Re: the future of The AA Independent Press Guide

As you probably know, I have been running my website for nearly five years now. You are probably also aware that my website hosts numerous free access writers' resources, including the invaluable AA Independent Press Guide, which has detailed listings of over 2,000 small and independent press magazines and publishers worldwide.

What you may be less aware of is the fact that I have now spent approximately £1,000 (or $2,000) in hosting and other admin costs over that period. I have also spent many thousands of hours building, maintaining and updating The AA Independent Press Guide and all the other resources on my website.

When I first set forth on this venture, back in September 2003, I was full of energy, enthusiasm and idealism. I was also considerably financially better off than I am now. I was more than happy to offer up my time for free and I was delighted to be able to offer my services for free.

About a year after the launch of the website - once I realised what it was costing me - I added a page to the website, asking for donations. I hoped, by doing so, I might generate enough donations to cover my hosting and admin costs. I rather naively expected people to be happy to help out, especially as I had received so many emails and letters from people thanking me for the services I was providing.

However, in four years I have received exactly 6 donations, amounting to a grand total of £50 (or $100).

Nearly five years down the line, my enthusiasm for this venture has waned considerably. I have maintained the website solely out of a sense of duty: my heart is no longer in it like it was.

Every day emails arrive from magazines and publishers asking me to amend their details, or from people wanting information, or even from students who are writing a project about the publishing industry. In five long years I have never managed to clear my email inbox. Right now, today, there are 68 emails in my inbox awaiting my attention. There have been times when that number has been closer to 600. I have a pile of letters on my desk and beside me I have a notebook full of "to do" lists. There are days when I feel I am going to drown in it all, but I persevere, out of a sense of duty.

For nearly five years I have tried my best to juggle my obligations as a father, a husband, a breadwinner and as an unpaid provider of information for thousands of writers and artists. I have also tried - mostly in vain - to find adequate free time to write, draw and make music.

My financial circumstances are no longer anywhere near as healthy as they were five years ago, and, as such, I can no longer afford to take only part-time, temporary jobs. Unless things turn around substantially in the near future I will be forced to take full-time work either delivering mail, working in a factory, or (if I'm lucky) as a trainee bus driver.

Please understand, this is not a begging letter. I am perfectly prepared to do whatever I must do to keep our family's head above water. I have no complaints about the fact I am not capable of earning a professional wage. It was my conscious choice to follow the path of the poet, artist and musician. I knew fine well when I made my choices that I was embarking upon a "career" path with little prospect of financial stability. All through my life I have taken menial, low-paid work to enable me to continue in my chosen field; and I confess I have done this sort of work as seldom as is humanly possible, because I need time for my real (and mostly unpaid) work as a poet, artist and musician.

The simple fact of the matter is that once I commence full time work, there will be no spare time to maintain this website. I will have to pull the plug on The AA Independent Press Guide and all the other resources... and, to be honest, I will not be that unhappy to do so, because at times the workload involved has been utterly overwhelming. I have, for five years now, been a voluntary administrator. Not only have I not been paid for this: I've actually had to pay for the privilege.

Now, I would prefer to continue working at something that at least relates to my chosen "profession": administering, maintaining and developing a writers' resources website is infinitely preferable to driving a bus or working in a factory. But how can I do this? Well, I did approach the Scottish Arts Council with a proposal, but they couldn't help me as the resource is not specifically Scottish, and as far as I'm aware there is no World Arts Council. Maybe, somewhere there is a suitable grant award funding body. If so, I haven't found it. The only way forward is to charge for access to my website.

Unfortunately, having only basic HTML skills, I do not have the necessary expertise to set this up. Nor can I afford to pay for someone to do it for me. So, the only solution I can see is to ask people to send me a donation. That is... I'm asking you to send me a donation!

Some of you, no doubt will consider this an imposition, some of you may consider this out and out cheek. I accept that, and I apologise to you if this letter somehow offends your sensibilities. However, I do know that many of you have used my website and have benefited from it over the years. Many of you have even written to me and thanked me for the work I have put in. And whilst I appreciate this gratitude, I would appreciate it more if you would dig your hand in your pocket.

I know, some of you, like me, are in financial difficulty, but I also know that no matter how skint I have been, I was always able to find the cash to buy myself a copy of The Writers And Artists Yearbook, even if it meant having to live off of beans and toast for a month. No matter how broke you are, you can find money for the things that really matter; and the future of this website does matter. It matters to the 1,000+ writers who have photolinks to their websites, it matters to the 2,000+ magazines and publishers who are listed in The AA Independent Press Guide, it matters to the 750+ internet magazines that it's linked to, it matters to the 75,000+ people who have accessed since it was launched.

Whether you are a writer at the very beginning of your career or one at the pinnacle of your powers, you have been, either directly or indirectly a beneficiary of this website's presence on the World Wide Web. This website has, for nearly five years, been part of a network which connects readers, writers, artists, editors & publishers. If it dies the only beneficiaries will be those writers' resource websites that charge for their services.

If you care about what this website offers, if you care about its continued survival, then please do make a donation. If you can afford it, make a substantial donation. If you can't afford it, then even make a small donation. Every penny will count.

At this moment in time I have enough cash to see me through the summer. After that - assuming this plea falls on deaf ears - I'm going to have to look for a full-time job. The day that happens, The AA Independent Press Guide and all the other writers' resources on this website become history. It's as plain and simple as that.

If you want to prevent the demise of this website - if you want me to continue sweating my guts out keeping it up to date and accurate, and even expanding it -

you need to pay me. I'm sorry, but that's the way it is. I've got to be pragmatic about this. Either I earn a modest living through this website or I have to go and get a full-time job. These are my only two options.

As I said before, this is not a begging letter. This is a letter asking you to pay to ensure the continuation of a service that has been invaluable to so many writers. What you pay is up to you. Pay as little as you can afford or as much as you can stretch to. Just pay something!

As long as the donations keep coming in the website will keep going. I'm happy to continue knocking my pan out to keep this website going, but I need to derive an income from it.

If you believe this website is a valuable resource and you want to see its continued existence and development please send a cheque or money order, in UK pounds sterling only, made payable to Dee Rimbaud, to 35 Falkland Street (0/1), Glasgow, G12 9QZ, United Kingdom.

To pay in other currencies, or to pay electronically, see here for more information.

Thank you for taking the time to read this far. I hope that you are pragmatic enough to appreciate you "don't get nothing for nothing" in these difficult days and that you will indeed make a donation. If you aren't willing to help, the next time you log onto the website, you might just get a white screen with "Error 403" written on it. Then you'll know the experiment failed.

I'm sorry for harping on about this, but after putting nearly five years of my life into this I don't want to see it go down the tubes.

I look forward to hearing from you.

All the very best

Dee Rimbaud

www.thunderburst.co.uk

(Enjoy it while you still can!)

ps: I do apologise for using "cut and paste" to address this letter to you specifically. This is the nearest that time will allow me to come to a personal email. I am doing it this way - which is hugely time consuming as it is - because mass mails invariably end up in "spam" folders, unloved and unread (which is fair enough, because, like yourself, I do not want to buy viagra or send my personal details to a "phisher" in Nigeria who is offering me millions of pounds for no apparent reason). This email though is relevant and important, not spam. You are on my mailing list because you are a writer, an artist, a magazine editor, a publisher, or because you have specifically requested to be on it. I am approaching you, asking for you to send a donation because you are either listed or linked to on my website, or because you have at some time used my website. If you are none of the above, you have ended up on my mailing list by accident. In which case, I apologise for inconveniencing you and will, upon request, remove you from my mailing list.

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WEB links:</>

http://www.thunderburst.co.uk
http://deerimbaud.blogspot.com
http://rimbaud-products.blogspot.com
http://www.virb.com/melted_rubber_humans
http://www.virb.com/melted_rubber_humans_2
http://www.myspace.com/captainmelted
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http://uk.youtube.com/user/deerimbaud

BOOKS:</>

http://www.rimbaud.org.uk/bookofhope.html
http://www.rimbaud.org.uk/droppingecstasy.html
http://www.rimbaud.org.uk/stealingheaven.html
http://www.rimbaud.org.uk/thebadseed.html

Sorry - but this is just slack. No excuses.

'Sweating his guts out' updating a website? He needs to take a long look at himself.

A quick skim through the listings shows that many are long inaccurate - Wolf still based outside of London, Poetry London still edited by Pascale, Rising details five years out of date; Red Wheelbarrow info way out of date; Reater still listed despite no mag for seven years; Poetry Wales details out of date; PNR address wrongly moved to Glasgow; Mslexia recommended but info out of date; Idler details out of date; Dripping still listed despite not out for five years; Brittle Star details outdated; many other publications which should be listed just aren't - a free service might require magazines to let them know their updates, but one which is looking for payments needs to be informed and accurate. I presume this level of inaccuracy is the case across the site. Most new publications are missing too.

'You need to pay me - either I earn a modest living through this website or I have to go and get a full-time job.' - five years and he hasn't learned the basics, still hasn't learned enough for the design not to induce nausea? Go for the job, I say.

Directories are a nightmare to run. Dee's list replicates The Poetry Kit, and there are many more listings pages on the Web, most are free. I think the only way to keep them current is to pass control to the listee (and prompt them), Dust Books do this with their catalogue and database for small presses in the US. It's in the nature of such lists that there's going to be some dead ends and some dead links. Maintaining them can be a big job. I can't see any model where that would pay for itself on the Web. I think donations is a poor model: too unpredictable, too insecure. Dee's enthusiasm is admirable and not just in this list, but I think Roddy's right that it's not really sophisticated enough to survive as a resource. Dee certainly has the passion but not the Web skills to develop something that might compete with (ultimately) print products from A&C Black or Macmillan, or Jim Bennett's site, or the listings at the Poetry Library. Making money from the Web is tough, and if Dee wants to do that as his job, I'd advise him not to. There are easier ways to earn a living.

Hmm. Not sure it's a wise idea to continue something, even for a small wage, it if your heart's not in it at all. If I were Dee, I'd take the job and strip back my duties as far as I can. Unfortunately, I think that's what most of us have to do.

I recently reached a similar position with the Poets on Fire listing site. Since I consider it a valuable resource, which took me a long time to build up and establish as such, my response was to advertise for a small team to take over from me to keep the site going. It certainly never occurred to me to ask for money. (I obviously missed a trick there!)

My POF team is Nina Davies, Matt Merritt and Charlotte Runcie, and between the three of them they are doing an excellent job of keeping POF flaming away on the internet while I concentrate on both my own work and editing the new Salt magazine, Horizon Review (plus running this forum, of course - though with Angela and Roddy also on board, the admin work is now fairly light). For all of which I am immensely grateful, of course, especially since nobody within either of those groups is getting paid for their efforts, including myself.

Hi, Dee.

Having been responsible for developing and maintaining a similar online poetry listing service a few years back I can fully sympathise with your predicament. The work involved in maintaining a listings website is far more arduous than Roddy (apparently) implies.

I took my site down when I finally realised that I didn't have the time nor inclination to keep every listing fully up to date. I would seriously suggest that you, too, should consider moving on to better and bigger things. Nobody deserves to be on the dirty end of the beating stick year after year.

And as Chris points out, there's a number of other listings sites out on the web - though the AA website is better than most of the competition (in my opinion). My personal feeling is that this is the sort of job that an organisation like the Poetry Society should be running - they at least should be in a position to get a grant from the ACE folk to pay someone to do the hard work ...

So no sympathy for the thousands of writers (if it's used as much as he claims) who have been paying the postage to send to wrong addresses, wrong editors and to defunct magazines for years?

If you take five years to notice a magazine has gone defunct, fail to add new presses of note, and can't keep up with the editorships of major magazines, then you shouldn't be doing the job, far or less asking for hand-outs.

If you don't like the service Dee offers, don't donate.

If you really don't like the service Dee offers, then start your own poetry magazine listing service or - even better - lean on your contacts at the Poetry Society to persuade them to start one.

I have no sympathy for writers who submit to a magazine using information not gleaned from the magazine's own submissions guidelines - as published in their latest issue, or on their website.

Then why sympathise with those providing the wrong information?

All the information you'd need - and accurate info - is available from the Poetry Library at the cost of a stamp, which is no doubt what the Poetry Soc would advise poets to do.

Or you can find them online here:

http://www.poetrylibrary.org.uk/magazines/
http://www.poetrylibrary.org.uk/publishers/

So you're suggesting that the AA database is one of the better ones online, but that writers shouldn't trust it and instead should check magazines' websites for their submission details? Doesn't make much sense to me... in putting such a database out there (and by extension, making the claim that it is reliable) the webmaster should either keep it up to date or just take the whole thing offline. There's not much of a middle ground really... else, as Roddy says, some poor writers are going to be wasting time, paper, effort and money.

On a cheerier note, however, there is a good listings service of poetry magazines provided by The Poetry Library's website, and - glancing over it and given my previous use of it on occasion - is up to date and reliable:

http://www.poetrylibrary.org.uk/magazines/magazines/

The AA listings were one of the better ones when I took down my listing service (in 2005) - I apologise for not knowing about the Poetry Library's own listing service, which I don't remember being online back then.

Given that the Poetry Library appears to be doing a sterling job, then there is even less need for Dee to continue maintaining the AA list. I notice that the Library has ACE sponsorship while Dee doesn't.

I also notice that the Poetry Library offers the following advice:

"This list is compiled from the current, "live" magazines stocked at The Poetry Library. This list is aimed for both readers of poetry and writers of poetry, looking to submit their work. In the latter case, it is recommended that you take a look at the magazine that you are considering submitting your work to."

Yes, it was, and I don't want to knock Dee too much because he's worked hard for poets and poetry and I admire his enthusiasm and his integrity in the paths he has followed for so many years, but he can't ask for donations when his site isn't in order (and as one person pointed out to me - I'm clueless on these things - why is he paying way, way over the odds for hosting costs?)

The P Library is the best limb of the establishment to do this because, I hope, it is seen as comprehensive and neutral.