Collaboration Idea – What Are Your Thoughts?

Lee – I am glad you think it’s a good idea. I only used the end of the course as a starting point for discussion. I myself always get more dedicated with a firm deadline date to spur me on.

I definitely don’t wish to take away from your wonderful opportunity to work with Jon Morrow. I only offer this as a way to connect and collaborate and hopefully compliment the work we are all doing and help to exhibit the vast array of stories we are writing.

I am very glad you’re in. Now if we can convince a few others I think this will make for a great learning experience and hopefully give us a chance to get to know each other a little bit better.

Thanks again for joining in.

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

Hey Ann – Great to hear you are in. I know nothing about putting together an anthology either – isn’t that great!!! We’ll learn about the process together. You have a great idea – including a short bio is perfect.

Look – I believe it’s an opportunity to learn by doing and I truly believe that there are writers participating here that have things to say – (I read your Death Dreams so I know). This could be just the platform to say those things.

I am very pleased that you are in – That’s 3.

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

Ebony – First of all I am very glad to hear you believe in the idea and that you are in.

We haven’t had much of a chance to interact so far, but I wanted to tell you what a big fan I am of your writing. I also have been meaning to tell you for some time that I love your blog. I love the design, I love the content, when I saw it I thought “I want my web presence to look like that.” Big Fan !!

I really look forward to having an opportunity to collaborate and work together on this with you and the others. It think it’s going to be a wonderful learning experience and I know your contributions will make it successful – so thank you.

That’s 4 !!!!

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

YEAH SUNNY !! I am very excited to hear that you are interested. Everyone here knows how strong a writer you are. I am very pleased that you would want to participate. So far – of all that are interested – I am probably the farthest behind in terms of Skill set, web presence, body of work, and I am very glad to have such strong writers to prop me up a little higher.

Lee also mentioned a theme – we should discuss it – I think it might be a good idea. Honestly I do not have much experience in putting an anthology together, but the great thing is this can be whatever we want it to be.

Once we have determined who is in and who is out – I think we should try to arrange a web meeting/chat/project management type of thing and start to put some ideas together. This is intended to be a group project – the crux is to encourage everyone to feel free to contribute and participate – and get to know each other along the way.

My thought was to give this a week or so to allow other members in the group to have a chance to comment – then probably after the 4th of July Holiday weekend – we start the ball rolling.

Comments? Thoughts? All views are welcome –

Thanks again Sunny !!!

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

Ebony – thanks for getting back. Like you, Wednesday is not a good night for me, and the next couple of weekends I am helping a friend build his home brewery (Homebrewers tend to be very similar writers, we are always tinkering and as soon as you finish one project – another presents itself).

I myself have next Thursday open. Are you on the West Coast with Ann. I was just trying to judge what time periods could be most convenient for all. I am not sure but I think Stephanie is in an even later time zone.

I am very glad your looking forward this. I’m pretty pumped myself. I don’t want to get to far ahead of myself on this, but I have already been thinking about who should to play me if Hollywood decides they want to turn this into a movie!!!!!!

Thanks Ebony,

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

Margie, Thank you so much for agreeing to help – especially from a Newbie like myself. I went to look at your site and I was blown away. It means a great deal that you would volunteer to handle the layout and design of the book. I don’t have really much of an idea about what it takes to layout a book, but you obviously do and I am thankful for your direction here. In many respects, that may be the most difficult job of the entire project.

If you would agree to help us assemble the book, I promise I will help you in any way I can, even if that means staying out of your way. Whatever you require – I will try my best to make happen.

I cannot thank you enough for this gesture. It truly is appreciated.

Sincerely,

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

Brian – I was hoping to hear from you. You and I have a whole lot in common and I know that you will be great for the project. There are still room available so you’re in my friend. Currently we are working on logistics and Joe is going to let us put up a site where we can gather and collaborate. I’m glad to have you aboard.

Sincerely,

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

Stephanie and Brian – You just let me know what you need and I will find a way to get it done for you. Brian and I are from very similar backgrounds. While I would not presume to call myself a web builder, I am fairly tech savvy as well. If the three of us put our minds together, and ask for help if we need to, we can build an awesome site, not just for us, but for feature Cartel folks who may finds it useful.

You let me know how I may be of service and I will be there in a flash.

Thanks both of you for lending your talents.

It is greatly appreciated.

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

LoriMarie – you’re in. We are getting the site prepared as we speak. Many people are already working behind the scenes, but we are going to start discussing this project later this week.

I’m sure that everyone will be glad to have you on board and I know that you will be a great addition. You are a great writer yourself and your participation only makes it stronger.

I’ll be getting everyone an update later tonight.

Thanks again for your interest and welcome.

James Lee Schmidt

Thanks Lori – I greatly appreciate that compliment. What I am finding as we go into this project – The Story Cartel is just chalk full of really talented and really nice people. I am amazed how much people who want to help. I am just happy to be a small part of that.

Thanks again for the great sentiments.

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)

Ann – Thanks for replying. Stephanie and I are checking out a few chat plugins, but we too are not all that familiar. There is one called Chat, another called chat room, and then there two more advanced type of WordPress site setups, one called Buddypress, and another called Studio Press. Both of those seem to have additional features that can essentially turn a part of your site into a social network where we could interact, create new topics, etc. Angie has an inside track with Studio Press, and Stephanie was exploring BuddyPress sites. Actually – I kind of stubbed our collective toe when I went ahead and registered the domain without waiting for advice from the more knowledgeable members here, so the delay is completely my fault.

If you are comfortable working within a type of site similar to the Story Cartel, that we could have a private member space and include some kind of chat room feature, then I think that is what we will try to target.

Thanks for your input and your patience Ann – Keep checking in and if you need to get in touch with me my direct email is jamesschmidt@bsrconsulting.net

Sincerely,

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S)

Margie:

Thanks so much for being here and helping out. If not for you and the others helping like you all do, I would be kind of like a rudderless boat on the ocean. I just want everyone to know how much I appreciate their efforts here.

Now let’s get to it:

1.) The logo was designed to compliment The Story Cartel Logo, a kind of a tip of the cap to Joe for taking care of the website and everything he has done, plus I thought it just had symbolic appeal. Now – I have not heard Joe’s feelings on the matter. He may not be in favor of that logo be so close and while he has been super supportive- it may not be his intent to have his name so closely tied to it ( a coattail riding thing). I used it for a starting point. If you have time (IF YOU HAVE TIME) you might mock up some other ideas. I like it – but I am not married to it and I am open to other possibilities.

2.) I’m jumping around a bit on your list – but because it is sort of similar to the logo – I think that it is important to arrive at some sort of title for this and relatively soon. The project will only hold water so long. It would be nice for all of us to be able to see the lighthouse, even as we are pretty far from the shoreline presently. Joe’s title spoke to me – It’s catchy -it’s descriptive – and as both you and Angie have said often – I believe it is enough to hit that 8 to 10 second click mark that we are targeting.

3.) Now we get to the heart of the project. I will defer to you and others who have more publishing experience. It’s funny that you say my time frame was a bit ambitious – I told some members of my local writer’s group what we were doing with Story Cartel and a member who kind of mentors me along – his first comment was “Wow that is an ambitious time table”. I really had no idea.

As for the intro – Do you think Joe might consider writing the introduction? I mean Story Cartel is where this started. The project is a direct result of Story Cartel Course lessons. Maybe that’s pushing the limit – I don’t know – but I would at least like to give him a chance to say NO. Thoughts?

I totally agree with setting the bar very high. You have opened my eyes what is required and now I see – there is a massive process required after the initial writing process. If you think January is more suitable – than I’m behind you 100%. I know what it’s like to role out a software package before it is ready and it is almost always a big mistake. Angie talked about the importance of build up and launch plan. This needs to be done right and professionally or else its just going through the motions.

If I am hearing you correctly – Just the assembly time will take about a month to complete. How long do you think the editing will take. The reason I ask is because I am wondering what your opinion would be for a target date to have first drafts ready? Is Labor Day still a target? I would value your thoughts

About 30 readers – I may need a bit of help there. I myself probably know only about 30 writers/readers, and I only recently started working with professional editors (see earlier post for that experience). I have one question that may seem stupid, but I don’t know; how much would professional editors cost? Is this something we need to perhaps start some kind of budgeting area/fund for. I know that the editors I have worked with (not many mind you) they charged me about $3 per page. I’m not really sure how high up the “professional” ladder they are either. We can cross those bridges later, but if there is going to be some anticipated expenses (There probably will be) then this project should to have an estimated expenses list as well as a budget.

Again Margie – thanks for your input. I guess I feel like one of those people who foolishly bought a restaurant not knowing how it works exactly, and you are Gordon Ramsay who is now dropping some reality on me. That’s not a criticism BTW. I need to know exactly what the true picture is.

If you need to talk to me directly my email is jamesschmidt@bsrconsulting.net.

Thanks Margie.

Lori – First – Freya appreciates having fans. I have two Great Pyrenees dogs, but Freya is the queen of the castle ( not always a good thing BTW). I’m no animal expert, but that snake appeared so happy when I scooped it up and took it outside. It was definitely not a fan of Freya’s.

Margie – posted earlier and she opened my eyes to how the entire process works. I am not sure my time line provided enough time to do this right. Just the reading, editing, rewriting, reediting process, alone might require several weeks to complete. I myself have already started outlining my story simply because I didn’t want to get behind while I’m working on other requirements.

BTW – Twitter account is up. Don’t know if I have things right but check it out James Lee Schmidt@jamesleeschmidt (I think that is how it goes). See if you can find me. I’m already famous.

Thanks for your participation. I really appreciate it Lori

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S)

BTW – Writer’s Carnival, maybe just Carnival – That is a good title. I say we drop that one on a list of possibilities.

Carnival will probably be descriptive of the process before this is all over.

Ebony brings up something that I wanted to but I didn’t know how people might feel. Both my Maker’s Group and my Homebrewers Group use Google Groups. I have not used Google+ Communities that Stephanie brought up. That might be something that would work for us and I am hoping that this would be something that would grow beyond the seed group that we have created.

Will everyone use it. The groups are easy to use and I don’t think it would hurt to set one up – might broaden our reach. I am almost tempted to just try it. However, after my screw up with the domain name, I will wait a few days and get with Stephanie ( If that’s OK) before we commit to early.

James Lee Schmidt (J.L.S.)