling sites on mobile devices and tablets (and their touch screens). By late 2013, 28 percent of website visits were from mobile devices (phones and tablets) and that percentage was growing at a phenomenal rate. For businesses whose visitors are in demographics that rely on phones and tablets, the percentage is likely far larger. For the mobile visitor, clicking little text links on a touchscreen is painful; scrolling, a breeze
What’s gained, what’s lost
My experience with mobile-friendly websites that rely on scrolling is that the process of getting information from them is less hierarchical and more immersive. I get a sense of the personality of the organization. If I need to click to get to a secondary page, the link is a large, bold button.
That said, I miss the hierarchy. Without a detailed site map or drop-down navigation, it’s easy to feel that you’re lost and overwhelmed.
Perhaps that’s why some of the most appealing scrolling sites are ones that represent simple, discreet events (such as a conference).
Looking ahead
Thinking about migrating your organization to a scrolling website design? These 12 scrolling sites featured on awards.com provide plenty of inspiration. Be sure to check out the Unfold site — it’s a continuous loop!
It’s time to join Clarion West’s “shadow workshop” and spend the summer writing.
Are you a wordsmith who wants to spend more time writing fiction?
I’m always delighted when my friends in journalism, marketing communications, and technical writing reveal that they have fiction projects underway — novels, short stories, poetry, and flash fiction. I want to tell you about a great way to get some of that creative work done this summer, as part of a virtual community of 300 writers.
Clarion West is a Seattle nonprofit that for 30 years has hosted a six-week residential summer workshop for writers of speculative fiction. It also has less-intensive opportunities for those of us who want to experiment with fiction writing or get back to a neglected fiction project. One of those opportunities is the summer Write-a-thon.
The Write-a-thon is like a Walk-a-thon, but usually less physical (unless your computer is on one of those new treadmill desks).
You really should write that story.
Here’s how the Write-a-thon works: You set goals for your fiction writing and, if you want, a goal for raising money for Clarion West’s operations. Then you create a Clarion West account and a Write-a-thon page. After that, all you have to do is start writing.
If you’re the marketing type, tell your friends what you’re doing and ask them to support you and Clarion West. If you’re shy — hey, that’s OK. Clarion West will list you on their website, with a link to a Write-a-thon page where people can read your bio and an excerpt of your (published or unpublished) writing. You’ll attract donors (and perhaps secret admirers) this way.
Perks of Write-a-thon participation include hanging out with the Clarion West community on Facebook and attending “Tweet-ups” with some very cool authors.
I hope you’ll join me in getting some writing done this summer and raising some money for Clarion West.
My Clarion West Write-a-thon page is up. I’ve set the goal of writing three new short stories and submitting one to a magazine or anthology. I’ve also set a goal of raising $1,000 towards Clarion West’s operating expenses.
I hope you’ll join us, as a writer (Sign up before June 22!) or as a donor (You’ll have until August 2 to make a contribution). Please visit the Clarion West Write-a-thon headquarters to check out the growing list of Write-a-thon participants and read excerpts of fiction from hot new authors like Corry Skerry, Cat Rambo, and Jude-Marie Green and established novelists like Steve Miller and Cassie Alexander.
Please feel free to ask me questions about Clarion West, and I’ll be happy to answer them.
Full disclosure: I’m a member of the Clarion West board of directors and I’m committed to making a transformational workshop experience available for talented and courageous writers.
Steve Davidson and a team of 50 bloggers have relaunched Amazing Stories magazine as a community site for science fiction fans.
April 1926 —Hugo Gernsback, publisher of Electrical Experimenter science magazine, launched the first magazine devoted to science fiction — or what Gernsback liked to call “scientifiction.” Amazing Stories was published for almost 80 years, passing through the hands of a wide range of publishers (including, in the late 1990s, Wizards of the Coast). It debuted writers including Isaac Asimov and Ursula K. Le Guin, but the magazine suffered from uneven leadership, uneven quality, and controversial editorial policies. It ceased publication in 2005.
January 21, 2013 —Steve Davidson of Experimenter Publishing (note the company name) has re-launched Amazing Stories as a web community, with the goal of establishing a market that will enable him to revive the professional fiction magazine. Davidson, curator of the Classic Science Fiction Channel website and author of several books on paintball, spent three years obtaining the rights to the Amazing Stories name. He published two online issues of the magazine last year, as a proof of concept.
“Every genre fan now has a chance to help support the creation of a new market for the stories, artwork, and articles they all love so much,” Davidson said in a news release this morning.
At the core of the new site’s content are posts by a team of bloggers covering a wide range of science fiction-related topics. The site will offer product reviews, convention news and listings, and will take advertising.
I have more than just a science fiction reader’s interest in the revival of Amazing Stories. I’m going to be one of the bloggers for the site, writing primarily (but not exclusively) about my explorations of science fiction-related communities including gaming, girl geekdom, the Maker community, Steampunk, Browncoats, Discworld, and SF/mystery crossovers. Please come join us at Amazing Stories.
This includes some of the finest speculative fiction I’ve read. David’s explorations of astonishingly imaginative “what if?” scenarios are precise, rigorous, and often deeply moving. Here’s the publisher’s blurb:
“This Endeavour Award-winning collection pulls together 15 critically acclaimed science fiction and fantasy stories that take readers from a technicolor cartoon realm to an ancient China that never was, and from an America gone wrong to the very ends of the universe. Including the Hugo Award-winning “Tk’Tk’Tk,” the Writers of the Future Award winner “Rewind,” “Nucleon,” “The Tale of the Golden Eagle,” and many other highly praised stories, Space Magic shows David D. Levine’s talents not only as a gifted writer but as a powerful storyteller whose work explores the farthest reaches of space as well as the depths of the human heart.”
The collection is $5.99, and the stories in it are available as individual ebooks for 99 cents each. Highly recommended.
Book View Café (“Because you can never have too many ebooks”) publishes works by Vonda N. McIntyre, Laura Anne Gilman, Jeffrey A. Carver, Phyllis Irene Radford, Linda Nagata, Chaz Brenchley, and many other speculative fiction, mystery, and romance authors. While you’re there, check out Chris Dolley’s Reeves & Worcester Steampunk mysteries, including What Ho, Automation!
Author Kathleen Alcalá is teaching an Oct. 7 Clarion West workshop for writers.
Where do writers get their ideas?
My friend April Henry was inspired to write her novel Learning to Fly by news stories about panic and confusion in the aftermath of a chain-reaction car accident on an Oregon freeway. Her recent Girl, Stolen had its roots in the true story of a blind girl kidnapped while sleeping in her parents’ car.
On October 7, I’ll be taking a one-day workshop taught by author Kathleen Alcalá (The Flowers in the Skull, Mrs. Vargas and the Dead Naturalist) on how to transform thought-provoking headlines into stories — and how to go a step beyond to create your own headlines (a.k.a. story titles).
The workshop will be in Seattle’s University District. You can find more information on the Clarion West website. There are still spaces open.
Here are a few early progress reports from Clarion West Write-a-thon participants:
We’re off! 228 of us, pursuing writing, editing, and publishing goals for six weeks to attract donations for the Clarion West Writers Workshop.
I encourage you to explore the participants’ pages, where you’ll find excerpts from the work of pros like Andy Duncan, Vonda McIntyre, Elizabeth Bear, Louise Marley, Rachel Swirsky, Kelley Eskridge, and Nisi Shawl, and emerging stars like Vylar Kaftan, J.M. Sidorova, and Cat Rambo (to name just a very few of the 228 participants).
In the next few days, I’ll be posting here about my own Write-a-thon goals — which including writing three short stories inspired by Jonathan Coulton songs and publishing them on Writer Way. (Thank you, Jeff and Allen, for your generous support!)
Here are a few early progress reports from Write-a-thon participants:
Brenda Cooper is writing 1,000 words a day on a novel — plus training for the STP (Seattle-to-Portland) bike ride event.
Janine Southard is writing four short stories and outlining a novel.
Sandra Odell is writing 2,000 words a week on her novel while focusing on taming her Inner-Bitch (er, Inner-Editor).
Gabrielle Harbowy, who edits novels for a living, is going to start writing one.
I’m writing this post from the 4th Street Fantasy Convention in Minneapolis, where I just had the honor of moderating a writers workshop on storytelling that featured Oneal Isaac, Scott Lynch, Beth Meacham, and Mary Robinette Kowal. I was so inspired by their presentations and Q&A with the workshop attendees that I’m tempted to repair to my room and spend the rest of the weekend writing. But there are too many other great panels to attend, such as “Story Templates and the Folk Process” — which is starting in 10 minutes.
I’ll be at Gnomedex Friday and Saturday, soaking up new ideas.
I’ll be at Gnomedex Friday and Saturday, soaking up new ideas and meeting new people.
Working at a computer, connecting via all the usual social media platforms, certainly gives you the feeling of being exposed to new ideas. But the in-person experience is so much less controllable and, usually, so much better.
I’ll report back on the highlights — or maybe I’ll see you there and we’ll get to talk.
The Clarion West Write-a-thon combines a fundraiser for the workshop (keeping tuition affordable for aspiring writers) with an opportunity for Clarion West graduates and other fiction writers to focus on their own writing or publishing goals during the workshop period.
If you read contemporary science fiction, chances are you’ve enjoyed the work of some of the graduates of the Clarion West Writers Workshop — writers like Kij Johnson, Cat Rambo, Mary Rosenblum, Nisi Shawl, and David Levine. You may recognize some of these names as nominees (and winners) of Hugo, Nebula, and World Fantasy awards.
Each summer, 18 students from across the country (and around the world) come to Seattle to spend 6 weeks at Clarion West, studying with leading writers and editors in the field of speculative fiction.
It’s an exhilarating experience. For many students, Clarion West is the catalyst that transforms them from promising writers into polished professionals — people who go on to present extraordinary works of imagination to the world.
The Clarion West Write-a-thon combines a fundraiser for the workshop (keeping tuition affordable for aspiring writers) with an opportunity for Clarion West graduates and other fiction writers to focus on their own writing or publishing goals during the workshop period.
If you’re a writer, you can sign up to write (by June 19) and then invite your friends to encourage you via a donation to Clarion West.
If you’re a reader of speculative fiction, you can find out more about participating writers and support one or more of us during the Write-a-thon event (June 20 – July 30).
As a new member of the Clarion West board — and as a 2010 Write-a-thon participant — I invite you to join us this summer for the Write-a-thon and for the Clarion West Summer Reading Series at the University Bookstore. The readings feature this year’s instructors, each presenting recent works or works-in-progress and answering audience questions about writing, teaching, editing, and more.
No matter how you constitute a group, certain people will fall into the roles of the leader, the anarchist, the followers, and the deserters.
I was a psych major in college and working at a community counseling program. We ran a crisis hot line, manned a “trip tent” at rock concerts, and took a lot of practical training in group dynamics as it was then studied by the Tavistock Institute.
A psychologist from the university facilitated a training for us in group processes that had a profound effect on my life.
Or should we order subs instead?
At the training, seven or eight of us were put in a group and assigned what seemed a simple a task: to order pizza for lunch.
But by the end of an hour, we had no pizza, the group had split into two warring factions, and I was miserable.
It started when someone suggested ordering two pizzas, one with one type of topping, the second with another. There was a general murmur of “sounds reasonable” and “one of them should be vegetarian” and I joined in that affirmative chorus. Discussion of specific toppings had begun when my friend Tim, a glint in his eye, said loudly “Why does it have to be pizza? The restaurant has sub sandwiches, too. We could get meatball subs.”
Everyone looked at Tim.
“Good point,” someone said. But others in the group were frowning. Things were getting complicated.
There was discussion of getting a couple of subs and a pizza. Then someone pointed out “Look, the assignment for the group was to order pizza.” General agreement, in which I joined. The suggester, buoyed by the agreement, returned to the plan for choosing the toppings for two pizzas, and people began discussing what should go on the veggie pizza and what on the non-veggie.
“Why do we have to do what we’re told?” Tim asked. “No one said we couldn’t change or modify the assignment. Perhaps this is an exercise to see if we can stop being sheep.”
This made sense to me, and apparently to several other folks. People stopped talking about pizza toppings, and started talking about the assignment. Groups dealt with disagreement! This was natural!
After a while, discussion died down and there was a tentative suggestion that we go ahead and order sandwiches from a deli instead.
At which point, a fellow who’d been moving in to Tim’s camp said. “Why do we have to order anything at all? Why couldn’t we just decide to give the pizza money to charity? We could decide to do that, and just go home. Hey, we could just take the money and go to a bar and get drunk.”
I think, at this point, Tim got up and reached for his coat.
“Sounds good to me,” he said.
Not surprisingly, several people in the group began looking distinctly uneasy. They looked at the psychologist who was sitting on a couch, observing our group process. He, of course, looked utterly detached.
By now the group had polarized. At one end, there was Tim and the other anarchist. At the other end, the conservatives, who by now wanted to order the damn pizzas and forget Tim.
On the sidelines were a few people who thought Tim was being a clever jerk and the pizza people were getting ridiculously worked up over a pizza. By now, most of them looked bored and ready to leave.
And then there was me. All I could think was that this silly argument was going to go on for ever, and we’d never get anything accomplished. Or any lunch. And I was utterly miserable.
At the end of the second hour, the psychologist called a halt to it. He pointed out to us how the group had polarized, and what roles each of us had taken. He assured us that no matter how you constitute a group, certain people will fall into the roles of the leaders, the anarchists, the followers, and the deserters.
At the end of the training, the psychologist called me over. He said: “You need to stay out of groups. You take on the overall experience of the organization. Whenever there is conflict, which there inevitably is, you experience the conflict, and it will tear you apart.”
I heeded his advice, and worked for a number of years as a journalist, observing and describing conflicts without having to be part of the conflicts themselves. In recent years, I’ve been careful (and fortunate) to work with strong, decisive bosses and clients.
I’m just now starting to be involved with groups as a volunteer and, let me tell you, it’s pizza and anarchy all over again.
Englishman offended by the municipal authorities’ decision to “dumb down” his street’s name (from “St. John’s Close” to “St. Johns Close”) he returned his local street signs to the proper singular possessive — using paint and a paint brush.
I’ve studied with two of the best news editors who ever lived (the late Tim Cohane and Irv Horowitz) and worked under some pretty damn good ones.
So my hat is off to Stefan Gatward, of Tunbridge Wells, England. According to this UPI report, Mr. Gatward was so offended by the municipal authorities’ decision to “dumb down” his street’s name (from “St. John’s Close” to “St. Johns Close”) that he returned his local street signs to the proper singular possessive using paint and a paint brush.
. And Grovemade.
