Monday, July 10, 2006
The SASE: an outdated paradigm
For a long time I thought that, while e-mail/electronic submission was clearly better for the writer, it wasn't better for the journal. However, I've done a total 180 turnaround on that front since The Eleventh Muse took the plunge and started accepting e-mail submissions as of late last year.
Pros of e-mail submission for the journal:
So back in October 2004, I sent a set of poems to Maize. I never heard from them despite multiple queries, withdrawing a poem, etc. I figured the submission was lost and just gave up on it. Then, earlier this year (I'm guessing March or April), I received a rejection from them, which noted that the magazine was folding (not sure why they held my poems for a year and a half to make that decision), but that (get this) their contest was still open, and why didn't I send work for that? Disgusting.
Pros of e-mail submission for the journal:
- Easier to catalog and track submissions.
- Easier to pass submissions to multiple readers.
- Easier to screen and reply fast with rejections for the ones that obviously aren't right.
- When you accept a poem, you already have the electronic file to put into your manuscript and don't have to either transcribe a printed piece or ask for the file.
- Gives you an automatic 2+ day head start in response time versus paper/SASE submissions, and more likely a week head start.
- Cuts down on kooks. (Seriously--hard to send a handwritten submission or a loose set of different-sized pages, including business cards and photocopied clip-art, via e-mail.)
- You can charge $1 per submission, make a little revenue, and people are still paying less than they do for postage, envelopes, paper, and printing to make paper submissions.
- It will increase volume at least somewhat. (More of a concern for bigger journals, as I understand Kenyon Review got swamped when it first went to e-submissions. This can probably be offset by the small charge mentioned above--Meridian and some other journals are doing this already, with Ploughshares soon to follow, I think.)
- People are a little more sloppy/hasty with e-submissions. I'd say I get more typos in electronic submissions than I did in paper submissions. I've also gotten "corrections" e-mails a few times, which is as sure a way as I can think of to get yourself an auto rejection.
- Spam will be a problem if you use an e-mail address rather than an electronic submission form.
- Poems with notable formatting can be problematic, especially if you don't want file attachments.
- Bad poets think a swift response via e-mail is a reason to send more the same day or strike up a weird conversation or insult you. Yes, I've had all of the above happen to me. You can structure your standard rejection to avoid all but the most egregious and rare of those, however.
Since bad submission experience stories always strike a nerve, I thought I'd follow up with one more that's probably my worst experience so far (and I realized actually took even longer than Modern Haiku, though I don't know exactly how much because I didn't note the exact date).
So back in October 2004, I sent a set of poems to Maize. I never heard from them despite multiple queries, withdrawing a poem, etc. I figured the submission was lost and just gave up on it. Then, earlier this year (I'm guessing March or April), I received a rejection from them, which noted that the magazine was folding (not sure why they held my poems for a year and a half to make that decision), but that (get this) their contest was still open, and why didn't I send work for that? Disgusting.
Comments:
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You've answered just about all your own "objections" or cons but one, and that is formatting. What about telling those with submissions that depend on it to send a .pdf? Anyone can make a .pdf with free software like PrimoPDF, and of course the reader is free as well. Does create the downside that you will have to re typeset it if you accept it, but you can ask them for a plain text copy in that event and odds are you were going to have to work on the layout anyway...
$1 is reasonable and frankly constitutes enough of a "door charge" to keep people from just flooding you, without being an amount that any reasonable person would consider "profiteering" or becoming a pay-to-publish type scam. If one doesn't understand the poetry scene well enough to understand journal people aren't rolling around in Mercedes based on their fat journal budgets, well, you're probably not missing anything.
Now if something could be done about journals not getting back to you ... *there's* the true obsolete practice...
$1 is reasonable and frankly constitutes enough of a "door charge" to keep people from just flooding you, without being an amount that any reasonable person would consider "profiteering" or becoming a pay-to-publish type scam. If one doesn't understand the poetry scene well enough to understand journal people aren't rolling around in Mercedes based on their fat journal budgets, well, you're probably not missing anything.
Now if something could be done about journals not getting back to you ... *there's* the true obsolete practice...
I submitted to Tiferet last fall and waited about 8 months. Then, I queried. Waited two weeks. Queried again. Waited a week.
About a month ago, I sent an email withdrawing my poems.
Still no response.
Talk about unprofessional behavior.
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I think that charging a buck per email submission is a wonderful idea. When I first read your post, I thought, "Why charge a dollar?" But, your reasoning makes perfect sense.
On top of what you've already said, you also don't have to stand in line at the post office while some slack-jawed teenager tries to figure out if he wants insurance on the bootleg Playstation games he's sending to his brother in Philly. Yes--that actually happened.
About a month ago, I sent an email withdrawing my poems.
Still no response.
Talk about unprofessional behavior.
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I think that charging a buck per email submission is a wonderful idea. When I first read your post, I thought, "Why charge a dollar?" But, your reasoning makes perfect sense.
On top of what you've already said, you also don't have to stand in line at the post office while some slack-jawed teenager tries to figure out if he wants insurance on the bootleg Playstation games he's sending to his brother in Philly. Yes--that actually happened.
Wow. That is disgusting. I find it offensive that some journals will reject you and solicit a 'contest entry' [re: free money] from the same you in the same letter.
[barf]
[barf]
Another "Pro" of the e-mail submission process is that it gives everyone, regardless of their distance from the journal(s) in question, an equal footing in terms if accessibility. Whether a poet lives in Indonesia, Canada or elsewhere; their sub takes the same amount of time and costs the same amount of money (if a nominal fee is in place) to expedite the submission. Also, international SASE's are no longer a concern for the poet abroad that is subbing.
what you've said about online submitting is dead on. I love journals that allow e-subs (we do them @ PLR). However, we do get a LOT of sloppy submissions, errors in crazy formatting, etc. etc. Watch for a giant jump in the # of subs you get.
Great post, BTW.
Great post, BTW.
We RHINOs have been contemplating eventually "taking the plunge," and this is so helpful. I may have to ask you for advice if it does happen.
Call me old-school, but it doesn't feel like a submission to me if I don't go through the hideous, arduous process of printing and mailing. And waiting by the mailbox...
Call me old-school, but it doesn't feel like a submission to me if I don't go through the hideous, arduous process of printing and mailing. And waiting by the mailbox...
At Terrain.org we've always taken submissions only by email (unless artwork, queried ahead of time). It's definitely the way to go. We do have to change our submit email address about every three years, though, as spam builds up.
And I agree whole-heartedly with your comment about sending the revised poem. If it's that fresh to begin with, don't send the frickin' thing! Give it some time to mature, for all of our sakes!
And I agree whole-heartedly with your comment about sending the revised poem. If it's that fresh to begin with, don't send the frickin' thing! Give it some time to mature, for all of our sakes!
Since I write most of my poems with irregular ("ragged") margins on both the left and right sides, that usually causes problems or at least a lot of work with formatting and/or typesetting, regardless whether I submit on paper or electronically.
This in addition to the fact that -- if the poem is sent as text in the body of an email message (rather than as an attachment) -- the formatting doesn't always come across as the author intended it, depending on the compatibility and formatting of the email systems.
The suggestion of one of the commenters to have people using unusual formats submit a pdf file is an interesting idea, although it just makes one more software to learn how to use, and we (the human species) spend too much time using software already.
Poetry is a slower medium than anything electronic. It takes longer to read it than it takes to read (for example) a news article, and poetry *should* take longer, it should read more slowly. I prefer paper for reading poetry. I prefer the silence around the poem that the paper medium affords.
For years and years I typed on a portable manual typewriter. (I still have it.) For a while, before I decided to get a computer, as many poetry magazines changed from print to online, and as many switched to accepting submissions by email *only*, it gradually limited the number of potential places I could submit to.
To my thinking, a liveable compromise would be to accept submissions by *both* email and paper mail.
I would not be likely to submit poems to a magazine that charged a submission fee, even a minimal one of a dollar or so. Yeah, I know it's less than postage for a paper poem submission and S.A.S.E. But it's the post office (not the poetry magazine) that charges for postage. Charging for submissions (especially for email submissions) isn't a reduced cost to the submitter, it's an added cost.
Thanks for posting this. I enjoy the discussion.
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This in addition to the fact that -- if the poem is sent as text in the body of an email message (rather than as an attachment) -- the formatting doesn't always come across as the author intended it, depending on the compatibility and formatting of the email systems.
The suggestion of one of the commenters to have people using unusual formats submit a pdf file is an interesting idea, although it just makes one more software to learn how to use, and we (the human species) spend too much time using software already.
Poetry is a slower medium than anything electronic. It takes longer to read it than it takes to read (for example) a news article, and poetry *should* take longer, it should read more slowly. I prefer paper for reading poetry. I prefer the silence around the poem that the paper medium affords.
For years and years I typed on a portable manual typewriter. (I still have it.) For a while, before I decided to get a computer, as many poetry magazines changed from print to online, and as many switched to accepting submissions by email *only*, it gradually limited the number of potential places I could submit to.
To my thinking, a liveable compromise would be to accept submissions by *both* email and paper mail.
I would not be likely to submit poems to a magazine that charged a submission fee, even a minimal one of a dollar or so. Yeah, I know it's less than postage for a paper poem submission and S.A.S.E. But it's the post office (not the poetry magazine) that charges for postage. Charging for submissions (especially for email submissions) isn't a reduced cost to the submitter, it's an added cost.
Thanks for posting this. I enjoy the discussion.
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