Hello again. And thank you for being a valued subscriber to E-
Writer!

I had a nice weekend away recently in Yorkshire. My youngest
sister, Liz, lives in a beautiful village called Harden (the
nearest large town, Bradford, is about 15 miles away). She and
her husband Ian asked Jayne and me to be godparents for their
son Leo, so we drove up there for the christening, staying at a
local B&B on the Saturday night.

Anyway, after the service on Sunday morning, we all went back to
Liz's for lunch and conviviality. I found myself chatting with
various people, including the son of the vicar who had conducted
the christening. I'm sorry I can't remember his name, but he was
17 and in the process of applying to various universities. But
what most intrigued me was that he knew exactly what subject he
wanted to study there: forensic computing.

He explained that this involved the use of computers in criminal
investigations. Forensic computing experts not only seek out
evidence, they ensure it is preserved and presented in a legally
acceptable form. Apparently there are only three universities in
the UK which offer degrees in this subject. I've no doubt it is
a fascinating field of study, though not one I would want to
pursue personally!

But what most struck me was that people such as this young man,
who from such an early age have a clear vision of what they want
to do in life, are in many ways fortunate. They know where they
are going and have plenty of time and opportunities to get
there. Obviously nothing in this world is guaranteed, but in all
probability this young man will thoroughly enjoy his studies, go
on to get a fascinating (for him) and well-paid job, and have
plenty of time to rise to the very top of his profession.

By contrast, many of us, myself included, take a lot longer to
work out what we really want from life. We may spend years in
jobs that do little more than pay the bills until (hopefully) we
discover something which really does excite and inspire us.
However, I do believe it's never too late to find your passion
and pursue it.

I was reminded of this again this week when I received an email
from E-Writer reader Roger Dunn. I mentioned Roger in a previous
issue of E-Writer - he's a member of my local writers group, so
unlike most E-Writer readers I've met him personally. I'm sure
he won't mind me saying he is past the first flush of youth, but
in mid-life he discovered a passion for writing poetry, and in
particular sonnets. His latest successes, which he wrote to tell
me about, included first prize in two Writers Forum magazine
poetry competitions (prizes of £100 and £250) and the £50 first
prize in the latest Freelance Market News poetry contest. One of
his poems can also be seen in the new WAH online poetry magazine
at http://www.wah.org.uk (click on People Poetry Feature)

Roger is a good example of what I believe is one of the best
ways to achieve success as a writer: find a field which really
interests and excites you, then devote some time and effort to
becoming a specialist in that field, and perhaps ultimately an
expert.

My own specialisms, as you may know, including writing about
small business matters, self-development, careers, gambling for
profit, and (of course) writing itself. Sonnet-writing is an
unusual specialism, but by pursuing his interest in it (and his
obvious innate talent) Roger has turned it into an excellent
paying niche for himself. If you're still looking for the best
way to get established as a freelance writer, I would always
say, follow your interests and develop your expertise. Whatever
you choose to write, or write about, if you are an 'expert' in
that field, editors will be keen to hear from you, and you will
never be short of opportunities to profit from your knowledge.

There are a couple of other things I wanted to mention in this
issue. One is that, if you use the free AVG Anti-Virus program
which I recommended back in E-Writer issue 4 (
http://www.nickdaws.co.uk/ew004.htm), you should really have
upgraded to the new version 7 by now. The previous version will
no longer be updated after February 15 2005. If you haven't yet
done so, you can go to the AVG website at http://www.grisoft.com 
and download it. I would, however, recommend that you uninstall
the old version 6 before installing the new one. I have found
that version 7 is quite similar to its predecessor, though with
a few extra bells and whistles. As before, the free version does
not include free technical support, but if you take a moment to
register you can get access to a message board on which any
queries can be asked and answered by other AVG users.

The other thing concerns Google AdWords advertising. I have
mentioned this several times in E-Writer, mainly as a potential
paying sideline for writers (see, for example,
http://www.nickdaws.co.uk/ew010.htm). As I noted in the last
issue, Google have changed the rules recently, so a maximum of
two ads for any one website will be shown in any set of search
results. If you want to go on using this system, therefore, you
will need to consider building special 'landing pages' to send
people to from your adverts, rather than sending them to your
merchant's site directly. These 'landing pages' are really mini-
websites which provide further information about the product in
question and encourage visitors to click on to the merchant's
site to place an order.

Anyway, the good news is that there is a new, free program which
will build simple landing pages for you - no knowledge of HTML
required. You can download it from
http:///www.landingpagebuilder.com. You will need to buy web
space to host these landing pages (or use the free space
provided by your ISP), but this is explained in the free (and
well written) instruction manual that accompanies the program.
If you're at all interested in AdWords and other pay-per-click
advertising, you really ought to check out this free resource.

And maybe I should just add as well, if you want the lowdown on
using AdWords to generate a sideline income from affiliate
sales, I highly recommend the e-book Google Cash by Chris
Carpenter. Here's a link to it: http://tinyurl.com/2xtga 


2. Article: Writing for the Internet

Recently several E-Writer readers have asked if I will say a bit
about writing for the Internet. Of course, I like nothing better
than to please my readers, so I thought I would give you my
personal take on this topic.

Let me get one misconception out of the way first. There are NOT
thousands of little-known websites waiting to pay top dollar to
publish your articles every month. Sorry.

The net CAN be a good market for writers, but it differs in some
important ways from 'traditional' markets. Understanding these
differences is the key to making money writing for the net, so
let me start by listing three of the main ones...

(a) Few websites operate on the daily, weekly or monthly cycle
of print-based publications. Those that do are typically
offshoots of print publications (e.g. newspapers) and use little
additional content for the website.

(b) Most websites are run by a small team or even a single
person. They do not usually have the resources to sift through
dozens of articles and proposals sent in by freelance writers.

(c) Most web-based publications do not charge their readers, or
charge only a small fee. Mostly they make their money through
advertising.

All of this means that few websites have the need to buy in
fresh material every month, the resources to handle such a
process, or indeed the budget to pay for it.

That's the bad news. But there IS good news is well. To start
with, many print-based publishers are waking up to the fact that
they need some sort of internet presence if they are going to
compete nowadays, be it a website, email newsletter or something
else. There can be opportunities for freelance writers here if
they approach potential clients at the right time, and have some
basic Internet knowledge as well as writing skills.

For example, a couple of years ago I approached one of the mail
order publishers I work with regularly and suggested that he
should produce an e-mail newsletter for students on one of his
courses. I offered to research and write the newsletter for him,
and after a short time I took over distributing it too (for an
additional fee). The job is not too demanding, takes me one day
a month and pays me around £200 ($350) in total. It's the kind
of job any E-Writer subscriber could probably do, if they can
find a publisher (or any other type of business owner) who needs
this service.

There are also many opportunities for writers to provide content
for new websites. Increasingly, the people creating such sites
are becoming aware that, to attract people and search engines to
their site, they don't (just) need whizzy graphics and cutting-
edge design - they need well written, informative content too.

Such potential clients obviously need writers, but finding out
about their requirements can be difficult. Some are mentioned in
E-Writer, of course, and others advertise their requirements on
writing websites, message boards, and so on. Try entering
"Writers Wanted" in any search engine and the chances are you'll
find a good selection of such sites.

And, of course, many potential clients surf the web looking for
freelance writers (most months I get at least one or two queries
from people who have discovered my website whilst searching for
a freelance writer). This is just one reason why you should have
your own writer's website, of course.

There are also websites such as Elance (http://www.elance.com)
where people who want to hire writers post details of current
projects, which freelance writers can then bid on. With more and
more people creating websites in the hope of 'striking it rich'
online, this is likely to be an area of growing potential for
freelance writers. I plan to include a special article about
this in a future issue of E-Writer.

And finally, I must also say that the net is an area of massive
potential for self-publishers who have some (however minimal)
website-building skills. One example: I've just banked my first
$100 cheque from Google for AdSense advertising on my website.
This refers to the small 'Ads by Google' you'll see at the top
of some pages on my site. Every time someone clicks on one of
these ads, I get paid a small fee by the advertiser.

There is nothing to stop any writer creating a site about a
topic that interests them, then applying to AdSense to get
context-relevant advertising to run on the site, and collecting
a steady stream of payments from this. Again, I will say more
about this (and other web-based self-publishing opportunities)
in a future issue of E-Writer. But if you want the full lowdown
on AdSense now, an e-book I highly recommend is The Definitive
Guide to Google AdSense by my colleague William Charlwood. This
tells you exactly how you can make money by hosting small ads on
your site. Once you've got this right, you can look forward to a
payment every month from Google, with no further effort on your
part. To find out more, go to http://tinyurl.com/3sn6p. 

Summing up, then, the net is a market with big (and growing)
potential for writers, but you do need to understand how it
differs from traditional markets, and perhaps be a bit more
proactive about contacting potential clients and advertising
your services. It helps a lot, too, if you have some basic
knowledge of HTML, website design and so on (though there's no
need to be an expert in this - I'm certainly not!). As the web
matures, good quality written content is becoming highly sought
after by online publishers. This can only be good news for
writers ready to embrace the challenge of writing for this
medium.


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3. Market Info - Miscellany

Here are a few more potential markets for you, starting with an
appeal from one of my regular writing clients...

Do you write about cookery? If so, Nikole Bamford from Lagoon
Games would love to hear from you. She is looking to amass a
collection of recipes which (to quote Nikole) are 'flashy and
dangerous, things that men would like to cook'. If you have that
kind of (dangerous) knowledge, drop her an email at
nikole-at-lagoongames.com.

Here's an unusual opportunity for trainee question writers for
TV quiz shows. British TV production company 12 Yard is looking
for talented writers with good general knowledge to produce
questions for TV quiz shows such as "In It To Win It" and
"Eggheads". No TV experience is required. Application forms
are available from their site at http://www.12yard.com/trainee.
The closing date for applications is 23 February 2005 (ignore
the September 2004 date on the form).

Eggplant Literary Productions are looking for speculative
fiction novellas between 12,000 and 40,000 words. They publish
in electronic (e-book) form and pay 50% royalties on sales. They
say all types of speculative fiction are welcome and reprints
will be considered. Short story collections, full length novels
(40,000 words or more), poetry collections and non-speculative
fiction aren't required, however. Queries are unnecessary, and
manuscripts should be sent as .TXT or .RTF file attachments to submissions-at-eggplant-productions.com. Before doing so,
however, you are strongly recommended to read the full writers'
guidelines, which can be found at
http://www.eggplant-productions.com/jintsu/guidelines.asp.

A Hint of Seduction is a monthly e-zine containing two romance
short stories per month. They are currently accepting
submissions from both published and unpublished authors for
their 2005 schedule. They accept everything from sweet to erotic
romance, and all sub-genres. Payment is on publication, and
currently the rate is $10 per story, paid via Paypal. They say
they hope to increase this in the future as their circulation
grows. Detailed submission guidelines can be found at:
http://www.ahintofseduction.com/submit.html. 

The Tom Howard/John H. Reid Short Story Contest is currently
open for entries. The top prize is $1,000 and publication in an
anthology by Tom Howard Books. The contest is for an original
short story, essay or other work of prose (maximum length 8,000
words). There is a reading fee of $10 per entry, and entries
must be postmarked by 31 March 2005. You can enter either online
or by ordinary mail, and unusually you are allowed to submit
work that has been published or won prizes in competitions
before (as long as you own the anthology and publication
rights). For complete guidelines, go to
http://www.winningwriters.com/tomstory.htm.

Finally, some news about Kwickee. As long-time readers will
know, I am a freelance group editor for this UK company, which
intends to publish articles and fiction people can download via
their mobile (cell) phones, PDAs and the net. After a period of
refinancing and reorganisation, the company has re-emerged with
a completely redesigned interface and bold new plans for the
future.

If you're already involved with Kwickee as an editor and/or
contributor, you should have received at least one email from
the company by now telling you about the changes, so I don't
want to duplicate that here. I would just emphasise though that
if you have submitted any Kwickees in the past, you should as
soon as possible log on at
http://www.kwickee.com/associates/login.asp and reclassify them
using the new categories system. This is explained in the
section titled How to Submit at http://www.kwickee.info. 

In addition, I would recommend studying the House Style guide
(also accessible from the kwickee.info page) carefully, as this
has been fully revised as well. In particular, note that all
contributions should be produced in (or copied into) a text
editor such as Notepad before being uploaded to Kwickee. If
everyone did this, it would save the editors an awful lot of
work removing Microsoft Word characters which will not display
on the Kwickee interface!

One thing the House Style Guide doesn't say, though - if you're
using Notepad, DON'T save the Kwickee before you upload it, or
the program will automatically insert hard returns at the end of
every line, which again will make me and my fellow editors very
unhappy! Personally, I prefer to use the free TextPad program (
http://www.textpad.com) for creating and editing Kwickees, as
this enables you to save articles without hard breaks being
automatically inserted (unless you want them to be).

For the benefit of new readers, Kwickee publishes articles and
fiction which customers can download via their mobile (cell)
phones, PDAs and the net. Anyone is welcome to submit material,
and writers receive a proportion of the payment received every
time someone pays for one of their contributions. For further
information, and to register as a contributor, see the web pages
http://www.kwickee.com and http://www.kwickee.info. Anyone from
anywhere in the world is welcome to contribute Kwickees -
payments to non-UK residents will be made by Paypal.


Thsat's it for this issue. I hope you've enjoyed reading it and
found something that may be useful to you. E-Writer will be back
again in the next few weeks. In the meantime, have a very happy
Valentine's Day!

All the best,

Nick


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Copyright Info

Except where specifically stated, material in E-Writer is
protected by copyright of Nick Daws, 2005. Material from the
newsletter may, however, be reproduced in other online or off-
line publications so long as (a) the text (including any URLs
and e-mail addresses) is not altered in any way, and
(b) the souce is acknowledged and a link or text reference is
provided to my website at http://www.nickdaws.co.uk. Notifying
me is not essential but would be appreciated - please use the e-
mail address above or the link on my site. Many thanks!

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