[Kate Sender]

Greetings,

I would like to know if work posted in Forums for comment and critique in the Eratosphere is considered published work or simultaneous submission? Even though we have to log in and use a password to post work or comments to other work?

Though publications have varied guidelines as to what they consider previously published, most all I've read recently cite to open forums visible to the public as being published? Those that disallow simultaneous submissions appear even more strict.

If the answer is that we are generally a public forum, are there settings that can make posted work non-public?

Thank you for any guidance you can offer.

Kate ^_^

[Matt Q]

Hi Kate,

This question comes up periodically. Here's a brief summary:

Technically some journals will consider a poem published if it's been posted anywhere on the net, but in practice this is only really an issue if the editors can find the poem when googling its title or a couple of lines from the poem

As Alex explains here, bar the thread titles, everything that's posted on the critical fora is made invisible to Google and other search engines, so if you're worried, then use a thread title that isn't your poem title. You'll see that happening a fair bit here.

I recently discovered a slight exception to the above, detailed here. A nasty site called rssing.com are 'scraping' (i.e. taking) the first 150 characters of threads and reposting them here where they then do show up in Google. So your poem (at least the first lines of it) could be found this way. If that worries you, prefix the your poem thread with 150 whited out characters (spaces don't count). Alex has asked rssing.com to desist, but they've not done so yet.

All of the above may be superfluous because inactive poem threads are deleted on a monthly basis. So by the time the editor gets around to reading the poem, even if she finds the a reference to your poem on Google, it will lead nowhere. The poem itself will no longer be on the site, which I imagine will be good enough for most editors (I checked this out with Tim Green, Rattle's editor and he said it would be fine for him, despite having an "if it's on the web it's published policy"). You can also ask a moderator to delete your poem thread if the monthly cull doesn't seem soon enough.

Some people believe that the precautions suggested above are mere foolishness and a waste of time and may post below to say so. Others disagree. I say do whatever you need to do to feel relaxed about posting.

I look forward to seeing your poems.

Matt

[ross hamilton hill]

Eratosphere does have a high profile, generally considered the top forum for formal poetry so of course editors who publish formal poetry are not only going to google but they may well be members of Erato and read your poem here anyway.
The easiest solution is to keep some poems for submitting to magazines and ezines and some for posting to Erato and other poetry forums you may belong to.
Personally I think if you submit a poem for publication and they request that the poem not have been posted anywhere else then you should be honest and abide by that requirement.

[Matt Q]

Ross,

You do have a point about honesty, but I do think it's very much about obeying the spirit of the law here. My understanding is that these rules are intended to relate to poems posted as finished pieces on personal blogs and other websites, and not to unfinished pieces posted for a few weeks for the purpose of workshopping. I could be wrong I guess, but that's how it seems to me.

I'd be very surprised if any editors who are also members of the Sphere would discard a poems because they'd seen it posted on here. Again I could be wrong.

best,

Matt

[Michael Cantor]

Let me see if I understand you correctly, Ross. You suggest that we have one group of poems which we save for Eratosphere and similar workshops - but don't submit anywhere - and another group which we submit - but don't workshop.

Do you have any idea how absurd this is? I can only echo what Janice told you on another thread - "Eratosphere rules make it impossible for me to give an adequate reply to your silly proclamations." Just out of curiosity - have you ever actually published anything? Do you even submit? Or do you just post your poems here from time to time for the attention? Has it struck you that the purpose of the Eratosphere workshops is to workshop (that's why it's called a workshop, see) poems for publication?

Kate - it is simply not a problem in 99% or more of the cases, and virtually none of us have ever had a problem despite at least 500 submissions (in my case) over ten years to a huge range of publications. It's not a problem. Say this ten times. You can either turn yourself inside out fretting about it, or you can ignore the non-problem and post away. The worst thing that can happen is that some magazine, somewhere, will reject you because they saw a poem - or an echo of a poem - on the Sphere, and because their particular guidelines are whackier than almost anybody else's. So?

[ross hamilton hill]

Michael
You don't decide the purpose of Eratosphere, there is nothing in the guideliens about publication, nor should there be, it is about improving one's work and helping others.
As for what I do with my writing, mind your own business.

[Siham Karami]

Kate,

As Matt mentioned, you can change the title for the post and there should be no problems. I've never had a problem, and some publications actually state that workshops are ok. I've seen poems in The Hudson Review, for example, that I recognized from the Sphere, and other well-respected places as well. Some poems in which only one word was changed or something minor. Reputable publications care about the quality of the work, and having been through the Eratosphere critique process, which itself has a good reputation, in a sense shows that other experienced poets, some of whom are also editors, thought well of your effort, or that you took time to expose your work to more than just friends. Some member editors may even ask to publish a poem that was workshopped. The risk is mostly hypothetical, and the benefits are real and tangible, and far outweigh the supposed risk.

Best,
Siham

[Janice D. Soderling]

This question comes up regularly from new and old members. Michael, Matt and Siham have summed up that which is usually said. I would just add that you (and every new member) should read the Guidelines and the FAQ where most questions are answered.

As you see below, the poems are not retained indefinitely so they are not "published". Alex, the owner of this workshop site, has provided tags for making the posts invisible to the search engines and if you use those tags they will not be retained on the Internet.

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/view.p...#_Toc239789940

Publication Eligibility
We prune threads so that works posted on them do not count as “previously published”. This would render them unacceptable to some publishers. Please note that some publishers may reject poems that have ever appeared on the internet, even temporarily in a workshop. To limit this concern, Eratosphere restricts search engine access to workshops (see the FAQ section for more details). However, you should weigh this risk before you post.
***
More about protection here:

http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/showth...ighlight=index