The Ipswich Athenaeum (Library)

Subject: The Ipswich Athenaeum (Library) Sun Dec 18, 2011 8:29 pm

Quote :: Ipswich Athenaeum
Call for Manuscripts

Construction is underway on the Ipswich Athenaeum, soon to be Minescape's premier literary destination. Given the relative dearth of literary material, however, which would otherwise leave sadly empty shelves, the library director is sponsoring a call for manuscripts.

Generous payment in Terras (our in-game dollars) is being offered for accepted works of reasonable quality. See categories below for the specific pay-rates.

Literary Guidelines:

In addition to category-specific guidelines, please observe the following - submitted works falling short of these standards will not be accepted:

Writing Quality: Works should be written in clear, grammatically correct and idiomatically appropriate English. Excessive verbosity, redundant prolixity, and associated pompousness one might consider "flowery language" will not necessarily improve chances of acceptance - though some stylistic flourish is acceptable in relevant categories.

Brevity: An instance of the above standard worth special mention. Note that our in-game books have only six lines per "page", holding something like 40-50 words on average. That's about 1/6th or less of the per-page text in a paperback book or double-spaced page on computer paper. Since these submission are meant primarily to be enjoyed in-game, authors should keep this limitation in mind. Write as succinctly as possible.

Originality: Submissions must be your own original work. No plagiarism under penalty of repeated death. You are free to use relevant information from the game Wiki and so on, but you must be improving it somehow - e.g. editing and compacting technical information to make it easier to read, adding missing information or elaborating.

Terms:

In short, by submitting a work you are granting me the right to "publish" this work in-game as long as I pay you the advertised rate for that category in in-game currency. If I accept your work, I will not need to check with you for pre-approval unless I have re-classified your book into a lower-paying category, or if I have opted to significantly shorten it by cuts/editing. Given the technical details of our Bookworm plugin, I don't believe there is any way for me to control in-game distribution and reproduction of the work. You are, therefore, waiving any sort of pesky 'copyright' claim to the work, aside from the right to be attributed as the original author.

Note that once a book is submitted, and especially once added in-game, I will likely not be able to honor requests for changes. Further, I may at my discretion edit submitted works - if there are any substantial changes, this will be added as an editorial note.

Categories:

Informational

This includes any technical references about in-game commands, information on classes, skills, mobs, guides for new players, and 'tips and tricks' material. Quality standards for this category will be very high. I don't need to pay for a dozen New Player Guides that all give the same information.

Pay Rate: 1 Terra per word, estimated average of 40-50T per in-game page / 200-250T per 'normal' page.

Accurate Historical

This category is for works that give accurate, actual histories of relevant in-game institutions or events. A prime example would be a history of the town of Bastion from inception to fall, or an impartial history of some of our wars. This is not the category for auto/biographical books, except, perhaps, for especially interesting figures.

I may pay additional bonuses for this sort of work - particularly if you write e.g. an authorized town history that you have already approved with the mayor of that town. Unauthorized histories will, however, still be accepted if they meet quality and accuracy guidelines.

Pay Rate: 2 Terra per word or more at my discretion, estimated average of 80-100T per in-game page / 400-500T per 'normal' page.

Lore/Religious

This category includes only those works that are based on, or at least take account of, current server lore as published by Cav on the wiki. You should not, for example, simply make up your own set of deities given that the server's deities have already been established and somewhat described. But you may elaborate on the given lore as you like, come up with fitting stories about the various deities, and can even deviate from the 'official' story so long as you give some account of why the deception/inaccuracy occurred.

Religious manuals / books of worship, detailing prayers or rituals for honoring whatever deities, are encouraged.

Please do not go so far beyond the given lore as to write e.g. The Word of Juniper, alleging to contain words directly inspired by a deity. Indicating some degree of indirect communication may be permitted, e.g. reporting a legend that Neith the goddess of Wisdom commanded so-and-so to build a temple or whatnot. But no "I was hangin' out in Bale and Neith came down from the heavens and was all like "Yo, what up?"

Pay Rate: 1.5 Terra per word or more at my discretion, estimated average of 60-75T per in-game page / 300-375T per 'normal' page.

Other

I'm happy to accept any worthwhile submission that doesn't fall into one of the above categories. Whether it be a roleplay autobiography, The Song of the Pyromancer, faux-diaries of dead adventurers.. if it's good enough that the average player would enjoy reading it, I'll take it.

And please, don't try to submit a book as a different category for a higher pay rate if it doesn't fit the guidelines. I'll either reject it, or agree to publish only under this category. In any case, exceptionally interesting works will likely be awarded a bonus beyond the base rate.

Pay Rate: 1 Terra per word, estimated average of 40-50T per in-game page / 200-250T per 'normal' page.

How to Submit:

Submit by email, pasting the manuscript directly into the email. In-game there is no formatting other than spacing; please leave a double-space between paragrahs.

Email: Ipswich@post.com

I will not be accepting all submissions. Depending on quality, I may reject most submissions. But I do hope to add a nice quantity of books into the game and am rather well-funded, so I will take anything original and of good quality.

Include the following:

1) Your in-game name
2) Category of submission
3) Suggested Title of submission*
4) Name of author to be included in the in-game book**

*Note: I may alter titles as I see fit.

**Note: You may use your in-game name, leave the work as anonymous, or choose a pseudonym. No real names, please. I may coin a pseudonymous authorial nickname for anonymous works if I get too many, but I will not reveal authors without permission.

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The main point of all this is to add some fun and depth to the game. Please don't look at it as a mere money-making opportunity. Payment is offered to give you some degree of tangible reward for your time, to encourage those who are able to contribute to do so. The greater reward is making the game more interesting for yourself and everyone else - so if you're going to submit, submit something good!

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