[John Whitworth]

So many competitions say that if a poem has appeared on a website you can't enter it. I suppose that must include Eratosphere. Sorry if this has been thrashed out before

[Seree Zohar]

Technically that should only include the sphere if a sendout is made before the workshop thread is pruned, or before the individual poster cleans it off the thread her/himself once the poem's sunk beyond feedback interest. Since mods are so overloaded anyhow, I do this to all my own threads - [add-in] ie, I remove the poem itself tho leave all comments as-is, and insert a note that it's been subbed, just so no one thinks it's a variation on the gut-theme. Problem solved. On only a couple of rare occasions, a friend sent notice of some themed journal or comp'n and it was the very thing on the board that seemed suitable - so I just asked the mod to do the removing.

[Jayne Osborn]

Well, we know it doesn't apply to The Spectator or The Oldie competitions, fortunately. We post our entries on D & A with carefree abandon -- and still win!

Now that we have the Deep Drills board, originated primarily for the New Statesman comp, we can always use it for entries to other competitions if there's any doubt regarding this matter.

Jayne

[Tim Love]

It depends. "The View From Here" says on their site Online publication includes your personal website or blog, or anyone else's website or blog, whether or not it represents itself as a publication. In other words, if it can be found with a search engine, it's published. Workshops and similar forums are, of course, exempt - we use them and love them, too which sounds a bit vague. Other places are stricter - if they can find it, it's been published.

Aside from comps ... given the recent rash of incidents in the UK (most recently Eamonn Griffin's "On being plagiarised") I've become more wary of presenting my work in situations where mere trust is involved.

[Janice D. Soderling]

A word of caution to Sistah Seree. A mod will always delete if the time is ripe and the member asks. Deleting own thread content without permission falls under the "gutting out your thread" sticky which appears at the top of each workshopping forum.

Not that I suspect you, Seree, of ignoring these rules, but it is, I think, a good idea to remind old and new readers that the thread doesn't belong to the person who initiated it, but to all those who take part, which includes not only replying, but also those following along and reading.

Remember too that there is the no follow tag which prevents googling. I use that and a fake thread heading. (When I remember in time. It doesn't help, if a bot has already registered the thread before the no indexing tag is applied.

[Shaun J. Russell]

Yeah, I recently wrote what I consider to be a very strong sonnet, and I debated whether or not to toss it in the bakeoff ring. Given that only 15% of what was submitted will make it to the adjudication stage, it would probably a faint hope anyhow, but if it did make it to the final ten, then it would limit my publication options fairly dramatically.

Generally speaking, when it comes to the workshop forums, I'm careful to only workshop stuff I'm truly not sure about. Stuff that I think might be good, but not stuff that I immediately think "Oh, this is ready for publication." Different people use the workshops in different ways, of course. Some folks post nearly perfect material (occasionally even posting while the poem in question is in consideration for publication), while others post material that is the proverbial chunk of marble that hides a great work of art. But when it comes to material that is closer to the former, it's worth considering that more and more publications are becoming vigilant about their "first look" requirements. Hopefully not enough to detract from Eratosphere's immense value, but certainly enough to give one pause before workshopping.


P.S.: John, this has been discussed before, but I think it's very worthwhile to revisit from time to time.

[Janice D. Soderling]

Thanks for clarifying in your earlier post, Seree. That explains it well, I think. Good luck with your submissions.

Note to everyone. Remember that Alex has provided the noindex alternative to protect from bots and your thread will not then show up when you are googled.

[Gail White]

Originally Posted by E. Shaun Russell

Yeah, I recently wrote what I consider to be a very strong sonnet, and I debated whether or not to toss it in the bakeoff ring. Given that only 15% of what was submitted will make it to the adjudication stage, it would probably a faint hope anyhow, but if it did make it to the final ten, then it would limit my publication options fairly dramatically.

I thought the way bakeoff finalists were printed - to ensure they could not be seen outside the Sphere - would leave them eligible for competitions & publications, unless one of Us was the judge. Am I wrong?

[Shaun J. Russell]

Originally Posted by Gail White

I thought the way bakeoff finalists were printed - to ensure they could not be seen outside the Sphere - would leave them eligible for competitions & publications, unless one of Us was the judge. Am I wrong?

No, in theory you're correct. But in practice, the poems are still out there in the open, and can't even be explained away as being "workshop" offerings. And related discussions of the poems (using their titles etc.) can easily take place in unprotected places.

I recognize that this all sounds paranoid, and I truly don't care a great deal personally, but it's still a consideration, given how many pubs seem to be cracking down on this sort of thing.

[Julie Steiner]

A couple of considerations:

Some formal-friendly editors lurk here, and may see something firsthand even if it's not "googleable".

A poem workshopped here may actually have more eyeballs pass over it than a poem published in a small-circulation poetry journal.

The gender gap in poetry publishing has many causes, not all of which have anything to do with editors or their policies; but it's been noted on many occasions that female poets (as a group) tend to be much more hesitant than men (as a group) to ignore rules such as "no simultaneous submissions", "no poems previously posted anywhere online, however briefly", etc.

I understand that publishers want to surprise their readership with new and unique content; but it would be nice if they could balance the desire to print a "scoop" with the desire to print high-quality work. And workshopping, when done right, tends to increase quality. As a reader, I'd rather have another chance to appreciate a really fine poem, even if I've seen a previous draft of it, than read a merely good poem that I've never seen before.