Gone but not forgotten.

[Talo Segura]

There are over one hundred authors listed on the site with many more stories, but lots of those authors are gone, absent ghosts, either no longer in this world or disappeared from the site. It would be nice to know the active authors, those whom you could write to and say you enjoyed their story and get a response. 

I don't suppose you have a list of living active authors, but a simple exercise of emailing the one hundred plus, those you don't know if they are around, would provide the list and an indicator could be placed next to authors names. It's time consuming, I know, but I volunteer to do it if you like. I hate the idea of talking (sending emails) to ghosts, with no hope of a reply.

[Cole Parker]

 

Great idea, but a ton of work!

 

C

[Alien Son]

Sorry, I only just found this topic.

It's a good idea, Talo, and if you're willing to do it, I'm happy for you to go ahead. If you can determine which authors are still contactable, I'll undertake to label them.

It would be great to have this done for AD as well as CW. Where we know an author has died we indicate this on their index page, but there are others who seem to have dropped out of sight.

~ John

[Alan Dwight]

I tried to reply but received a bounce back that the  reply address was wrong. Sorry.

[Altimexis]

I just received an email from Talo in reference to this thread. I’ll reply to it, but then it’s pretty obvious I’m still around and active here. The problem is that there are twenty email addresses in the TO field. That could be a problem for a lot of us. Some email servers will block an email message with multiple people in the TO field, assuming the message is spam.

My first thought in seeing the email was that a spambot was at work. The link back to this thread assured me of the message’s validity, but I don’t generally trust links in messages I think might be spam. I took a chance on it, but it’s easy to spoof a link that actually links to someplace else. Some authors who don’t know Talo aren’t going to trust an email from him.

Even so, I think it’s safe to say we’ve all gotten emails from people we know, asking us to send them emergency cash. Many if not most will assume the effort is a scam.  Unfortunately, the best way to verify each author’s address is to send out individual messages to each one, from legitimate AD and CW addresses.

[Talo Segura]

15 hours ago, Alan Dwight said:

I tried to reply but received a bounce back that the  reply address was wrong. Sorry.

Your email was received, however, you sent it to everyone on the list rather than only to me.

15 hours ago, Altimexis said:

My first thought in seeing the email was that a spambot was at work. The link back to this thread assured me of the message’s validity, but I don’t generally trust links in messages I think might be spam. I took a chance on it, but it’s easy to spoof a link that actually links to someplace else. Some authors who don’t know Talo aren’t going to trust an email from him.

Even so, I think it’s safe to say we’ve all gotten emails from people we know, asking us to send them emergency cash. Many if not most will assume the effort is a scam.  Unfortunately, the best way to verify each author’s address is to send out individual messages to each one, from legitimate AD and CW addresses.

I appreciate the points you make asking if the email is genuine or not. You don't need to click the link in the email to this thread in the forum, but can simply log in to the forum and find the thread, then you know it's not a false spam email. I will add this advice to the next email so recipients can check. Honestly, I thought everyone would know how to deal with emails from unknown sources, and after all receiving feedback from a reader will be from an unknown address.

Regarding sending individual emails, and using a legitimate AD address, it would be very time consuming to send one email per author, the legitimate address, well I'm a stranger asking for a reply, like a reader sending a comment, so you make a fair point in one sense, but the other side of the coin is also valid.

So far, with this first email to twenty authors, I think the result has proven the exercise worthwhile. Six emails don't exist, five authors have replied so far, which leaves nine outstanding. If no reply is received from the outstanding emails it's safe to assume the authors have disappeared. An indicator, example red or green, can then be put next to the listed authors allowing readers to know who is active and will reply to their feedback. 

Thank you for your comments, replying, and supporting the exercise. I think it adds something important to the site.

[Altimexis]

18 hours ago, Talo Segura said:

So far, with this first email to twenty authors, I think the result has proven the exercise worthwhile. Six emails don't exist, five authors have replied so far, which leaves nine outstanding. If no reply is received from the outstanding emails it's safe to assume the authors have disappeared. An indicator, example red or green, can then be put next to the listed authors allowing readers to know who is active and will reply to their feedback. 

The problem is that the failure to respond doesn't necessarily mean an author is no longer around. There are some mail servers that automatically reject all emails from certain domains. Quite a few of them block all emails sent from Yahoo, for example. To reach Timmy at IOMfAtS, for example, I have to use my gmail account. There are also people who routinely send all email from senders not in their address book to the Junk mail folder. Some people don't check their inboxes more than every few weeks. And as I already noted, some will block emails sent to multiple recipients. That's why this is a good method to confirm some viable email links, but it isn't a good method for rejecting them. There will be a lot of false negatives.

[Alien Son]

2 hours ago, Altimexis said:

The problem is that the failure to respond doesn't necessarily mean an author is no longer around.

I can confirm this. Recently I emailed one of our authors about a story I planned to use as a Dude's Pick. I didn't receive a reply immediately, so I assumed the author was no longer contactable. He did reply, however, almost two weeks after I sent my email.

Talo, thanks for taking on this project!

~ John

[Talo Segura]

5 hours ago, Altimexis said:

The problem is that the failure to respond doesn't necessarily mean an author is no longer around. There are some mail servers that automatically reject all emails from certain domains. Quite a few of them block all emails sent from Yahoo, for example. To reach Timmy at IOMfAtS, for example, I have to use my gmail account. There are also people who routinely send all email from senders not in their address book to the Junk mail folder. Some people don't check their inboxes more than every few weeks. And as I already noted, some will block emails sent to multiple recipients. That's why this is a good method to confirm some viable email links, but it isn't a good method for rejecting them. There will be a lot of false negatives.

I will take on board the points you have made. 

1. There are some mail servers that automatically reject all emails from certain domains. Quite a few of them block all emails sent from Yahoo, for example. To reach Timmy at IOMfAtS, for example, I have to use my gmail account.

The address used is a gmail account, talo.segura.x@gmail.com 

2. There are also people who routinely send all email from senders not in their address book to the Junk mail folder.

These authors it is reasonable to class as unavailable because they will not receive email comments on stories from their readers.

3. Some people don't check their inboxes more than every few weeks.

I will allow two weeks for a reply, which seems reasonable and a status can be changed if an author eventually replies after this time.

4. some will block emails sent to multiple recipients.

I will send individual emails to authors who have not replied to the first email. This will take some time to do so whilst waiting perhaps these authors could be shown by a yellow indicator meaning no immediate replies. This status can later be updated.

I feel this answers your concern about false negatives, on completion of the exercise I think we can be pretty certain we have a list of active and non-active authors. Thanks Altimexis and John for your input, it all helps to make the final list of active authors more robust.

[Cole Parker]

Talo, you're to be lauded for doing this.  The problem of  getting it 100% acurate is meaningless.  If an author is still alive but has no intrerest in anything AD, then why should we care if he gets listed as not being active?  Conversely, if we list one like that and he takes offense, he can write us or you and his status can be changed.

Overall, you'll be pretty accurate, and it's a worthwhile endeavor even if some names are listed incorrectliy.

C

[Talo Segura]

@Cole Parker thank you for the kind words and support.

I would like to expand this thread a little because of what I have discovered only by skimming the surface of the contributions to the site by all authors, past and present. I have always been fascinated by discovering little glimpses into the lives of others, their work and passions, the collection of authors here is a goldmine.

My question is simply: what do we do about this goldmine? 

As it stands the gold is hidden away in every little corner, from authors who have put out an author bio, to authors like John S Lloyd who has a link right at the bottom of his page to writing videos. https://www.awesomedude.org/john-s-lloyd/index.htm It is kind of quirky the way everything is arranged with authors home pages all being different and sometimes links to discover. I don't think this should be changed, but I was wondering about having a feature on the front page of the site that highlights some of the authors who have contributed more than stories. I would be happy to put something together as an example. I would really like to honour some of these authors, some of whom judging by their age may no longer be with us.

The kind of front page site features would be topics like the writing videos I've highlighted. There might be a feature on Australian writers, I was surprised at how many there are. Other members may have suggestions, may like to contribute. Those of you old enough to have been around a few years may have something to tell about your fellow authors from the past, things to share which would bring alive the backgrounds of authors who have contributed over the years.

Consider it like shining a torch on the past to highlight the contributions from so many authors whose work has led to today. This site is not just a collection of stories, but a tiny glimpse of people's lives and backgrounds, and it's fascinating.

Your thoughts on this are solicited.

[Talo Segura]

One more question. What are your thoughts on this: https://www.awesomedude.org/kid-boise/index.htm

It is a single story/book which you have to purchase from Amazon for $2.99. Do I check the author's email is valid? Does the link even stay in the author list? I think $2.99 is like the minimum sales price on Amazon, but that's not the question. All authors on the site contribute their stories for free! 

There are other authors with links to PayPal or Patreon where they solicit money for writing either as a simple donation or in exchange for advance reading or extras.

I think there needs to be a site decision, policy?

[TalonRider]

You have to watch some of those authors that use Patreon to solicit money. They are holding the next chapter ransom. You want to read, you pay. 

[Alien Son]

5 hours ago, Talo Segura said:

One more question. What are your thoughts on this: https://www.awesomedude.org/kid-boise/index.htm

It is a single story/book which you have to purchase from Amazon for $2.99. Do I check the author's email is valid? Does the link even stay in the author list? I think $2.99 is like the minimum sales price on Amazon, but that's not the question. All authors on the site contribute their stories for free! 

There are other authors with links to PayPal or Patreon where they solicit money for writing either as a simple donation or in exchange for advance reading or extras.

I think there needs to be a site decision, policy?

Talo, this story dates from 2015. I coded it, and it was originally posted on AD as a normal multi-chapter story with 20 chapters. I can't say for sure, but my guess is that the author later published the story and Mike replaced the links to the chapters with the link to Amazon. I think that's reasonable. In fact our Story Submissions guidelines offer support to authors who publish stories after having them posted on AD.

I wouldn't worry about checking the author's email address. He's not going to be receiving emails from readers who have read the story at AD.

Please email me a list of other authors who have links to PayPal or Patreon and I'll check them out.

~ John