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Guidelines for paid contributions for publication in The Coastal Passage
(Effective TCP #26)
What defines paid material? An article that has real polish, something that has taken time and effort to prepare and organise. There will always be space in TCP for the most amateur contributions or issues oriented forum subjects and articles that may promote community supported events etc. That’s what creates the connection to community that makes TCP what it is but those are the things we all volunteer our effort for, and what TCP is willing to sponsor page space to support. It’s perfectly OK to ask when sending material if it qualifies for payment but is the editors final decision.
To avoid unnecessary work and disappointment and to maximise payment for contributions, intending paid contributors should read and follow the guidelines below. It isn’t a bad idea to ring or email TCP for questions regarding this information or to see if the subject matter qualifies for consideration.
What sort of material does TCP want?
1. The material must be of relevance and interest to TCP’s readers.
A study of recent issues of TCP is helpful to determine the type of material sought and the way it should be presented but… TCP accepts and in fact seeks a different approach on occasion. It is your rag, what have you got in mind? Can you suggest material improvements in presentation?
TCP aims to provide lively, well-written articles, as well as interesting and reliable technical information, all supported by good photos. Genuine heartfelt experience and thoughtful observation are prized aspects of any contribution.
2. Make it easy for the Editor, Organise it! If it takes additional time to process the text due to the use of unusual formatting or photos need to be resent or scanned from poor sources for example, the value of the contribution is reduced.
3. Take your time. TCP’s editor typically rewrites material several times over several days before committing to a page (Thus reducing suff-ups to a minimum). Test the results on friends. Check and recheck your facts.
4. TCP encourages contributions from the young folk and special care and consideration is given.
5. Material that promotes a religion will be either edited or refused. TCP must not seem to endorse or favour any particular belief system over another.
Practical considerations:
Written material should be supplied in either PC or Macintosh format and emailed to bob@thecoatalpassage.com Text and photos mailed on CD are great. Photos sent by email are often too small to use. If you are intending to send a number of high resolution photos to TCP via email, give us a warning.
There is no stupid word count at TCP. Creativity doesn’t come in tidy packages all the time. A very long article though, is harder to work with and difficult to place but merit is determined by the read, not the count. Sometimes a 500 word little nugget can be the best article in the paper.
Be imaginative, but also ensure that your information is accurate. All facts, especially ones that could be contentious, should be thoroughly researched before writing and reference for facts along with the article are helpful.
Personal notes about you in the form of a small autobiographical sketch are good, a photo all the better but not a big deal.
Photographs: Don’t mess with them! Even smaller digital cameras these days, take a good photo. Problems TCP encounters are usually in processing done by the contributor. AVOID PICASSA!! We have found this free program by Google may be destructive of photo files. Best thing to do is to save your jpg photos in a ‘documents’ folder in your computer and then transfer to disc from there. Please don’t; crop, convert, adjust or compress and please get the bloody date and time off them! TCP can use photos of 1 meg or larger for just about anything. Photos as small as 100kb can even be used for a small shot on an inside page as long as the pic is sharp and file characteristics are not corrupted by inappropriate manipulation.
The GST and payments
We are still sussing this out but as far as we know now, most of you are under the term "hobbiest"thus GST does not apply. If your professional status requires GST be addressed TCP will need an invoice to that end.
Payments
TCP will pay about $100 per page (exclude ads) for text and photos used, more for really outstanding technical articles or exceptional story telling. Less if much work has to be done to prepare the article by TCP. All fees are tempered by the amount of advertising revenue generated by the issue involved. TCP will pay via bank transfer or by mailed cheque. If some other form is required let us know and we will try to work with you.OR... You can choose to have your fee donated to Sailability or other nominated charity.